For myself, suffering doesnt make me a good person; it makes me selfish. Why do we think that people who have less should find it edifying?
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
It's a rare and precious thing to be close to suffering because our society - in many ways - tells us that suffering is wrong. If it's our own suffering, we try to hide it or isolate ourselves. If others are suffering, we're taught to put them away somewhere so we don't have to see it.
We create our own unhappiness. The purpose of suffering is to help us understand we are the ones who cause it.
Suffering doesn't improve human beings, does it?
People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.
I do not believe that sheer suffering teaches. If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness and the willingness to remain vulnerable.
Suffering is the substance of life and the root of personality, for it is only suffering that makes us persons.
Suffering isn't a moral endowment. People don't always do well under duress, and it seemed to me to be truer to a fellow in that situation to make him angry.
Suffering does not necessarily ennoble you.
I think we have a creative impulse where suffering can magnify our work, but so can joy. You can be in love and write the greatest love song ever. Sometimes I think too much suffering makes it difficult to do one's work.
Suffering makes a people greater, and we have suffered much. We had a message to give the world, but we were overwhelmed, and the message was cut off in the middle. In time there will be millions of us - becoming stronger and stronger - and we will complete the message.