Of Pain, Connection, and Process

We engage in reading, viewing works of art, listening to music, and attending the theatre in part to know that we are not alone, for in the strictly corporal sense we are alone. We exist moment by moment in our bodies separate from all others and from the world. While the separation cannot help but be a natural state of existence, it nevertheless causes pain, and, at times, acute pain. The pain, however, is not bad; actually, it doesn't relate to morality at all. The pain, like the separation, is a factor of our existence. And to deny pain and separation does nothing but lead to denying who we are.

We are supposed to experience the pain of being separate and to admit that experience, for the pain is the motivator to our seeking connections and relationships with other people and our world. Acknowledging our pain is necessary. The pain moves us into the process of becoming whole and healthy, of becoming ourselves. It motivates us to become vulnerable and take the risks of friendship, of love, of compassion, of exploring spirituality, and of building a relationship with God. Without the pain, we would not have the need to take the risks to connect outside ourselves.

But making connections has a price. When we choose to proceed with our own becoming by connecting outside ourselves, we risk experiencing the pain that exists outside ourselves. We discover that friendship, love, compassion, and a relationship with God are not without pain. When we connect in the purest sense, we experience the pain of others, of our world, and our God. But this, too, is healthy, for it is part of the process of becoming. The pain is part of those relationships and is part of living happy, vital lives.

When we deny our natural pain of existence, we are in danger of delving into illusion. We seek the illusion of safety by closing ourselves from others and from God so there would be no possibility of being hurt, of not only feeling the pain of our own existence but of being hurt by relationships. We surround ourselves by things and seek fulfillment in entertainment, social or monetary success, or even by a belief in God devoid of a relationship. We fool ourselves into thinking that pain is bad and it is not supposed to be a part of life. We think ourselves happy but at the same time experience a nagging sense of waste and need. Consequently, in order to attempt to dispel that nagging sense of waste, we constantly seek to eliminate all kinds of pain, sometimes to the extent that we become fascinated by violence. A nearly complete denial of our pain could very well result in ourselves being devoid of friendship, love, compassion, and a relationships with God, and we respond to our world with brutal violence.

But acknowledging pain as part of who we are as human beings empowers us to take the risk of self-becoming. This is different from being self-engrossed in the pain we feel due to life-situations. Becoming too deeply involved with our own pain as a result of living life may lead to a kind of violent self-infliction, from feeling guilty over a past that we cannot change, to feeling hatred toward those who have wronged us, to feeling the need to end our own lives. At times, we use our pain due to life-situations as a way to seek fulfillment by using our pain to gain attention or to create relationships in order to meet our own need. However, a focus on our pain due to our life experiences is often an attempt to deny pain and we may miss the reality that pain is a necessary part of our existence, of our life and living. If we become healthy and tune into our own process of becoming, however, the pain we experience by living life connects to our natural pain of separation and helps us become even more compassionate when we connect outside ourselves.

Self-becoming necessitates conflict resulting in balance. Fortunately, pain is not all we experience when we make connections to others, to our world, and to God. When we acknowledge the pain of our separation and make connections, our own pain becomes balanced with pure joy and ecstasy. Pain and joy are two conflicting elements of the same experience. To have one without the other is an illusion. The two balance each other, for while pain is the motivator, joy is the height of fulfillment. A person who is self-becoming has this balance. Furthermore, pain and joy are proportionally related: the greater or deeper the degree of pain we experience, the greater or deeper the degree of joy we experience. The interrelationship between pain and joy define balanced relationships with others, our world, and with God.

Relationships and connections, therefore, mean that we risk the joy of living life as well as the pain of suffering, loss, and death. We experience a caring for all living things, a compassion for all suffering people, and a relationship with God in which we do not attempt to dictate or control. A recent film, Shadowlands, is about a man who takes the risk of accepting pain as neither good nor bad but as a factor of living and existence and lives a fulfilled and vital life. As the author of that film states, the pain later on is part of the happiness now. It's the balance we must seek to proceed toward self-becoming. Sometimes, we need the help of Christ to bring us into balance, but that seems to be precisely what Christ has always tried to do for us.

Theatre has the potential to help us seek that balance. Theatre is about relationships, about making connections, and offers us an experience. However, theatre is safe. We experience life in the theatre without the danger of being hurt. We also experience connections in the theatre. Theatre, as does all art and literature, helps us know on a deeply profound level that we are not alone. Its reason for being relates to our need to explore ourselves in our world, for it directly addresses our natural pain of separation. By experiencing such connections in safety, we can experience them in life.

Copyright 1990 Debra Bruch

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