Is in the Pain

A very wise proverb from Rumi is “The cure for pain is in the pain.” This sentence not only captures a profound truth about human resilience & transformation but it signifies on the power of pain. When I read this I felt a deep sense of reality check, whenever I have tried to run away from the pain or relationship/situation that causes pain, I have been in a loop. A never ending loop of discontentment, despair , desolation and further pain, but whenever i have walked with the pain and embraced it, i have come out with more clarity of life and aspects around me.

Pain is not a plot in life, but its the essence of character development, it makes us explore our strengths and vulnerabilities. Our action or reaction when we encounter pain shows us our resilience, courage, or capacity for endurance and the aftermath of the situation of pain is learnings from the ordeal.

Broadly pain can be of two types physical & psychological. Physical pain is a sensation that is a result of an actual body tissue damage.

Psychological pain is usually an outcome of our feelings such as regret, grief, loss, or mental health conditions like depression and anxiety. Though it is rooted in our mind but it is as painful as physical pain, on the contrary emotional pain can also manifest physically, contributing to symptoms like headaches, muscle pain, nausea, and stomachaches etc.

So, how is it cured? That question almost all of us have , for physical pain we have medical science with all kind of medicines & therapies.

But when it comes of psychological pain we tend to ignore it. But why do we ignore it?

We ignore it as we feel vulnerable, we feel unsafe, we feel if we will share with someone how will they react, we just don’t want to give any priority to our emotional & mental state as we give to our physical pains. I can say it today loud with my decades of encounter with psychological pains that we shouldn’t ignore it. As most of the chronic illness are the outcome of long term psychological unhealed situations.

Women being emotional in nature cry out loud when in depression or anxiety, but men don’t.

Men at large follow this mechanism of not expressing or asking for help when in psychological pain, as it has been ingrained in us from centuries that men are strong and their masculinity is questionable if they expresses emotions or shows their vulnerability to someone. Even the data from various researches show that men are always seeking help or counselling in finance or physical health not for their emotional needs.

“Women took 60.11% of relationship counselling while 68.55% of financial counselling was sought by men, reflecting nuanced gender-specific needs, showed the report.” Article in ET on May 2024.

So, when I see women around me struggling that they are having concerns on their emotional needs being unheard and not understood, I would like to put forth my viewpoint : Please bring clarity on your needs and wants from a relationship. And never forget Men are from Mars & Women from Venus is not just a book or phrase, its reality. Our centuries of upbringing, expectations, societal norms, hormones, body desires etc, have been nurtured differently.

Thus, a man’s way & a woman’s way to handle pain both physical and psychological is different. But if we take an ideal scenario that both are having same emotions and are ready to accept pain in similar fashion we can say pain can be cured with :

CLARITY – CONVERSATION – CONTRIBUTION – CAPITULATION