Spiritual development has much to do with how we handle pain.
Creation's wisdom has a pattern we must not avoid, lest we suppress our soul. We can be religiously compliant all our lives and still lose our souls if we run from the necessary cycle of loss and renewal. Death and resurrection are lived out at every level of creation, but only we humans think we can avoid it.
We try to handle all suffering through willpower, denial, medication, or even therapy, we have forgotten something that should be obvious: we do not handle suffering; suffering handles us.
To follow Jesus, He exhorted us to carry our cross. It is this "cross" - the journey into the necessary night, of which we must be convinced, to receive the transformative gift of resurrection.
Luke 9:23 "If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross daily, and follow me."
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