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The answer is to be find in the intent. Jesus did not simply suffer because it is not conscious. People do not understand why they suffer; they suffer through ignorance, not through choice. They suffer because they are attached to impermanent things; they identify with that which is fleetimg and momentary. As the first Noble truth puts it: 'Clinging to existence is suffering.'
It is curious what happens when we cling to existence. Because existence is suffering, and clinging to that existence is suffering, we have to mask the reality because we do not like to suffer. Because we seek ways to avoid suffering, we try to find ways to deny suffering. We find different ways to what is called 'self-calming'. Self-calming is lying to oneself, telling oneself a story to cover up the terrifying state of reality, convincing oneself that it is possible to live in this world without suffering.
When we have a physical pain, we take a pill, some form of painkiller. We anaesthetize ourselves to the pain. Having done this, we have a choice. We can look at the causes of this pain and work to remedy it, or we can ignore the causes and rely on more drugs to make us feel 'pain-free'. In other words, we can live in a lie and deny that there are underlying causes. However, if we do not look at the source of this pain, at the disease or infection that causes it, and if we do not work to alleviate the causes, the pain will return when the effects of the drug wear off.
self-calmimg is like taking a pain reliever without working on the underlying causes. One continues popping the pills, and the underlying cause can worsen, creating the need for another, stronger pill. If this continues, the pill-popping can become our reality. We can live completely under the influence of the drug. Our body will continue to suffer, it may even continue to manufacture the warning signs that we are ill, but we become oblivious to these signs, these warnings.
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To jstify fence-sitting, this refusal to make a choice. or this refusal to see the bad, people will find many and varied excuses. They may understand that suffering has been turned into a virtue in and of itself by the Church, with no discussion of context and its relationship to intent. The more you suffer the better; the more you suffer the holier you art, the closer to Christ you dwell. This acceptance of unintentional suffering has become a tool for oppression of the masses by the major religions. But rather than understanding that the problem is the question of intent, those who reject this Christian interpretation mechanically reject suffering itself. They never ask themselves: Am I suffering because I am still caught in the world of mechanical reaction, or am I suffering by choice?
Mechanical suffering is useless suffering.
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If the above is uselessly suffering, what, then, would be 'useful suffering'?
Can such a thing exist?
When we say that the life is suffering, we mean that life is an endless succession of events, many of which lead to suffering. There are many causes. If we learn to avoid a specific form of suffering, we can be certain that a new form will arise to challenge us.
Let us say we are in a relationship where we sacrifice ourselves for the good of another, using the excuse that we are closer to God by accepting out lot in life. With effort and reflection we can step back and identify the cause of our suffering. First, it is the acceptance of the Christian teaching on suffering and the subsequent ordering of our life upon that teaching: our acceptance of the needs of someone else at the expence of our own. Having identified this, we can change. We can refuse the original teaching that deformed our understanding of the world, we can step down from the pedestal of long suffering self-righteousness that justified our self-sacrifice, and we can refuse to put our misunderstanding of the needs of others before ourselves.
If we implement these changes, one form of suffering will end. However, a new cause of suffering may well arise - the reaction of those around us as we change. We have learned to stop suffering in one way, and we are now called upon to learn how to stop suffering in this new way. The change within the relationship away awy from our role and identification with 'self-sacrifice' may well lead to a rupture with those around us if they are unable to accept the change. They may to force us back into the old habits until we are obliged to break free in order to maintain the lesson we have learned. This, too, will create more suffering as we face a new life alone, meeting the experiences of learning to live alone and of relying upon ourselves.
But this suffering brought on by new experience can be accompanied by a feeling of joy as we look at what we have accomplished, as we see the change we have brought about in our lives. So there can be, if we so choose, a coupling of suffering and joy: we are joyous because we understand that we are suffering for a reason.
Moreover, although we continue to suffer, we are not suffering in the same ways. We are opening ourselves to new experences and new challenges. Gradually, we can change our outlook on sufering and on life. In looking back and seeing how we have been able to surmount past difficulties with success, as we understand the beneficial changes within us wrought by this testing through fire, we begin to look forward to the difficulties of the future as opportunities and challenges for growth. By passing through the fire of our experience, we know we are changing our way of being in this world and coming to a greater and greater understanding of ourselves, of our abilities, and of our capacity to surmount the roadblocks thrown up by the world to keep us in our place. WE build the faith in our ability to surpass the limits we have placed upon ourselves, the limits of our own thoughts and ideas that prevent us from being who we are, from seeing the world as it really is.
This growing understanding of suffering that comes from passing through the tests of suffering will in turn aid us in understanding others. Through our experience, we will be able to truly help others in the face of their own suffering: not by taking it on and helping them avoid it, but by teaching them the tools necessary to confront the suffering in their own lives. We can help others to see suffering as a means of surmounting suffering., choosing to accept and face this suffering consciously.
The approach
is certainly different than that which would have us erect a protective wall around ourselves, a wall that separates us from the world. The approach that rejects suffering, as we have seen, is a rejection of the Truth about the world and our existence.
The joy brought about through suffering is the lesson that sufering can be more than a burden. It can be a means of self-realization, of burning away the limits we impose upon ourselves. It is the alchemist's fire that transforms metals into gold, the means of forming our link with our 'higher selves' through burning away the dross. Is is the joy to live in Truth, no matter how horrendous tht Truth might be. It is never flinching because we know that we have the strenght to face the Truth and overcome it, no matter how great the challenge. It is the joy of knowing that we can choose not to live in the lie of self-calmimg.
Sufering can thus become the doorway through which we pass to an open experience of a limitless world because we are not afraid to look ahead, not afraid of pursuing new paths for fear of what awaits us, and not afraid of what we might find.
