Suffering

What is SUFFERING?


Human suffering can be many things that we are faced with. These can include - hunger, survival, pain (physical & emotional), denial, loss, self-esteem, judgments and other afflictions.


What we call suffering is a form of LEARNING. When we are dealing with these above afflictions we are SUFFERING until we have learned what the afflictions mean and how to deal with them and to accept them into our lives.


Why we SUFFER?


Life does not come with a book of instructions. We have so much to learn and to process - feelings, defining our self, defining our environment, understanding LIFE and other important issues of who "I am" and "My Life". These are things that each individual needs to learn and is not easily taught. We need to LEARN these issue through LIVING and EXPERIENCING, not through another. Others may assist and support us, but it is the individual that needs to experience LIFE.


There are different levels of suffering, from a very mild form to a very serve form. The mild form we may not even see as "suffering", when we learn and accept issues easily and quickly, to issues that we struggle with. The more we struggle the more we suffer.


Why we STRUGGLE?


When we are struggling we are in the process of assimilating different afflictions that we are experiencing - feelings, health, loss, desires and other similar issues. We struggle with them because we are in a state of DENIAL or because we are having a difficult time understanding them and HOW to assimilate (accept) them.


Denial is a big reason why we struggle and suffer over our ISSUES. We often deny our issues, when the issue we are experiencing does not align with our 'belief system". Denial is our attempt not to ACCEPT the experience we are having. Sometimes we are having a challenge in understanding what we are experiencing and why. Understanding our experiences can also cause us to hang-on to these issues, sometimes we need to just ACCEPT them for what they are - the meaning may come to us later. It is this hanging-on to issues that the often used Spiritual saying "let it go" comes from. SOMETIMES when we 'let go' the meaning and the why is revealed to us.

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ACCEPTANCE is a big tool for us to use in reducing the level of SUFFERING that we experience. This ACCEPTANCE can be a complicated sense of BALANCE that we need to maintain.