Hello,
I was recently asked by a family member about my opinion on suffering. I spent a good majority of the day contemplating my thoughts and how to respond. After a bit of back and forth, I was able to produce an answer that Is true to my beliefs.
Here is my response.
“On the topic of suffering, I’m not sure if I can give you a definitive answer. I know for certain in my life it has been an amazing guide. To me, suffering has been a soft manual for navigating through pains and pleasures. An instruction list of ways to explore my human form. Suffering to me is not the absolute of torture, pain, or depression. It’s more of a tool to be utilized in life. To a certain extent, we can all control our level of external suffering, and we have near total control of our internal suffering. So it’s just a weighted scale tipped in the direction we choose. I wouldn’t say I’m particularly masochistic, but I wholeheartedly endorse designating a schedule of regular mental torment. In my opinion, it helps us as humans perceive that nature really has no use for our imaginative concepts. The universe doesn’t care how much we suffer, what we experience, or even if we are dealt the cruelest and most surreal life possible. In the end, suffering is more honest in nature than the most gleeful of memories, experiences, and love encounters. And that’s the beauty of it to me. Suffer, or suffer not. It does not matter and it never will matter. So with that understanding, I use suffering as a tool to better myself at being a human. Not for the sake of religion, family, or even god itself. I use it for me. To engineer harmony in whatever it is that I am as a sentient life form. If nature does not care about my suffering, why should it care about how I utilize it? Balance is all I seek, and I choose to use suffering for what it can give me. It uses me every day, so have I, not the right to use it?”
Thank you for reading this post and visiting That’s Mind. I greatly appreciate every one of you. Let me know your thoughts on suffering in the comments.
I love you all.
Dan
