Pain Is Inevitable—Here's How to Make Suffering Optional

Do you know the difference between pain and suffering? Do you know which one you'd choose?

When I think about the most painful experiences in my life—whether they involved physical pain or emotional pain—I notice something funny. The amount of hurt I felt at the time is not proportional to how much I shudder at the memory when I look back.

Let me give you some examples. There's no way any event caused more sheer, body-wracking pain than giving birth—I labored for 20 hours! But even in the toughest moments, I felt pride and excitement. The next most painful experience was breaking my ankle in the first month of college. But for the most part, that experience was humorous.

On the other hand, that time it was really cold when I was visiting Minnesota and my feet were freezing? That was a drag. And it’s no exaggeration to say that every time I get a mosquito bite, I rage and rail. Suffering galore!

The secret ingredient behind how much we suffer from painful experiences lies in the way we think about pain.

Judged by the level of pain alone, giving birth is a million times worse than a mosquito bite. Judged by duration, a broken ankle lasts much longer than cold feet. And yet, I didn't endure prolonged suffering with my most painful events. So, what governs the amount of suffering we experience?

For some hints into the difference between pain and suffering, we can look to the cognitive-behavioral and mindfulness underpinnings of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, a treatment developed by Dr. Steven Hayes, a psychology professor at the University of Nevada and developer of Relational Frame Theory.

Spoiler—the secret ingredient behind how much we suffer from painful experiences lies in the way we think about pain. Don’t believe me? Let’s take a look.

What is pain?

Pain is very clean. It’s simply an unpleasant physical sensation—either mild (like an itchy elbow), extreme (like a broken bone), or somewhere in between.

Pain can also be an unpleasant, raw emotional experience. I emphasize “raw” because once a natural emotion has been processed, thinking about it or analyzing it too much gets into suffering territory. A raw emotion is an automatic and simple feeling, one that a first-grader could name—anger, sadness, fear, joy.

Pain is universal and unavoidable. Nobody can truly say they've led a completely painless existence.

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