Transforming Pain

Robert Bly says we carry all of our hurts and pains around in a big sack that gets heavier and bigger as we age. But what is it that we do with that pain. As men we are much better at doing that holding. Perhaps our female counterparts can hold on to pain and endure far longer that we males can. So at some point we face the issue of having to do something with the pain.

The only thing that we can really do with it though is transform it. We transform pain when we listen and learn from its message - its lesson. Each pain has some specific message - a value to teach; a line never to be crossed again; a door to be opened. And when we learn that lesson the pain is transformed into the teacher. It is no longer resident in us as a lesion or tumor. it has healed and transformed.

But the pain that we do not embrace and allow to transform us we will inevitably pass on to another. So as Richard Rohr always says pain is either transformed or transmitted. The choice is yours. Stop the cycle of violence - the pain do its work in you.