There is no manual on how to face pain.
To face pain bravely — in a fearless manner…could mean that the person inflicted has control over his or her state.
What would it mean then, to not have control over your pain?
Does this control evolve when it is lost, and is redefined when found again?
And once pain is taken care of, what does it leave in its wake?
To think: A lesson, a reflection, a change in course. A wake-up call, an alarm, a call to action.
Life is best guided by purpose. When pain interferes, in a way that it distracts, encapsulates, dominates and changes the natural course of things, of life and living, of disciplined rituals that produce value, service to others, worth, utility and merit…when pain gets in the way, it causes anguish, because it veers toward an unknown dimension, where there is no control. Full attention goes toward making it stop. It must go away. It is an obstacle that altered the normal state of things. A wrench thrown into a beautiful system previously in flux, now viciously attacked by a malfunction that progressively gets worse. A machine breakdown with no mechanic in sight. Then there’s the diagnosis, and the multiple opinions, the different so-called experts interpreting what is acutely felt, as if both healer and the wounded were somehow connected. Palliative remedies are a crapshoot. Some hurt more than they help. Then to find more solutions, the body is picked and prodded. All the while the productive weekday continues, in and out, business as usual, workers in and workers out, punching in cards, attending key performance indicators, except now, in the physical world, where we walk to and fro, it’s a limping soldier behind a steady marching outfit. So? Grin and bear it. Keep going. Shut your mouth (shut your brain, for that matter) and take it. How many people live this on a daily basis and don’t gripe about it? Whole continents of people. Soon, the idiosyncrasies around what surrounds the pain become normalized. Well-wishes. Tender faces. Pseudo-empathetic postures. Lamentations. Difficult interactions because both parties know it’s impossible to understand exactly what the other one is feeling, but both know what is appropriate. And what is suitable, as society demands it, is to receive that desire from your fellow human being to have better health, as a genuinely generous desire, which must be reciprocated with a grand gesture of gratitude. After the exchange ends, the pain is back, and that moment fades into the background. Enough of those happen and they’re easily undermined. To the point where sarcasm and irony might sneak in when receiving the odd angel or happy-go-lucky person.
It’s not all bad.
There is purpose, as mentioned. To stick it out. Not just because there is valor to facing an ailment, disease or malady fearlessly.
Pain is beautiful because it forces you to take a breath. It stops you dead in your tracks, and it makes you feel, think and reflect. It measures the world against you, placing you dead center in a self-absorbed dimension where you quickly realize that even though you matter to the people that love you the most, in general terms, at least in terms of the universe, you don’t matter at all. You’re a speck of dust in a timeless infinite expanse, and have little if at all, effect over the grander scheme of things.
Powerful.
To influence others, to cause an impact in others, to add value to fellow human beings, in the face of pain, because of pain, that makes it all worth it.
