Why You Shouldn’t “Just Get Over It” When Bad Things Happen

The hurts of life, like the wounds of the body, take a toll in pain and your ability to live normally. Deep tragedy and loss deserve the same respect as a broken limb.

When a patient with a broken leg presents to the medical system, the care is pretty much the same:

• Address the pain
• Reduce and immobilize the injured area
• Rest the area
• Let the body’s miraculous and and wonderful healing system take over.

Note that there is no place here for ignoring the pain and moving on as though the injury never happened to begin with. The advice to “just get over it,” mantra of well-meaning family and friends has no place here. Indeed, it is even dangerous advice. “Just getting over it” skips the important steps of “getting through it” so that you can resolve your injury and become a more whole person.

Turn your attention back to the case of the broken leg. A patient who jumps out of bed and starts dancing on a newly broken bone puts their injured leg at risk. Indeed they may end up with a broken bone that heals crooked, fails to mend, and threatens their ability to ever walk again with a normal gait.

So it is with the deep wounds and hurts of life that ache deep in your soul and rob you of the passion and joy of being alive and contributing. There are healing strategies for moving through the pain of life wounds. What works for one might not work for another. Here are some things to try out for your own healing journey:

• First, take the time to heal and recover your balance
• Read about others who have been through the same thing.
• Talk to a trusted friend or counselor
• Get a journal and “write your way” through it.
• Last, have you been through some bad things and have recovered and come out even stronger, please use the comment section of this post to share your story and journey.

Bad things do happen to good people. And when the good people choose to get through it and rebuild, they often end up better than before. Susan J Brison was right on in her book, Aftermath: Violence and the Remaking of a Self, when she told the story of a group leader who told a group of rape survivors, “You will never be the same, but you can be better.”

So true. The choice to being better or residing in a state of permanent victimhood is all yours.