Difficult, Daze (10.16.24)

Is there a point to suffering?

My family recently had a rough spell.

I won’t go into details, because it’s personal, but it was bad. Have you ever been in that place when things seem so awful, so dark, that your time horizon shrinks to minutes? When so much is hitting you at once that you’re not even thinking about the next hour, much less tomorrow? In survival mode, the room starts to swirl and all you can think about is: What do I do now? How do I get through the next 10 minutes? What if this doesn’t work? That’s where we were.

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash

This is not the first time when the illusion of control melted in my hands like butter on a hot skillet. I had such a spell during COVID, and over a decade ago, after an unexpected family death. Modern people don’t like to discuss this. Why? For one, it’s really personal and private. And unfortunately, people can be cruel. Vulnerability exposes us to their manipulation and to the pain that brings. We risk contempt if others think we are using our circumstances to seek pity or preference, which deepens and dishonors our pain. Others think vulnerability signals weakness, or incompetence. We become uncomfortable if other people know that our lives are not perfect. We fear they will dismiss us as useless or unworthy. We want them to think of us a certain way, and we feel diminished if they don’t. We often live our lives through others’ eyes.

Photo by Dorsaf sayeh on Unsplash

Given all those reasons, why am I sharing this?

1. We Should Embrace Truth. We are all weak and frail in some way. To deny it would be escapism, which amounts to choosing to be weak, as distinct from the inevitable weakness which accompanies the reality of being human.
   

2. Truth Is the Basis for Progress. It’s important for others to know that things go wrong for me sometimes. Why? Because I’m pretty sure this is true of you too. Yes, we could all pretend we are “ok”, but what does that achieve? Making a better world requires us to confess, and examine, the ways in which we are “not ok”. Talking about our struggles shapes the problem statement for the world, so we can start tackling it. Vulnerability leads to human flourishing, because we can only fix what we know.
   

3. Truth Leads to Understanding. Lastly, I share because one of you may be going through something difficult right now. I know it’s hard. You may feel afraid, uncertain, confused. I felt…dazed. Like me, you may have made choices you regret, that you wish you could go back and change, that you know you can’t. You may be asking: Why did this happen? What do we do? What comes next? I will not condescend to tell you everything will be all right, because I don’t know that it will. But I do know that it hurts, that it’s terrifying, and isolating. I understand - firsthand - what that feels like. And others do too.

   

   Photo by Preslava Glushkova on Unsplash

   I believe my pain has a purpose, even if it is only to let you know that you are not the only one who has ever felt that way. I am more complete now that my heart has the capacity to hurt for you. It gives me comfort to know that we are united by our experiences, through which we can overcome our differences.

J