I am realizing that so much (if not all) of what we are concerned about ends up being an attempt to avoid pain. This desire to avoid pain really runs our lives. Anxiety, anger, insecurity, all stem from pain. Something as simple and as common as not liking something about one's body can be traced to an inner pain that we are not enough. We resist these feelings because we do not want to feel the pain. We resist our emotional pain the way that your hand would pull back if you touched a hot stove. But in this case avoiding the pain does not cut us off from the source of pain as removing one's hand from a hot stove would.
In order to get rid of the pain we must "learn to transcend the tendency to avoid the pain." (T.U.S., p. 104). Take a look at the bottom paragraph on page 104. Our hearts are constantly trying to push feelings away. "If life does something that causes a disturbance within you, let it pass through you like the wind." (T.U.S., p. 104). What I have found to be most helpful in this process of letting pain pass through me is to relax...relax the heart...relax all of the areas of my body where I tighten up because that is where I hold the pain. Although we think we are getting rid of the pain when we push it down or distract ourselves from it, we really are doing the opposite. We are locking it inside and I notice this happens a lot. Often the little irritations, worries, insecurities, jealousies hit the bigger pockets of blocked pain from the past (samskaras) and so we resist feeling them.
This may paint a gloomy picture, but in reality I don't feel that that is the case. If the pain is there (and, based on my personal and professional experience, for most of us it is) then this is an opportunity for freedom and growth. Jesus said that "unless you become like little children you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven." One way to live in freedom as children do is to allow the feelings to pass through. It only hurts for a moment and there is freedom on the other side.
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