Emotional pain is an inevitable reality of life. Pain need not only mean discomfort but can also be utilized as a positive force for growth in humanness. A life without pain, if such a life were possible, would be but part of a life; for pain and joy are interrelated, at times dependent one upon the other, in certain circumstances growing one from the other.
Emotional pain is largely self made. It does not arise, as we so often presume, from the actions of others, a negative situation or an unhappy occurrence. It is our personal reaction to these things. It is not others and other things which caused our unhappiness. It is ourselves. In a very real sense, we are directly responsible for our pain.
We may either agonize over our human condition and curse our friends, family, society and God, whom we feel are responsible for it, or we may choose to accept it and do something constructive and personal to ameliorate it.
One decision will continue to create useless pain, the other will bring solutions to it. We may feel hopeless depression at the thought of our inevitable old age and death, a depression which will deprive us of present possibilities for life; or we may see the existence of these phenomena as an incentive to improve the quality of our lives now.
A personal rejection may be taken as an insurmountable barrier and a reason for self-pity and hate, or as an incentive for looking more closely and critically at our behaviour as a means of correcting and thus, attempting to change the behaviour of others towards us. The choice s are ours to make.
- Leo Buscaglia
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