Pain Teaches Us Empathy.....

     One of the greatest lessons pain can teach us, is a lesson in empathy. By definition Empathy reads:
Empathy has many different definitions that encompass a broad range of emotional states, such as caring for other people and having a desire to help them; experiencing emotions that match another person's emotions; discerning what another person is thinking or feeling; and making less distinct the differences between the self and the other.
It also is the ability to feel and share another person’s emotions. Some believe that empathy involves the ability to match another’s emotions, while others believe that empathy involves being tenderhearted toward another person. Compassion and sympathy are two terms that many associate with empathy, but all three of these terms are unique. Compassion is an emotion we feel when others are in need, which motivates us to help them. Sympathy is a feeling of care and understanding for someone in need. Empathy is distinct from sympathy, pity, and emotional contagion. Sympathy or empathic concern is the feeling of compassion or concern for another, the wish to see them better off or happier. Pity is feeling that another is in trouble and in need of help as they cannot fix their problems themselves, often described as "feeling sorry" for someone. Emotional contagion is when a person (especially an infant or a member of a mob) imitatively "catches" the emotions that others are showing without necessarily recognizing this is happening.

 Since empathy involves understanding the emotional states of other people, the way it is characterized is derivative of the way emotions themselves are characterized. If, for example, emotions are taken to be centrally characterized by bodily feelings, then grasping the bodily feelings of another will be central to empathy. On the other hand, if emotions are more centrally characterized by a combination of beliefs and desires, then grasping these beliefs and desires will be more essential to empathy. The ability to imagine oneself as another person is a sophisticated imaginative process. However, the basic capacity to recognize emotions is probably innate   and may be achieved unconsciously. Yet it can be trained    and achieved with various degrees of intensity or accuracy.

It is said when one experiences pain, their ability to acquire empathy, which from definition would mean.....you feel what the other is feeling. That is so much deeper than just feeling poorly for them. So much more than even having compassion and service toward them. To identify with someone by almost becoming one with their pain, is so similar to the Lord himself, taking on our pains upon himself. In order for us to follow in the path of compassion, one must acquire a sense of empathy to motivate true oneness and unity with those we serve. We are taught that we are to become one and unified in service to one another. There really isn't a closer way to feel unity than to truly have empathy for others. Pain is excellent at training us to recognize and actually FEEL for ourselves what another may be travailing through in their pain. Sometimes empathy is troublesome. I know I have acquired so much empathy it is a burden at times to feel others feelings so intensely. But what burden is not made light, by showing compassion, kindness, service, and just relating to another's pain. We know we need to stand as a witness of God at all times, in all things, and in all places, and mourn with those that mourn and comfort those who stand in need of comfort. Let us not turn our back on pain, but let it be a teacher of becoming one through empathy.

Pain Teaches Us We Can Go Another Direction....

     Imagine the joy of having a future of possibilities in front of you, a graduation, a long awaited achievement, a birth of a child, a new career opportunity.A long awaited and saved for vacation, Closing a big business deal that will change everything in your life, a wedding, etc. The list could really go on and on. Now imagine all hopes, dreams, as you had imagined, being swooped away in a flash. News that you were 1/2 of 1/2 percent short of receiving a grade you worked hard for. That baby you so anxiously awaited and wanted,  slips away and you have nothing but empty arms to bring home from the hospital. That new job you thought you were getting, well, you were passed over for the next guy because he was the bosses, cousin's, brother. That vacation you planned and saved so hard for, well that money will be paying for medical bills of a new chronic illness you have developed, And what about that big deal, the one if you close it, you will have a handle on all the problems in your life, but instead, you are cheated by your own client (who was a friend and trusted) and you are told it's not about church, this is business.What about the marriage of your dreams, the one where fairy-tales come true...and it ends up 6 months into it...and you aren't even sure who you married.

    These are just scenarios. But the truth is we all endure times when doors are slamming in our faces. that can be painful. What to do with a big fat NO! No you can't graduate, No! you can't have that new job you worked hard for, NO! you can't have your baby, No! you can't close that life changing deal, No! your vacation will be paying medical bills, No! there will not be a fairy-tale ending to your story!!!!! Got it?????? Your answer to your dreams is NO!!!!!

    Okay, now this is sounding like a really depressing post, well, let me ask you this. Is pain depressing? Oh, yes it can be, and will be, at times. But there are times, maybe few and far between, but real, true times when, pain has something else to say. It is not just saying NO!!!! It  is saying look the other way. Go a different direction. You have a different path. It looks like your in a cave of darkness, but in reality...it's a path into the light. The only gate holding you back sometimes...is not taking your focus off the great big NO!!!!! And looking at your life in the face and saying well, if  I received a NO!!!! about my dreams , then there has to be a YES!!! in another direction. 

    I remember standing in my shower sobbing, I was so weak from crying, I had to lean my head on the wall of the shower. I cried out to God with deepest sorrow, for I had just lost a second baby in a row, over a period of a year. I couldn't understand why he was telling me a big fat NO!!!! I was completely and utterly beside myself. I finally humbled myself , which felt devastating, and cried out, "Okay! I get it! You're telling me NO!!!! Now what in this world am I suppose to do with this pain???? Just because you said NO!!!! Doesn't mean I'm not hurting. And I don't like your answer!"( I do kind of talk back to God sometimes. But he is very patient with me.) I told him "I'm beside myself in sorrow!" So what did pain teach me......in that very dark , painful moment....I heard a voice speak to me.......It was my Higher Power, "This happened to you, so you can weep with those that weep, and comfort those who need comfort.You will start a support group webpage for women with Pregnancy and infant loss. You will get out of your pain and comfort someone else's."

     So that is what Pain taught me, to not go inward with my disappointment, and become bitter, angry, and selfish. But instead go outward and touch, and reach, and bless, another hurting soul. Somehow there is healing in it. I can't put it into words, but it's real and it works. Sometimes when life slams a big fat No!!!! in your face, it's just saying take another direction. Here is my website that has helped many women of loss. If you know anybody this can comfort please feel free to share it.  Beside Myself :A safe lace to Grieve
I have many other Yes'es!!! That resulted from NO's!!!!

    Pain teaches us, we can go another direction.....and it can turn out beautiful! It can turn out to be the biggest YES!!!! of your life.

Pain Teaches Us to Hope....

     One of the strongest virtues I can re-call developing out of painful situations in my life is the trait of having hope. For some reason in the darkest corridors of pain, there is a small echo back whispering..."Have Hope!". I can not claim that this hope is a constant companion mind you. It has come and gone throughout my earthy duration, so far. I have just noticed that in painful moments when hope visits me....the pain  itself, is easier to tolerate. As a child we may even be born with an essence of hope. It seems to come natural as in "I hope I get a bike for my  birthday.", "I hope I can win at a competition.', or " I hope I will do well on a test." As important as those things are at those ages, what pain does, is it gives depth to our hopes, depth to our character. How different it is to hope forthose things then compared to pain produced hope. A hope that the sun will rise after a night of deep soul searching darkness, or to hope someone close to you, whom is knocking on death's door, is still breathing right now and will be, in an hour from now, and to hope a wound caused by the deepest betrayal of a trust shattered , can be healed. These hopes are so different in nature due to the pain that birthed the hope. Hopes so different, than the simpler hopes we had of yester-year.

     Why is hope so important anyway? The definition says "Hope is an emotional state which promotes belief in a good outcome related to events and circumstances." Well that sounds very optimistic.  

If thy hope be any thing worth, it will purify thee from thy sins. -Joseph Alleine, 

Hope is a waking dream.Aristotl,

 Know then, whatever cheerful and serene
Supports the mind, supports the body too:
Hence, the most vital movement mortals feel
Is hope, the balm and lifeblood of the soul.- John Armstrong

 Hope knows no fear. Hope dares to blossom even inside the abysmal abyss. Hope secretly feeds and strengthens promise. Sri Chinmoy

• "Hope" is the thing with feathers —
  That perches in the soul —
  And sings the tune without the words —
  And never stops — at all —
  And sweetest — in the Gale — is heard —
  And sore must be the storm —
  That could abash the little Bird
  That kept so many warm —
  • Emily Dickinson, Poem 254 in The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson (1960), edited by Thomas H. Johnson
  •  
   Hope is the feeling we have that the feeling we have is not permanent. Mignon McLaughlin,
  
   Hope is brightest when it dawns from fears. Walter Scott
  
  Pain can teach us to hold on a little longer, to look forward to tomorrow , to trust in a new found friend, a virtue that can transfigure your life and your soul...that virtue of Hope. When I am exasperated by pain in any of it's forms...I have been taught through pain to turn to Hope, for she patiently waits for me.
  

Pain clears the way for inspiration....

      Pain clears the way for inspiration. Getting some disheartening news can throw you back on the couch with a heart racing and tears swelling. But after the news sinks in , and you settle into the reality of the situation, you can see the lesson. It is there. Something happened, the reason may not be so clear, but what to do with this may be the real inspiration.

      We get to decide if we will fight against the tide of disappointment, or we will accept that this, may be a path we have to travel for a purpose. Going through a dark, long, tunnel can start to feel overwhelming. Light starts to appear in the far distance, of the misty abyss. It may appear even very small, yet growing brighter, and brighter, as you approach the end of the tunnel of darkness. There you receive a gift. The gift is a lesson. You learn that no matter how scared or overwhelmed you felt just moments, months or years ago....you can experience something else in the near future. The past does not have to be your future. Now sometimes the past will re-visit us in the form of a new lesson. Maybe a lesson we didn't learn well enough, on our last trip down the long, dark tunnel. This may enrage you, or discourage you, or even cause resentment, at the idea that we must once again, suffer for what appears to be no purpose at all. But oh, how our lives are laced with intricate details all interwoven to bring us to our highest good. Hard to believe, that pain is a teacher. I understand. Pain hurts.....it does. Without it you would never understand joy, happiness, peace, serenity,sweetness, kindness, compassion, goodness, charity......LIGHT. "Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." John 8:12

     There must be opposition in all things. Not some things, not sometimes, not only for other people. Opposition is part of the deal. It is part of Earth School. It is part of inheriting light without end. unimaginable joy, treasures untold. It's how and what we do with that opposition, that pain, that builds character. I'm not saying, you won't fall apart sometimes, you won't have the wind knocked out of you, you won't cry out "My God, why has thou forsaken me?" because most likely you will do those things. But it's what you do after that, it's what you do when you are capable of pulling the pieces of yourself back together into something that resembles a human life form. It is what you do with the pain, and how you let it inspire you, when your healed. Even if it it's a bad patch work job of healing. You will know pain is the teacher when all  is said and done with your pain, and you feel inspired to do something positive with yourself.

Motives are worth exploring......

     Motives is one thing I have studied and learned so much about. It is a subject worth exploring. I love the quote “We examine our actions, reactions, and motives. We often find that we’ve been doing better than we’ve been feeling.” It's the examining part that I find so important. Pain teaches that it hurts when people have impure motives. Pain teaches us that we hurt others and ourselves when our motives are impure. In the manual called The Big Book of 12 step programs there is a wonderful piece of advice.

"At Step Four we resolutely looked for our own mistakes. Where had we been selfish, dishonest, self-seeking, and frightened?  Though a given situation had not been entirely our fault, we often tried to cast the whole blame on the other person involved.
We finally saw that the inventory should be ours, not the other man’s. So we admitted our wrongs honestly and became willing to set these matters straight. Page 67 "

That right there, is the knowledge we are looking for. That magical advice that when applied to life can make all the difference. Checking our motives, keeping the focus on ourselves, will save the world a great deal of pain.
     From the meditation book
Each Day a New Beginning

Being alone and feeling vulnerable. Like two separate themes, these two parts of myself unite in my being and sow the seeds of my longing for unconditional love.
—Mary Casey

How easily we slip into self-doubt, fearing we’re incapable or unlovable, perhaps both. How common for us to look into the faces of our friends and lovers in search of affirmation and love.
Our alienation from ourselves, from one another, from God’s Spirit which exists everywhere causes our discontent. It is our discontent. When souls touch, love is born, love of self and love of the other. Our aloneness exists when we create barriers that keep us separate from our friends, our family. Only we can reach over or around the barriers to offer love, to receive love.
Life offers us the tools for loving, but we must dare to pick them up. Listening to others and sharing ourselves begins the process of loving. Risking to offer love before receiving it will free us from the continual search for love in the faces of others.
I won’t wait to be loved today. I will love someone else, fully. I won’t doubt that I, too, am loved. I will feel it. I will find unconditional love.

I shall not pass this way again;
Then let me now relieve some pain,
Remove some barrier from the road,
Or brighten someone’s heavy load.
–  Eva Rose York

Illness has helped us better understand the relationship between those who help and those who need help.  Loving help is not prompted by pity or superiority, but by empathy and shared humanness.  Also, we’ve learned that no one is always the helper or always the one needing help.  We are both.  We are bonded to others through what we give — and what we receive.
I will show my love by helping and being willing to be helped.

I personally really appreciated the meditation reading in One Day at a Time.

One Day At A Time
~ FIGHTING ~

And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone …
–The Big Book, page 84

When one goes through life at full speed ahead as I have done, it’s hard to really step back and look at one’s life. Everything is happening too fast and each day seems to blend into the next and, before you know it, the next segment of life seems to take over.
When I began my Twelve Step program, I found myself slowing down … examining my life … observing those around me … and reflecting on my past. I began to know who I was and I didn’t like one of the things I discovered: I was a fighter. I didn’t accept people, places or things unless and until they met my expectations of what they should be. I tried to control situations that I should have walked away from. I clung to people I should have distanced myself from. I tried to manipulate things that were toxic to me, and make them un-toxic … and, in the process, did myself great harm.
“We have ceased fighting anything or anyone,” I felt it didn’t apply to me … because at that point, I hadn’t categorized myself as a fighter. It took living and working the Steps to realize that. And it took living and working the Steps to take the action necessary to stop being a fighter.
Life is calmer now. Relationships are smoother. I sometimes miss the excitement of going through like as though I were on a roller coaster … but I won’t go back there. Serenity means too much to me. Fighting is something I have put away forever.
One Day at a Time . . .
I will direct my thinking and doing to those things in my life which will contribute to a meaningful and pleasant journey.
~ Mari ~

Here is a wonderful thought helps me to know when we get our motives in check, and  life can be magical.

Journey to the Heart
Open to Life’s Magic
“I will never forget my mother’s words to me the first time she took me to the Hob rain forest,” a woman told me, when she learned I was going there. “We were at the edge of the forest, about to enter. My mother stopped walking and turned to me. “There’s magic here,” she said. It wasn’t her words that impressed me. What struck me was the absolute certainty and matter-of-fact way she said it. It was like she had just told me, ‘Dinner’s ready,’”
There’s magic in the air. It’s the next place on the journey. It’s inevitable. We have been clearing the path so we could do more than merely trudge down the road. The road leads to magic– a magical way of living. A magical way of being here. The magic in the air isn’t an illusion, isn’t a trick. You have done your work. You have stuck with the journey. Now is the time for fun,the time to see and know more of life’s magical ways.
Walk lightly. Enter the enchanted forest. Look around. Keep your eyes and ears open. Tell others what you see. The journey to the heart is a journey of wonder and awe.
“The ancient ones, the trees, are waiting for you,” the woman said. “When you get there, tell them I said hi.” Open to life’s magic. It’s been waiting for your call.

Here is another great one: (And yes...I'm kind of attached to meditation books)
Elder’s Meditation

“The Old Ones have always said that no matter who despises or ignores you, no matter who keeps you from entering their circles, it is right to pray for them because they are like us, too.”
–Larry P. Aitken, CHIPPEWA

You don’t know how an apple tastes until you taste it. You don’t know what a fish tastes like until you eat it. You don’t know how it is to be a woman unless you are one. You don’t know what it means to have a baby until you have one. So it is with the natural laws. An example: the natural law of forgiveness says, if you hate someone, pray for the person to be blessed with happiness, joy and all the blessings of the Great Spirit. You will not know about this law unless you do it. The natural law says love others as you love yourself. If you hate yourself or feel guilt in some area of yourself, you will tend to judge and condemn your neighbor. You cannot give away what you don’t have. You teach your children by your example, not by your words. The natural laws are written in our hearts.
Great Spirit, teach me how to look into my heart.
 
 Checking motives of our-self and being aware of motives of others will help us on our journey, to learn that motives in the wrong  direction can cause pain. One of my worst worst motive driven behavior is being people pleasing. I will end today's post with one last thought from a favorite meditation of mine on people pleasing.


The Language of Letting Go

People-Pleasers
Have you ever been around people-pleasers? They tend to be displeasing. Being around someone who is turned inside out to please another is often irritating and anxiety- producing.
People-pleasing is a behavior we may have adapted to survive in our family. We may not have been able to get the love and attention we deserved. We may not have been given permission to please ourselves, to trust ourselves, and to choose a course of action that demonstrated self-trust.
People-pleasing can be overt or covert. We may run around fussing over others, chattering a mile a minute when what we are really saying is, “I hope I’m pleasing you.” Or, we may be more covert, quietly going through life making important decisions based on pleasing others.
Taking other people’s wants and needs into consideration is an important part of our relationships. We have responsibilities to friends and family and employers. We have a strong inner responsibility to be loving and caring. But, people-pleasing backfires. Not only do others get annoyed with us, we often get annoyed when our efforts to please do not work as we planned. The most comfortable people to be around are those who are considerate of others but ultimately please themselves.
Help me, God, work through my fears and begin to please myself.

My final thought is if I please God, if my motives are to glorify him, I should be in a peaceful place. Pain has taught me that much.

For children who were broken.....

For children who were broken, it is very hard to mend....
Our pain was rarely spoken and we hid the truth from friends.
our parents said they loved us, but they didn't act that way. They broke our hearts and stole our worth, with the things that they would say.We wanted them to love us. We didn't know what we did to make them yell at us and hit us, and wish we weren't their kid.
They'd beat on us and scream at us and blame us for their lives. Then they'd hold us close inside their arms and tell us confusing lies. Of how they loved us -even though we were BAD, and how it was OUR fault they hit us, OUR fault they were mad. When days were just beginning we sometimes prayed for them to end, and when the pain kept coming, we learned to just pretend
that we were good
and so were they
and this was just
one of those days......
tomorrow we'd be friends.  We had to believe it so. We had nowhere else to go.
Each day we pretended,
we replaced reaity
with lies, or dreams,
or angry schemes,
in search of dignity.....
until our ies
got bigger than the truth,
and we had no one real to be.
Our bodies were forsaken.
With no safe place to hide,
we learned to stop
hearing and feeling
what they did to our outsides.
We tried to make them love us,
till we hated ourselves instead,
and couldn't see a way out,
and wished that we were dead.
We scared ourselves by thinking that, and scared ourselves to know, that we are acting just like them-
and might evermore be so.
To be half the size of a grown u
and trapped inside their pain...
To every day lose everything
with no savior or refrain....
To wonder how it's possible
that God could so forget
the worthy child you knew you were,
when you'd not been damaged yet...
To figuare on your fingers
that the years till you'd be grown
enough to leave the torment
and survive away from home,
were more than you cold count to, or more than you could bear, was the reality we lived in
and we knew it wasn't fair.
We who grew up broken
are somewhat out of time,
struggling to mend our childhood,
when our peers are in their prime.
Where others find love
and contentment,
we still often have to strive
to remeber we are worthy,
and heroes just to be alive.
Some of us are healing.
Some are stealing.
Most are passing the anger on.Some give their lives away to drugs,
or the promise of life beyond.
Some still hide from society.
Some struggle to belong.
But all of us are wishing
the past would not hold on
so long.
There's a lot of digging down to do
to find the child within,
to love away the ugly pain
and feel innocence again.
There's forgiveness
worthy of angel's wings
for remembering those at all,
who abused or scared childhood
and programmed us to fall.
To seek to understand them,
and know their pain became our own,
is to risk the ground we stand on
to climb the mountain home.
The journey is not so lonely,
as in the past it's been....
More of us are strong wnough
to let the growth begin,
But while were trekking
up the mountain
we need everything we got,
to face the adults we have become,
and all that we are not.So when you see us weary
from the day's internal climb...
When we find fault
with your best efforts,
or treat imperfection
asa purposeful crime...
When you see our qquick defenses,
our efforts to control,
our readiness to form a plan
of unrealistic goals...
when we run into a conflict
and fight to the bitter end,
remember...
we think that winning means
we won't be hurt again.When we abandon OUR thoughts
and feelings,
to be what we believe YOU
want us to,
or look at trouble we're having ,
and want to blame it all on you....
When life calls for new beginnings,
and we fear they're doomed to the end,
remember....
Wounded trust is like a wounded knee-
it's very hard to bend.
Please rember this
when wee're out of sorts.
Tell us the truth, be our friend.
For children who were broken.....
it is very hard to mend.


Elia Wise

Pain brings Spiritual Awakening

 

     If I ponder on some of my darkest days....they become so real I can taste them. I can re-experience every sensation that encompassed me. I am slowly becoming a humble, and emotionally mature creature. I see that, I can use that pondering, as a tool to study and learn from the past. When I get too carried away with any one distraction from this world, it is good for me to settle down for some meditation time. In those moments, sullen, and serious, and deep, I find I reflect on what my life story has taught me. There is a path, there is a mountain to climb, there is a direction to go, there is a gateway to be entered. Unfortunately that path is narrow, the mountain quite steep, I'm at a loss at directions sometimes, and the gateway, well it is covered with angels, who I dare not pass.

     One thing is for sure, if I have any hope....which most certainly we all do, I must be brave.
I must be brave in the storm even if brave means shaking and shivering it out ,bruised and broken and scared, only to rise with the sun to feed the hungry children. What is brave?  Brave is courage. What is courage? It doesn't mean you don't doubt yourself, or you aren't scared, or you have everything under control. It means you don't give up, you have hope, you believe in possibilities, you rely on unseen help. It means you embrace empty moments, and just let them melt into you as your heart pleads for answers. It takes a brave, courageous woman or man to walk the narrow path , to enter the angel guarded gates.

    The lessons pain has taught me is that in those darkest reflections called memories, I can be prepared for something so vast in purpose, so beyond my finite comprehension, that I wouldn't trade all the suffering of a lifetime, to miss out on knowledge like that. That very knowledge leads me into true spiritual awakening. You know you have struck the brilliantly lit pot of spiritual gold, when you can no longer look in the mirror without seeing in the reflection, the suffering of the whole world. There it is, when that moment happens, grasp hold before it slips beyond reach again. Hold tight, and use that tug on your heart called compassion. Take that hard earned gift, and touch someones life today. It doesn't have to be someone you know or someone you feel is deserving of your compassion, actually it may be best if it's not. Go touch a life, that no one wants to touch. And then no matter how it is received, the reflection in the mirror, will show you your path, the narrow one, the one you never thought you could maintain, the one that leads you down a road that connects to choruses of angles beckoning you to stay.


  

Just Be Held

So I cry a little.......

 

  Sometimes the only answer is a good cry. Crying is good for the soul. For perhaps the first time, researchers are successfully verifying that crying is actually good for us because it reduces tension and it increases the body's ability to heal. Not only tears, but perspiration, urine and air that we exhale rid the body of various toxins and wastes. According to many studies, people not only feel better after crying, they also look better physically as well.

     Then there are those who frown upon a good cry....I say give it a try. I have spent many hours in tears in my lifetime. And I can't say I regret any of them. It is so human to cry. It makes us so real, so vulnerable, and yet so strong. The best thing ever is to find a safe shoulder to cry on...but that is hard to to come by. People are uncomfortable with their own pain, so it is hard for them to weep with those that weep. But if there is one lesson pain has taught me...(because I have had my share of it)....it is that once and for all, when pain passes and tears are all dried up, I'm stronger than before, and more prepared to weep when another soul weeps, and comfort when there is no comfort to be found. I can get comfortable around pain in ways some people just can't. So the beautiful teacher...pain....has helped me to help others learn what this pain stuff is all about. Do I regret the troubled waters I have waded my whole life? Well, ask me on my good days if you want to hear inspiration! If you ask me on a painful day, You may think the sky is falling...and there is nothing that can catch it. Or I might just start crying.....