Suffering is inevitable in life; we suffer due to childhood traumas, unexpected problems and tragedies, abundant desires, and other reasons. Parents suffer as a result of losing their only child; a farmer loses his crops to draughts and is in search of food; a poor suffer in poverty; a wealthy businessman gets stressed, loses his mind, and suffers due to restlessness and fatigue; a patient bears the hardships of illness and cannot wait to recover; everyone suffers in life owing to some reasons, but sufferings can be subdued and be a source of happiness and strength if we change our perspectives about them. Life without suffering is not possible, we need to embrace sufferings in our life to get stronger and face the adversity of life; we need to have the mindset of a winner and be able to subdue our pain and not succumb to bad desires.
“It is for the difficult moments in life—the crossroads that Seneca found himself on when asked to serve Nero—that virtue can be called upon. Heraclitus said that character was fate. He’s right. We develop good character, strong epithets for ourselves, so when it counts, we will not flinch.”
KEY POINTS:
- Know about your childhood.
- Overcome bad desires.
- Know the limit, do not go to the extreme.
- Appreciate beauty.
Heal the inner child:
Everyone has a different background that molds their personalities as they grow up. We suffer in adulthood due to carrying the pain of childhood while we are not aware of it; we need to know how we were treated in childhood since childhood traumas are difficult to heal, but not impossible. A child brought up in a violent family will suffer badly and may act like his parents. In healing, we need to have a clear picture of our childhood, what made us feel bad, and what made us feel happy.
The child is in me still . . . and sometimes not so still. —FRED ROGERS
“As Freud explained, “We all demand reparation for our early wounds to our narcissism,” thinking we are owed because we were wronged or deprived.”
As Thich Nhat Hanh has written:
After recognizing and embracing our inner child, the third function of mindfulness is to soothe and relieve our difficult emotions. Just by holding this child gently, we are soothing our difficult emotions and we can begin to feel at ease. When we embrace our strong emotions with mindfulness and concentration, we’ll be able to see the roots of these mental formations. We’ll know where our suffering has come from. When we see the roots of things, our suffering will lessen. So mindfulness recognizes, embraces, and relieves
Beware desire:
A lot of sufferings we get due to indulging in bad habits or bad desires. It is better to carefully evaluate the potential consequences of bad desires; once the picture is clear, it gets clear to overcome bad desires in the first place unless they are taken seriously. Healing is all about knowing what causes sufferings; once the things that cause suffering are known; it gets easier to defeat them and find ways to heal and fulfilled life. To quit smoking, the first step is to be aware of the signs that you are getting addicted to it; the next step is to overcome the urges by not going to the places where it is likely that you will smoke. It takes courage and strength to fight bad habits or bad desires; nothing is difficult in life.
Every man has a passion gnawing away at the bottom of his heart, just as every fruit has its worm.
—ALEXANDRE DUMAS
“Lust is a destroyer of peace in our lives: Lust for a beautiful person. Lust for an orgasm. Lust for someone other than the one we’ve committed to be with. Lust for power. Lust for dominance. Lust for other people’s stuff. Lust for the fanciest, best, most expensive things that money can buy.”
“A person enslaved to their urges is not free—whether they are a plumber or the president.”
The most common form of lust is envy—the lust for what other people have, for the sole reason that they have it. Joseph Epstein’s brilliant line is: “Of the seven deadly sins, only envy is no fun at all.”
Democritus, twenty-four hundred years before him: “An envious man pains himself as though he were an enemy.”
Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita calls desire the “ever-present enemy of the wise . . . which like a fire cannot find satisfaction.”
Enough:
A human being is by nature greedy; he loses his sleep and health pursuing things in abundance that he leaves later in life. It is not unwise to have goals in life; it is not unwise to collect money, but it is unwise to wreck health and mental peace for the sake of things that will be left behind. The art of saying enough and knowing moderation is a skill clever people have acquired in life when they felt life is not just about pursuing careers; it is about spending time in nature; building a family; getting quality sleep; talking to friends; taking long trips; doing what made them happy. Remember: the excess of anything is bad, even water in excess can spoil your health.
History relates no instance in which a conqueror has been surfeited with conquests. —STEFAN ZWEIG
“As he writes: It occurred to me to put the question directly to myself, “Suppose that all your objects in life were realized; that all the changes in institutions and opinions which you are looking forward to, could be completely effected at this very instant: would this be a great joy and happiness to you?” And an irrepressible self-consciousness distinctly answered, “No!” At this my heart sank within me: the whole foundation on which my life was constructed fell down.”
“It is a painful crossroads. Or worse, one that we ignore, stuffing those feelings of existential crisis down, piling on top of them meaningless consumption, more ambition, and the delusion that doing more and more of the same will eventually bring about different results.”
The best insights on enough come to us from the East. “When you realize there is nothing lacking,” Lao Tzu says, “the whole world belongs to you.”
Epicurus: “Nothing is enough for the man to whom enough is too little.”
Thomas Traherne: “To have blessings and to prize them is to be in Heaven; to have them and not to prize them is to be in Hell. . . . To prize them and not to have them is to be in Hell.”
Bathe in beauty:
We have made our life miserable constantly thinking about things that do not matter, and not focusing on the good things happening around us. We need to enjoy our moments in nature, feel our surroundings, enjoy the singing of birds, and get out of our fantasy world for a while. Living in the present heals us, our thoughts about the past get blocked, and we do not get anxious about the future. For a peaceful mind, peaceful moments are required, and we can have such moments by appreciating beauty. Beauty is not just in nature, it is everywhere, it could be the crying of a child, the voice of your beloved, and the reading of a book. What makes you happy is beauty, no matter if it is scary to others such as enjoying the lighting of the sky.
In the face of the Sublime, we feel a shiver . . . something too large for our minds to encompass. And for a moment, it shakes us out of our smugness and releases us from the deathlike grip of habit and banality. —ROBERT GREENE
“Rose Lane Wilder wrote of looking out over the grassy plateau in Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia: Here there was only sky, and a stillness made audible by the brittle grass. Emptiness was so perfect all around me that I felt a part of it, empty myself; there was a moment in which I was nothing at all—almost nothing at all.”
Conclusion:
We can heal ourselves by healing our inner child; overcoming our desires; saying enough when we feel are hurting ourselves, and we need to spend time in nature, focusing on good things happening around us, we need to live in the present.
References:
- Holiday, R. (2019). Stillness is the Key. Penguin.
Recommended books on healing yourself:
There are many books that focus on healing yourself, covering a variety of topics such as physical health, mental health, emotional well-being, and spiritual growth. Here are some suggestions:
- “The Power of Now” by Eckhart Tolle – This book emphasizes the importance of living in the present moment to achieve inner peace and heal past traumas.
- “The Body Keeps the Score” by Bessel van der Kolk – This book explores the impact of trauma on the body and mind, and provides practical strategies for healing.
- “You Can Heal Your Life” by Louise Hay – This book explores the connection between our thoughts and physical health, and provides affirmations and exercises to help readers heal themselves.
- “The Four Agreements” by Don Miguel Ruiz – This book offers practical guidance for improving self-awareness and overcoming negative beliefs that can hinder personal growth and healing.
- “The Secret” by Rhonda Byrne – This book explores the power of positive thinking and the law of attraction, and offers practical advice for achieving personal and professional success.
- “The Alchemist” by Paulo Coelho – This book tells the story of a young shepherd who embarks on a journey of self-discovery, and explores themes of personal growth, spirituality, and the pursuit of one’s dreams.
- “The Gifts of Imperfection” by Brené Brown – This book explores the importance of self-acceptance and self-love, and provides practical strategies for cultivating compassion and resilience.
- “Radical Acceptance” by Tara Brach – This book offers practical guidance for cultivating mindfulness and self-compassion, and explores how these practices can help us heal from past traumas and overcome negative patterns of thinking and behavior.
- “A New Earth” by Eckhart Tolle – This book offers practical guidance for living in the present moment and cultivating inner peace, and explores how these practices can help us overcome negative beliefs and achieve personal growth.
- “The Miracle of Mindfulness” by Thich Nhat Hanh – This book offers practical guidance for cultivating mindfulness in everyday life, and explores how this practice can help us overcome stress, anxiety, and other forms of emotional pain.