“We see that children repeat in their play everything that has made a great impression on them in actual life, that they thereby abreact the strength of the impression and so to speak make themselves masters of the situation.” (Sigmund Freud) I was reading all about the pleasure principle and what it means to feel the difference between pleasure and pain. Why something that makes us feel good is referred to as pleasure and feelings that make us sad is referred to pain, can affect us so greatly that we have to find something to keep our minds occupied to be able to cope with the painful experiences in our life. This quote from the reading really stood out to me because anyone who experiences life has to manage life’s curveballs. Freud speaks about pleasure and pain and how it is connected to our mind and how our mind tries to deal with what our bodies are feeling. This quote gives us a clear explanation on how a person should deal with the problems that life hands us.

Whatever it is that gives us pain, we eventually have to deal with. Whether we deal with the problem immediately, or we handle the problem somewhere down the road after suppressing it, the problems come back to haunt us. What I took out of this reading was that we have to be like the child who is dealing with the loss of his or her mother for a period of time. The child deals with it by playing with the toys around him. He plays a disappearing act, much like the mother disappearing for a few hours, then makes the toy reappear just like the mom. Coping with the loss of the child’s mother through a game where the child finds joy from the toy reappearing makes the child feel happy to know that the mother will also reappear.

In a way we all do what the child does, obviously on a more mature level. Take a look at the child. The child is who we are. The toys are whatever helps us feel happy once something bad happens. The toys can represent our friends who are there to help us, our family members, our dog, a video game, or even something so glutinous as food. Whatever the case, hiding our feelings deep down will only make things worse for us because we are not facing the problem at hand. This quote is a perfect way to describe a time of difficulty. Let it be known that you are hurt, just like the child, then express it through any means and face it and work to make yourself feel happy once again.[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/A1tL_iT3Rw0" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]