Pain.
Physical pain. Heartbreak. Job loss. Illness. Loss.
To some degree it doesn't matter what the pain is. It still hurts.
When we work on pain, we look at two levels or layers of pain.
The first is the primary pain. The actual physical sensation within the body. The fact your husband just walked out the door. Your best friend died. This is the primary, source of the pain.
The second layer of pain has to do with the impact the primary pain has on your life, the way we experience it, think about it, feel about it, and adjust your daily life because of it. For example, a car accident leaves you with chronic back pain related to an injury sustained from the crash. The secondary pain may be: inability to perform the job you had before the accident, inability to play softball on the team you loved, irritability from always being uncomfortable, anger that the other driver ran the red light and was drinking, fear to drive again, avoidance of social events that would require you to drive, avoidance of that intersection, depression from losing the life you were enjoying...this secondary pain is referred to as suffering.
A team of the world's best doctors might not be able to put your back (life) together the way it was. The nation's supply of medications may not be able to make the pain go away. There may be nothing that can be done about the primary pain - the accident, physical pain, sudden divorce.
But we can work with the secondary pain. We can take a look at the suffering and with care and attention and commitment, evolve from suffering into living again.
We always have the choice. We can participate in the loss of our lives. Or we can choose to live. It may not look like we thought it might. It may not be even close to what we dreamed of. And it is ok to grieve the loss of that. But in time, we know from experience, that we can put life back on the table - a life that is fulfilling and well worth living.
Isn't it worth a shot?
