Pain Is the Best Teacher

Pain is the best teacher. 

Without it, we languish and stagnate, and stagnation is death for the soul.

Pain keeps us moving, evolving, growing, and expanding. 

Pain shows us where we are stuck,

How we are not fully living.

It shows us our blind spots. 

Pain illuminates the ways we make unfair demands on life,

Insisting that it all go our way, 

That life always do what we want, when we want, and how we want.

We resist anything else that comes calling at our door, 

Blocking from ourselves the gifts that always come with the hurt.

When pain comes visiting, when loss visits our house, 

We must not run, or try to hide. 

Instead, we must open our arms wide, asking what this loss, 

This pain is here to offer us,

What it has to teach us,

How it will rip us wide open, 

Making us more alive,

Opening our hearts to more love, 

And opening our minds to more of life.

We must remain open.

Pain is the best teacher.

Without it, we languish and stagnate, and stagnation is death for the soul.