Necessary Pain, Unnecessary Suffering

“If you stop thinking about how to get out of the body that may be painful or how to keep the body that is pain-free, you get to experience the truth.”

Physical pain is an essential aspect of life that serves the survival and well-being of the body, but we can easily turn the necessary pain that alerts us to injury and illness into unnecessary suffering. What is the difference between pain and suffering? What can physical pain reveal to us when we meet it directly?

Transcript

I am not a pain doctor,

But I am a suffering doctor,

And I know that the medicine for suffering is to turn and go into the pain.

As long as there is a resistance and a running in the mind,

Running from the pain,

There is suffering.

Hello and welcome to Being Yourself,

Self Inquiry with Gangaji.

My name is Barbara Denempont.

This month,

My inspiration for the podcast comes directly from my own life.

I had a bit of a health crisis in the last few weeks,

And I'm fine,

I'm recovered.

But it was definitely a moment of dealing with some significant pain,

Being hospitalized.

And one of the things that happened as I left the hospital and I came home is I was saying to Gangaji how grateful I was for all the wonderful care that I received and all the support that I received.

And at the end of that exchange,

I said,

And you know,

I'm grateful for the pain.

It was a lot of pain,

Let's just say that.

It was a lot of pain,

But I was grateful for the pain.

And she wrote back and said,

Yes,

Holy attention getter.

So there is this essential role that we know pain plays in our lives.

But so much of our lives can be spent trying to avoid pain or get rid of pain.

Now I understand with physical pain,

You know,

You take medication,

You know,

You try to heal things,

You fix things.

But there still is a difference between meeting that physical pain and suffering that physical pain.

And that's what I wanted to get to this month.

So I have found a wonderful exchange that dives directly into what it is to meet physical pain.

Hi.

Hi.

I've never seen you before,

But I've heard a tape and you seem like a wise person.

So I thought I would ask you something.

Okay.

Yes.

Okay.

All right.

I'm not afraid to make a fool of myself.

Oh,

Good.

Um,

I was wondering what you do with,

Um,

Okay,

I have a physical pain condition and I've done a lot of physical,

A lot of spiritual work,

But I can't seem to get around it.

What is the pain situation?

Well,

I just have a lot of pain and it's just seems to be what I've come into this life with,

You know,

And I know that I'm more than the pain,

You know.

How do you know that?

I've experienced it.

Well,

That's beautiful,

Isn't it?

And you do what you can do to take care of the pain?

Yeah.

And it's just like,

It won't go away?

Then the pain has something to teach you that you have not.

.

.

It's already taught me something.

No,

No.

Yes,

I understand it's already taught you,

But there is something waiting inside it.

I'm not saying the pain will ever go away.

I don't know that it will go away.

Some bodies have pain throughout their lives,

But I know that the suffering around the pain is some resistance to what the pain is offering.

And not even that it came to offer that.

I'm not speaking in a metaphysical way.

It's just I'm speaking about the possibility of actually meeting the pain,

Not going around it.

Going right into it.

Yeah,

I've done that sometimes.

And what happens?

It can momentarily bring peace.

It brings the peace?

Yeah,

But it doesn't go away.

What brings the peace?

Yes,

But there's peace.

So in momentarily,

In moments that you have experienced,

If I'm understanding you correctly,

When you stop resisting the pain,

You actually go into the pain,

There's peace.

There has been,

Yes.

There has been peace,

Right.

Yeah.

So the pain doesn't have to go away for there to be the recognition of peace.

Is that right?

I don't want to feed you your lines.

Say it again.

So the pain doesn't have to go away for there to be a recognition of peace.

Yeah,

That's true.

So then the question is,

What do you want most?

And in this case,

Not in all cases,

But in this case,

Let us say that,

Do you want most for the pain to go away or most for there to be peace?

That's a hard question,

I can appreciate it.

So,

Before you answer,

If the pain goes away,

What is it you will get?

I don't know.

Well,

You must have some idea.

If I'm rid of this pain,

Then I will have.

.

.

I can't say peace because I don't know that.

But isn't that what you hope?

Yeah,

But it seems like when you get something that you hope you,

Or you think you want that will make everything right,

Then as soon as you get it,

Then there's something else to fill its place.

That's right.

That's wisdom of,

That's maturity.

But if you will examine that your hopes and your energy of getting rid of this pain has to do with wanting peace to be in the way it is.

You want the pain out and peace there.

But you've just told me that in moments in the past,

Where for some reason,

Through grace or exhaustion or whatever,

You stopped fighting the pain,

You stopped trying to get rid of the pain so that you can get whatever will be there when the pain's not there.

You just go into the pain,

There is peace.

Problem is,

Is I live in a physical body,

You know.

I mean,

I can't always go into the pain.

How long does it take?

Are you aware of the pain right now?

Uh-huh.

Let's go in it together then.

Okay.

Where is it?

Various parts.

Shoulders,

Neck,

Head,

Knees.

Pick one of those spots.

Okay.

But not to get rid of it.

This is not an exercise in getting rid of it.

There are plenty of exercises to get rid of it and some work,

And they can be learned and they're useful and I have nothing against them.

But that's not what this is.

Uh-huh.

This is an exercise in not getting rid of it.

Okay.

Okay?

This is an exercise in going into the very core of it.

Okay.

Are you there?

Uh-huh.

How long did it take?

Not long.

Less than a second.

Uh-huh.

What's there?

What's in the core?

Fear.

Fear.

So now we have a deeper core.

Let us go into that fear.

Not to get rid of it.

This is an exercise in not getting rid of the fear.

Okay.

Just going right into it.

What are you experiencing?

Peace.

How long did that take?

Not long.

So let's go into the peace.

Not to keep it.

Not to keep it.

This is an exercise to see if you can get rid of it by going into it.

I don't want to get rid of it.

Yes,

I understand.

Just like you didn't want to go into the fear or into the pain.

So this is like counter-intuitive.

It's counter what we have learned as organisms,

Usefully learned,

To avoid pain,

To avoid fear,

To listen to fear,

Because that's been part of the survival mechanism.

But in our meeting tonight,

We are more concerned with what's eternally true than we are with particular survival.

So when you go into this peace,

Not to keep it,

Just to meet it.

What's your experience?

I went into my head.

But you know the difference,

Don't you?

That's excellent,

That's all that's required.

That's called discriminating wisdom.

That means you can tell the truth and you just told the truth.

So you attended to your thoughts.

But did the peace go anywhere when you attended to your thoughts?

Now you can check that out.

Because really the whole point of this is,

Does the peace come and go when thoughts come and go?

I recognize that experience of the peace may come and go.

But I'm speaking of,

Does peace itself come and go?

Experiences by their nature come and go.

I'm not a pain doctor,

But I am a suffering doctor.

And I know that the medicine for suffering is to turn and go into the pain.

As long as there is a resistance and a running in the mind,

Running from the pain,

There's suffering.

And this suffering has a past and it has a projected future.

But in the willingness to stop and inquire,

Either who is suffering or what is in this pain,

The mind loses past and future.

And what is real and true is revealed.

So we have the experience of many different kinds of bodies.

And some bodies are extraordinarily healthy and have very little pain.

And some bodies are extraordinarily sensitive and have quite a bit of pain.

Physical pain,

Emotional pain,

Circumstantial pain.

And this is across the board.

Rich,

Poor,

All races,

All tribes,

All nations.

That's just the variety of life.

The activity of mind in either trying to keep a particular type body or get a particular type body is suffering.

In this body that you have thought you are,

In the core of this body,

Whatever type of body it is,

A sensitive,

Painful body or a healthy,

Painless body,

It doesn't matter,

In the core there is the space that is peace.

And if you stop thinking about how to get out of the body that may be painful or how to keep the body that is pain-free,

You get to experience the truth.

So that's self-inquiry using pain.

I thank you.

Got a little bit of peace here yourself.

Just sitting here,

Yeah,

I see what that guy meant.

Yeah,

Right?

Sit a little longer,

Look out at them so they can see what I see in your eyes.

Show them your,

What I'm seeing.

Keep,

Keep looking.

This is intense.

Yeah,

Yeah,

You just stay with it.

It gets intense sometimes.

It gets painful sometimes.

Then it gets even more intense.

Just stay with it.

You are listening to what is deeper.

Or you can listen to what is deeper.

You have the invitation to listen deeper,

To hear deeper,

Regardless of what is happening physically,

Mentally,

Emotionally,

Circumstantially.

This is your birthright.

This has always been with you,

This capacity.

But in our culture it is not fostered.

Nevertheless,

It is still here.

What are you experiencing now?

A little embarrassment,

But pretty peaceful.

So let yourself be even more embarrassed,

And see if the peace gets smaller or bigger.

You make an offering of yourself up here,

That's why I keep directing you to,

To see what is receiving your offering,

So that you can receive that.

Then we will have met one another.

I feel met.

Yes.

And once you really recognize you are met,

Then you can meet whatever appears.

This I promise.

This is the issue.

Are you willing to see deeper?

Right now.

And I don't mean see like imagery.

Are you willing to be deeper?

There is no end to the depth.

There is a beginning and an end to everything.

But the depth of your being is no thing.

It is the presence of God.

It is endless.

It is your own self.

Reviews

Amazing!

Thank you 🙏

Wonderfull! Thank you for your wisdom! 🙏🏼