Toughing out the pain.

     Going through a hard time? Don't blank out on it. It has something to show you. And even if you can't figure out the lesson it brings you, you can rest assured that if you stay conscious throughout it, it will bring you growth. And the more dreadful the experience (again, if you stay conscious through it), the more massive the growth.
     The natural instinct when pain hits is the opposite. Run away from it.
Distract yourself from it. Get drunk. Gamble. Sex. Waste time on the internet/TV/movies. Sleep. Anything to blank out the awareness of the pain.
     But avoidance is a fool's game. When you avoid the pain, it remains. Oh, maybe you can block it out, push it down— for a while. It's still there. Maybe deep in your unconscious. But it's still there.
     Think of when people go through something horrific. Say, their child is brutally murdered. The natural tendency again would be to just one way or another, for survival's sake, get away from the awareness, the conscious awareness, of the pain. But what you see sometimes, albeit very rarely, is people staying conscious through such pain. And those people are heroic. And those people benefit (in terms of healing, psychological balance, managing bitterness, overcoming despair) massively for their courageous effort.
     And staying conscious through pain or disappointment or suffering can lead to new insights, breakthroughs in our emotions and psyches and souls.
     Are you hurting? Stay conscious. It's hard to do, sometimes nearly impossible, but the benefits are more than worth it.