Tortured soul mate

There’s nothing like another soul that’s been cut up the same. True story, albeit a bit morose. What I mean is we find (odd) comfort in meeting someone who has struggled like we have, or has been through life challenges on the same level as us. I cannot speak for everyone, hell on most days I can barely speak for myself, but I truly believe people are just as happy finding a “tortured soul” mate as they are a “soul mate”. There’s an odd kindred spirit shared bw those who have faced a struggle together; and the harder the struggle the stronger the bond. People share a sort of cosmic kinship when they get to know someone who battles the same demons, has overcome some of the same obstacles, encountered the same heart ache, or meet someone who can actually empathize with our experience/journey and not just sympathize. But why is that? Is it true that misery loves company? Are we the fellowship of the miserable? I think not, and I can speak somewhat authoritatively on this subject. Pardon the arrogance. Having been down what might euphemistically be referred to as the road less travelled, I say this without equivocation….it is understanding “we” seek, not company in our misery. To that end, there may be no better example of this than Holocaust survivors. They do not seek each other out in an effort to feel sorry for themselves or host pity parties. Instead there are holocaust survivor groups all over America (and the world) because as one survivor put it “"Because of our tragic past, we understand each other," (http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/2012-01-10/news/fl-jjbs-fridman-0111-20120110_1_holocaust-survivor-leon-schagrin-student-awareness-days). Certainly none of us have ever faced a time as dark or as challenging as that. God willing no one ever will again. I use it as an example not to minimalize or trivialize our own experience but rather to demonstrate the fact that there truly is nothing like another soul that’s been cut up the same. When we are able to relate with someone on that level we form an unbreakable bond, one formed through shared experience/suffering that someone who has not had that experience can possibly understand. Ask yourselves why so many people do GORUCK challenges, Tough Mudders etc… Is it just to test you? Or is part of it bc you bond with other people during that shared experience, that those who have not faced that test can relate to? Ask yourself if you would have done it alone. Shared suffering forges bonds; suffering alone suffocates the soul and can break the spirit. Trust me, nothing hurts more than that. There are countless stories of POW’s, who when removed from their fellow POWs and are isolated quickly deteriorate, some to the point of no return. We need understanding. We seek it out with every ounce of our being and when we cannot find it we feel, or at least I feel, like a caged animal, slowly suffocating with each passing breath feeling more labored. Understanding, true understanding, is the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. And we can only appreciate the miracle of a sunrise if we have waited in the darkness. There are things or times so dark that others may never truly be able to understand about us, but those people who give a fuck enough to try, they are our sunrise, they are our miracle.