I basically wrote a 3 page paper on what I have been going t..

I basically wrote a 3 page paper on what I have been going through, I'm not going to post it all in here, because I think all of you are aware of the suffering I have been going through. What I will post though, is what I have learned from thi s situation with books, meditation, lectures, and experience. Now, let me explain what I have learned on this wild journey. One of the key factors that has been identified as being predictive of a positive outcome after acquiring any facial disfigurement is 1. The number of positive and non-avoidant coping strategies and 2. The variety of them. I am currently reading a book called "Mans Search For Meaning" by Viktor E. Frankl, the author of this book was a psychiatrist living through the realities of being a prisoner at a concentration camp in Auschwitz but still finding spiritual meaning to his life, even with the suffering he endured everyday. There is no religious aspect of this involved, it is simply how he held him self together with his own mindset. One of my favorite quotes from the book is “If there is a meaning in life at all, then there must be a meaning in suffering. Suffering is an eradicable part of life, even as fate and death. Without suffering and death, human life cannot be complete.” The test then for all of us is how we respond to the suffering in our lives. And that right there has been something that I have struggled with deeply, by associating myself with my emotions and allowing myself to think they are intrinsically me. But suffering does hold purpose, if you allow it to. In some ways suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning. “To draw an analogy: a man's suffering is similar to the behavior of a gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering is great or little. Therefore the "size" of human suffering is absolutely relative.” My face does not define me, but how I respond to or how I view myself is ultimately what defines me and my character. It seems so cliche and easy to understand, but it isn't, it's hard to practice. I am not my mind, and I am most certainly not my suffering, these things are merely just tools in order to navigate through this reality. Who I really am, is love. I am deep rooted in love and that is my true being. Another quote from Frankl “For the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth - that Love is the ultimate and highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love.” What Frankl is trying to get across with his book is identifying a purpose in life to feel positive about, and then immersively imagining that outcome. In this psychosocial paradigm of effectively treating how one with facial palsy views his life and his surroundings has a graded approach to goals "The What If Plans." 1. Work out what it is you want to do 2. Then working out how to achieve it 3. What is my absolute worst fear about doing this activity? These steps are goals that I will be taking in life in order to 1. Navigate my new reality with facial palsy by implementing different goals and how I can achieve them. 2. By remembering that the true test of our character is revealed in how we act, and you have the complete freedom to choose how to respond in any situation.