The penance of pain

The penance of pain [+ favourites]

I have a very important question to ask. Please try to answer it as honestly as possible...

When one suffers a loss such as betrayal, or loss of a loved one, or sadness for any reason that results in your heart hurting everytime you think about it, generally you think and think and think about it, it goes away, then you wake up the next day and find yourself in the center of the cesspool once again.

This proceeds for days and days, and eventually gradually gets forgotten. But if that same thought is brought up and explored even a great deal of time later, the person might react almost as emotionally as they would the day it happened, as if it never went away but was repressed.

My questions are this:

1. What do you think is the most effective way of dealing with such pain? Do you think time must be spent in mourning or can you think through it more effeciently to quicken the process?

2. Do you think the uncontrolled method of simply being depressed or sad day after day until time dissolves the pain is a natural and completely normal process? How do you think this affects the person in the long run? Do you think it is really resolved this way?

3. What would you say is the most effecient method of dealing with various different pains? Obviously the death of a loved one involves no confusion... they just perished. But betrayal, for example, encompasses mistakes on your part that can result in your defilement. Have you found an effective way of coping with pain or are you as unprepared for it as you were when you first suffered it?

"Hating everyone protects me from elitism."

1. for me, thinking and focusing on the pain as much as possible for a set amount of time each day works well. thinking through it is the only way to truly let the pain go. many people simply accept the fact that time is the only thing that will heal the pain... bullshit, time does nothing but force you to forget.

2. if the depression is not controlled, it is not healthy and will not result in any progress. again, force yourself to concentrate on the pain and how you can deal with it, but limit your time each day. if you deal with it by being depressed all the time, eventually you will tire yourself out and over time become too tired to even think about it or deal with it.

3. i had a great deal of trouble with this several months ago, i never saw myself as a person going to "self help" tapes for comfort, but i tried it and stumbled upon a pretty good technique that works for me. each day i ask myself these questions:

1. whats great about this? what could be great about this?
2.whats not perfect yet?
3.what am i willing to do to make it the way i want it?
4. what am i willing to no longer do in order to make things
the way i want them.
5. how can i do whats neccicarry to get this job done and enjoy the
process?

they are suppose to apply to improvement in your life, but i find them very useful when trying to deal with any sort of pain.

like everyone, ive worked through a lot of pain. the loss of very close relatives and family pets. the betrayal of past loved ones, and the complete changing of situations i thought i knew so well. the pain i feel now is a good pain however, a pain of rememberence and appreciation for what i have been through. i can speak comfortably about my past and enjoy sharing my experiences with others who are willing to listen.

"UNIX is an operating system, OS/2 is half an operating system, Windows is a shell, and DOS is a boot partition virus. ~Peter H. Coffin"
[  Edited by Wyote at   ]

1. I have just dealt with the death of 2 relatives and for me, I think that it is healthy to mourn, but not to the extent that it comsumes all the happiness inside you. You can't just dismiss the fact that someone close to you has died, and bottleling up your feelings/emotions would make you feel the pain alot longer. Then I think logically about what has happened, and I know that I will let it go soon enough.

2. I don't think that deep depression is the best way to overcome the pain. I try thinking or involving myself into different things, like running or just wandering the streets of downtown. Being depressed would affect the person in the long run in many ways. It could affect your relationship with others. They could start losing their friends because they don't know how to act around you or if you want them to be with you. You could become overly tired and lose contact with your friends. Like say they're inviting you out for dinner or to a party, you'd be too depressed to go. I think that the emotional and moral support for friends/family is the best way to get over the pain and by talking about it with others who has had experience with it.

3. Dealing with other pain such as betrayal, I must admit that I'm not very good at recovering. In my head I would be thinking negative thoughts, which wouldn't help at all. Then I end up avoiding the person or dismissing them entirely. But eventually (say in acouple of weeks/months/yrs depending on the gravity of the situation) I try to comfront the other person about it and try to work things out.
I wasn't really prepared for anything thats happened. It was very surprising and it took me off gaurd, and up till now, I still think of how this could all happen.
I don't let the pain run my life though, because I always try to think logically about the effects of it and so I make myself understand and accept in eventually. I think that loss of a loved one doesn't hurt as much as being betrayed.

"Crap. I lost my watch, now I'm lost in time."