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I've dealt with enough pain to last a lifetime.
Sure, I could sit here and list everything bad that's ever happened to me, but what good would that do? It certainly wouldn't change anything. It certainly wouldn't make anything okay again.
A lot of shit has happened, and I've accepted and come to terms with most of it. Still, it's normal to feel pain, even after you've healed.
I don't want to make it sound as though I'm whining about my life. You know, throwing a pity party. But I do think that expressing when something hurts, is a good way to eventually move on from it.
Pain doesn't mean you're broken beyond repair. Pain is simply something that lets us know we're still alive, still breathing, still feeling.
A lot of people try to run from pain. They're either tired of feeling it, or scared that it'll never go away. Whether it's the use of drugs, alcohol, or even more drastically, suicide... everyone seems to find some way to deal with pain.
I myself, have used numerous things to hide pain. I've never gone as far as to have haunting thoughts of ending my life, I'm simply not brave enough to endure those type of feelings, but I empathize wholeheartedly for people who struggle with those type of thoughts on a regular basis. It takes great strength to have those thoughts, but to not act on them.
I have used alcohol, herbal substances, or even just ignoring the pain all together, hoping it would just stop or go away on its own.
People feel things differently. People grieve differently. It isn't anybody's place to tell you how you should feel or deal with certain situations/emotions. Nobody knows you, better than you.
A lot of the time, we try to seek guidance from other sources in order to lessen the pain we feel on a regular basis. We cling to music, to poems, to quotes, to writing, because we desperately don't want to feel alone. We want to know that we aren't going crazy, and that the pain we feel is real. We want to know that someone else out there, knows exactly how we're feeling. We want someone to explain the things we can't.
The truth is, only we can explain ourselves and why we feel what we feel. Sure, all those other things help in describing our emotions and our pain, but ultimately it's our own acknowledgment and our own words that describe it best.
Many times, when I'm upset, I shut myself down. I have no motivation for anything. I tell myself that nobody cares, even though I know that some do. I think about all of the negative things I can possibly think of. I give myself all the pain, thinking I deserve it. I'm not sure why I do this, but that's just how I am sometimes.
Shutting down is the easiest way to hide your pain. It's the easiest way to make it seem as though it's not there, but while doing that, you forget that you are there as well. You not only shut out your pain, but you shut out incoming happiness. You shut out the possibility of resolution. You shut out the possibility of anything.
If that is what helps you cope, I say keep doing it. But if you're tired of feeling the way you feel, day in and day out, I challenge you to try to do something to change the way you handle day to day situations.
I challenge you to feel your pain, in full stride. I challenge you to embrace whatever emotions may be plaguing you, because feeling them, can ultimately help you to resolve them.
It may sound crazy, but give it a chance.
Take a look at what's hurting you, and come up with a solution. It can be the simplest thing or idea, but as long as the outcome is a positive one, then you've succeeded already. As long as you come out just a tiny bit stronger, you've succeeded.
The hard truth to accept is, you need to stop waiting for someone to come and save you. You need to stop relying on other people for your happiness, because let's face it, people leave and people hurt you until you feel as though you're left with nothing.
Why don't you stand up and save yourself?
Be your own hero. Be your own reason to smile. There's this sense of self respect, and self-admiration that you can get from helping yourself to feel better, when nobody else can.
I'm not saying you never need help, help is always sought after and appreciated. But maybe, every once in a while, you can appreciate yourself.
So again, I challenge you to feel all of your pain. To bask in it.
Because that's the thing about pain, it demands to be felt.
Feeling pain doesn't always have to be a burden. Pain is real. Pain is valid.
