I Want My Pain to Last… Forever
I am inspired by how much we are all very absorbed with our relationships and the emotions which follow that dictate what we think is the “absolute truth”. Many times we end up all twisted and stuck. Personally, there is no absolute solution for the absolute pain we hold on to but I can only share my journey in hopes that we will find a solution and enjoy the journey.
This is a hypothetical conversation between Mr. Ego and Ms. Wisdom, which may sound familiar to some of us…
Wisdom: “Please do not get all worked up. Look at the bigger scale of things. Would you prefer living a lie? From a bigger perspective, you should think how fortunate you are.”
Ego: “What? Are you kidding? My world has just fallen apart! My partner has just cheated on me with my best friend. I am in so much pain. How can you ask me to feel lucky when I have been betrayed and hurt? I have lost time, energy and effort on this relationship!”
Wisdom: “What happened is not fair of course, but it is really not the end of the world…I mean ‘your world’. If you keep thinking negatively, how will you heal? Pain and issues like this are great opportunities to learn and be stronger.”
Ego: “But… it means I have wasted the last 5 years of my life. It is not fair. I want to get even!”
Wisdom: “How will getting even make you heal? It will only create more pain and suffering for you and them. The situation will open up more wounds. Emotions will flare up, words will be spoken only to be regretted later. Because of the law of Cause and Effect, there will be repercussions if you act from anger that comes from the hurt. Isn’t it better to know the truth now rather than later?”
Ego: “I can’t think too much now about anything other than my pain.”
And we all know how these conversations go. It just keeps going round and round, like a dog chasing its own tail, with no end in sight. Situations involving highly charged emotions are never pleasant, and we have all had our share of these traumatic experiences. Haven’t we? I know I have.
Betrayal, love lost, hurt, pain, humiliation, anger, jealousy… you name it, we have at one time or another indulged obsessively in these negative emotions. But guess what, we didn’t die from it, at least physically. Emotionally, many of us may have reached a place where we can only be diagnosed as “numb”. Some of us might even still be there and have not moved on from whatever hurt us.
Regardless of whether you are wearing your pain on your face, or pretending you are not hurting, the big question to ask is, “Where do we go from here?” A relationship filled with love and romance is probably the one thing we all want so badly that it blinds us and renders us emotionally and mentally irrational or unstable. When the romance begins, we are on “Cloud Nine” as the saying goes, and everything is beautiful and faultless. We even regard the person’s flaws as charming until time wears down the bewitchment and the same thing that was once charming is now annoying.
I was once very much in love with a man whom I labeled my “soul mate”, and I strongly believed it was true then. As time passed, it did not work out. His intelligence that I once was attracted to, became a skill he used to push me out of his life. The charming intelligence became a cutting coldness. It hurt. I cried. I lost my self-respect. I felt like the dumbest woman on the planet. I was devastated. It felt like the “end of the world”. I wanted to run him over with a big car! It took me a couple of years to heal and accept that it was not meant to be, and to stop thinking that relationships suck.
Relationships do not suck; how I managed myself sucked. I willingly consented to be a victim and for my hurt and pain to blind me and tell me that my happiness depended on him and the relationship with him. In that thought that I abided in, I was at my most delusional state. The truth is, my happiness is within myself and when I am happy with myself, I can have meaningful relationships with anyone, and it was not about him.
What made me come to my senses (and this is without running him over with a big car) was this realization:
“In life we love and we hurt. And we think it’s all about us. Who we loved, loved us too. As we hurt, they hurt too. Life is fair, but maybe not at the time we want it to be.”
The above is only one example of a relationship and it does not have to be limited to lovers, boyfriends, girlfriends and couples. Relationships also include those we have with friends and family, which can turn sour as well. We have lost friends from misunderstandings that we were too proud to forgive and forget. We left it to brew and stew, and with time the situation was beyond repair.
For some of us, the list of failed relationships seem to keep building. We have to ask ourselves, when do we stop accumulating failed relationships and start piling up fantastic relationships? We need to stop carrying our negative experiences into the next relationship. Most of all, we must manage our expectations – have none of the other person. Note that taking our negative experiences like hurt and anger into the next relationship is basically expecting the worst, and it will end up just like that. And, be realistic. Much easier said than done, trust me I know. But if we do not make that conscious choice now, when will we begin to accumulate positive relationships? Life is too short to keep having failed relationships and friendships.
Choose to let go of the past and of our angst. Let’s give ourselves a chance to make a positive impact by changing our attitude. We want to be happy and we are not an island, therefore the relationships we have now, and will have in the future, are dependent on our conscious choices every moment we are involved.
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I felt awake after reading this blog, thankful to Li Kin for sharing your thoughtful experience. It’s also true that sometimes our pain comes from a scary place where we don’t want to say it out, talk about it, or even admit it’s true to ourselves. For many people it is a debilitating part of everyday life.
When it continues to prolonged period of time, it also can end up affecting your physical health as well in some cases it causes physical pain. Every painful experience teaches us a lesson and every relationship create karma through expectation. Just like Li Kin saying be realistic and stop carrying negative experiences and manage our expectation. I found that the most importantly forgiving is the best solution at times in order to truly heal and divert the way of thinking.
A very impressive quote on realization which was very thoughtful “we often think about us when we are hurt and at the same time we often ignore and make mistake that we hurt them too. “Life is fair, but maybe not at the time we want it to be.”
I have really enjoyed reading the insights presented here by Li Kim.
Thank you Li Kim for sharing this post.
Forgiving someone that hurt us is very difficult to do. However, we have to force ourselves to do it because as long as we hold on to the anger and grudge, it will hurt us again and again and again without an end. It is like holding a burning coal in our hands, it will continue to burn us unless we learn to let go. Why are we punishing ourselves with the mistake of others?
On the karma point of view, they hurt us because we have the karma to be hurt. If we retaliate back or take revenge, we will create new bad karma. It is a never ending vicious cycle. If we are able to forgive and be compassionate about them, this bad karma will be exhausted. So, it is a wise move for us to start learning on how to forgive.
Chris
“In life we love and we hurt. And we think it’s all about us….”
The root of all our problems – we think it’s all about us. With the information technology age upon us, knowledge is at our fingertips. Social networking has allowed everyone to share their experiences, inspirations, sadness, happiness online with the rest of the world. Ms Wisdom can tell us a lot and give all angles of debate but Mr Ego will always find some lame excuses to counter all reasoning.
We repeat our negatives experiences like a broken record. One would think we have learnt from our past not to start another war but no…countries continue to fight over territory and political views, tribes continue to fight over cultural and racial differences, even religions continue to fight over different beliefs. And we continue to fight every single day between each other over every little petty things under the sky. Some of us even fight with ourselves every single day between Ms Wisdom and Mr Ego.
It’s time to let go. Don’t take everything personally. Relationships are inevitable – between family, friends, lovers, partners, colleagues, countryman, strangers, etc. Positive relationships among mankind is possible. Happiness is possible. It may take some conscious effort but to continue to suffer failed relationships takes even more effort.
let go , move on , forgive & forget , learn from past mistakes , have no expectation of others but yourself to be a better person . Life is like a box of chocolates , you’ll never know what you’re gonna get
Thank you for a very honest and vulnerable blog post. It is true that we spend so much time and energy being victims of our choices and, eventually, become angry and bitter about how life had been unfair to us.
Unlike most of us who run from pain and avoid pain. Rinpoche aspires for the pain of all being to come to him. Rinpoche choose to be in Malaysia where Tibetan Buddhism is hardly heard because he is continuing his legacy of bringing dharma to places where it does not exist.
We should learn to revise our relationship with pain so that it becomes an experience that strengthens us and opens our hearts to being kind
Li Kim thanks for sharing this article. It is so true and it reflect ourselves so much in many situations be it relationships, friendship, work or family. Most of the time we would dwell into pain and keep getting deeper. It reminds us that we should stop and move on. Why suffer the pain when we have a choice to change?
And all this is in our mind. If we can manage ourselves better and confront it, we can get out of it. We should forgive and let go.
I hope I can keep reminding myself this message and be happy always. 🙂
Thank you Li Kim for this article. Very practical advice and I especially the contrast between wisdom and ego.
Your article reminded me about one of the Eight Verses of Mind Transformation:
In all actions I will examine my mind
And the moment a disturbing attitude arises,
Endangering myself or others,
I will firmly confront and avert it.
Our two main problems are wrong projections on impermanent phenomena and grasping at our wrong projections and acting on it. The suggestions you have, which is stop carrying our negative experiences into the next relationship, manage our expectations and be realistic, those are starting steps for us to stop our wrong projections.
I also like you what said that (when we ) choose to let go of the past and of our angst, we give OURSELVES a chance, many people cannot let go of the fact that they have been hurt and the hurt is not justified or it is not fair. “Who we loved, loved us too. As we hurt, they hurt too. “It is a good teminder for us to focus out and not in.
Rinpoche’s quote is a good conclusion, that if we give love, then the pain will go away. No point to keep suffering in the pain, or using the pain as an excuse to give other pain.
Thank you Likim for the article on pain and letting go. This is a big topic of discussion as most of us go through pains and subconsciously carry these pains throughout our life, letting the imprints influence our choices, thought processes and our “world”. Oprah had numerous shows exploring and interviewing people who have been through tremendous pain. Some heal from it and some do not.
Most of us do not like pain and always think of ways to prevent pain. I write “most” and not “all” because I have met people who, based on their actions, choose the pain because they are more comfortable to be in their comfort zones. The uncertainty and fear of going out of their comfort zones or areas of familiarity is too overwhelming for them. So they choose to live with the pain.
My personal experience of letting go is that it takes a tremendous amount of effort to conscientiously stop myself from acting out of anger and depression, calm myself and dive into the root cause that created these reactions. What works for me is to examine thoroughly the root cause and how hanging on to it doesn’t help me.
I realised that imprints from experiences during my younger years have a huge impact on how I am now. Understanding the importance of letting them go on an intellectual level is easy, but really having the shift and letting go from the core, I realised, takes years. I attribute that to my huge ego. As long as the experience is similar, regardless of who creates the experience for me, my reaction kicks in. It is so automatic that I have to catch myself all the time. As Tsem Rinpoche tells me many times, I am a damaged good.
Forgiving is easy for me because I don’t hold grudges and would rather spend my energy on something more positive and constructive. I am very lucky and fortunate to have a guru like Tsem Rinpoche who guides me patiently regardless of how damaged I am. Rinpoche has given me the tools and wisdom teachings to letting go and healing. The key is to focus out on others consistently and the rest will melt away with time.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this topic Li Kim 🙂
One of the best quotes I have read about relationships is that no relationship should “complete” you. It shouldn’t be two halves coming together to make a whole, but two wholes coming together to make something even better. The relationship should *complement* your personality and goals, and not “complete” them.
Why would people who feel they are not complete and that parts of them are missing, think it is healthy to join with another person who similarly has missing qualities about themselves?
To say a relationship “completes” you is to me a Hollywood-fueled notion of romanticism that is cliched, unrealistic and full of expectation, and it is expectation and lack of communication that kills any relationship.
You expect the other person to behave in a certain way, to react in a certain way, to say and do certain things according to your perception of the world. When these expectations are not met, or are not communicated clearly, we get upset and then trouble arises in the relationship. I mean, just think back to all of the fights you have had with your friends, partner and loved ones. This applies to any kind of relationship, whether romantic or platonic.
When we come together to form any kind of relationship, the combination of two minds, two sets of effort, two sets of resources, etc. has the potential to propel people’s self-improvement. After all, with the amount of effort we will have to invest into the relationship, the least we can do is get something positive out of it!
But if a relationship “completes” you, it means you had to change something about yourself to accommodate the relationship. It means your original pre-relationship state was flawed / damaged; how is it a good idea that two damaged people come together? Why not ‘fix’ yourself first before joining together with someone else or with other people?
So on the topic of change, as Li Kim said, there is a danger when people get into relationships, that they change themselves to accommodate the other person and, in the process, forget themselves. But a person who truly cares for you will never allow you to do that, but instead encourage you to be the best version of who you are. So when people tell you you have changed, actually you haven’t…it just means you have stopped living life their way.
What you shared here is really what most of the people experiencing. The key is how we move on because for those that unable to, they will always trap in their own deluded mind and causes much anger for themselves and worst case is the explosive action taken out of control which will hurt other people and unknowingly hurt the people they love.
I like what you said here that we should stop carrying our negative experiences into the next relationship. Once we identify the problem we should let go, move on. To me be ‘realistic’ is that if you don’t want how people treat you, then you don’t treat people the same way. That’s to be ‘real’ for me. We all have a choice so is up to us to choose the positive way to move on or the negative way to stay back and stay behind while seeing others move on.
Great post and thanks for sharing Li Kim.
谢谢 Likim 的分享， 让我更加了解人生。
我们常常都把自己放在大前提，忘了身边人的感受，当得到的不是自己想要的就会大发雷霆，把自己放得太大了。 每一样东西抓的太紧，让我们失去原本的意义。
Likim 说的对， 如果我们不停的埋怨，被负面的情绪拖着走，脚步会很沉重。 不如重新出发正面面对，为快乐的每一天努力。
Thank You Rinpoche and Li Kim for the sharing.
We have a lot of expectation on relationships and if the expectation does not meet our expectation, we will be disappointed and anger, especially when it involved with the person we trust, respect and love. We must manage our expectations, however, it is much easier said than done. We need to let go as life is too short. “Give happiness, patience, kindness and care and the pain goes away, Then only LOVE remains”
With folded hands
Pee Bee Chong
We are all suckers for pain! Somehow we just dwell deeper and deeper in the pain thinking that it is normal and ok. Until we come to our senses that what we put ourselves through is pure stupidity. Letting go is the freedom to love again especially to love yourself. Many a times, it is the fear of the unknown that is pulling us back from making that leap into the unknown. And most of the time the unknown is a place where miracles can happen.
I read the comments and I’m truly happy that my article helps. Honestly, when I wrote the article I too laughed at myself. I laughed at how “silly” I had been. Of course I can laugh now but at that time when my deluded ignorant mind was in control, it wasn’t that funny
Omg I love this post! It is so down to earth, real and talks about stuff we can all relate to one way or another… but most of all it made me laugh! Half way through I knew this writer sounded familiar… scrolled down and saw Li Kim’s face! Lol I knew it, it is the ‘Li Kim humour’. I really liked the familiar scenarios of “running him over with a big car!’ yes many of us have had that fantasy… myself included hehe.
Thank you for your wonderful post, it made me laugh and woke me up. Yes I can relate to many things mentioned and definitely this can be applied to any relationship/friendship we have with anyone. It is really our choice how we wish to handle the situation, listen to Ms.Wisdom or Mr. Ego… and how we should move on from any failed situation or event in our lives. Just because we got bad feedback(s), that doesn’t mean the end of the world.
We have got to stop over reacting and turning red, fanning the fire of ‘anger’ inside. The truth is no one out there is hurting or cares, only you are hurting and you enhance that hurt by playing it over and over again in your head. So often we make ourselves ‘the victim’… yup we suck at managing us. Acknowledge you screw up and letting it go is the best, though this may sound easier than done, but in time, it does get easier. Also keeping ourselves occupied with positive work helps a lot. Being productive helps one to stop focusing in instead focus out… work on something to get results, and get back our self-esteem!
Thanks again, love your realistic advices and looking forward to your next post!
Thank you so much for such inspiring piece lah. It is so practical and logical. The turn of the perspective is what we all need to do while coming to dealing with the situations we come across. We have been always thinking just about ourselves. Being Little selfless and giving out love and kindness and being being honest to self and others may change our lives forever. Thank you for such beautiful sharing _()_
I am started to believe the cause and effect since I was young. I believe that each of us may have done whether virtue or non virtue actions in our many previous lifetimes and of course there is no one but only ourselves to bear the karma that we have done.
Thank you Li Kim for this sharing which remind me that the choice to be happy and freedom is depend on ourselves and not others.
Relationships do not suck. It is how I managed myself that sucked. I found out the hard way. Thank you very much, Li Kheng, it reminds me let go of the residual negative emotions.
Humbly,
Stella
thank you …I feel so better now!!!
Li Kim, big thank you to you for sharing such a post. It is not only applicable to all of us here on the blog. But you also shared your own personal experience so that all of us here will understand what you mean better.
Thank you for being so honest with us in order to benefit all of us. Many of us have experiences like you. We get so blinded that we push everyone aways from us and just like that so called “pain” take over of our lives and cover all the logic and wisdom that we have.
Many times when things like that happen to us, we go into self destruction mode. When we do that, we do not only self destruct, but we totally forgot about the people around us that care for us and want us to be well. We are too blinded by that so called “pain” that maybe one party has infused in us that we forget that there are still many that love us. With them seeing our pain and self destructing, it will also hurt them and make them feel pain.
A wise person once told me, it is only when we let go that we will be able to receive the true meaning of happiness. When we do not know how to yet, we can fake it. Fake it till we really learn how to do so. Only then we will be able to know how to improve ourselves so that we will be alright and improve ourselves as well. When we improve and move on, it will no longer make us so miserable and when we look back, we will know that we have improved in our lives. Maybe even have a day when we walk pass the same person again and they will then regret for having hurt us as we generated that hurt to motivation to make ourselves work harder so we are better. Not that small and weak person that we previously were.
Thank you Li Kim for sharing her thoughts and experiences.
Most of the times, our ego surpasses the knowledge we have and we choose to follow our ego, inside secretly knowing that somehow it’s not the “best” choice after all. However, ego has proven its power to us. How powerful it can be in destroying our lives, our beliefs, our relationships with people…
When everything that we do or experience, is surrounded within the “I”, the “me”.. we are already expecting something in return that will bring benefit to ourselves and when it does not fulfill our satisfaction, our anger blows up like volcano and we start pointing fingers at everyone else except to, of course, “me”, our own self.
Like Rinpoche says “Happiness is a choice”. Everyone at a point in life, experienced things that aren’t pleasant, aren’t to our satisfaction, but we have a choice. We can choose to indulge in our negative emotions for months, years, getting depressed… and yet nothing has improved in our lives, worst still, slowly deteriorating; or we can choose to move on and let go.
“Let’s give ourselves a chance to make a positive impact by changing our attitude.”