Transforming Pain…
Photo by Marah Bashir on Unsplash. Second photo by Kat J on Unsplash.
You hurt Sweet Friend. I know. And not just because it’s Valentine’s Day. I know.
You ache deep in the tender valves of your succulent heart. I know. Your tears are burning hot with the salt of your aloneness when you shed them, and when you swallow them down into your stomach they join the dead sea within you that your soul floats upon. I know.
…
We all hurt sweet friend. That’s why the image of Jesus of Nazareth has spoken so deeply to so many souls throughout the ages – we all feel crucified by life. We all feel nailed to that damnable cross that is our story. Even the peaceful Buddha’s first words after slaking his thirst with the nectar of nirvana were that ‘Life is suffering’. He - the most fortunate prince the world had ever seen.
You hurt because you were the sensitive shy child at school.
He hurts because he was the sad funny boy at school.
They hurt because they were the lonely weird children at school.
She hurts because she was the smart rich girl at school.
He hurts because he was the handsome popular boy at school.
We all hurt sweet friend. I know you want someone to blame. There is always someone to blame… but no one runs the gauntlet of childhood without emerging with a sacred wound or two. There was never actually anyone to blame really.
My work now for over 20 years has been listening to the sobbed-out confessions of how each of my clients hurt. Everyone admitting to a shameful pain so deep and desperate, made worse by the knowledge that everyone else is ‘doing life’ better than them at some level. That they are horribly alone. The knowledge that we all hurt is only the first step, however. Knowing that we all still have our cross to bear.
So what do we do with our pain, Sweet Friend?
We hold it to our bosom like a mother holds her child. We don’t turn our backs on it, we don’t abandon the crying child within. We build the pain deep into our being, we pack the pain into our very marrow, we drink the pain as we would kiss the tears off of our beloved's cheeks... and eventually, it isn’t pain anymore, it isn’t poison anymore, it is a dead sea no longer…it is that which makes us who we are.
Like a gnarly old tree we grow around and through and with what once was pain, for they were only ever growing pains. The knots within its wood are what make it strong and beautiful. Growing pains indeed.
Labour pain in fact, as we birth ourselves forth - like a ripe fruit pregnant with the seeds of itself. That sacred wound is what cracks open the shell of what we were – which was always way too small – and opens us to something so much vaster.
So cry me an ocean this Valentine’s Day sweet friend and I will sob with you throughout the night, and when the sun rises we will look into each other’s red-rimmed eyes and we will remember that we are not alone… for that was always the worst part of the pain anyway.
You are not alone.
With Heart,
Jimi
