The Problem of Pain

Beneath the sands of time I now search. Picking up grains of the life I have lived so far. I don't know how I should feel. Nostalgic perhaps. I feel like I have grown old, just when I got the hang of being young. But as the great Dr. Seuss said "Do not cry because it is over, smile because it happened." Searching through pictures of old, I wish I could do it again. Often times I wish for a mulligan. Others I just wish to relive. It is funny how some of the people you least expect to still be there are still there, and some of the ones that swore allegiance are gone. I can not blame them. Without a doubt I am an absent person who has sworn allegiance in someone else's life. Anger has never been an emotion I carry closely towards another. (To myself is a different story.) This brings to light the problem of pain that is manifested by those come and gone. How do you deal with it? Some more constructively then others. Some pretend it is never there; bury it down deep to never be addressed or resolved. Then they wonder why it hurts so much to breathe. They walk through life unconsciously yet consciously with hurt written on their faces. In their smile, laughter, and tears it is evident. They just hope, they pray, that some day someone special will recognize it. They hope someone will ask the question they have been dying to hear.

I have a thought (as I typically do) on the problem of pain. Embrace it like a brother. When it knocks on your door welcome it gladly. Pain is one of the greatest assurances we have in knowing that we are aliens of this world. "God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world" - C.S. Lewis. When I say the word home what does it mean to you? Warmth, beauty, comfortable, familiar? Does it mean dysfunction, abuse, failed expectations, hurt, pain? If you are reading this and never felt pain at home, I encourage you to check your pulse. Pain is nothing more then an alarm that something is wrong. Something has been set out of place. Something is not as it is meant to be. I plea with you to challenge that pain. Do not merely rub it, until it goes away. Do not pass it off as norm. Challenge it with why. Why do I hurt?

Quite simply, you are not yet truly at Home.

" Your soul has a curious shape because it is a hollow made to fit a particular swelling in the infinite contours of the Divine substance, or a key to unlock one of the doors in the house with many mansions." - C.S. Lewis