Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls;
the most massive characters are seared with scars.
— Khalil Gibran
It is not that we are happy for the suffering…
we are happy for the new level of intimacy
with God that the suffering has brought us to.
— Teresa d’Ávila and Richard Rohr
Suffering: undergoing pain, distress, or hardship.
—Oxford Languages and Google
The title suggests a couple of things:
Out of suffering can come peace, strength, and understanding… and
There’s a force in the cosmos that can lift us out of suffering, or at least turn it to our advantage.
Here’s how it works….
— — — —
Why We Suffer
I wrote a previous article about this, but in a nutshell:
Earthy things can make us suffer: accidents, addictions, assaults, competitors, crimes, deceptions, disasters, diseases, genetic defects, hunger, loss, parasites, poverty, poisoning, predators, war….
Psychological things can make us suffer: fear of death, sense of separateness, wishful thinking, attachments, expectations, negative emotions.… (read more…)
Spiritual things can make us suffer: karma, meddling spirits from the shadow, our soul choices for a lifetime (for example, an ethereal being from finer realms who wants first-hand experience of suffering in this rough world might incarnate into a loving family as a sensitive child wise beyond its years… and then—after shining brilliant invisible light into our world that we feel as love in their presence—maybe die young after getting a taste of suffering)….
Bottom line: To live on Earth is to suffer.
To Alleviate Suffering
So, lots of things can make us suffer, and nowadays there are lots of things to help us alleviate suffering, for example:
To alleviate pain: pharmaceutical drugs,
To alleviate distress: psychoanalysis and therapy, and
To alleviate hardship: support from family, friends, insurance companies, and welfare programs.
We have these anti-suffering tools at our disposal. We keep them in what might be called our lifetime happiness drawer. But there’s one shining instrument in the drawer that can turn all that suffering to our advantage, and that deserves a closer look.
Out of Suffering
So the question is: If pain, distress, and hardship are inevitable on Earth, how do we not just cope with them but use them for inner peace and strength? How best to turn suffering to our advantage?
person and a planet… and everything else in our material universe,
which all have subtle copies of themselves (or spirit bodies)
flourishing in superimposed dimensions leading to the source.
I believe the answer is what our ethereal friends call the moral way: To understand, to acknowledge, to devise, and to act. It’s a simple formula that can apply to most situations, but generally, for a lifetime on Earth with all its suffering, I believe it has a specific meaning.
To understand. At the center of everything there’s a source of vitality, purpose, infinite strength, and fine motivations like love, honesty, gratitude, and service.
That timeless, infinitely powerful source rests not only at the center of the cosmos but at the center of our being as the real you and me.
Throughout our rollercoaster lifetime, the source rests undisturbed in the area of the heart, filling us with vitality, purpose, strength, and fine motivations.
The more we can connect consciously with it, or resonate with it through our thoughts, words, and actions, the happier we can be, regardless of the inevitable suffering in our lives. (read more…)
Then, after we die with a good attitude, we’ll awaken in paradise. But in the meantime…
To acknowledge. The next step, then, is to acknowledge its presence in our lives. To acknowledge the source is to acknowledge that:
- Reality and truth exist only in the source.
- The dramas we experience on Earth are illusory… maya.
- When we’re hypnotized by Earth’s dramas (as most of us are most of the time), we can find peace by stepping back periodically to remind ourselves of our anchor to the source of truth and pure light.
To devise. Then, we devise or adjust the knowledge gained from conscious contact with the source to fit our life circumstances. For example:
- When we see others suffering, especially our loved ones, we can hold them in the light, see the perfect light within them, and know that they too will rise out of suffering once they “see the light” within. Preaching to them usually won’t help, but patience and persistence will, as long as we’re driven by source motivations like love and gratitude (not by fear or desperation or other earthy motivations).
To act. Finally, we act accordingly. Through it all, we can keep in mind that:
- Everyone eventually acknowledges the source and “sees the light.” The fortunate ones are those who do it during their lifetime, before leaving Earth’s illusory dramas behind.
.
The moral way.
# # #
Macy Afterlife: The Beacon 
Thanks Mark…this is a good one.
Of the 4 precepts here: understand, acknowledge, devise, and act…I think we tend to flake out at the devise and act levels of the practice to start reducing and ending our suffering.
Oftentimes, we deceive ourselves, and (maybe) everyone else, by putting on a show of understanding and acknowledging, but we don’t devise and act often enough to allow the practice to set in. We are just putting on a show.
The 14 precepts presented in the “read more” link under Why We Suffer is great.
I think a way to practice those 14 is to pick one of them and work on it daily.
Benjamin Franklin had a list of such “devise and act” precepts that he would sequentially practice.
Onward
I agree John,
To devise and to act seem to be the bigger challenge for our humanness.
Alicia Rodriguez (from the link to 14 reasons for suffering) has certainly given the matter a lot of thought. Brilliant.
Warm wishes,
Mark
Ben Farnklin’s 13 Virtues are high practices from his time.
I have this list on our refrigerator. I think the pursuit is important even if one feels unattained in the virtue.
Here is the list:
1) Temperance. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.
2) Silence. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.
3) Order. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.
4) Resolution. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
5) Frugality. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; waste nothing.
6) Industry. Lose no time; be always employed in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
7) Sincerity. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
8) Justice. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
9) Moderation. Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
10) Cleanliness. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes, or habitation.
11) Tranquility. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
12) Chastity. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation.
13) Humility. Imitate Jesus and Socrates.
That looks like a good, practical list for polishing one’s behavior.
It’s interesting to go through it point by point to see which one’s I have a bit of a tussle with from time to time.
We are back to understand, acknowledge, devise, and act!
I’ve been thinking about that, John.
Being closed off (mostly) from spirit during these lifetimes on Earth, morality does seem to be a cyclic thing for us humans.
As our brains, hormones, genetics, and other carnal processes get immersed in the illusive dramas of the world, and we’re mostly blocked from the eternal truths that run the cosmos from the finest realms of spirit, we have to keep updating our basic understanding of how things work. Science keeps making strides, new inventions and discoveries come along, we learn as we grow up… our reality is constantly changing and updating.
So it seems like we always have to cycle back to the first step: To understand. Then to acknowledge, to devise, and to act. Although…
I think that once we make conscious contact with the source (the way mystics do), that cycle can be broken, because then we finally “understand”… and everything else starts falling into place, coming into perspective.
You and Kate and other readers keep pointing the way for me.
Can’t thank you enough……….
Mark
Au contraire!…just to help set the record straight…I can’t thank you enough!
Do you remember coming into my office back in 1993 with a copy of the Noetic Sciences Review article entitled “When Dimensions Cross” which you had authored…?…with no less than a prologue note by Willis Harmon.
You had already written your books about healing the world…and you.
And then in 1994 you were visited by Konstantin Raudive. You wrote another article about that…”Long Distance Calling from the Afterlife.”
You had come a long way since “The Beacon” in Windsor, CO, which must have set you up for launching your own family version called Macy Afterlife: The Beacon.
And here we are.
Then there was your 2 books “Miracles in the Storm” and then “The Project.”
All of this, and more, like a presentation you gave in Santa Fe at the Science and Consciousness conference…all of this helping me graduate from one school, based on Christian church dogma and then Siddha Yoga, into a new school of study about the Earth dimension being just another classroom extension of Heaven where humans have never learned how to get along. As they say, “Life is the school and love is the lesson.”
Why is that lesson so elusive? You have put together some fine writings to answer that question also.
And thanks to you and Regina for our 8-8-02 marriage ceremony. We’re still going strong!
Those were the days, my friend….
The ‘semi-colon’ is still going strong too.
Thanks for that… and for the glowing friendship over the years.
Love to you (and Jean),
Mark (& Regina)