Life is suffering. To live is to suffer. To be human is to hurt.

 

Such are the summaries we learn from the Buddha, Holocaust survivor Victor Frankl, and Norman Newlander – a character in the Netflix series, “The Korminsky Method.”

 

But you don’t need to turn to philosophers, biographies, or a comedy-drama to know this. It’s obvious. We all know that life is, well… hard.

 

But the real question is – how shall we then live? And it’s clear that the answer to that question must include a way to thrive with suffering.

Frankl himself said it best when he wrote, “If there is meaning in life at all, then there must be meaning in suffering.”

 

We’re going to meditate on this more next week. But for now, here’s a simple way of looking at it. In our world today, suffering is something we spend our time trying to escape. The path of least resistance offers us a reprieve from its claws. So we aim to navigate through the minefields of anxiety, betrayal, loneliness and trauma by escaping. And there are plenty of escape routes – amusement, intoxication, inebriation, distraction, hustling, spiritual festivals and the list goes on.

 

Now that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Be proud of yourself for striving against the current. For doing whatever it takes to make it through another day. If Doritos and movies are what get you through, then good on you for finding a way to make it!

 

But we also want to ask a different question today – what if we can find a deeper sense of peace, not from escaping suffering, but from finding meaning and purpose in it? In that sense our pain becomes a paint brush through which we make the world more beautiful. It becomes a tool of contribution that gives meaning to our suffering and with that meaning, a deeper sense of centeredness and belonging.

 

Of course, the ice-cream tub and teli-binge days will always be there and it’s OK. But with a different view of our anxiety, we can also experience moments of beauty otherwise unavailable to us. 

 

Like the popular Pinterest quote says, “One day you will tell your story of how you have overcome what you are going through and it will become part of someone else’s survival guide.”

Purpose and meaning in suffering.

Let’s meditate on that.