Joe names the endurer pattern through Will’s choice to take the wrench from his abusive father “cuz [ __ ] him.” The only place Will could get a sense of himself was by resisting—by proving he couldn’t be broken. The wrench wasn’t masochism; it was the one move that produced an identity.
“He has learned to endure pain. And that pattern we call the endurer pattern. And that pattern is that I can’t enjoy life, that I have to fight for everything, that I will endure whatever you throw at me. You can’t break me.”
The trouble is that this becomes the person’s relationship to all of life, not just the abuser. Everything good has to be fought for; every gift comes wrapped in resistance. The endurer digs his heels in against love and against life itself. And crucially, he isn’t feeling the pain—he’s enduring it.
“He was literally learning not to feel the pain, but then all life became pain. It just all became endurance.”
The whole apparatus of endurance exists to protect against the devastation a child couldn’t afford to feel. The transformation comes only when the pain underneath is finally felt.
Related Concepts
- Endurance mentality blocks transformation
- Anger is the doorway from endurance into buried sadness
- Feeling the pain of a habit removes the need for discipline
- Trauma controls you until you feel the hurt underneath it
- Abuse creates either the endurer or the perpetual victim
- Resisting help replays the relationship with your father