Not physical pain, but emotional. Why is it that people are sometimes “only happy when it rains”?
I should not say pleasure, or happy, but instead a warm sense of comfort. Why, in even in moments of suicide (even more so then, actually) is that warm comfort there? What does it mean and where does it come from?
I don’t think there’s one single clear cut factual answer here. One of the reasons is that it’s a cry for attention, but it goes much deeper than that. Someone will probably be along soon with a more in-depth answer.
I should rephrase that or elaborate a bit. Not a blatant full-on cry for attention but more of a “Ok, it can’t get any worse than this, someone or something is going to notice my agony at this point and come along to lend a helping hand.”
Cisco, If you are right and it is a cry for attention, maybe it is because no one takes emotional pain as seriously as physical pain.
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Muad’ Dib asked:
Why is it that we sometimes feel pleasure in pain?
Sometimes one kind of pain distracts from a harsher pain. (Like the women in the old West who bit the bullet during childbirth – or like people who cut or burn themselves.)
I have noticed that I sometimes feel release (a kind of pleasure) in expressing anger. Is that what you are referring to? Or maybe the way some people write sweet, sad poetry on rainy days?
No, no. People in depressed situations often feel a weird sort of quasi-pleasure in it. Why is that? Like the song I quoted, there was another line “riding high up on a deep depression”, this is paradoxical, yet true. Why? The question has bothered me for years.
Oops, simu-post. I meant that in reply ti Cisco.
I think that many times it’s the painful and dark emotions that we feel that remind us of what’s important and what everything is all about. If we spend time only experiencing the good we become complacent. When we fall into depression we feel that our eyes are suddenly opened back up to the reality of the world. This can be a quite addictive state.
That’s my $0.02, at least.
Another example of this would be Goth’s, professional moppers who go out of there way to remain in a constant contemplation of all things sad, morbid and depressing.
In an old thread I was just reading, someone had a line that went something like “a known sorrow is preferable to an unknown joy”.
I haven’t got the quote quite right, but there’s definitely a comfort factor to familiar pain. If depression is a common feeling for you, it may feel safer and more comforting than happiness which is strange and new (think about how people who are in a very good, joyful situation sometimes feel bad or scared because it’s so unfamiliar).
Depression may also be a signal that action is not required. “I’m depressed, so it’s O.K. for me to just lie here doing nothing, because nothing’s going to get better and nothing good is going to happen to me.” Feeling bad can serve, even subconsciously, as an excuse for not doing unpleasant or frightening things.
Pain can also be better than the absence of feeling at all. It’s a signal that you’re alive and functioning, and that can sometimes be a comfort.
Temporary ego-death. Sort of.
IMHO?
IMHO, some down feelings can give rise to self-pity which can be vaguely satisfying. Also, anger at others can be a rush and distract from feelings of guilt over our own wrongs. Just my speculation.
Well, as a weary veteran of mild depression with occassional dips into the severe, I think I can say with certainty that sometimes, we feel we ‘deserve’ the pain and it quiets our consciences a little to be suffering. I sometimes think I don’t ‘deserve’ to be happy and I fully ‘deserve’ to be miserable. It’s like karma, but I know I’d be overreacting.