Pain

Today's topic is a relatively easy one, because pain is an old friend.
It has been all I have known at times, because I happen to be a magnet for it.
But I do not view this to be something so steeped in negativity, because pain is the purest teacher a person can be blessed with.
It is never unjust, it never looks down on you, it never lets up, it never decides you are a lost cause and it gets better only when you do.


"Pain pays the income of each precious thing."   -William Shakespeare


Physical pain has always been there, to never let me forget the fact that I am still alive. The ache of a long days work illicits the small personal joy of knowing that today, you earned your place in this life. A feeling that makes your meals taste better, your activities seem more enjoyable and your sleep all the more restful.
As for the shock and slow to set pain that comes from physical aggression and violence, a wholly different side of oneself is vindicated.


Depending on circumstance of course, but I can truthfully tell that I have never taken the violent turn unless provoked to do so in order to preserve my own set of principles and/or come to the aide of one I care for on some level.
Win or lose, I am always left with a deeply satisfying primal fire in my chest, knowing that I stood my ground, defended my own "patch of earth", and that my unwitting opposition learned that there are beasts with bigger teeth.

"The only antidote to mental suffering is physical pain."  - Karl Marx 

This brings me to the subject of psychological anguish and torment, the price tag of intellectualism. The world is filled with many losers, few winners and even fewer thinkers in between the two. A cohort of mine once posed a scientific notion to me that high intellectual capacities are actually a form of genetic mutation in our species, hence probably being ultimately unhealthy in the overall scheme of things. You would be hard pressed to find many notions that anger and frustrate me more than that one.


We are a species actively averting our own evolution, in order to preserve the status quo. Rather than become grudgingly acceptent of a species where mediocrity reigns supreme, I choose the path of highest resistance, the path to evolution and preservation of our fascinating and curious race.
This of course gives way to mountainous cerebral strife, but it is a pain I choose, because I feel it is ultimately needed in some way.
I will suffer as many fools as gladly as I can muster and never dumb myself down for anyone, in hopes that one day a ripple is felt.


" There is no coming to consciousness without pain. "  - Carl Jung


This brings me to the third rung in our pain ladder, the rung of emotional pain.
One that I'm sure we are all more familiar with than we care to be, the most potent and slowest of the three to fade.
No pain burns within quite like that brought on by things such as heartbreak, betrayal and complete and utter powerlessness.


Have you ever loved someone or something so intensely that you know you are at their mercy entirely?
Have you ever felt that sensation of overwhelming elation whenever that person calls or texts or reaches out to you in any way?
Does anything matter more in those moments when true love is felt?


Of course I do not mean the shallow, idealized and domesticated concept of love. that shit is for teenagers, another necessary growing pain which exists, I feel, in order to pull the curtain back and get in tune with ones then developing emotional core.
No, I am speaking of the kind of love that renders you both loquacious and utterly speechless all at once.


The kind of love that tunes you in to the other person and gives way to an unspeakable synchronicity, one that is not easily explicable.
The kind that when you utter those three little words, you can feel them moving through your chest as they make their way out of your vocal chords, as if a part of your soul came out with them.
The kind of love that has you questioning your sanity and examining the line between enamorment and obsession with a vested interest and worry.


The kind of love that has you writing your own wedding vows on a random whim even though marriage has never even been discussed.
The kind that has you dreaming of your prospective offspring together and the life that could someday lie ahead for the two of you.
The kind of love that can sharply steer you around dark corners when things go bad.


I am fortunate enough to have felt a love such as that and I hope that you, dear reader, are granted the same in your lifetime.
It took my losing and completely ruining things in order to realize what was within me. Only then did I realize the truth, that nothing meant anything without her.


Food had lost it's flavor, music no longer carried it's melody and I became a mere shell of a being. I could not find the will to press on and find meaning in her absence.
I had no desire to date or socialize, no interest in my pursuits, all I wanted was to numbed myself to it all and was, quite frankly, just waiting for the god's to call me home.


I saw no light even in the bright eyes of my wonderful daughter, whom I was always thankful to have with me, asking obliviously and adorably if I was okay.
Without my little girl there to remind me of why I am simply not allowed to die yet and the forgiveness and friendship of a certain person, I honestly shudder to think what I may have fallen into.


This confessional was given to share with anyone who has felt along the lines of my own. Love such as this is why we are alive, it is what stokes the fire that burns inside of us.
Life is a meaningless exercise when passion is absent from our respective souls.
I embrace the fire and accept happily the burns and scars that come with it, because I would rather know that one thing can make me feel so many things all at once then wonder if something else can make me feel anything at all.


“I know that pain is the most important thing in the universes. Greater than survival, greater than love, greater even than the beauty it brings about. For without pain, there can be no pleasure. Without sadness, there can be no happiness. Without misery there can be no beauty. And without these, life is endless, hopeless, doomed and damned. Adult. You have become adult.”
- Harlan Ellison


In conclusion, I have come to understand pain as the necessary educator and healer of ones own soul. I never shy away from it, I always openly discuss it when asked. I proudly boast my galaxy of scars both external and internal, because they all serve to document my passing of life's tests thus far.


I may never recover or get back to what i so foolishly let slip away, but what I have now will always be enough to give me the strength to pull myself back up and march forward to a better and more meaningful life.
I may be forever bent but I can never be broken, because I had the best teacher one can have.


"Your pain is the breaking of an empty shell that encloses your understanding. It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self, so therefore trust the physician and drink his remedy in silence and tranquility."

- Kahlil Gibran