Pain

"Even discomfort or pain delivers awareness of life, and an opportunity for gratitude."

"Don't judge someone's attitude until you've felt their pain."

"I think what hurts the most is that I just really want to belong. I want to stand inside the circle of other people and be noticed for the right things, but it seems like the wrong things are always bigger. And all the advie I've ever read --smile more, be yourself, dream big, stay positive--seems to have some darker side that's never mentioned."

"Hurt but do not harm?” Zach asked. “What’s the difference?” “Hurt is a bruise on the outside.” Nora sipped her mineral water delicately. “Harm is a bruise on the inside. If you’re a masochist, pain feels like love to you. Not being hurt is what hurts."

"Gravity hurts"

"Because everything worth having hurts."

"Everyone gets broken. Everyone. Some grow stronger in those breaks. Others never recover."

"You can see when someone's been hurt the way I was. It's obvious. Something changes in their eyes; pain becomes their center, even when they try to hide it."

"Rigor Mortis.” I say, almost as an apology. But he won’t have any of it. He locks onto my gaze. He doesn’t lean forward, but he doesn’t need to, suddenly the room feels like it’s filled with him. His presence floats in the air like a noxious gas, and I’m breathing it in. “Ike, you don’t get it. That’s why I wanted to talk to you. Do you think I have the right to talk to anyone? Do you think its fun to have a ‘human’ brain in a pet’s body? Sure, I have Kamu. And that’s fugging great, but guess what? Kamu is queen to be, and emotionally unstable.” I've never heard Rig talk this powerfully before, but he doesn’t seem scary, just sad. “And then I get someone else I can actually talk to, Ike, I get you. And you don’t treat me like I’m a pet and you talk about Kamu like she needs to be protected and you are there. You are there, and you keep being there, and the only one who’s ever there is Kamu, but now there is Ike. And Ike is perfect, albeit a bit dense, but perfect.” “Rig, I’m really sorry bu-“ I start, I don’t know how much more of this I can take. With each sentence Rig loses some of his force, he sounds more pathetic and lost. “I’m not done.” He pronounces the words in such a voice that it makes me shut up more than the context of the sentence does. “And all I want is to be with this boy who is there, this boy who is my friend, this boy who isn’t always caught up in politics. All I want is to have my one good break.” He finishes. I keep holding his eye contact, and his eyes, they already reflect hurt and rejectment. I don’t know if from me…or from life."

"As long as it still hurts, it isn’t love yet."

"He put his forehead against hers. “Alannah, my heart is yours.” He said softly.“And yet, I must hand it over to someone else for the keeping.” Her last words falling to a strained whisper."

"Judge no one until you know their circumstances. No matter how awful they seemed, sometimes there was a valid reason for their behaviour. Granted, some people were just mean and corrupt, but not always. Many people were just in pain, and by acting out, they were only trying to protect themselves from being hurt more."

"But when a cut is deep, it’s still just flesh beneath."

"Falling in love is like leaping from a cliff. Your brain screams that it’s not a good idea and that hurt and pain will inevitably come to you. But yourheart believes you can soar, glide and fly."

"You have someone in your life whom you honor and revere so much that every hurt on them is inflicted on you as well. And the closer they are to you, the greater the pain."

"Walker and Timothy sat quietly for a very long time. “Why do so many people make it so hard for anyone to help them or to love them?” Walker asked finally. Timothy chuckled. “Ah, Walker—if I could explain all of humanity’s foibles, I’d be a rich man indeed, at least as far as money goes. I believe people are like that because of fear. They fear being loved because they fear that if they’re loved, they’ll have to love back. And if they love back, they may get hurt. And many people aren’t ready to put their hearts on the line like that. Mostly because they don’t have anything to fall back on. It’s quite a shame, really, because they hurt themselves by trying to avoid getting hurt. But we have to be willing to die many times if we’re ever going to get on with this business of living."

"Only someone you loved could make you wear that kind of expression. Someone who had once loved you knew how to get to the part of you where the pain lived."

"Yet I am not writing with ordinary ink, but with red blood that dripsfrom my heart. All its wounds long scarred over have opened and itthrobs and hurts, and now and then a tear falls on the paper."

"While Mc Murphy laughs. Rocking farther and farther backward against the cabin top,spreading his laugh across the water. Laughing at the girl,at the guys, at George,at me sucking my bleeding thumb, at the captain back at the pier and the bicycle rider and the service station guys and the five thousand houses and the Big Nurse and all of it. Because he knows you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep yourself in balance, just to keep the world from running you plumb crazy. He know's there's a painful side; he knows my thumb smarts and his girl friend has a bruised breast and the doctor is losing his glasses, but he won't let the pain blot out the humor no more'n he'll let the humor blot out the pain."

"This is a touch game. There are times when you've got to play hurt when you've got to block out the pain."