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Cristina Crescenzo (she/her/hers), Low Entropy Volunteer Writer

Do you remember when you were a kid and you touched the stove when it was still too hot? Or when you were playing in the park, and you fell down and scraped your knee? Well, for many, those were the first times we experienced pain. Unfortunately, pain is one of the only constants in life, and as much as we resent it for hurting us, we also have to learn to accept it. Pain is something that will always be there, through every stage of life. Some of the blows can be dull, and there isn’t much damage, but some can hurt so much that they send you crashing down on the floor, so it’s a harsh reality to accept that pain is something that we genuinely need. 

It stops us from making the same mistakes repeatedly; it reminds us not to touch the stove and not to run too fast in the park. However, no matter how hard our natural instincts try, we sometimes fail to heed the warning, and so we make the same mistakes again, resulting in a wound that hurts twice as much. Another thing about pain that I should mention is that it seems easier to avoid physical discomfort than it is to avoid emotional suffering. Which is funny because don’t bodily afflictions come with higher stakes? At least, that’s what I thought. I suppose extreme emotions can end up hurting your body too, like how a bad breakup can make you lose your appetite and not want to get out of bed. Maybe it just doesn’t matter because, at the end of the day, all the pain we experience is valid and necessary.

Furthermore, it is also a tool used to humble us and bring us back to reality when we think we can control everything and manipulate people for our own gains. It’s because we are human and we are flawed that we can cause pain in other people. However, when we do hurt others, even if the feeling is not instantaneous, everything will balance out once more, and pain will return, but this time with its bitter partner called guilt. If we try to cause pain needlessly, it can transform a helpful and innate sensation that protects us from danger into a poison that never stops plaguing our minds. It can evolve into a persistent form of anxiety and depression. You may not have deliberately caused it to occur, but pain and other unpleasant emotions can build up over time and create these intangible afflictions. 

That’s why it’s essential to always be kind to others and ourselves, because while we may not be able to get rid of pain in its entirety, we can minimize its impact on our lives. It makes me think about the speech Rocky says to his son in the movie Rocky Balboa (2006): “Let me tell you something you already know. The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows. It’s a very mean and nasty place and I don’t care how tough you are, it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t about how hard ya hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done!”

It is a sobering speech that all of us need to hear once in a while, because though we may not like it, pain is necessary, and life doesn’t cause it for no reason. It has a purpose to help us even if we can’t always see it, so we can’t just ignore it and hope it eventually skulks away. We must let it do its thing and turn us into stronger people with big hearts. I believe that if we use the pain for good, then that’s how we can all be winners in life. To end it off, I want to quote Rocky one more time and say, “Until you start believing in yourself, ya ain’t gonna have a life.”

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I am just a 24-year-old finishing her English bachelor’s degree at Simon Fraser University who loves to read and write in order to help someone in some small way. I will also always advocate for mental health and disabled causes through the written word, and Low Entropy lets me do just that.