Suffering

There's a whole lot of suffering going on.

I had this thought on my way to work.

And at the same time I thought no wonder we created religion

We have too.

There is no other way to explain the place that suffering occupies in our existance as a species.

Unless life just sucks and then we die.

Now, I'm not saying our suffering is proof of anything beyond this life.

Nor am I saying that our suffering serves any purpose at all.

But it exists.

And it tortures us.

And maybe as humans with our oversized brains, we have to make things overly complicated.

We have to explain and understand and rationalize and punish.

We need rules.

When we break the rules we suffer.

When we commit transgressions we suffer.

Yet sometimes we are innocent and find ourselves in the crosshairs of a tsunami or crosstown bus or a violent military regime or a misfire in a cell's nucleus that results in cancer.

And we suffer.

We suffer because we are human.

We make mistakes because we're human.

We make sucky decisions because we're human.

I work really really hard to do the best I can. And still I fuck up.

I'm only human.

And maybe humans fuck up, or maybe we just exist, but no matter what we suffer.

So. There must be a point to all the suffering.

Or not

I have found that my suffering breeds compassion.

Today I am grinch butt free. Today I am giving thanks.

Today I can get lost in my patients and feel their suffering because I'm experiencing my own.

So. I am responsible for the choices I make.

I am human. I fuck up. And then I suffer.

And others suffer too.

But I am thankful that the Universe gives me a silver lining of compassion

rather than bitterness or anger or hatred.

At least for now.