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When someone comes to me in pain, my first question is not what to do about the pain. My first question is: what does the pain need?
Not what you need to do about the pain. What the pain itself needs.
This distinction matters. The question "what do I do about this?" puts you in opposition to the pain. It frames the pain as an adversary to be managed, reduced, eliminated. This is sometimes appropriate. But it is not always the right frame.
Sometimes the pain needs to be witnessed. Simply seen, fully, without immediately reaching for a response. The pain that has been managed and hidden from others is often longing for the same thing a person longs for: to be genuinely seen without being immediately told what to do.
Sometimes the pain needs to be believed. The person who has been told their pain is not that bad, or should be over by now — that person's pain needs, first of all, to be taken seriously at face value.
Sometimes the pain needs company. Not solutions — the simple presence of another person who is willing to stay with it.
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