I forget where I came across this idea, but it has been on my mind lately: We are wired to value what we suffer for. This aspect of human psychology is at least in part behind hazing, boot camp, most fitness programs, freshman weeder courses, and the practice of sending young people on evangelical missions. If you spend 18-24 months having doors slammed in your face, living on a shoestring, homesick, and subjected to rigid social strictures, you are set up to conclude that the inspiration for all those miseries must be a pretty worthy part of life.

A pernicious corollary is the notion of no pain/no gain.

In my life, I can certainly see the “if I’m suffering for this cause, it must be worthy” mechanism at work in parenting. Nothing wrung me out emotionally, physically, or financially, like being a single mom. I don’t think I have another slog like that in me, not for any motivation on this earth… except maybe my grand kids? I got caught up in the same rip tide, though, with child welfare lawyering.

That is largely miserable work. An occasional child would be adopted into a good situation where even the birth parents regarded the outcome as optimal all concerned, but the opposite scenario–abuse in foster homes, children’s lives ending tragically, social workers betraying trust, judges making stupid decisions for stupid reasons–was too often the case. But I stayed at my oar for 25 years, thinking that it was “important” work, and I knew how to do it, so I should spare others from having to take it on.

What has been puzzling me lately is that this dynamic–if I’m suffering for it, it must be a worthy relationship/institution/cause–typically pops up in precisely the areas where maintaining some objective judgment, or keeping a healthy boundary, is particularly important. We suffer for family, for the company that employs us, for the church that never seems to have enough volunteers or money, no matter what its bank balance is or how many seemingly not-so-busy people attend services.

On the one hand, I can see where this retrofitting of meaning onto suffering saves us from feeling stupid and betrayed, but on the other hand, when we are being foolish and being betrayed, we need to see pointless or unjust suffering for exactly what it is.

Have you ever talked yourself into sticking with a painful situation because “the work/relationship/cause is important,” only to heave yourself free eventually, and realize you should have walked much sooner?

I’ve sent out my ARCs for The Elusive Earl, and he’s already on sale in the web store  and in print (Friday he’ll be available from the retail sites), but give me a couple weeks, and I’ll be putting together the ARC file for A Gentleman of Questionable Judgment!