“What hurts us is what heals us.” Paulo Coelho
What’s your go-to when you’re in pain?
Retaliation?
Hybernation?
Exploration?
When we’re feeling the emotion of anger, we often reach for retaliation. Retaliation is when we get punched, we punch back (literally and metaphorically). It can be easy to see in some cases: When someone insults us, we hurl an insult back towards them. It can be more subtle in other cases: When our spouse says something hurtful, we punish them by withholding our love.
The thinking behind retaliation is that since you hurt me, I’m going to make you feel just as bad as I do right now. It’s a cry for healing of the pain we’re in, but it isn’t terribly effective.
Many people when they’re hurt, they go into hibernation. That can look like withdrawing and feeling the sadness of the pain. We might move through our days like we’re fine, but inside we don’t feel fine. We shut down and don’t talk about it because when we talk about it, all the sadness comes to the surface and we’re forced to feel it. So instead, we go within and pretend we’re fine…when we’re really far from fine.
Pretending is also not terribly effective when it comes to healing, but at least we’re giving ourselves some space and not just reacting.
And sometimes when we’re hurting we are able to go into exploration. We ask:
- What’s the exact emotion I am feeling? Is it more mad or sad?
- Why am I so hurt by this?
- What is it about my life experience that makes this situation impact me in this specific way?
- How do I want to feel about this circumstance?
- What do I want to do differently in the future based upon this experience?
When we are able to get into exploration mode, we have a much better opportunity to heal the hurt. It also gives us the ability to understand ourselves more deeply and craft a conscious response to the hurt. That could be…
- Having a direct and difficult conversation with the person that hurt you
- Setting a healthy and loving boundary for yourself
- Forgiving without ever receiving an apology
The outcome can look any number of ways, but at least when we choose to go into more of an exploration mode, we have a better opportunity to heal what hurts.
If you’ve been hurting and you’re just tired from it all, let’s talk. Moving your life forward in a new way isn’t easy, but carrying the weight of the pain also is not easy. If they’re both hard…choose your hard.