Quotes About Suffering

Some people degenerate into the hell of resentment and the hatred of Being,

only the desire to produce suffering, for the sake of suffering. That is the very essence of evil.

Christ takes a different path. His sojourn in the desert is the dark night of the soul—a deeply human and universal human experience. It's the journey to that place each of us goes when things fall apart, friends and family are distant, hopelessness and despair reign, and black nihilism beckons.

In a crisis, the inevitable suffering that life entails can rapidly make a mockery of the idea that happiness is the proper pursuit of the individual. On the radio show, I suggested, instead, that a deeper meaning was required. I noted that the nature of such meaning was constantly re-presented in the great stories of the past, and that it had more to do with developing character in the face of suffering than with happiness.

If the worst sin is the torment of others, merely for the sake of the suffering produced—then the good is whatever is diametrically opposed to that. The good is whatever stops such things from happening.

Are you so sure the person crying out to be saved has not decided a thousand times to accept his lot of pointless and worsening suffering, simply because it is easier than shouldering any true responsibility? Are you enabling a delusion? Is it possible that your contempt would be more salutary than your pity?

And maybe when you are going for a walk and your head is spinning a cat will show up and if you pay attention to it then you will get a reminder for just fifteen seconds that the wonder of Being might make up for the ineradicable suffering that accompanies it. Pet a cat when you encounter one on the street.

Your life becomes meaningful in precise proportion to the depths of the responsibility you are willing to shoulder. That is because you are now genuinely involved in making things better. You are minimizing the unnecessary suffering. You are encouraging those around you, by example and word. You are constraining the malevolence in your own heart and the hearts of others.

El sentido de nuestras limitaciones no es el sufrimiento; es la existencia misma. Se nos ha otorgado la capacidad soportar voluntariamente el peso terrible de nuestra mortalidad. Le damos la espalda a esa capacidad y nos degradamos a nosotros mismos porque tenemos miedo de la responsabilidad.

Nonetheless, people will often accept or even amplify their own suffering, as well as that of others, if they can brandish it as evidence of the world's injustice. There is no shortage of oppressors among the downtrodden, even if, given their lowly positions, many of them are only tyrannical wannabes. It's the easiest path to choose, moment to moment, although it's nothing but hell in the long run.

La participación en actos cuyo único propósito es la expansión del dolor y el sufrimiento inocentes es algo que destruye el carácter; el encuentro directo con la tragedia, en cambio, puede potenciarlo.

Me?utim, sama tragedija (shva?ena kao proizvoljna grubost društva i prirode, nasuprot ranjivosti pojedinca) nije jedini - možda ?ak ni prvenstveni - izvor patnje. Treba uzeti u obzir i problem zla. Svijet je ?vrsto protiv nas, to je sigurno, ali ?ovjekova nehumanost prema ?ovjeku nešto je još gore.

the suffering and malevolence that characterize life are real, with the terrible consequences of the real—and our ability to solve problems, by confronting them and taking them on, is also real. By taking responsibility, we can find a meaningful path, improve our personal lot psychologically, and make what is intolerably wrong genuinely better. Thus, we can have our cake and eat it, too.

Self-love is the only antidote to the chaos of existence. And if you don't love and care for yourself and your own needs, you will cause unnecessary suffering both for yourself and others.

The idea that life is suffering is a relatively universal truism of religious thinking. This is the first of the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism as well as a key Hindu concept.

Life is in truth very hard. Everyone is destined for pain and slated for destruction.

Y'know what happened in the Soviet Union, was that it actually became illegal to suffer. And I'm really serious about that, because, y'know, if the system is working, then everything's ok with you... and if everything is not okay with you.. well, is that your fault, or the systems fault? Well it's not the goddamn systems fault. Then it's your fault. Then you don't get to suffer. And that's what happened in the Soviet Union.

Earthquakes, floods, poverty, cancer—we're tough enough to take on all of that. But human evil adds a whole new dimension of misery to the world.

In a crisis, the inevitable suffering that life entails can rapidly make a mockery of the idea that happiness is the proper pursuit of the individual. On the radio show, I suggested, instead, a deeper meaning was required. I noted that the nature of such meaning was constantly re-presented in the great stories of the past, and that it had more to do with developing character in the face of suffering than with happiness.

El reconocimiento del yo desnudo, expuesto de manera indigna a los estragos del tiempo y el mundo, insoportable y altamente motivador, condena al hombre y a la mujer a llevar una carga y a sufrir por la vida y la muerte.

Todos tenemos que asumir la máxima responsabilidad posible a nivel individual, de la sociedad y del mundo. Todos tenemos que decir la verdad, arreglar lo que está deteriorado y destruir y recrear lo que se ha quedado desfasado. Es así como podemos y debemos reducir el sufrimiento que envenena el mundo. Eso es pedir mucho. Es pedirlo todo.

To sacrifice ourselves to God (to the highest good, if you like) does not mean to suffer silently and willingly when some person or organization demands more from us, consistently, than is offered in return. That means we are supporting tyranny, and allowing ourselves to be treated like slaves.

If you confront the limitations of life courageously, that provides you with a certain psychological purpose that serves as an antidote to the suffering.

Ignored reality manifests itself in an abyss of confusion and suffering.