Pain

[ChristinaTherese]

So, I'm not sure this is directly related to religious life or even slightly related to it specifically, but this feels like the right place to put it. If you want to move it, mods, I would only stick the caveat AugustineA put at the end of his post about sympathies: I'm not sure if it would be taken seriously anywhere else. Anyway, now that I'm done with the caveat:

 

So, pain exists and I generally moan and groan and complain about it. And then sometimes, I decide to be nice and saintly and offer up dealing with it like a decent mature person, because it isn't much but it is something. Ridiculously often, the pain goes away when I do this. Like, I'll decide that I'll offer up the orchestra rehearsal with a migraine and the migraine doesn't bother me again during or after rehearsal. Am I crazy? Has this ever happened to any of you? It seems so weird... in a way, although I might be able to explain it. But, basically, am I alone in this experience or not?

[maximillion]

Not by any means.

 

There are two possible explanations, - they may be linked!

 

In pain clinics and for professionals helping people to deal with chronic unremitting pain, often the person obtains a measure of relief once they have learned to stop fighting the pain, to relax and accept it. Perhaps when you offer it up this is in part what you are doing, whereas when you don't offer it up it continues to be something you are resisting.

Resistance causes tension -> tension = more/protracted pain.

 

This for me has always been an area where my faith as a Catholic and the science of pain relief knit so wonderfully together. Persons who have no believe have no thoughts of offering their suffering for the salvation of souls or for any other cause, so it is incredibly hard to facilitate this relaxation and acceptance. To them it feels as if I am asking them to suffer needlessly........

 

Praise God for faith and for so many opportunities for indicating that this has a direct, efficacious and positive effect in our lives.

[AnneLine]

Max, sometimes I think you and I are linked at the hip.....    :buddies:   I was about to say roughly the same thing.

[Credo in Deum]

I have found when I consent and offer up a particular trial to God, and stop worrying about how bad it is going to be, I usually find I'm given the grace to get passed it with less pain than I had expected.  This has shown me that worrying about how painful something is going to be creates more suffering than the pain itself, and that my expectations should not be taken as the reality of how things will be.  God is Reality, and His yoke is easy and His burden light.  God doesn't cause half as much suffering as our own will. 

 

 

 

[Mary's Margaret]

Christina Therese, I too live with chronic pain, the result of several car accidents. Sometimes, when I offer it for souls or for someone's suffering, I notice my pain is lifted.  It doesn't happen every time, but when it does it's like God's saying thank-you for my little offering and encouraging me to continue offering all for the salvation of souls.  In this way, God protects us from the temptation to use our offering as a 'magic button' to alleviate our own suffering by.