The key then is to understand what resistance to the pain we may be holding. Resistance to the pain comes from what we attach to the pain. Because pain is our body’s way to tell us to pay attention to something being wrong, we tend to attach several fears and anxieties to the experience of pain. The pain may trigger some deep belief which in turn creates fears and anxieties that are not so much about the pain itself, but about the underlying bigger issue that got triggered. That is what creates suffering.

I would like to offer examples of such fears and anxieties (and one possible underlying bigger issue) creating suffering:

1) I am aging and this pain is going to disable me into a dependent old person (fear of aging).

2) I am a failure if I keep having this pain (wanting to be perfect).

3) This pain means that I would not be able to do most of what I do now (fear of asking for help).

4) I am not disciplined enough to (or I don’t want to) do all the physical therapy exercises, so this is doomed (impatience or non-acceptance).

5) Why can’t some doctor just fix this problem! They don’t seem to have a clue and I hate this insurance setup. I hate all this. Pain — just go away (pattern of blaming external circumstances).

6) I want someone to coddle me and care about my pain. Why don’t they seem to care that much until I make a big drama (deep longing for love and caring)?

This resistance to the pain is sometimes conscious and sometimes it requires detective work exploring the psyche. Once this resistance and the underlying issue are correctly identified, there is a sense of clarity or a sense of relief. There is an experience of an “Aha” moment. Things make sense and then we know what we want to work on. The work may require separating the irrational part of the fear from the reality, acceptance, getting what we need and to stop the unjustifiable restrictions you may be putting on yourself.

A common question that comes up in reducing the resistance is, “Does this mean I just give up and accept the pain?” The answer is, “Not at all!” Identifying the resistance does not exclude investigating the cause of the pain or to work on reducing the pain by medical methods acceptable to you. Another common question about suffering and pain is this. Could the pain be created from past suffering? Could it be because of the “muscle memory” from a past trauma that can create pain? Yes, it is entirely possible. In such cases, some factor about the pain (location, magnitude or onset) cannot be explained by usual medical explanations. In such cases, it is essential to investigate any past trauma that could have led to the onset of the pain. Identifying and desensitizing the effect of the trauma helps in reducing the pain and the suffering both.

Physical pain creates psychological suffering, just the way psychological suffering can create physical pain. Investigate, get clarity and then work on the underlying issue. The existence of the physical pain can be used as a good opportunity to take us to a stronger and less fragile place.

For more by Swati Desai, Ph.D., LCSW, click here.

For more on consciousness, click here.

For more on chronic pain, click here.

Follow Swati Desai, Ph.D., LCSW on Twitter: www.twitter.com/SwatiMeditate

The number of self-help books on happiness has exploded. This drive towards spreading happiness is not surprising, given the fact that as the US became wealthier and more powerful, reported cases of depressed people increased.

Most of this advice gives pointers on how to be happy by not focusing on getting richer, by practicing gratitude, by giving up envy, by helping others, by reducing stress, by paying attention to small wonders around you, by changing the environment whenever it is under your control and practicing happy patience when it is not under your control, and most importantly by connecting to other human beings. Some tell you to “fake” happiness till you “make” it.

Let us for a moment pretend that everybody in the US practices the to-do-list on how to be happy and indeed becomes happy. We all learn to be mostly loving, kind, grateful, compassionate, un-envious form of happiness in the success of the others, optimistic, un-obsessive-overanalyzing, forgiving, virtuous, socially supportive, and mostly committed to practicing happiness within and without. The meaning in life can come from doing the best possible job of whatever is given to us, let it be cleaning toilets, parenting, or being a CEO. Does that sound as close to paradise as our world can get?

Somehow, most people are uneasy about this picture as well! Who would create great works of art, music, and literature? There would not be Van Gogh, Abraham Lincoln, Emily Dickinson, Beethoven, and Dostoevsky in our world. Great leaders, artists, scientists, and wealth-generators have not always been happy. In fact it seem these individuals created their work out of painful conflict and struggles with adversity.

Without envy and jealousy there would be no fire in the belly to do more and to make progress. All negative emotions have a purpose, and most of the time this purpose is physical and emotional survival. Some say that negative emotions are essential for evolution. Others say that practicing happiness generates complacency which in turn generates a lack of motivation for excellence. Some psychologists argue that personality structures are not so flexible and a pessimist cannot choose to be an optimist and it would be unfair to expect people to all fall into the same mold of being happy.

If we were a nation of happy people, would we be the super power? Would we have the best military and the best weapons? Would we be able to defend ourselves against the aggression of other countries? Does that mean we need to wait for the whole world to be happy first, before we decide not to be zealous about being powerful? Is the self-protective mode, in this world in which cruelty exists, necessarily a happy state of mind? Is a happy state of mind capable of defending against external aggression?

Yet as much as we admire and appreciate great works by great people, if we are asked a question: “Do you want your child to have a happy, safe, and good life or be extremely gifted and yet have a life full of unhappiness?”, most parents will choose a happy, safe, and good life for their children.

What this suggests is the following. We understand the importance of having unusually gifted (albeit unhappy) people and the inevitability of defending against the cruelty in the world (by being a cruel aggressor yourself). However, we do not want to be one of them. If the world has to be divided into two groups of people, we would much rather belong to the happy side, the ones reaping the benefits of the unhappiness from the unhappily gifted and the cruel aggressive defenders!

This is what I suggest. When you are unhappy, let it stay for a while and consider what “purpose” this unhappiness is there to “serve”. Take your own sweet time to stay unhappy. Then allow it to serve its purpose, play out its role, before getting in a hurry to ward it off. This means that being unhappy could in fact make you excited that you are on to the next best thing in life. This is the importance of being unhappy!

Episode 3 from the ten part series on CNBC TV-18 about Good Relationships.

When I first started studying Buddhist Psychology, Buddha’s Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path toward enlightenment, beyond the rules and the analysis, there was one thing that was striking about all the teachings. This one thing, which is supposed to be the foundational stone before one begins to internalize the teachings, is COMPASSION.

“If what I hear about your powers is all true, then bring my son back to life”

Unable to bear the intense pain of her son’s death, Gautami had gone to the Buddha to asked him to revive him. Buddha asked her to fulfill one condition before he could do what she wanted. “Bring me one sesame seed from any household in town where there has been no death.” Gautami followed his admonition, combing the whole town. She returned exhausted, without the sesame seed Buddha had requested. She understood what he was trying to teach her. There is no household without the pain of loss. Human lives—no matter how good or prosperous—do encounter difficult and trying times at some point.

This universality of human pain had set Buddha out to look for an answer to the question of how to alleviate the pain, until he found enlightenment in the form of The Four Noble Truths and The Eightfold Path toward enlightenment.

The more I paid attention to this fundamental idea and attempted to truly understand the implications of compassion, I found myself delighted and inspired. The idea of having compassion for the world around us exists in several religious, philosophical, psychological, and humanistic teachings. However, in Buddhist meditations, the art and technique of cultivating compassion is so well developed, and such an integral part of the Buddhist lifestyle, that I could not help but be amazed by its power.

Compassion and Suffering

Dalai Lama defines Compassion as wishing that oneself and others be free from suffering. As a psychotherapist, and as part of any helping/healing profession, the ability to hold compassion is what motivates us to go to work every day and enables us to witness unbearable pain.

Compassion For Self

For those who are not in a helping/healing profession, holding compassion for oneself (self-compassion), and for others(for the difficult emotions of fear, anger, shame, guilt, loneliness, confusion), makes the world around them a better place to live. The non-judgmental view of the humanness of our condition, makes them better parents, better friends, less critical of themselves, and better global citizens.

Compassion and Freedom

Compassion makes all teachings and rules less dogmatic, more human, and more realistic. The definition of compassion, the wish to be free from suffering, makes it possible to hold it even for the most sociopathic elements in our world.

What Compassion Isn’t

One very important understanding of compassion is the following. It is not simply a sugary sweet way of talking or being. It is not a lame excuse for inaction. It is not condoning acts of violence. Compassion is a force. Compassion changes the impulsive way you would take action against injustice. Compassion gives you a more effective and long-term way to overcome the perils of your life. Compassion is not bleeding-heart pity for others, nor it is a feel-good act of giving money away. Compassion is a world view that we are all in it together, that we all make mistakes that we have a right to correct. Cruelty and inconsideration can be replaced with strength, instead of striking back with the same cruelty.

Compassion Is Tricky

Thinking about compassion in extreme and politically jaded and violent situations (crimes, terrorism, war, and so on) becomes tricky. I’ll leave this one to the masters, however, one thing I can absolutely promise, in your personal life—toward spouses, kids, friends, acquaintances, service people—learning to hold the right type of compassion will enhance the quality of the world around you to an unlimited degree!

Are you a married couple with children, often times considering divorce as a way towards freedom from all the scary compromises you have to make? Are you not yet doing it just because keeping a marriage is a value to you? Are you wondering if it is all worth it?

I have some “Grandmotherly old-fashioned” advice for you, with one difference; I am going to support it with “evidence”. The advice is: “stick it out” till the last drop of your blood! Dramatic? Yes, it is! However, it makes a point: wait it out for the longest time, even if it means going through years of overwhelming dissatisfaction.

First I want to present evidence that you are not alone in experiencing a post-children reduced sense of well-being. Your dissatisfaction with the post-children marital relationship is a growing trend in our modern and increasingly individualistic society, getting worse with each generation. This is a conclusion reached by a study conducted by the psychologists Campbell and Twenge, in 2003. This dip in the marital satisfaction and sense of well-being is well supported in academic research as reported by the 2008 NPR program “Kids may not be bundles of joy”, the 2010 popular New York Magazine article “All Joy and No Fun”, and 2011 report “The Global Perspective on Happiness and Fertility” presenting a study conducted in 86 countries ranging from Tanzania and El Salvador to the US and France.

This evidence may make you realize that you are probably going through a perfectly normal phase in your marital life, so you can simply relax, take a breather, and think about the next two pieces of evidence that support my advise to stick it out for the longest period.

First, a major scholarly study released by University of Chicago sociologists challenges the assumption that staying in an unhappy marriage is asking for misery forever and getting out of this marriage will mean happiness in the long run. Not so simple! This study concludes that the people who divorce are not necessarily happier than the ones who choose to stay. More interestingly, two thirds of the ones who stay in the unhappy marriage reported being happy in their marriage five years later. The increase in marital satisfaction is especially true for couples who reported their marriages as “very unhappy” and still stayed together!

Second, along with the above result, consider that a decade old long-term study from UC Berkley shows that as a couple moves into older age, the marital satisfaction increases, possibly because children leave the nest to be independent.

Both these findings together suggest: it may be worth staying together, not just for kids, or for financial reasons, but for the increased sense of marital happiness awaiting you.

As a couple’s therapist I would like to suggest keeping a few key points in mind as you wait it out. This makes the current wait easier and the future increased marital satisfaction more meaningful.

1)     Make it into an “active” waiting it out, not simply numbing you down.

2)     Active wait would mean a few different things: sometimes letting go of your demand, sometimes looking for a different way to communicate your demand to your partner till you find the right way, and sometimes looking for other ways to satisfy your “personal” needs bucket.

3)     Active wait may include arguments, sometimes too intense, but that is better than numbing down everything. Just keep it away from children as a “must” rule.

4)     Look for ways to keep at least some sexual intimacy alive. Never give up on that completely.

5)     Reorient yourself to the “meaning” your kids bring to you! In spite of the literature pouring out of academic circles on the reduced sense of well being while raising young or adolescent children, most parents think of their children as the most meaningful thing that has happened to them. Whether raising kids takes a toll on the marriage or not, it creates a fiercely protective, all engaging, and “primal” joy, as chronicled in “Parenting and Happiness Pair Well Despite What You Read” published in Politics Daily. What this suggests is that your life has a source of meaning and joy, a potential antidote to allow you to go through the troubled marriage for some time.

Make the process All Joy and Some Fun!

Download the Original article in PDF.