Deep down we carry pain in us that sometimes refuses to go away. It could be due to the loss of a dear one, an experience, a memory, or holding ourselves responsible for the past. It is not that we live with it every day, but time and again it surfaces, especially when we are emotionally vulnerable. Even though we can clearly see that the event has passed, and we want to wipe the pain out of our lives, we often struggle. Some pains don’t leave us easily.

Often when the pain surfaces, we reflexively shut it out and once again bury it. Pain suppressed is not pain resolved. The fact is that the pain keeps surfacing because it needs closure and resolution, which we may have been avoiding for a long time. Acknowledging and accepting that the pain exists, even though no one else may be able to see it in us, opens the way for us to deal with it effectively.

Fundamentally we need to stop becoming the pain and start learning to watch our pain. The pain doesn’t magically disappear but we learn to create a distance between ourselves and our pain. This internal shift not only helps us see our pain objectively, but it also allows us to tap into our inner strength and core, making us realise that we are not our pain. Seeing our pain from a distance, distances the strong emotion that had been choking our ability to deal with it.

Pain is the symptom of a deeper cause. When we start seeing it objectively, we suddenly realise that it is not the pain, but the cause of the pain that needs to be attended to. And when we start attending to and fixing the deeper issues within, we not only deal with the pain, but also blossom into a better person.

In the pain, our mind is clouded, but when we learn to watch our pain from far, we see the learnings and insights. And as these unravel, something within us starts unraveling as well, and often we stop feeling the pain and start living the learnings.

And the most effective antidote to pain that refuses to go away is love and gratitude. Truly feeling gratitude for everything that is in place in our lives, makes us expansive, and often, in comparison the pain which felt big diminishes in its relevance and intensity. And finding love, even when we are pained, is probably the most difficult thing to do, yet the most effective. If we can create that breakthrough within, to care in spite of being hurt, we can break through the baggage of pain, and live with the lightness of love and joy.

Sometimes what we perceive and experience as pain is life sending us a message and an opportunity to build a better life for ourselves and others. When we learn to smile at our pain and draw strength and inspiration to overcome it, we realise that joy expresses when we learn to deal with the pain we live with.

(Picture-Nimes,France)