When pain comes into our lives, (whether emotionally or physically) we usually tense up, fight our problems, try to figure a solution, or depend upon our logical minds. We feel we must overpower our problems with expertise. As soon as we feel pain or discomfort, we immediately try to stop it from happening and look for some way to soothe what we are going through. This orientation leads to increasing stress and a never ending battle with anything upsetting that goes on. After one problem is conquered, another arises. There is little room for peace of mind.
We do not stop and wonder what exactly the pain is saying to us – is there a lesson to be learned? In the Emotional Balancing Method, we do something different. We learn how to stop, listen and discover the lessons the suffering is trying to teach us. Suffering often comes when we feel defeated or overly exhausted. The distress may be the only way we can give themselves permission to stop, rest, and make much needed changes in our lives. Rather than tense up to fight our problems, there is another way to approach them that allows natural healing energies and understanding to flow.
In order to do this, it is important to learn how to stop, pay attention and respect all that comes to us. It is as if we were re-focusing a camera, receiving our experience through a different lens. As we do so, we see that pain is not bad. It arises from lack of balance. Our suffering can be seen as a messenger. W hen we learn how to respect it, listen to it, and ultimately release it, healing begins in all kinds of ways.
Most of the time we are reluctant to notice the quality of our lives, moment by moment. We are all experts at brushing things under the carpet. Then the carpet begins to roll up at the corners, and we feel we are coming unglued. Our suffering demands that we now pay attention to all that has been unattended to. Stop and listen to me, it pleads. We learn to "dialogue" with our pain. As we do so, we find the suffering is holding a gift in its hands, and an entirely new life begins.
Learning To Listen
We usually listen only to part of ourselves. The rest is rejected. But no matter what we are rejecting, soon or later we must come up against it and face it straight on. Rejecting something never makes it go away. In fact, it will come back time and again, just for you to accept it. Everything needs to be loved and accepted, including our pain. When we allow ourselves to be present to the pain, to listen to what it has to say, incredible changes can happen.
Simply close your eyes, stop fighting, and ask what the pain is saying to you, what does it need right now? Then become very quiet and listen deeply. An answer may not come right away. Patience is needed. This attitude is called making friends with the pain. Answers come in different ways. Some hear answers within. Others see images, some have dreams. In this process you learn to be open to all that comes and in this openness, you learn. As you do this process over and over, fear diminishes and changes that are needed often take place on their own naturally. Try and see.
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