There’s an old joke about a patient who says, “Doctor! It hurts everywhere I touch. Here. And here. And here.” To which the doctor replies, “Hmm. I see. It seems that you have a broken finger.”

I recalled this joke as my five-year-old son complained — bending his arm in a peculiar way — “It hurts when I do this.”

To which I replied, “Then stop doing that.”

* * *

It prompts some deeper thinking. How often do we visit the places where we’ve been hurt? Not to heal, but to revisit the pain?

It can be tempting to press on old wounds ... or to prod scars from injuries long since healed.

But does that serve us?

If feeling the pain is not helping us — if it’s instead tethering us to the past — perhaps it’s best to “stop doing that.”