"you cannot appreciate the highs without the lows." pleasure is simply the strengthening of the connections beween neurons and pain is the weakening of connections between neurons. brains function by abandoning old connections and building new ones in response to sensory input (when available) and themselves. if a mind were to only feel pleasure or only feel pain it would cease to function. everything you will ever know emerges from the magnificently complex relationship between birth and death inside of your skull.
consoling yourself by considering your suffering to be nothing more than a prerequisite for happiness cheapens your appreciation of this very moment. Instead of telling yourself "it is better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all", savor the bitter taste of grief and rejoice because you are alive and you are feeling something. next time you weap, notice the orgasmic release of emotion. cherish the feeling of hot tears running down your face. somewhere, hidden in our suffering is a kind of beauty more sublime than our
petty notions of good and bad.
