The Pain Project: Part 1

June 16th, 2024.  

 

Hello, and welcome.  If you don’t know me, my name is Annabelle and I’m a 16-year-old writer living in Canada.  In this blog post, I will be taking a bit of a turn from what I had intended on talking about this month.  I’m titling this post “The Pain Project: Part 1”, as I am hoping to do more entries in this series.  The “Pain Project” refers to my own experience with emotions and human connections, and therefore my views on “humanhood” at its core.  With that being said, this post will be one that is primarily centered around my own perspectives.  I feel it is a way to give my thoughts to the world in an effort to create a community.  Any feedback is always appreciated :) 

 

Starting off strong, I will explain how I have felt things surrounding the impact I have on others’ lives.  

I think what affects me the most personally is the feeling that something/someone is “slipping through my fingers”.  The control I had (if it was ever there) has been lost, and that person/thing cannot be “helped” or “saved” from what has happened or what is to come.  As some may know, I am in the process of writing a novel.  The protagonist is a young boy (Noah) who is starting to have a relationship with his grandfather, who has been estranged from the rest of his family for the past 4 years.  Although the story is entirely fictional, I base a lot of the feelings Noah has on my own.  

For example, when Noah is eventually having to face the death of his grandfather, he states that he mourns the loss of the parts of him (his grandfather) that he could not save.  This specific excerpt is a reflection of some thoughts I’ve had about one of my own experiences.  

I want so badly for readers to crave the affection of true humanity after reading my book, while understanding that it may not be entirely possible.  Of course, I believe that in the real world we are always able to go to a point where “humanity’s affection” is in fact there.  However, in my novel (as it does contain an element of dystopia), hope is not always present.  

 

I like to think that I have a kind nature rooted in me that affects what I do and how I do it.  With that, I also believe that no person is born innately “good” or “bad” (or rather, “kind” or “unkind”).  There is for sure an element of nurture from external influences that affect how a person’s personality is formed.  But to advocate for the other side, I do understand the belief that things like personality disorders and/or mental disabilities can affect the level someone feels empathy at.  I go back and forth on this one a lot, and at this point in time I feel what is accurate lies somewhere in the middle.  

 

It makes me happy to be helping people in some way, although this can cause some heartache.  I am currently working towards my goal of becoming a social worker by completing high school and volunteering.  Working in the field of humanities is something that I have always (whether I realized it or not) been passionate about.  

While I am not what most would consider a “science person”, there are definitely aspects of it that I really value in my own life.  The psychology behind us is amazing in my eyes, and I feel we should all understand it to some extent.  For me, understanding why someone behaves a certain way, or views something a certain way, is crucial to creating a better society.  If we know know why something occurs, we can use that information to advance human development.  

 

On the other side of this, we must understand that the human race is (obviously) in the hands of the people…and people don’t have the same views on everything.  Which is okay, as that is the beauty of our whole experience!  Our individuality is what makes us (mostly) cohesive, but it also creates some dilemmas.  

 

This is an issue that I circle back to quite often, so there will most likely be other blog posts on this series in the future.  If you have any feedback or questions regarding this topic (or the topic of the previous post), please feel free to send me a message under the "Give Feedback" section of this website.  

Thank you for reading this blog post!