It is extremely easy to not look at what is in front of you, especially when you know that there are some areas of your life that are screaming for your attention to grab the mop and bucket out of the hidden corner and start cleaning. Not only is your life in need of a good floor cleaning. There is a pile of something awful smelling in the corner that has not been touched in years, which is going to require some heavy-duty Home Depo trash bags and a large dumpster. “I rather not look”, screams your internal voice; however, the more that you act as if things do not exist, “the worse things will become for you”, whispers the small voice inside. A flood of thoughts plagues your mind, “Oh no! Your mom, friend, dad, sister, brother, husband, wife, were right”. You have been running from the truth, and even though you hate to run, you are in the starters position on the track field. In a colorful mixture of panic, stubbornness, shame, fear, and blindness, you begin to wrestle with the truth. You are in over your head, while you fight from a position of tug-a-war, fighting the new and clinging to the old. You throw your hands up in frustration, realizing that the only way to move forward is to let go. The admittance of stating “you were wrong”, the shadow of disappointment, and acknowledgment of your pride is too difficult to speak; however, it is required for forwardness.

You have reached your breaking point and begin to whisper softly, “God, help me. I just want the pain to stop”.

You see, pain has a funny way of waking you up, even when you think you can manipulate, ignore, out run, hide, and disguise the effects that unaddressed pain will cause. No matter how much you try to hide or run from pain, the roots of pain will continue to grow, unless faced, pruned, restructured, and replanted. Majority of us where not taught how to deal with pain in life, whether that is emotional, physical, and/or psychological pain, which all have a significant impact on the way our body’s function. Pain has sadly, been a concept that majority of people do not want to feel, acknowledge, heal, and recover from, which stems from our limited education and proper teaching in this area. Regardless of our educational level in the field of pain, each one of us is required to learn through pain, heal through pain, go through pain, and grow through pain. There is no getting around this aspect of life; you will face pain, no matter your economic or social class. Pain is apart of the human souls cirriculum, which can be difficult to understand and navigate through, if you are unclear about the meaning of your life, purpose, and human creation. Often, when pain rises to the surface of its dormant bearings, it is meant to cause one to further examine their ideas, character, beliefs, values, and purpose. Although, many have known pain to be a ruthless, selfish, relentless, harmful and a heartless thief in the night, which comes at a time that is extremely inconvenient towards the destination of where we were determined to sail towards. Pain is actually meant to serve as gift of direction, towards our next steps in life.

Pain is our directional compass. It is there to guide us towards healing.

I know for many of us, it is hard to wrestle with the fact that the nature of pain is good. However, it is true. Pain has not come to harm us, it has come to direct us inward and outward, by being the body’s primary advocate of communication; however, we must be willing to listen to the language that pain speaks. We must train our ears to listen inward and learn how to trust what we feel, see, and hear outward. We must lean into our senses and discern what the voice of the holy spirit is communicating and warning us to pay attention towards.

So, you may be thinking, “well how does pain communicate to us”?

Pains speaks to us through the physical discomfort of our emotions, mind, and body. Anytime, our body is in pain of any kind, even if the discomfort is something that we do not understand, we must stop and immediately pay attention to what is happening within our body. This is going to be extremely difficult for majority of us, due to the oppressive teaching that many of us have learned, which goes against trusting what we feel. Many of us have grown up with the teaching of ignoring our God given instincts, and placing our trust in human reasoning, knowledge, and logic. However, to move through pain, we must re-learn how to trust our bodies instincts and embrace what we feel. Pain is our body’s way of redirecting us to take notice of what is occurring on the inside and outside of us. Where are we physically, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally out of alignment with the way our creator has designed us to function.

Pain has come to teach us, strengthen us, heal us, and most importantly reveal to us truth.

The truth about you, the truth about them, the truth about your circumstances, the truth about society, and most importantly the truth about God.

Pain has come to reveal truth.

Until we shift our perspective and adjust our lens to view pain from a different vantage point, we will consistently plow through painful experiences. Sadly, when we approach pain in this measure, we will find ourselves trying to mask, deny, avoid, and fill the pain that we carry with things, places, and people, which at best will only provide temporary relief; however, they will never heal our wounded places. Wounds must be healed intentionally and directly. Uncared for wounds will only turn into infections that will quickly metastasize throughout our whole body if left untreated.

So, what are we to do?

Let’s continue this conversation in Part 2 of “Pain Woke Me Up”

Till we meet again,

~ Joe

Stay the course; the victory is already yours.

Your best is forward!