Suffering and pain I do not know who ever promised me a life without suffering and pain. I have heard it said on this list that suffering is a medieval concept without any benefit or grace to be earned by enduring it . This, I feel, is a gross misrepresentation of life as anyone who lives this journey will tell you. Life is filled with hurts, pain and suffering and also with man’s inhumanity to man. Only by living and dealing with those things that I cannot change, can you ever really find peace. I think that these brilliant minds say it better than i can: “My personal trials have also taught me the value of unmerited suffering. As my sufferings mounted I soon realized that there were two ways that I could respond to my situation: either to react with bitterness or seek to transform the suffering into a creative force. I decided to follow the latter course. Recognizing the necessity for suffering I have tried to make of it virtue. If only to save myself from bitterness, I have attempted to see my personal ordeals as an opportunity to transform myself and heal the people involved in the tragic situation, which now obtains. I have lived these last few years with the conviction that unearned suffering is redemptive.” Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. “Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it. <http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/1632.html>” Helen Keller “Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved. <http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/30186.html>" Helen Keller “We could never learn to be brave and patient, if there were only joy in the world. <http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/2332.html>” Helen Keller “It requires more courage to suffer than to die.” Napoleone Bonaparte “The salvation of the world is in man’s suffering.” William Faulkner “If you suffer, thank God! It is a sure sign that you are alive.” Elbert Hubbard “Suffering becomes beautiful when anyone bears great calamities with cheerfulness, not through insensibility but through greatness of mind.” Aristotle “We are healed of suffering only by experiencing it in full.” Marcel Proust While I too, would love to live in a perfect world and I would never go out and deliberately look for ways to torture myself, I do not see any way to avoid having suffering and pain in my life. Oh, there is one more quote…it’s in my signature file: -- Joan Blessington Snyder 54/14 [log in to unmask] http://www.pwnkle.com/jes/jes_web/index.htm “Hang tough……..no way through it but to do it.” Chris in the Morning Northern Exposure ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn