No pain, no gain.
It's one of those sayings that we've heard so many times that it's lost all meaning whatsoever. But, it's so true. In a way that is hard to connect with... until suddenly you do. This week I've been thinking about my relationship with pain and how I might be able to leverage it to better serve me. This all began when I was at the gym, the place where most of us experience pain that we wouldn't otherwise on a day-to-day basis. Generally speaking, pain is something we try to avoid at all cost. Even if we shouldn't.
Earlier this week, I noticed something. Even though I was well rested, uninjured, fighting fit and reading to go - I didn't do that well at the gym. I didn't increase my weights, I didn't try as hard as I could've, I didn't push myself. It seemed odd to me. Surely the circumstance was rife with opportunity for me to excel? You see, the week earlier when I went to the gym, the opposite happened. I was in a world of hormonal pain, I was tired, sluggish and really out of sorts. But something magical happened. I totally smashed it at the gym. I upped my weights, I pushed harder, and just generally Schwarzeneggered the crap outta it.
Why?
I pondered on this for a little while, and then it occurred to me. It's all about pain. In Situation A: I'm painless, and therefore find it difficult to initiate the pain and work hard at the gym, causing pain that I want to avoid. Situation B: I'm already in a lot of pain, so working hard at the gym is easy because adding a little bit more pain to the pile makes no difference. Does that make sense? My brain seemed to lump existence into 2 categories, in pain and not in pain. There was no middle ground. So if I'm in a little bit of pain, I may as well be in more pain and therefore make hectic gains at the gym (bruh). Whereas in a state of no-pain means that my brain wanted to keep it that way at all cost.
This made a lot of sense to me, and not just in a gym related context. It made me think about the rest of life, and how often times when people have gone through hardship, difficult circumstances or any other kind of 'pain' - they often seem to try a lot harder than people who are (for lack of a better term) fine. I hope that makes sense to someone other than me. Those of us that are used to pain, or more comfortable with the idea of pain, are more likely to end up actually gaining something positive from it. Whereas those of us who are not so familiar with pain, might find themselves missing out on the positive gains made from pains.
For instance, taking a risk in business and failing - is painful. But you learn a lot from failure, even if it is painful. And eventually you have a win based on all the experience and pain you've been through. Or asking out a crush and getting rejected - painful as all heck. But hey, if you never risk the pain you never chance the gain. Ya dig? I'd love to hear some examples of pain/gain you've experienced in your life, drop it in the comments below!
---
Thanks so much for reading this blog post! Have a browse on my website and check out all the different artworks I've created recently - you can even find these highly limited necklaces featuring my artwork!
