Over the past couple of weeks I’ve been discussing a subject we all deal with at some point…pain. It comes in many forms, varying intensity and duration; and none of us are immune.
This may seem like a depressing statement, and I guess it is in one sense, but what if there’s more to consider?
Last week I mentioned one of my heroes, Viktor Frankl, a Jewish survivor of the concentration camps of WW2 and author of “Man’s Search for Meaning”. If anyone is an authority on pain & suffering it’s Frankl. Remarkably, he offers a perspective that doesn’t come naturally to most of us, including me.
As a psychiatrist, his approach to therapy, called, Logo-therapy, was different from his contemporaries, Freud and Adler, in that he believed that we can find meaning even in our suffering.
He argues we have personal agency in determining, not what happens to us, but how we respond to it.
We can choose to respond to our pain in various ways; we can retreat, seek isolation, wallow in it, or get enraged and even seek revenge.
But there’s an alternative.
We can find meaning in our suffering.
But how?
As Donald Miller says, in his book, “Hero on a Mission”, we can move from a victim mindset to a hero mindset. “A hero wants something and must overcome something that is difficult to achieve. This is the plot of nearly every inspirational story you’ve ever read.
A victim, on the other hand, does not move forward or accept challenges. Instead, a victim gives up because they come to believe they are doomed” (p6)
Our greatest pain can serve as our greatest point of impact
If pain is inevitable, and we can choose how we respond to it, then we can choose to find meaning and purpose in it.
I believe that you and I are here in part to serve and benefit other people, and one of the best ways I know to find meaning in pain is to use it to benefit others.
So let me ask you a question. How can your pain serve or benefit someone else? I assure you someone is facing their own pain and could benefit from your experience.
I’m not asking you to ignore your pain, minimize your pain or act as if it never happened.
What I’m suggesting is, don’t waste your pain.
There’s a story in the gospel of John where Jesus and his disciples were walking together when they passed a blind man, who had been blind from birth. The disciples asked Jesus if it was because of his own sin or the sin of his parents. (a common belief at the time) But Jesus responded, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life.” (John 9:3)
What if we saw our own pain as an opportunity for God to work through us? To impact the life of someone else? Maybe many lives?
That is a different perspective on pain.
What’s Possible
If you and I can focus more on what’s possible, rather than the pain itself, we might begin to see opportunities to help someone else. In fact, the very pain that once may have sabotaged your life, may very well be a clue as to what you should do with your life.
We all experience pain.
We can’t avoid it.
But we can choose how we respond to it.
So instead of, why is this happening to me, ask, what’s possible because of it.
Feeling stuck? Not sure what to do next? Your life not where you want it to be? Life coaching can help. Contact me for a free 45-minute discovery call. Let’s talk.
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