Was it Worth it?

When you try to help yourself, sometimes you wonder: is it worth it?

A friend recently shared that she got divorced, and now she questions if it was worth it, her divorce was born our of her awakening to living a life that was not in alignment with who she had become. Her words carried something deeper.

Her struggle, “was it worth it?” is a real one. Every choice comes with both benefits and challenges. Staying the same has benefits. Changing has benefits. Each path also has costs. Often, parts of us gain something from living in cycles of shame, fear, disappointment, or dysfunction. As strange as it sounds, pain itself can be addictive. It gives certain parts of us familiarity, identity, and even safety.

Emotion is rarely logical and yet it often makes sense.

Awakening, like sleep, moves in rhythms. You wake up and then fall back asleep. You stumble, you rise. Both happen. And each is still part of the journey.

The Illusion of Control

Many begin the awakening process believing it will give them control: control over outcomes, health, relationships, and even fate. But awakening does not make life smooth. It does not prevent injuries, accidents, or loss. What it does offer, at least in my experience, is perspective.

Control is the ego’s favorite food. The promise of manifestation, of shaping everything by willpower or thought, is tempting.

Maybe we do create through the subconscious or maybe we create our experience through our un/sub concsious. Maybe something larger moves through us. Call it Source, Spirit, God, Universe.

Whatever name you choose, perhaps its agenda is experience, not comfort.

You might not be in control of what happens to you. But you are in relationship with how you perceive it.

Pain in Awakening and in Sleep

Whether asleep or awake, there is no escape from pain. The question is not “how do I avoid pain?” but “how do I meet it?”

Awakening often means revisiting old wounds. Like Herrings’ law describes, numbness, tingling, tickling, pain, pressure, the healing process moves backward through layers of hurt. Each release can feel like reopening what you worked hard to bury. This is why awakening can be stressful, even destabilizing. And yet, it is also what makes it transformative.

Pain is part of both staying the same and part of waking up. There is no path free from it.

Meeting Ourselves

My friend shared that she now has lung disease. Whether she links it to leaving her marriage or not, it is clear she carries deep pain. Many of us, in moments like that, speak to our “inner children” with the hidden agenda of trying to change them. But imagine being five years old, scraping your knee, and hearing, “You should not feel that way. Walk it off.” That denial hurts more than the scrape itself.

What if, instead of trying to change our inner parts, we simply acknowledged them? What if we went inward not to fix, but to understand?

When I dislocated my shoulders four times last year, I sat with them. Not to force healing, not to shame myself for being injured, but to feel and acknowledge the truth of what was happening. Reverence for what is.

Awakening is not about perfection. It is not about control. It is about humbleness and curiosity.

Finding Purpose in Suffering

Here is the paradox: as long as I resist finding purpose in my suffering, I suffer more. When I slowly, over time, find threads of meaning, the intensity of suffering shifts. It does not disappear, but it changes shape.

The shadow of awakening is bypassing, jumping straight to “everything happens for a reason” while ignoring feelings. Awakening invites both: the rawness of feeling and the curiosity to see differently.

Is It Worth It?

Only you can answer. Staying asleep comes with pain. Waking up comes with pain. Both paths carry gifts and burdens.

For me, the awakening process is worth it. Not because it prevents hardship, but because it helps me move through life with a little more grace, curiosity, and compassion. It helps me notice the miracles hidden in ordinary moments, even if my ego does not label them as such.

It has become my habit, my hobby, my fascination. I want to explore, stretch, hide, fall asleep, wake up, take the blue pill, the red pill, and sometimes both. I want to feel and observe.

So the real question is not “is it worth it?”

The real question is: are you willing to accept the challenges and benefits of both paths, whether you stay the same or step toward change?

Both are allowed. Both are part of being human.

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