Beloved Swamiji, What is suffering? Why do we suffer?

To start with, it will help to realise that suffering is not an event in your life - it is a response to an event. Whether you suffer or not in a particular situation depends entirely on your reaction to that situation. When do you undergo suffering? When you fall ill? When your neighbour gets a new car? When your partner leaves you for someone else? Well, suppose you decided to just accept these situations without anger or resentment. Just as they are, so be it. Would you still suffer as much? After all, there is nothing inherently painful about your neighbour getting a new car. Even if there is pain in the moment, as when a loved one leaves, you cannot wish it away. Try to accept the inevitability of the moment, without reaction. [Nothing can make you suffer without your permission.] It is ONLY your negative response to an experience that allows it to hurt you. Don't you see, no one or nothing can make you suffer without your silent permission? Make a habit of witnessing experiences minus your personal judgement. [Suffering can be a shortcut to inner growth!] Because suffering can be a powerful catalyst to growth. Just like a seed first has to rupture before a plant can grow and blossom, intense suffering can break down the defenses of your ego, leaving you open and vulnerable to existence. With your usual thought patterns shattered, you begin to see things as they actually are. You begin to recognize a subtle distance betwen you and the pain - that it is not 'your' pain, someting intrinsic to you. In fact, pain is simply the response you've chosen to that particular situation. And once you see that, how can you suffer anymore? In consciously accepting your pain, you truly let go of it. Suffering is not necessarily the key to bliss. But if you learn your lesson well, suffering can certainly open your eyes to the unreality of suffering. It can teach you how unneccessary it is to suffer at all. This is what I call 'necessary suffering'!