Teachers: Stew Glick

The Cycle of Hurt

The following article by Stew Glick is from the Spring 2002 Newsletter.

"Why do we get hurt?" Or, "What is it that gets hurt?" These questions often come up in dialogues and in talks here at Springwater Center. They are never old questions with pat answers, no matter how many times the hurt comes up or the question is asked — if we are open to look and question anew.

Through the course of any day there are so many possible instances for being hurt. It could be a comment that goes against our own ideas, images or beliefs, especially from someone who we hold in high regard, and whose opinion means something special to us. Or we may get hurt if events don't go the way we have planned or hoped for, or if someone we love and hold dear leaves us. Sometimes even someone's look or glance may be enough to set off a hurt reaction, and this can happen so quickly the origin of the hurt feelings may be hard to detect. The list could go on, but it is clear when we are the least bit aware of ourselves that getting hurt is something we need to look at and question, lest defense mechanisms, vengeful thoughts and actions, or outright isolation take root.

It already takes some awareness to notice that there is hurt. Without that glimmer of awareness it is so easy for the feelings/emotions to do their thing, creating walls of self-absorption at the very least, and possibly — if enough anger and rage is there — the desire to retaliate in either a subtle or gross manner. Is it possible at the moment of hurt for the listening and looking to open up to what is going on inwardly, including the subtle physical movements? Is it possible to stay right there with what is going on, refraining for the moment from the movement into defense, denial, or rationalization — no matter how justified it may seem to oneself, but just watching it all dispassionately? Just staying with what is. And with the energy staying here, more space opens up. At such a moment, the question may arise: "What is getting hurt?" Seeing reveals that there are thoughts, bodily sensations, the interconnectedness of it all — but no one there "doing it," it is just happening. One could say that it is simply how this organism is wired. In awareness there is no one to blame, no one at fault... and no one to be hurt.

So, in staying with this presence energy there is a letting go of the hurt for in this presence energy it cannot survive. The hurt will continue if thought were to go over it again and again, unawares. There is some momentary release or satisfaction in that as well as in seeking allies, repeating one's story to oneself and to anyone who will listen, and yet the hurt continues. There needs to be this shift in energy. And when this shift occurs, such thoughts are seen without the energy any longer there to sustain them, for the energy is now in simply being here, open and undefended. When the hurt is not sustained, how can it be passed on to others (through revenge and the like)? In such a moment the cycle of hurt, anger, revenge and further hurt is broken. This cycle, which leads to further divisiveness and isolation, to more pain and suffering, is replaced with an in-touchness, made up of love and care and affection.

Many people ask how this work relates to the world, with its wars and the suffering brought about by the never-ending cycle of attack and retaliation. It's all right here in oneself. We need to look below the surface of what we call "my life," which is not separate from "this world."