When Joy and Pain Live Side by Side

Yesterday was Mother’s Day. Mother’s Day can be such a joyful holiday. There is so much beauty in honoring mothers, honoring those who love and nurture and give and sacrifice. There is so much beauty in remembering the gift it is to raise children. I deeply value the goodness of a day set aside to celebrate mothers.

And Mother’s Day can also be an intensely painful holiday. For those whose arms are empty and whose hearts are aching to be a mother. For those who have lost a mother. For those whose mothers couldn’t give them what they needed. For those who are grieving the loss of a child. For mothers whose complicated relationships with their children leave them raw with hurt and confusion.

Our relationships with our mothers and our children are some of the deepest, most intimate, and most vulnerable relationships. There is so much opportunity for the deepest of joy and the deepest of pain.

Yesterday I was scrolling through Facebook, delighting in all of the pictures of happy mamas with happy babies. Of beautiful old pictures honoring mothers whose children and grandchildren are grown, who have a legacy worth celebrating. I love seeing all the celebrating.

And I was thinking through those I know who are hurting. Who are grieving or waiting or fighting or struggling. Whose hearts and arms ache for things lost or not yet seen.

And then all who are doing both, who are celebrating and mourning, experiencing joy and pain side by side.

It is such a complicated holiday.

And I guess what I want to say is that there’s room for us all. Our pain and joy are not a threat to each other. We can stand side by side. My joy does not diminish the truth or depth of your pain; your joy doesn’t invalidate my hurt.

As a society, we don’t always know what to do when joy and pain stand next to each other. We don’t know how to handle it, so we avoid it, we say nothing. We downplay either our joy or our hurt to try and make each other feel better. We avoid looking at each others’ eyes and seeing the hurt or seeing the joy, because we fear what it would mean for our own inner reality.

In many ways we are better at dealing with the joy than the pain, but there really are times when we aren't great with either.

We can rejoice with those who rejoice. We can celebrate and honor and laugh and hug. And we can mourn with those who mourn. We can cry and hope and pray and hold. But they have to go together. There has to be space and room and time and attention for both experiences.

As a culture and as a society, we need to make room for both. We need to know how to rejoice together and how to mourn together. We need to figure out how to handle the reality that sometimes joy and pain live side by side. It’s not an easy path to navigate, but I believe we can do it.

As an individual, if you are in a season of mourning, you need to hear that it is ok to mourn. If you cannot rejoice, you have permission to hold your grief or your anger or your fear. I deeply encourage you not to hold it alone. Let someone else be there with you.

And if you are in a season of rejoicing, let there be rejoicing. We tend to be much better at rejoicing together than mourning together, but sometimes as we become aware of those who are mourning, we fear we no longer have permission to rejoice. You have permission to rejoice and celebrate.

There is room for all of us. Joy and pain can live side by side, and we can honor and care for both. As individuals in a broader culture, let’s struggle through the hard work of figuring out how to rejoice well and mourn well. Let’s learn how to rejoice and mourn together. It’s such hard work, and it is so vitally important.

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