Pain

Pain has been my teacher. My upbringing in a family bruised by alcoholism and poverty conditioned me to embrace denial of psychic or physical pain. Numbness, punctuated by raging anger, was the norm.

Neurophysiology of pain.

As I separated from my family through my early adult years, I began to recognize myself. The consciousness I had been bullied into burying by my family turned out to suit me rather well when I had time and freedom to get to know it. However, that re-wakening of my personality was quite painful. All the cuts and bruises it had suffered in childhood had not healed. Some had even festered and were causing some pretty dysfunctional behavior.

I began to understand by experimentation that acknowledging the pain of loss and alienation was actually palliative. I sought counseling. I embraced a group of friends who talked about life realistically and candidly. I chose to work with others in psychological and physical pain. I chose a path in life which was centered on being and becoming fully human, not on acquiring wealth, status or pleasure.

Now, as I am more and more aware of the age of my body, pain continues to guide me to moderation in activity and appetite. Pain cues me to meditate, to breathe, to relax. I hesitate to take pharmaceuticals for pain. I have found I have less pain as a result. I have learned to tolerate more pain.

Pain comes to us all, with the rare exception of those who cannot feel any pain at all. Those unfortunate individuals live in constant vigilance, since they are constantly at risk of unnoticed injury or disease. The rest of us will experience more pain as we age. This is a certainty of being human. Incorporating consciousness of my pain into my humanist practice has made me more compassionate. It has helped me to connect with other human beings with whom I may have little else in common at first glance.