In order to grow, learn and move on, there is no getting around pain. Pain must be experienced and felt, not avoided especially if we are going through a loss of some kind. If we don’t take the time to mourn our losses, experience them and process them, they will linger on longer and we shall learn nothing from the experience or ourselves.

We all experience pain differently and deal with it differently, but I’ve learnt that pain that is ignored through avoidance of some sort, be it drugs or by any other means, will keep us stuck and perhaps full of rage, sadness and grief that will inevitably come up at some time in the future, and it will be probably worse.

I’ve realized that talking it out, sitting with it and feeling it, coupled with a good cry, helps me get through tough times much faster, and in the long run, makes the experience more bearable.

It is human to feel deep sadness after a loss, it’s inhuman not to. Sadness is part of life and makes us more compassionate as we become much more empathetic. After having experienced what others have, I have often heard myself say: “Now, I understand his or her pain.”

I don’t mean to say we should wallow in the pain, but simply feel it when it comes, and just as it came it will go away slowly. Sometimes like the ebb and flow of waves, the pain will come and go, but eventually it will become more like a quiet lake with only ripples that someday will make us smile and say: “I got through that too.”