The Art of Feeling Better
What is pain? I almost never get this question. Nobody wants to know pain the way nobody wants to know a serial killer. However, it is a good question to ask in understanding what creates true pain relief.
The study of pain reveals many remarkable things. Pain is far more a psychological phenomenon than we think. Pain is highly subjective and does not automatically correlate with physical injury. Think about pain tolerance and its wide range. In my years of listening, pain has shown itself as the pariah of human consciousness—pushed away, feared, silenced—yet it keeps returning to knock on our door. If it is turned away from one door in the body, it will try another, and another, until it is received.
Many people seek me out to relieve their pain. All and every kind of pain. The emphasis is always the same—make this go away. Can you fix me? Can you fix my pain? How do I stop this from hurting? How long will it take to be pain-free?
What I’ve learned from years of practice is this: pain is not the enemy, it is the messenger.
Our human rejection of pain is understandable, given our susceptibility for being binary. As if there are only two worlds. A (happy) painless world and a (miserable) world of pain. The painless world may seem attractive, but a continuously painfree world is not real. It’s like wishing that the sun always shines. It sounds good at first, so we make this un-natural state our ideal, (anesthetized) vision of healing.
I don’t mean to be callous or reductively philosophical. The world of pain can be terrible. As a clinician, I have been with people in terrible pain and I have only compassion in the face of this. When I ask, “what is the bigger container or meaning of pain?”, it is to ultimately be of service. As hard as pain can be, it can also be real and loving and honest, but pain without curiosity or awareness is intolerable. We attempt to avoid it at all cost and get caught up in some human tendencies. The first is to reject or call “bad” any experience that disrupts our unconsciousness and the second is to believe that once we’ve been caught by “bad” things, that this badness will last forever. Under these conditions, pain is understandably avoided and feared like death. But this reaction comes at great a loss of opportunity to change your perspective and your life for the better.
For a moment, imagine that all of this avoidance is a big misunderstanding. Imagine that life is not a series of binary dualistic episodes of pain / no pain in which you are either blithely, blissfully numb or condemned to an eternal damnation and agony. Pain is fundamentally asking you to be present by bringing you into a present tense experience, whether you like it or not.
In practice, I’ve seen again and again that pain is the felt experience of inner conflict and resistance—like punching the gas and the brakes at the same time. You can make it a big smoky burnout if you want, but underneath all the drama is a very real opportunity for genuine healing, if you are available to it. If you are present to it.
What is pain asking you to see? Simply this: that who you truly are, is free and infinite by nature. We cannot accelerate into our own becoming while riding the brakes of our ego fears and expect to go any distance. But we do this all the time. Sometimes for a whole lifetime. When we relax and open our awareness to include the truth of who we are, it becomes painfully obvious how often we have forced ourselves into choices, relationships and habits that directly oppose our fundamental wellbeing.
And what happens when we live against our own wellbeing? Eventually or quickly, in big and small ways we create our own pain. Pain we can either see and address, or deny and medicate. The choice is yours.
The biggest learning pain offers us is that pain is not the problem. The problem is our response to pain, our response to the inner conflict between who we are and who we think we should be.
Pain is the byproduct of your ego fighting with reality—and losing.
Imagine, what exists past the boundaries of this town called panic? What if, as the last buildings and streetlights fade away, the whole of the universe begins to open up all around you. Opens into cosmic, loose particle, sentient space. Even the territory you know as you opens up into a vast vibrating “you plus” continuum. As each drop of water is also the ocean, you are also infinite and vast and connected.
So, back to the question: what is pain? Thinking as little drops, expanding our awareness of being, once we release into the truth of also being water, are our small drop fears really meaningful anymore? Is there even a continuum on which to slide between the duality of pain / not pain?
What my time with my own pain and my clients in pain has taught me is that a treatment can relieve suffering, but only a deeper devotion—relaxing and awakening into the truth of reality—actually shifts our relationship with pain into a part of expanding into fundamental wellbeing.
The first thing people notice when they sit with me is my bias: pain is not necessarily “bad” and “no pain” is not necessarily good, nor a goal to strive for. This does not mean I won’t treat pain. I will treat it and often resolve it. But it does mean that I don’t align with those whose ultimate goal is to remain or return to a sleep-walking-through-life state. That’s not a condemnation. It’s simply the declaration of who I am and who I am not.
What the %$@ does pain have to do with reality?
Pain asks to be met with presence and compassion. That’s how I try to receive the people who come to me. Pain is not fun. It is not easy. If that’s not enough, it seems that the more you resist it, the stronger it gets. It sucks to lose. A loss that ultimately can become a healthy grieving process, replete with all the steps, from denial to anger to sadness when we release control and let it be.
Imagine pain as an event, neither good nor bad, but an indicator of a misalignment. Pain is also always a journey and never a destination. This is that kernel of truth within our desire to stop feeling pain. We know it’s not meant to be a forever state, and we’d like the trip to be over quickly.
At its core, pain is a journey that asks you to take every step yourself, in your own shoes. There’s no short cut and no Uber. It’s a journey about presence, compassion, acceptance and developing a reverence for the body, heart and mind you call your own. A passage to becoming one with all that is and thus dissolving pain’s conflict and false story that you are or ever were separate from yourself.
What does it mean to walk the path of pain in your own shoes? For those that choose to, it’s about letting go of judgment and becoming curious. Over the years I’ve listened to people in every kind of pain. Each has its own flavor, but pain always speaks what wants to be known. When asked, it will tell you. Try starting with questions like, What was I doing when this pain arose? What was I dealing with at that time? How free or constrained was I feeling? How was my work life or relationship life? What stage of life was I at? How long have these feelings been going on? Who did I believe myself to be? Who did I wish I was?
What we often discover is that pain is telling us the very things our ego does not want to hear. But what if we did listen and did respond with presence and compassion? How different would life be now?
We cannot go back and do things over. The past is no longer happening now. But we can treat ourselves with gentleness, and be truthful about our needs and desires. We are free to choose to be both independent and interconnected. Below are a few comparative examples, not to condemn but to inspire self love and presence.
Physical strain & unspoken truth
Ignore: Don’t work like that, it will injure your neck.
Listen: I work gently, take breaks often, and don’t sacrifice my wellbeing. My body holds steady, and I actually enjoy my work and my day.
Ignore: Say what you mean or you will start grinding your teeth.
Listen: I speak my truth before it grinds me down. My jaw unclenches, and my words carry more ease than force.
Ignore: Don’t ignore your body or your body will create problems you can’t ignore.
Listen: I pay attention early. My body becomes an ally, not a saboteur. It thanks me with steadiness instead of breakdown.
Food & drink as emotional cover
Ignore: Eating won’t suppress your emotions but it will constipate you.
Listen: I let myself feel instead of stuffing it down. Digestion flows, and so do my emotions.
Ignore: Drinking to drown your anger will lead to inflammation and liver disease.
Listen: I face my anger honestly. My body stays clear, and I wake up without regret or a hangover.
Feminine & masculine balance
Ignore: Love and embody your feminine self or your periods will be painful and depressing.
Listen: I become curious about how to respect my feminine nature. My cycle becomes less a curse and more a rhythm that I move to.
Ignore: Don’t reject your masculine heart or you will have heartburn and frustration.
Listen: I welcome my masculine balance of loving independence. My heart relaxes into openness instead of burning with resentment.
Life stages
Ignore: If you enter menopause exhausted, you will have a harder time.
Listen: I enter menopause rested and self-loved or I take the time to create this ese now. I have bandwidth for shifting hormones and moods, and I move through change with grace.
Relational & emotional identity
Ignore: If you live for everyone else’s expectations you will develop pains of martyrdom.
Listen: I live from my own center. Energy that used to go toward resentment now goes toward joy.
Ignore: If you blame everyone else, you will develop pains of victimhood.
Listen: I take responsibility for my choices. My body feels lighter, and I step into freedom instead of complaint.
Ignore: Honor your sensitivities or migraines will give you an excuse to not go to the party.
Listen: I say no when I need to. The migraine never arrives, and I get a fantastic evening to myself.
