Kindness in the Face of Pain

I suffer from chronic pain. Backaches, headaches, stomach cramps - any given day, I’m bound to be dealing with one or more of these. It stems from a lot of different factors: the stooped posture granted me by my profession, the severe anxiety disorder I live with, the food intolerances I’m just beginning to understand. And the pain itself is bad, obviously, but it’s something you acclimate yourself to. You come to expect it, and thanks to that expectation, the pain becomes just another facet cut into your life. Days without pain are a gift, a treasure, and when things get bad, you can grit your teeth and envision those wonderful, painless days. Don’t worry, you can tell yourself. Another is bound to come along soon.

In truth, there are all sorts of strategies you can use to cope with the physical aspect of chronic pain. Meditation, medication, distraction, positive thinking, mindful acceptance that this is just How Things Are For Now: I’m a devout practitioner of these disciplines. None of them will get you all the way to a pain-free life, but all help. Something that all too often flies under the radar, however, is the toll that chronic pain exacts on your emotions - your interpersonal relationships - your “soul,” for lack of a better term. When pain becomes the rule, rather than the exception, it begins to leak from body to soul, and that can have dire consequences.

I like to think that, in each of us, there is a little monument to the person we’d like to be. Like a little statue, carefully hewn from soul-stuff, that stands point-of-pride, right smack in the middle of us. It’s something we can look to when we feel lost, and by studying its form, we can begin to mold ourselves into something of its semblance. That process - that molding - takes time and energy. It takes focus, drive, and perseverance. And pain gets in the way.

Let’s talk about my ideal self. My “monument.” I want to be an author, obviously, or else I wouldn’t be writing all this. I want to be respected, to some degree. I want to be loved. But most of all, at the core of the core of that idealized self-portrait, lies the desire to be a kind man. And to be seen as a kind man, because that perception brings with it the ultimate freedom; the kind man is granted passage into the deepest, most sacred chambers of the human experience. The kind man is allowed to witness things the selfish man can only dream of.

And pain gets in the way.

Pain wrecks kindness. I’ve felt it, deep in the core of me, gnawing away at my ideal self. It trips certain wires in our brain, telling us: “Now is not the time to be kind. Look after yourself, and only yourself. When the pain is gone, then you can be kind again.” But for me - and for about 20% of the American population - the pain is never gone. When we are not in pain, we are bracing for pain, and that triggers feelings of anxiety within us. We clam up, hide out, batten down the hatches. Our brains think that to focus on another is to ignore the self. But here’s the thing - kindness, compassion, caring for another: these are virtues, yes, but they are also methods of insulating ourselves from the negative attitudes and behaviors brought about by conditions such as mine.

I recently stumbled across a study from Leeds University, which mentioned that a single 20-minute session of loving-kindness meditation (a discipline focused around projecting love towards others, so that you might project that same love inwards, towards yourself) can successfully and substantially reduce the pain and tension experienced by chronic migraine sufferers. Loving-kindness meditation is also mentioned in the article as providing a boosted sense of well-being, as well as reducing rates of stress, anxiety, and catastrophizing. The name of the game, it seems, is self-compassion. And self-compassion is best cultivated by showing compassion towards others. When kindness becomes a reflex, it’s a simple matter to turn it back upon yourself, and to reap its many benefits.

So, if you’re out there suffering from chronic pain like I am, and if your brain, like mine, is trying to turn you into a self-consumed automaton of pain and misery, just try doing something nice for someone. Compliment them on something unexpected. Help them with a task, if you’re able. Feed them, house them, clothe them. It sounds simple - silly, even - but caring for others is how we learn to care for ourselves. It takes courage to live with pain, and even more to show kindness when pain doesn’t want us to. So be courageous. Show your pain that it does not rule your life. Stand up in its face, turn your back to it, and ease the pain of another.