Is Your Fear of Suffering Worse Than the Actual Suffering?

“Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams, because every second of the search is a second’s encounter with God and with eternity.” – Paulo Coelho

We spend so much of our time trying to avoid pain at all costs. We have this little voice in our head that says “I shouldn’t have to feel pain,” or “Pain is wrong, suffering is not where I want to be, so I will distract myself in any way possible from actually having to feel any sort of suffering.”

We have judged pain and suffering as an indication that there is something wrong with us. And because we view pain as something that needs to be avoided and fought against, when it shows up in our lives we resist it by trying to deny it, or we avoid it by distracting ourselves with things like addictions, or buying more stuff, or focusing on the lives of others in order to not have to focus on our own.