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Sunday, January 23, 2011

Suffering is Optional


The most common reason that people turn to spirituality is to deal with suffering. They don’t do this by accident, but because every religion promises that it can relieve pain, that faith transcends the sorrows of the flesh, that the soul is a refuge for the suffering heart. Yet when they turn to God or faith, or the soul, many people find no relief, or only the relief that otherwise might come from talking to a therapist.
Is there a special power found only in spirituality?

To answer this question, we have to realize, first of all, that pain is not same as suffering. Left to itself, the body discharges pain spontaneously, letting go of it the moment that the underlying cause is healed. Suffering is pain that we hold onto. It comes from the mind’s mysterious instinct to believe that pain is good, or that it cannot be escaped, or that the person deserves it. If none of these were present, suffering would not exist. It takes force of mind to create suffering, a blend of belief and perception that the person thinks he or she has no control over.

The secret cause of suffering is unreality itself.

The steps that lead to suffering:

1.      - Overlooking actual facts
2.      - Adopting a negative perception
3.      - Reinforcing that perception by obsessive thinking
4.      - Getting lost in the pain without looking for a way out
5.      - Comparing yourself to others
6.      -  Cementing the suffering through relationship 
           
      - Torkom Saraydarian

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