"Painful."

Pain.

 

It hurts. It makes us feel uncomfortable - weak. Sometimes it makes us cry. It makes us lay on the ground and feel like we could never get up again. These are just some of the negative effects that pain provides. But pain has other effects on us as well. It sparks creativity, it strengthens us, brings people together. We can learn through it. Yes, you might learn things, that you wish you wouldn't have learned, but in the end you gained more knowledge. With that type of knowledge you might be able to help and heal yourself and others. As painful as pain might be, it is essential at the same time. I know that every single one of us has somehow found themselves in pain. Some of us countless times, some of us a couple times. But it doesn’t matter how many times we’ve been there, neither does the reason that caused us pain matter. Whatever brings us pain hurts us so much in that moment, might it be physically or emotionally, that there is no reason to start comparing our pains with the pain of others. A lot of times I heard people saying things like, “Oh that person complains about this, but look at that person that had to go through all this.” Pain always hurts. Situations that don’t seem as bad to you, might feel horrible to another person. No one should feel pain and on top of that shame, because they feel like the situation that hurts them might not be as big as what another person goes through. We are all individuals, everyone has a different threshold. We all have the right to be sad and hurt. No matter what happened to us and how different our stories might be, there is one fact that we all have in common – we grow from it. In the following blog posts, I want to give you more insight in how to cope with emotional pain in healthy ways, or more specifically what has helped me and people that I know to cope with it.

 

Let’s grow together, be compassionate and lift each other up.