Over my life I have endured much personal pain. Many times, I have felt sorry for myself. Despite this, I have learned that pain gives me the chance to experience great love. What do I mean by this?
True love is an interesting thing. What I know about it is that the deeper we love, the greater the pain. Take the example of death, the deeper we have loved a person, the greater the pain we experience when we lose them. I also know that I do not want to live my life without loving deeply. For to love deeply is to truly live.
It is my belief that our life’s purpose is to face our barriers to love. These barriers hold us back from experiencing love as best we can. If you have lived, you will have experienced pain. Perhaps you are too afraid to face it. We all have our places where our secrets are hidden, where we hide memories about us or others for which we carry guilt and shame. The more willing we are to face these places, and the part we had to play in creating our own trauma, the greater our experience of will be. Love does not shame, nor does it burden us. Instead, it provides a cushion from which we can look at ourselves so that the pain of reality can be endured more easily.
The flip side of this is that as we become more aware of love, we are also more keenly attuned to our pain and the pain of others. Every journey has its peaks and valleys, but if our intention is to know love then these will not define our life. Our negative experiences give us a chance to grow and change for our good, and eventually the good of others with whom we interact.
I have made a choice to face my secret places, experience the pain and see love permeating my life. The power of love is such that when we live in it, we no longer remember the how much hurt we have felt but only the joy of experiencing love as we have lived.
Do you have hidden places? What are your barriers to love?
In love, Jenny
