Within Pain & Love

One of my themes for this year (still working on my 2017 goals and personal mission statement…), is integration. As a research scientist, I’ve found that many times a problem that hasn’t been solved in one domain has already been solved in another domain. However, the people working in each domain either don’t know that the solution exists in the other domain, or what I think is more common, is that language, schema, or words used to name and describe the problems/solutions are enough different that folks from one domain do not realize that folks from another domain are talking about the same thing. Anyway…I’ve found a lot of utility of taking something from one domain, and applying (often with small tweaks) to another domain.

I see the same thing with the leadership, productivity, and life books that I read. There are common themes that pop-up. One such “integration” is a theme that showed up in the book “Love Warrior” by Glennon Doyle Melton and Victor Frankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning.” Love Warrior is Glennon’s story about growing-up, feeling like she didn’t fit in, forming some bad habits to kill the pain and discomfort, and then coming full-circle to realize that most people have similar struggles (but most don’t talk about it), and that the path to healing is through pain and love. On the other hand, Frankl’s book is about his experience/survival of the concentration camps, where he literally loses everything in his life, and in the process he realizes that within those terrifying and painful moments it is hope and love that get them through.

In both stories there is an underlying (put perhaps buried theme) that

I have to say that within my own life, I have found this to be so very true. And as I move forward into the near year, when I find myself in pain rather than running away from the pain (most often with something negative like stress eating or drinking) I will first acknowledge the pain and look at it as an opportunity to grow…I will let you know how it goes, as with everything, this (AKA, my life) is a work in progress.