[15/30] Comfort

I sometimes give pain more credit than it deserves. And it can be any type, physical or mental. I work so hard to avoid it that I probably cause myself more suffering in the process.

Looking back, the most turbulent times in my life sucked. But I always got the best lessons from them. Mostly I understood myself better. It’s almost cathartic. And even though it is unbelievably uncomfortable, the pain of the moment always fades but the lessons stick with me. Yet, the fear of feeling that pain again drives me more than the lessons.

I tell myself, “Okay, I learned a lot, but let’s not do that again,” and then spend all my energy trying to avoid similar situations.

But some lessons only come through discomfort. They don’t say trial by fire for nothing.

And I think I am actually pretty good at putting myself in discomfort for the sake of progress. This writing experiment is one example, creating any kind of content publicly, to me, is a scary thought. Less scary now that I have been doing it for awhile but still scary nonetheless.

Lately, I’ve been in a lot of “pain.” Not in an abusive kind of way, but it's more mental. Work has been so busy that it has pulled me away from my goal of independence. It's frustrating, and my first reaction is resentment. I start resenting people for making me do something I don’t want to do.

Then I move into acceptance, going numb to the fact that I don’t want to do it. And then for some reason, I start enjoying it. I take ownership of the work, dig into the complexity, and end up delivering something I’m proud of.

It happens almost every time someone makes me do something I don’t want to do.

So as much as I resist it in the moment because honestly the discomfort is really hard to explain and tolerate. I can see that discomfort has shaped me more than anything else which is the normal human experience I think.

It makes me wonder if I am putting myself in enough discomfort. That I should do more uncomfortable things for the sake of progress.

Should I put myself into more situations like that on purpose? Even when every part of me doesn’t want to? If so, then how ? Maybe I need someone else to force me to do the things I don’t want to.