When you read this quote, what comes to mind for you?

[GoodPersonEffed]

Bid any number of individuals tell you the story of their lives: you will find that all have paid some penalty for being born.

- Seneca

 

[Fedrea]

The bad doesn't seem to outweigh the good for many I know well

 

[CynicalHopelessness]

Life is like scales: on one cup, there's joy. On the other cup, there's suffering. You can rely on the second cup being non-empty - it's theoretically possible for there to be no bad in one's life, but I know of no account of such thing, and even then it's more unlikely than three bullets hitting each other.

Being a consious human is either trying to make good outweight the bad, or refusing to play that game and killing yourself.

 

[Deleted member 17331]

The first thing that came to my mind was a question: What is there behind so many smiles on the street?

I feel like we're all broken, and we're born broken.

 

[Aap]

Shit happens...to everyone.

 

[HeavyOne]

Thank you for this wise quote!

Reminds me Freud's theories...

 

[Sinai Silence]

It makes me think that life is suffering and that everyone pays a certain toll on their existence.

 

[lostangel]

It doesn't matter what cards they were dealt they have all suffered in some way.

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

I think first of the threads that get posted when someone rich suicides, and the inevitable debates about how money can't buy happiness.

Then I think about people labeled because of their behaviors sociopaths, who do some really awful shit (I recently extricated from one who stole from me), and I think that they have to have been through some pretty bad shit to develop into that way of functioning. And even if they didn't, they don't connect to other people, so even if they "win" a lot, they have so much lack. I have an ex who was a sociopath, and his father was abusive to his mother, and he developed hatred for his mother, and learned from his father's example how to treat women like shit and drive them crazy. To watch one's mother be abused and to disintegrate, that's a penalty.

I also think about people like royalty, who are raised without compassion for others, go to boarding schools where there is so much cruelty, are members of exclusive secret and not secret societies, who have perversions they get away with but don't want to come to light. They are pampered and toadied to, which puffs up and feeds all that is negative. I see how power corrupts. If one makes others suffer and has no compassion for or awareness of them, then it is a sickness from them that they spread to others, rather than good, so it did not come from good. I think they've paid a penalty as well. Many throughout history have been in line for thrones and said no, and for good reason. Whether they handle the power well or not, such people do not have freedom over their lives, they don't have privacy, they're imprisoned in a fine and toxic environment. I've been around wealthy and privileged people, royalty in their own way. I experienced and witnessed the exclusion and nastiness, and I can say that they are not happy people. Smug, self-satisfied, but not happy, not content. They always want. They always protect. I never saw or knew one who was relaxed. That seems like penalty for having been born.

 

[Zappfe lover]

F

Bid any number of individuals tell you the story of their lives: you will find that all have paid some penalty for being born.

- Seneca

Don't have children. Problem solved.

 

[agentgeez]

I think first of the threads that get posted when someone rich suicides, and the inevitable debates about how money can't buy happiness.

Then I think about people labeled because of their behaviors sociopaths, who do some really awful shit (I recently extricated from one who stole from me), and I think that they have to have been through some pretty bad shit to develop into that way of functioning. And even if they didn't, they don't connect to other people, so even if they "win" a lot, they have so much lack. I have an ex who was a sociopath, and his father was abusive to his mother, and he developed hatred for his mother, and learned from his father's example how to treat women like shit and drive them crazy. To watch one's mother be abused and to disintegrate, that's a penalty.

I also think about people like royalty, who are raised without compassion for others, go to boarding schools where there is so much cruelty, are members of exclusive secret and not secret societies, who have perversions they get away with but don't want to come to light. They are pampered and toadied to, which puffs up and feeds all that is negative. I see how power corrupts. If one makes others suffer and has no compassion for or awareness of them, then it is a sickness from them that they spread to others, rather than good, so it did not come from good. I think they've paid a penalty as well. Many throughout history have been in line for thrones and said no, and for good reason. Whether they handle the power well or not, such people do not have freedom over their lives, they don't have privacy, they're imprisoned in a fine and toxic environment. I've been around wealthy and privileged people, royalty in their own way. I experienced and witnessed the exclusion and nastiness, and I can say that they are not happy people. Smug, self-satisfied, but not happy, not content. They always want. They always protect. I never saw or knew one who was relaxed. That seems like penalty for having been born.

I like that sort of empathy. No matter what kind of person someone is, they were unknowingly molded into it. That's why I can't agree with people who think bad people should suffer, there doesn't seem to be a good reason for it. Even if they're bad because of privilege, privilege itself can damage a person. In a way, people who were born into bad circumstances but were strengthened by them are luckier in the long run. There's a specific sort of suffering that can strengthen character, but there's also the kind of suffering that just seems to eat away at you despite the apparent privilege we live in. There's no satisfaction there. Also, I'm reminded of the 'hedonic treadmill' by the comment about rich people. Even great changes in someone's life won't stop your happiness from eventually returning to a baseline. I don't think desires can ever stop, which means no true satisfaction.

 

[Fedrea]

"The Winners Shout the Losers Curse
Dance before dead Englands Hearse
Every Night & every Morn
Some to Misery are Born
Every Morn and every Night
Some are Born to sweet delight
Some are Born to sweet delight
Some are Born to Endless Night "

 

[Deleted member 17949]

It's a nice way of thinking about things but these are never to be taken too seriously. The brain is a complicated thing and some people end up more willing to live life than others. While everyone's human experiences are somewhat similar they are all vastly different in their own ways.

 

[Lilium]

Everyone suffered, suffers, and will suffer.

We all have to pay a penalty for living; each person will react differently to their penalty. When these penalties pile up and become unbearable one is pushed into a state of despair, a state in which they start humoring the thought of suicide. I think that in this state there is no right thing to do, there is only what you choose to do. You should look at your problems, see if they can be solved, and if they can be solved ask yourself if you want to solve them.

 

[Zappfe lover]

I like that sort of empathy. No matter what kind of person someone is, they were unknowingly molded into it. That's why I can't agree with people who think bad people should suffer, there doesn't seem to be a good reason for it. Even if they're bad because of privilege, privilege itself can damage a person. In a way, people who were born into bad circumstances but were strengthened by them are luckier in the long run. There's a specific sort of suffering that can strengthen character, but there's also the kind of suffering that just seems to eat away at you despite the apparent privilege we live in. There's no satisfaction there. Also, I'm reminded of the 'hedonic treadmill' by the comment about rich people. Even great changes in someone's life won't stop your happiness from eventually returning to a baseline. I don't think desires can ever stop, which means no true satisfaction.

Free will is a myth, after all.

I coundn't agree more on the sentiment of "bad people should not suffer". Punishment should work as a means of prevention, not be an end in itself.

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

If one were to bid someone to tell the story of their life and they talk about any suffering, I think it's interesting that a lot of times people will reject that suffering or minimize it. They'll say it wasn't that bad, or that they've been through worse, or that they wish their situation had been that good. People tend to hear based on their own experiences and not hear the other's experience. Like the saying that one man's hell is another man's heaven.

I used to know a guy who'd been through so much, really hardcore stuff, and survived all of it, and was bitter he'd been through it. When someone would talk about their suffering, he'd shoot them down and say they hadn't been through anything like the big things that he had, and he got through all of it, and no one could trump brain cancer of course. He didn't have much luck with the ladies, but if he'd been more understanding and accepting, let alone comforting, he could have.

As @Lilium said, everyone suffers. Even getting scratched is a penalty for having been born. Our bodies can be hurt and they are. We have emotions that we have to learn to regulate, they can get so huge. Two year olds seriously suffer!

Someone saying "You don't even know what suffering is" doesn't change the fact that someone is experiencing suffering. It's real, it's valid. It gets minimized so much that its difficult to have compassion when someone needs it to be heard they're suffering. People are so quick to find a reason why it's wrong that someone is. I catch myself doing it. It's a bit of hate, a lot of negation.

How many little kids are ignored or made fun of by adults when they are absolutely losing their shit? If they're not shown compassion, they may have to make effort to learn it later, if they are motivated to. And not everyone who is compassionate is that way only because they've suffered, it can also be modeled and taught.