My Pain Is Your Pain

This post is not about art, at least not yet...

My friend Rog is a great writer. Occasionally, I’ll tell him about a dream or an event I experienced thinking he could turn my weirdness into a wonderful work of literary fiction (as if he needs my help). But there is one idea that I told him about that I want to write about myself because it fascinates me. Human beings as a collective have the ability and almost a need to hurt each other both physically and emotionally. Granted, most of the time this is by mistake but sometimes it’s on purpose and it happens every single day to all of us in one way or another. I find it strange because we’re all human beings and we all know what buttons to push, so why do we continuously do this to each other? We’ve all heard of the golden rule and it is so easy to follow, only eleven words for Pete’s sake and almost half of them are under three letters -

"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"

I believe pain cripples us, changes our opinions and our views on love, laws and sometimes life itself. Maybe there are times this pain never heals which is why sometimes the world seems so imbalanced and those of us who inhabit it seem so fragile. So, I thought wouldn’t it be interesting if everyone who doled out pain could receive that same pain in return (even if it is done unknowingly). I’m not talking about bitterness or payback, far from it. Let me give you an example. Picture a couple having an argument. I think everyone knows how easy it is in the heat of the moment to say something that may hurt the one you love. Let’s say after that first hurtful comment leaves your lips (you know what I mean, the one that, after the words come out of your mouth, you can literally see the hurt on their face. Yeah, that one) you literally feel this physical pain in your heart, or your gut, even in your head (I haven’t decided which yet). If we could feel the feelings we deliver to others, well, that would put a different slant on things wouldn’t it? If that could happen how quickly do you think the tone of arguments would change? Would we be able to take the emotional pain of our own words? Would we be kinder to each other or would we as human beings (with the ingrained self-survival skills we are all born with) become acclimated to accepting the pain we dish out?