bhaskar saikia

I have come to believe that every person who creates something meaningful carries within them a deep and inexhaustible reservoir of emotional pain.

Not always the dramatic kind. More often, it is the kind that grows quietly, over years. Pain shaped in childhood, in homes where love existed but arrived unevenly, or where silence spoke louder than words. Pain learned early—of adjusting, of understanding moods before language, of growing up too fast or learning to stay invisible.

Some pain comes from loss, yes. Some from betrayal. But much of it comes from becoming who you had to be, rather than who you were allowed to be.

Growing up in a dysfunctional family does not always mean chaos. Sometimes it means unpredictability. Sometimes it means carrying responsibilities that were never meant for you. Sometimes it means learning to read the room before reading books, to sense danger before safety, to measure your worth through usefulness rather than love.

This kind of pain does not announce itself. It settles into the nervous system. It shapes how one listens, loves, and dreams. It teaches vigilance. It teaches restraint. And over time, it becomes a quiet companion that follows people into adulthood.

What distinguishes those who merely endure from those who create is not resilience alone, but translation. Pain, when left untouched, hardens. But when given meaning, it transforms. It becomes the reason someone seeks depth over surface, honesty over comfort. Creation, then, is not ambition—it is alchemy.

People create not because they are fearless, but because fear once lived too close to home. They strive not for applause, but for coherence—for a sense that life can be arranged into something that makes sense. Excellence becomes a language through which they speak what they were never taught how to say.

Pain sharpens perception. Those shaped by early emotional fractures often notice what others overlook: shifts in tone, pauses in speech, the weight behind casual words. This sensitivity can be exhausting, but it is also fertile ground. It allows work—art, thought, care—to emerge with depth and sincerity.

And even when success arrives, pain does not leave.

It does not dissolve with achievement or recognition. It simply becomes quieter, more refined. It sits in the background, reminding the person of where they began, of what they learned too early, of what they still carry. It keeps them grounded. It keeps them searching.

Perhaps this is why certain creations feel instantly familiar. They speak not just to talent, but to shared histories—to the unspoken experiences of growing up, adapting, surviving. Pain connects us not by spectacle, but by recognition.

Maybe the purpose is not to erase pain.

Maybe it is to walk alongside it—to let it inform our empathy, our depth, our choices. Some scars are not meant to fade. They remain as quiet witnesses to the life we endured and the meaning we chose to make from it.

And so pain stays.

Not as a wound. Not as a failure.

But as a companion—one that teaches us how to create something honest, and how to live without pretending we were untouched.