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I am standing on the edge of a ravine. Below me are jagged rocks, twisted thorns and a world of pain. An unseen hand forces my feet to inch closer and closer. Dread and fear fills my heart as my mind imagines the broken, skewered, crumpled mass I’ll become at the bottom. I desperately reach behind me to grasp at anything that can save me from my fate. My hands feel a form and I cling onto it for dear life. But as I cling, I can feel sharp needles piercing into my skin and I cry out. What I’ve grabbed, the only thing within my reach to support me, was a cactus. And the unseen hand keeps desperately pulling at my legs, trying to get me to go over the ravine, so despite the pain, I cling even harder, and the needles sink even deeper. My nails dig into the skin of the cactus and I feel moisture trickle out. In my efforts to keep myself from falling, I’m hurting the cactus too. The cactus doesn’t want to hurt me, but the needles are its natural defenses, a part of itself, and I can’t blame the cactus for being painful when I cling onto it so desperately. But the tears run down my cheeks as I hopelessly contemplate – do I let go of the cactus and let myself fall into a world of pain? Or do I overcome the pain of the cactus to save myself, even if that means clawing into the one thing there to keep me from falling?