It’s hard to live with wonder and amazement when something in your life just doesn’t feel right. “So what if I’m breathing?” I say. “Is that all there is to life?!” There is something healthy and also something mistaken in this attitude.
If you’ve ever tried to focus you attention on something while you were in pain, you know what distraction is. Like a small child tugging at your skirt, demanding attention, it gets more intense the more you try to ignore it.
It is well known that masking symptoms can be a dangerous practice. If you didn’t have a sensation of pain, you would not pull your hand away from the heat. If you didn’t sense someone infringing on your boundaries you would not protect yourself.
Physical and emotional discomforts give you messages. They’re there to help you.
Instead of taking an aspirin to mask the symptoms, it’s worth giving the distraction your full, undivided attention. Be thankful for it. Then you will hear its message and get to its root cause.
Where is the error in refusing to be grateful for all the little things in life, as long as something hurtful is demanding your attention?
It comes from a fear that you are being oblivious to the problem that’s distracting you. Paying attention to the distraction and finding out the root cause of the dis-ease is a healthy attitude. But if, because of the pain-distraction you are unwilling to be grateful for all you have that is good, this indicates an irrational fear.
It means you are equating “gratitude for good things” with “ignoring problems.” “Positive thinking”-type people do exactly this. They ignore problems because they insist that “everything is wonderful.” Just because they are mistaken in thinking nothing is wrong does not mean you have to be mistaken in thinking nothing is right.
Gratitude for all that is good in life shouldn’t make you oblivious to pain, just as pain shouldn’t make you oblivious to the wonders of life.
Besides, having gratitude, even while this distraction, this something-is-not-right feeling is telling you to look for a resolution can even help pave the way to a resolution of the problem. It’s impossible to see solutions when you’re unhappy generally, because mind is closed to possibilities.
So be grateful for all the good things and be grateful for the pain.