To Live is to Suffer

My daughter had a biking accident. She fell on a tree stump and ended up with a gaping wound on her knee, so off to the ER it was.

The doctor was a bit rough while examining her wound. "That hurts" my daughter said.

"Life is pain", the doctor responded.


"Wow, that's so profound.
How about a punch in the balls so you can feel alive too?"


Our good doctor wasn't wrong though - pain is a fundamental part of our lives. None can avoid it, and it comes in all flavors.

In fact, it seems that pretty much everything we do is somehow tied to suffering. Our days are a constant struggle to prevent and escape it, and by doing so, we often just end up trading one kind of pain for another - we work in our unfulfilling jobs to avoid financial stress, let social media build up our anxieties in an attempt to escape loneliness and boredom, and hurt ourselves doing sports in the hopes of prolonging our seemingly pointless torment on this Earth.

Want to be healthy and thin? Then make sure you only eat food you hate. Otherwise, try at least not to think how smart pigs are when you have some on your plate. Perhaps try wearing those high heels for that party you absolutely don't want to attend? It's not like you might break an ankle or anything. Not satisfied with your nose, jawline or boobs? Surgery it is. Surely it'll be worth it. Who knows, it might even help you find a new lover to ruin your life with.

Suffering is a driving force behind our philosophies too: Existentialists want us to use it for fuel, Stoics say it's only as bad as we take it, Buddhists think we only suffer because we want it, and theists believe it'll all be worth it in the end.

Is there even such a thing as the wrong path to take? If it works for you, great. After all, anything is better than surrendering to our pain and to our fears of meaninglessness, isolation and death.

Right?

Just please remember - your path may not be the same as mine. And often when we suffer, all we need is for someone to sit next to us for a while, and maybe offer a few words of comfort.

Especially when we are children.

Comments

  1. Jenski01April 8, 2025 at 6:55 PM

    Hi, it's the daughter in question! The face is very accurate to the one I made. I got 17 stitches and he really wasn't gentle. 10 years later, it's a funny memory, though. :D

    ReplyDelete

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