Suffering is the aim of therapy. Or as Freud said a common unhappiness. Well not quite?
To suffer efficiently is to suffer in a way that suffering can be put aside.
Generally we are trapped in a pleasure / suffering loop. We reach for pleasure to avoid suffering. When pleasure is unreachable we suffer.

To be comfortable in our suffering creates a lessening of suffering but not a disappearance. But it can allow us to focus on something beyond ourselves.

Imagine your suffering self in a cinema blocking your view of the screen. We become concerned with the suffering self, blocking the screen and how it feels. We move to see the screen but our suffering moves to block the screen. At times the suffering is delayed – pleasure – the full screen in view. Only to move back into block.

If we can befriend the suffering self, it can move & sit next to us in the same row allowing more of a view of the screen. The screen creating something bigger than us.

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