Quotes about Suffering

The only way to see if it works is to try it. What have you got to lose besides suffering?

Most people tell you they want to get out of kindergarten, but don't believe them. Don't believe them! All they want you to do is to mend their broken toys. "Give me back my wife. Give me back my job. Give me back my money. Give me back my reputation, my success." This is what they want; they want their toys replaced. That's all. Even the best psychologist will tell you that, that people don't really want to be cured. What they want is relief; a cure is painful.

Waiting is painful. Forgetting is painful. But not knowing which to do is the worse kind of suffering.

But there is suffering in life, and there are defeats. No one can avoid them. But it's better to lose some of the battles in the struggles for your dreams than to be defeated without ever knowing what you're fighting for.

Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dream.

Where there is anger, there is always pain underneath.

The pain that you create now is always some form of nonacceptance, some form of unconscious resistance to what is. On the level of thought, the resistance is some form of judgment. On the emotional level, it is some form of negativity. The intensity of the pain depends on the degree of resistance to the present moment, and this in turn depends on how strongly you are identified with your mind.

The end of suffering happens in this very moment, whether you're watching a terrorist attack or doing the dishes. And compassion begins at home. Because I don't believe my thoughts, sadness can't exist. That's how I can go to the depths of anyone's suffering, if they invite me, and take them by the hand and walk them out of it into the sunlight of reality.

I've taken that walk myself.

The only time we suffer  is when we believe a thought that argues with what is. When the mind is perfectly clear, what is is what we want.

You move totally away from reality when you believe that there is a legitimate reason to suffer.

I am the perpretor of my suffering - but only all of it.

The healing of our present woundedness may lie in recognizing and reclaiming the capacity we have to heal each other, the enormous power in the simplest of human relationships: the strength of a touch, the blessing of forgiveness, the grace of someone else taking you just as you are and finding in you an unsuspected goodness. Everyone alive has suffered. It is the wisdom gained from our wounds and from our own experiences of suffering that makes us able to heal. Becoming expert has turned out to be less important than remembering and trusting the wholeness in myself and everyone else. Expertise cures, but wounded people can best be healed by other wounded people. Only other wounded people can understand what is needed, for the healing of suffering is compassion, not expertise.

"Oh, ancient god, whatever your name," whispered Ahmed. "Help this lost son of a good father, this evil boy who meant no harm but slept in school, ran errands slowly, did not pray from his heart, ignored his mother, and did not hold his family in great esteem. For all this I know I must suffer. But here in the midst of silence, at the desert's heart, where even the wind knows not my name? Must I die so young? Am I to be forgotten without having been?"

“Through indiscriminate suffering men know fear, and fear is the most divine emotion. It is the stones for altars and the beginning of wisdom.”

The gift of the Truth beats all other gifts. The flavour of the Truth beats all other tastes. The joy of the Truth beats all other joys, and the cessation of desire conquers all suffering

Abstinence is a path of choosing between profound suffering or abject failure.  Moderation is a more humane choice.

Abstinence is a perpetual cycly of holiness, misery and corruption.  Balance brings more fulfillment and less suffering.

There are times I forget to be grateful
easier to see things that are wrong
as I dishonor the the gifts I've been given
with worry, angst and woe.

There are times I need reminding
of the things I take for granted each day;
my children, my home or a stranger,
sent to brighten my way.

Take some time to say thank you
for the blessings that color your day;
Those colors will form a rainbow,
and chase the darkness away.

Marianne Goldweber

Who will tell whether one happy moment of love or the joy of breathing or walking on a bright morning and smelling the fresh air, is not worth all the suffering and effort which life implies.

Samsaric pleasures are like salt water, the more we indulge, the more we crave

The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.

Remember what I said about suffering...the suffering is repeated until the lesson is learned.

The world is a philosophical prison and Man is the philosophical prisoner.

If you want to end your suffering enter your pain.

Understanding and Love are not two separate things, but just one. To develop understanding, you have to practice looking at all living beings with the eyes of compassion. When you understand, you cannot help but love. And when you love, you naturally act in a way that can relieve the suffering of people.

What will it matter to him if he notices that he is growing old? Has he any reason to envy the young people whom he sees, or wax nostalgic over his own lost youth? What reasons has he to envy a young person? For the possibilities that a young person has, the future which is in store for him? "No, thank you," he will think. "Instead of possibilities, I have realities in my past, not only the reality of work done and love loved, but of sufferings bravely suffered. These sufferings are even the things of which I am most proud, though these things are things that cannot inspire envy.

The important thing is not to know who "I" is or what "I" is.  You'll never succeed. There are no words for it.  

The important thing is to drop the labels.  

As the Japanese Zen masters say, "Don't seek the truth; just drop your opinions."  Drop your theories; don't seek the truth.  Truth isn't something you search for.  If you stop being opinionated, you would know.  Something similar happens here.  If you drop your labels, you would know.  What do I mean by labels?  Every label you can conceive of except perhaps that of  human being.  I am a human being.  Fair enough; doesn't say very much.  But when you say, "I am successful," that's crazy.  Success is not part of the "I".  

Success is something that comes and goes; it could be here today and gone tomorrow.  That's not "I".  When you said, "I was a success," you were in error; you were plunged into darkness.  You identified yourself with success.  The same thing when you said, "I am a failure, a lawyer, a businessman." You know what's going to happen to you if you identify yourself with these things.  You're going to cling to them, you're going to be worried that they may fall apart, and that's where your suffering comes in.  That is what I meant earlier when I said to you, "If you're suffering, you're asleep." Do you want a sign that you're asleep? Here it is: You're suffering.  Suffering is a sign that you're out of touch with the truth.  Suffering is given to you that you might open your eyes to the truth, that you might understand that there's falsehood somewhere, just as physical pain is given to you so you will understand that there is disease or illness somewhere.  Suffering points out that there is falsehood somewhere.  

Suffering occurs when you clash with reality.  

When your illusions clash with reality when your falsehoods clash with the truth, then you have suffering.  

Otherwise there is no suffering.

Governments would rather spend their money on another bomber than education, and why do we fear black men when every bit of suffering in our lives has a Caucasian face attached to it?

The most fundamental law of tragedy is that the moments of greatest happiness are the hardest to attain.

The denial of suffering is, in fact a better definition of illness than its acceptance.

Love doesn't conquer suffering, it just makes it useless.