When Pain Leaves a Trace of Peace

Sitting on the couch while staring at a tree in silence…alone and with a warm drink in her hands, she notices a feeling. She has a peaceful sensation on her chest….a wanted feeling she was craving for in a long time.
 
She said, “I can’t believe that after searching for it and only finding inner turbulence, I now run into this peaceful feeling by chance.”
 
She was not expecting it. She was not searching for it. She was not reflecting about peace. She was not crying about how miserable she was for not being at peace with herself. Peace was just there when she did not expect it.
 
She looked back and realized that some time ago, her life was taking unexpected turns, maybe on her way to a crisis without knowing it. The months that followed were just turbulent and confusing. She did not know what to do with herself. The peaceful sensation seemed to disappear when remembering that pain for a moment as a feeling of panic took over her being. She was afraid that by remembering the pain, the peace she was just feeling unexpectedly would go away. She decided, however, not to cling to peacefulness and allow it to be and stay for the time it wants to stay with her. She then became in touch with that almost forgotten pain again. She realized one more time how painful, shocking, raw and unbearable everything was back then.
 
Now, she reads, hears and speaks about pain again and it seems like a distant experience. It seems like something she knows very well because she has lived it and experienced it in the past. So she shared with me the following:
 
Pain changes you at the deepest layers of your precious self.
 
It feels as it trespasses and devours your entire being.
 
I have felt how it shook me and made me fall into little pieces.
 
I have seen it manifest into tears nobody could witness but myself.
 
I have seen pain in its most cruel manifestation.
 
I have seen myself denying pain.
 
I have seen myself surviving pain.
 
I have seen myself angry at pain
 
I have many times wanted to get rid of my pain.
 
I have fought against my pain.
 
And I have yelled at my pain.
 
I have challenged my pain.
 
And sometimes I have felt the need to conquer my pain.
 
She knows how pain feels. She has had enough time to feel it as to think it was driving her to insanity, but today, she says, she is not in pain. She wants to celebrate the times she allowed herself to feel her pain deeply as for then allowing the spontaneous moment in which pain has taken its course leaving behind...leaving her with a trace of peacefulness.   ​

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