Dig where it hurts

To make emotional progress, I believe you often have to dig where it hurts.

      And even if now is not the time to address it, when you find a pain point that you aren't fully happy with or hurts you but you don't know why or it's hard to resolve, where it hurts is where you put a big red X to dig there.

      And sometimes feelings go deeper than we realize. 

       Then I used my childhood splinters as an illustration. For some reason we had so many basket sin our house, and I would use them a lot. And get splinters.

       I'd start by taking it out with my fingernails. I'd usually just end up breaking off the top and making it even harder to grab.

       Then I'd get the tweezers, and pull it out with those. I'd watch it slip out so cleanly it seemed. And I'd say " Yes, I learned my lesson I'd tell myself, I will just use the tweezers next time. 

       But sometimes that wasn't actually the end of it. When there would be pressure on that spot, it kind of still hurt. So I'd like to check. I'd tell myself it's nothing, it's in my head, it's the memory of pain; it can't still actually be hurting because I pulled it out already. 

        But the truth was, it still felt like it hurt.

        Then I'd have to go to my mom. And as I dreaded and was trying to avoid, she would have to use the pin. And she'd have to poke me with the pin where it hurt, peeling back layers and layers of my skin until she dug deep enough to be able to see the piece that was still left inside. 

         Sometimes it would be so tiny I'd be surprised at how something so small would cause me so much pain. And other times it would be so big I was shocked; how could there have been so much still deep inside when I thought I got it all out?        

       Occaisonally it takes fingernails. Sometimes it takes tweezers. Sometimes it takes the pin.

        You don't always know right away which one is going to be, whether tweezers alone are enough. You have to try, then see if it still hurts. And if it still does, you have to be honest with yourself about it, then use the pin to dig deeper where it hurts.

        This isn't about splinters.