For me, suffering "well" is something of a cumulative experience. When you are faced for the first time with a place of deep suffering, it provokes for most of us panic and fear; it is not possible for most of us to be fully present for it. When you have moved through it and discover that you can survive it, then over time when you are faced again with suffering, it becomes possible to be present and aware of its nuances and textures, like a not unfamiliar companion. Over time, you accumulate an experiential understanding that suffering takes different forms and that also it will pass, so that the companion of suffering becomes more interesting in its own subtle ways, and who you are through it becomes a source of stillness and self-awareness that you could not otherwise ever know. For each place of suffering we may face in a lifetime, there are so many different nuances and textures with many gifts, including often those we do not perceive until much later. But facing it, holding through it, seeing it to its end, can be very, very hard.
On Aug 19, 2015 Ebie wrote :
For me, suffering "well" is something of a cumulative experience. When you are faced for the first time with a place of deep suffering, it provokes for most of us panic and fear; it is not possible for most of us to be fully present for it. When you have moved through it and discover that you can survive it, then over time when you are faced again with suffering, it becomes possible to be present and aware of its nuances and textures, like a not unfamiliar companion. Over time, you accumulate an experiential understanding that suffering takes different forms and that also it will pass, so that the companion of suffering becomes more interesting in its own subtle ways, and who you are through it becomes a source of stillness and self-awareness that you could not otherwise ever know. For each place of suffering we may face in a lifetime, there are so many different nuances and textures with many gifts, including often those we do not perceive until much later. But facing it, holding through it, seeing it to its end, can be very, very hard.