How Can I Be Thankful for Pain?

Thanksgiving hits some sharp notes for so many of us this year.

What are we supposed to be thankful for in a year of tumult, solitude, restriction and change?

If you are reading this – it is most likely because someone you dearly love has died. HOW does one begin to feel “thankful” for a loss so great that we wonder if we’ll ever be happy again?

How can we be thankful for pain?

Well, I don’t know that we can exactly be thankful for it. When it comes to death, there is no consolation or reason to be found that justifies the loss. Your loved one didn’t die “for a reason” and there’s nothing you can do to make their death “worth it”.

But humans are remarkable with pain – we suffer it – it changes us – and somewhere along the way we get to choose what to do with how it changes us.

This innate ability to transform pain and damage into something new and meaningful is the human way to hope.  We can take horrible things and create ways to help. So many ministries, charities, helpers and guides exist in our world because of the power of transformation. 

The process of transformation can gradually happen over time and it can be helped with intentional steps.

If you are looking to give your pain and grief a direction, try asking some of these questions:

• What will come of the situation as it is?
• What can I make this into?
• How has this/is this changing me?
• What good can I bring out of this?
• Is there something I could do that would bring me some peace?

These questions are generic but the answers to them can begin to add shape and an idea of what might lie ahead. Know this; transformation will not diminish your grief or “solve” it. There isn’t a way out – but transformation can give you hope of a way through.