No wonder so many people are miserable!

Suffering is a part of life.  It is almost more natural in many ways than happiness.  To avoid suffering, or to fear it, or to treat it like a parasite, only serves as fuel for the fire.

When you were a kid, you were probably afraid of the bogey man or the monsters in your closet.  The more we feared them, the more we avoided them, and the more powerful they became.

Suffering is not the bogey man.  It’s not something to avoid at all costs.  We cannot avoid suffering at all times in a healthy way.

With most of the people I work with, an important part of the work involves opening the door to the closet and sitting down with the bogey man and letting him know you won’t be hiding any longer.

This does not imply seeking or embracing suffering as one’s lot in life; far from it.  The more open you can be to the dynamic nature of your emotional experience and to the fleetingness of all emotional states, whether good or bad, the better equipped you will be to face your bogey man.  Clinging to moments of bliss or running away from pain won’t make the happiness stay or the sadness go away.