The recurrent theme of suffering
Doris Lessing, Herman Melville, and Viktor Frankl were not the first writers to seek meaning in suffering. Here’s a sample of opinions from some others:
To live is to suffer.
(The first noble truth of Buddhism)
To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering
(Friedrich Nietzsche)
… in spite of or in defiance of the whole of existence he wills to be himself with it, to take it along, almost defying his torment. For to hope in the possibility of help, not to speak of help by virtue of the absurd, that for God all things are possible – no, that he will not do. And as for seeking help from any other – no, that he will not do for all the world; rather than seek help he would prefer to be himself – with all the tortures of hell, if so it must be.
There is only one thing I dread: not to be worthy of my sufferings.
(Fyodor Dostoevsky)
The absurdity of a life that may well end before one understands it does not relieve one of the duty to live it through as bravely and as generously as possible.
(Peter Matthiessen)
As a reliable compass for orienting yourself in life nothing is more useful than to accustom yourself to regarding this world as a place of atonement, a sort of penal colony .
(Arthur Schopenhauer)
That which does not kill me makes me stronger.
(Friedrich Nietzsche)
In order to become a man of knowledge, one must be a warrior, not a whimpering child. One must strive without giving up, without a complaint, without flinching, until one sees, only to realize that nothing matters.
(Carlos Castaneda)
Despite the claims of religions and economists, suffering seldom leads to enlightenment.
ReplyDeleteThe second noble truth of Buddhism is about the cause of suffering, the third is about the end of suffering and the fourth is about the path that frees us from suffering. It’s that process, not just the suffering, that can lead to enlightenment.
ReplyDeleteKindness
ReplyDeleteBefore you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and
purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you every where
like a shadow or a friend.
Naomi Shihab Nye
from The Words Under the Words: Selected Poems