Necessary Pain

I ran today after over two months of nursing a sprained ankle. If you read my blog “Own your walk of pain,” it tells the whole story. The temperatures turned this week, and it was glorious outside today. Seventy-One degrees and March 1, 2022, I’ll take it!

After not running for two months, uh you feel it! At one point in my run, I got the classic “side-ache.” We all know that pain well, the one that you got as a kid in gym class, playing kickball or having to run the elementary mile. When the pain hit me, it was such a familiar sensation.

Like with any pain, my brain was like, “why don’t you stop?” And then my rational brain went, “Nah… you can handle this, and you know it won’t last long, just push through.” So, I did and within a quarter of a mile, it stopped.

It got me thinking about necessary pain. Pain that we must live through or walkthrough. Pain that brings progress and growth. Pain that is not meant to stop us but to accomplish something else in our lives.

There is something about necessary pain that changes us. There is something about the spirit of God that is near to the broken-hearted. There is something about the bread that has to be broken before it can be shared. There is something about a seed that must be buried and live in darkness before it can bring forth fruit. There is something about dying that brings life.

There is something about enduring the cross for the joy that will come. Women know this pain in an intimate way, as they endure the pains of childbirth to bring precious gifts into the world. We endure the pain for the joy set before us.

I am a girl with a LOT of feelings, a lot of emotions, and part of my gift to the world is sharing my human experience. My sharing is not just a personality trait, it is necessary for my health. What I have learned about myself is… thoughts, feelings, and emotions trapped inside my body, make me sick. For my health, I must share, and for my healing, I must share my pain.

There is power in the sharing, there is healing in the sharing. It is in the sharing that we get to experience, “God with us.” It is in the vulnerable, broken moments that we can experience what grace feels like. It is in the sacred space of life on life, the real, raw, ugly parts of life when we see each other, that our souls connect, and we see “I am not alone.” Where we get to experience what the all-encompassing love of the creator might feel like.

To be able to experience friendship like this takes Necessary Pain.  It takes courage to bear your nakedness. It requires that you set your armor down. It requires that you show your weaknesses and the tender places inside of you and it requires transparency. It requires that you don’t run away from your pain, but you embrace it, and you grab a soulmate and say “help me carry this. “

“If deeply satisfying friendships were easy, everyone would brag of real and long-lasting bonds; however real deft of connection requires that we…learn the oft delicately textured language of intimacy (in-to-me-see) …but this is uncomfortable work…” Dr. Larry French PhD

I love this quote from Dr. French. I never thought about the word intimacy in this way until he spelled it out as he does in this quote. In To Me See… necessary pain.. bring necessary growth. Growth brings life and life brings joy everlasting. And isn’t this what we all want? Isn’t this what our soul longs for?

My dear, I pray you to find your soul-sister. The one that can “see you” and that you may experience the gift of the divine in sharing your pain.

To all my soul-sisters, you know who you are, thank you.