So you know how much fun it is to play the pain game? Like when we look at other people and think how much better or worse we have it when compared to them? And when we win we also lose because either we have more pain and that sucks, or we have less pain and therefore less right to feel justified in our misery?

Pain is not really quantifiable, and therefore setting up inequalities seems a rather fruitless enterprise. There’s no way to measure how a negative experience will affect one person versus another, let alone the impact of different types of experiences. Comparing pain just isn’t possible.

But of course, we still do it all the time. We want justification for our unhappiness. We want to feel like we deserve to be unhappy. That we’ve earned it. And so this means looking at other people for cues. If that person is unhappy because of this, then certainly I’m allowed to feel unhappy because of that. Or if I am able to cope with this event, then why can’t that person? Why are they making such a big deal of their pain when I’m doing everything in my power to minimize the damage and keep it out of sight?

And so we become invested in other people being hurt. We can feel good when we know they are more damaged than us. Or feel bad because they are coping with something so much better. We judge and judge and judge some more. Deciding when people have a right to behave in a certain way and when they are “over-reacting” or “milking it” or “being melodramatic” or “just doing it for the attention.” And all the while we ignore that all that bullshit is irrelevant, because that person is in pain so the only thing that matters is how they can find a way to heal.

Really, we should not need to play games with our pain. Because we know how it feels when people are measuring themselves based off of us, and when they are comparing our pain in order to judge us. And it fucking sucks. When people assume that they have had similar experiences that they have “handled better” and so they somehow have the right to tell us how to deal with things. Pain is not something that requires any justification, we can just feel it when we feel it, and handle it however we choose to handle it.

So pain is not a worthwhile investment. We can’t win or lose at the pain game, because it just sucks for everyone. Instead of spending our time trying to be better or worse at suffering, we could spend that effort working in tandem to heal each other’s hurts. And rather than splashing about in our separate misery puddles, we could seek to soak them up together.

So you know how people fuck you over again and again? And how sometimes there’s nothing you can do to stop it, but at least afterwards you can get high off your own anger and resentment? How everyone makes such a big deal about forgiving, but ultimately it can just feel so good to hold on to the hurt?

Damn it’s so sickeningly sweet. Saturating yourself in feelings of being “justified” and bathing in your puddles of pain and misery. It can be delicious. It can be addictive.

And in the end, it can be utterly useless and detrimental. Because holding onto to the pain damages exactly one person: you. Well maybe a couple of other people too if your hurt ends up happening all over everyone around you. It’s not like the person you’re angry at is affected by your pain. Even if you choose to exact some sort of revenge, the pain you cause them is just new pain, not a direct extension of your own. People can hurt other people, but everyone experiences hurt on their own and in their own way. Nothing you do will ever cause a person to “feel your pain” because it’s only yours.

That being said, hurting other people can have an impact on your own experience of your pain. Sometimes it makes it worse because you may feel guilty or ashamed, and sometimes it relieves it because you may get a sort of release from victimizing others.  It’s worth knowing that while strategies that cause further pain to others may allow for that short term release of your pain, they don’t resolve it, so the pain will just keep returning. Ultimately, everyone finds their own strategies for managing pain. The question is whether or not you will choose to seek out strategies that help you to deal with the hurt and truly move on. Because it is a choice to heal, and while not everyone chooses in their best interests, you can.

That is where the whole forgiveness thing comes in. Because at its heart, forgiving isn’t forgetting about what people do, or accepting what they do, or even understanding what they do. Forgiving is about finding ways to release your pain. It is when you look at another person, and realize that while you were not responsible for the hurt they caused, you get to choose whether or not you want to try to release it without causing any further harm to yourself or others. Forgiving is recognizing that while other people are responsible for the damage, you are still the one who has to deal with the mess, so you might as well clean it up in addition to whatever else you decide to do. Because you can forgive and still choose to dislike someone, or want to hurt someone, or to not understand someone, or to not accept someone.

So forgiveness is for your own sake. It’s for you to be able to heal, and so fuck whatever caused the pain in the first place. It doesn’t mean there are no scars. It doesn’t mean that you let go of everything and just forget about what happened. It does mean you get to find your own way of moving forward.

So you know how human beings are disgusting, cruel creatures? How they murder, rape, pillage, lie, cheat, steal, and just look really ugly when eating stuff? And no matter how much you try to ignore that you too are human, it’s just an inescapable fact?

Don’t worry, it’s not your fault. It’s “God’s.” “God” is in quotation marks because it’s too much of a hassle to try and discuss all religion and philosophy in a six paragraph essay. In this case, “God” is whatever the fuck is responsible for humans being what humans are.

You’re not particularly flawed if you’re disgusting and cruel. You’re human. And when you see those characteristics in yourself and others, and feel contempt for all humanity, you’re right on the money. Because human beings do a lot of fucked up shit. Since presumably you are a human, you are capable of doing a lot of fucked up shit too, and in fact, you have probably done plenty of asshole things worth being more than slightly ashamed of. Maybe even worth some guilt.

When people try and tell you about all the good shit that human beings do, they’re completely missing the point. When they focus on charity and love and selfless acts and all that rainbow bullshit, they don’t seem to get that all does nothing to erase pain and hurt and conflict.

Then again, when you focus on the pain and hurt and conflict, you don’t seem to get that all that does nothing to erase the charity and love and selfless acts and all that rainbow bullshit. Nothing can wipe out the flaws of human kind. There’s a cruelty button in everyone that’s just waiting to be pushed. Still, there’s also a kindness button. Or at least an apathy button. And an anger button. An amused button. A remorse button. A jealousy button. These buttons may never be pushed, or may be pushed all at once. The point is that while humans are sick little fucks, they are more than just sick little fucks.

So make sure to put all the blame on “God” because that’s why humans are the way they are, and why they have so many god damned buttons. Though on the flip side, “God” deserves the credit too. As humans, we don’t get to change the fact that we were born with some pretty disgusting capabilities. However, we do get to choose which buttons we push in ourselves, and in others. If you find that your cruelty is outweighing your apathy, you could care less. Or if you know how to make someone admire you as opposed to being jealous, you could purposely act to affect that outcome. What kind of human you want to be is up to you.