Our pain is not the poison; the lies about the pain are

Most of the messages we receive every day are from people selling easy buttons. Marketers need us to believe that our pain is a mistake that can be solved with their product. And so they ask, Feel lonely? Feel Sad? Life hard? Well that's certainly not because life can be lonely and sad and hard, so everybody feels that way. No, it's because you don't have this toy, these jeans, this hair, these countertops, this ice cream, this booze, this woman . . . fix your hot loneliness with THIS. So we consume and consume but it never works, because you can never get enough of what you don't need. The world tells us a story about our hot loneliness so that we'll buy their easy button forever. We accept this story as truth because we don't realize that their story is the poison in our air. Our pain is not the poison; the lies about the pain are. 

Craig and I have spent our lives breathing the same poisonous air. Along the way, we've internalized the lies: You are supposed to be happy all the time. Everybody else is! Avoid the pain! You don't need it, it's not meant for you. Just push this button. Finally, I was being quiet and still enough to hear the truth: You are not supposed to be happy all the time. Life hurts and it's hard. Not because you are doing it wrong, but because it hurts for everybody. Don't avoid the pain. You need it. It's meant for you. Be still with it, let it come, let it go, let it leave you with the fuel you'll burn to get your work done on this earth.

Glennon Doyle Melton, Love Warrior (p 203)