Worldly Suffering Quotes & Sayings

In both pleasant experience producing karma effect (shata vedaniya) and unpleasant experience producing karma effect (ashata-vedaniya), there is indeed a constant inner burning (antardaah, inner suffering). But because one has moorcha (worldly engrossment/fascination due to deluded worldly view), one does not notice it; he remains in a state similar to being unconscious. — Dada Bhagwan

The worldly [spiritual] science is methodic (kramic) in nature; one progresses "step by step"; one has to ascent one step at a time. Whereas this here, is Akram Vignan, a path of step-less spiritual science; it is a science that has arisen after 10 Lac (a million) years. In this path, one travels in only an 'elevator'. There is no effort to climb stairs here. Thereafter, one is constantly in the uninterrupted bliss of the Self (samadhi). There is constant bliss amidst mental affliction (aadhi), internal suffering (vyadhi) and externally induced affliction (oopadhi). — Dada Bhagwan

In nature, there is no pain or suffering neither in the spiritual life nor in the worldly life. The worldly life has become painful due to lack of this understanding. One does not know how to interact in life. He should remain untouched in the worldly life. When one remains untouched in the worldly life, there is no end to the bliss that arises! — Dada Bhagwan

For most of us, karma and negative emotions obscure the ability to see our own intrinsic nature, and the nature of reality. As a result we clutch on to happiness and suffering as real, and in our unskillful and ignorant actions go on sowing the seeds of our next birth. Our actions keep us bound to the continuous cycle of worldly existence, to the endless round of birth and death. So everything is at risk in how we live now at this very moment: How we live now can cost us our entire future. — Sogyal Rinpoche

Let no one out of laziness or continuous worldly occupations miss these holy Sunday gatherings, which God Himself handed down to us, lest he be justly abandoned by God ... If you are detained and do not attend on one occasion, make up for it the next time, bringing yourself to Christ's Church. Otherwise you may remain uncured, suffering from unbelief in your soul because of deeds or words, and failing to approach Christ's surgery to receive ... holy healing. — Gregory Palamas

If you are visiting someone and his wife feeds you a wonderful meal, you should be grateful but you should not wish that it would be nice if she could go home with you. Having such intents towards food and eating leads one to become increasingly possessed with turmoil (worldly suffering). This is why the Lord has said for us to enjoy but not become the enjoyer, to do something which we like but do not become habituated about it. — Dada Bhagwan

How could sufferings be relieved through purification? To know the Path is to get lost at the ford. Indeed, sickness comes from worldly love And poverty begins with the pursuit of greed. — Wang Wei

Every unpleasant worldly experience in life exposes our sensitive nervous systems to painful phenomena. Despite all the beer commercial advertisement slogans urging us to live with gusto, life is unavoidably painful. Life is a battering ram that inflicts trauma upon human beings. People blunt the traumatic force of enduring a lifetime of pain, fearfulness, and unremitted anguish and boredom with religion, sex, booze, drugs, fantasy, and other indulgent acts and forms acts of escapism. — Kilroy J. Oldster

The saints have to 'drink poison' (worldly suffering) and the world has to 'drink nectar' (worldly pleasures). Because people are weak. — Dada Bhagwan

Ascetics and fakirs come to mitigate human suffering; to heal us and lead us on the path. They put up with criticism; they go through many worldly trials. Some of them have even become martyrs for our sake. But they have done all this with a smile and with gratitude to God. Hence sacrifice is a great virtue. — Sadhu Vaswani

You cannot explain the whole world in one photograph. Photography pretends. You can see everything that's in front of the camera, but there's always something beside it. — Thomas Ruff

Behead yourself! ... Dissolve your whole body into Vision: become seeing, seeing, seeing! — Rumi

You will especially not find anyone who speaks bitterly to you. All the 'diseases' [worldly suffering] remains due to the sweetness. Bitterness will remove the disease, sweetness will increase it. Your life should be such that you will not have to listen to bitter words. If however, you have to listen to bitter words, then you should listen to it. It is always beneficial. — Dada Bhagwan

After having been lost in the world, suddenly, through the pressure of suffering, the realization comes that the answers may not be found out there in worldly attainment and in the future. That's an important point for many people to reach. That sense of deep crisis-when the world as they have known it, and the sense of self that they have known that is identified with the world, become meaningless. — Eckhart Tolle

Though I cannot claim to be a Christian in the sectarian sense, the example of Jesus suffering is a factor in the composition of my undying faith in non-violence which rules all my actions, worldly and temporal. — Mahatma Gandhi

Buddha's goal was to help people avoid suffering by teaching them to live according to four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path. The truths are that the world is full of suffering; that desire and attachment are the causes ofworldly life; that worldly life can be stopped if we destroy desire and attachment; and that to do this we must learn the way. The way is the Eightfold Path: right speech, right action; right living; right effort; right thinking; right meditation; right hopes; and right view. The Eightfold Path leads us to "Nirvana," a state of eternal bliss and peace. — Irina Gajjar

As a religious problem, the problem of suffering is, paradoxically, not how to avoid suffering but how to suffer, how to make of physical pain, personal loss, worldly defeat, or the helpless contemplation of others' agony something bearable, supportable- something as we say, sufferable. — Clifford Geertz

Mary, mother of Jesus, pays for her maternity by giving up her body, almost entirely: she foregoes both (hetero) sexual pleasure (Christ's birth is a virgin and "spiritual" birth) and physical prowess. She has no direct worldly power but, like her crucified son, is easily identified with by many people, especially women, as a powerless figure. Mary symbolizes power achieved through receptivity, compassion, and a uterus. (There's nothing intrinsically wrong with a consciously willed "receptivity" to the universe; on the contrary, it is highly desirable, and should certainly include "receptivity" to many things other than holy sperm and suffering.) — Phyllis Chesler

This [worldly suffering] is indeed the result of a flawed-vision. When this flawed-vision goes away, the world will be seen "As it is". By sitting with the 'Experienced Person' whose flawed-vision is gone, our flawed-vision will go away. Nothing else will make it go away. — Dada Bhagwan

He saw the human shadows flitting through his second world. Most of them had unkempt beards. Some walked along looking at the sky, others at the ground. All wore shabby clothing. All lived in poverty. And all were serene. Closed in on every side by streetcars, they freely breathed the air of peace. The men in this world were unfortunate, for they knew nothing of the real world. But they were fortunate as well, for they had fled the Burning House of worldly suffering. Professor Hirota was in this second world. So, too, was Nonomiya. Sanshiro stood where he could understand the air of this world more or less. He could leave it whenever he wished. But to do so, to relinquish a taste he had finally begun to savor, was something he was loath to do. — Soseki Natsume

Always try to earn with an intention to return. — Debasish Mridha

The Enlightenment, finally, invented progressive 'history' as an inner-worldly purgatory in order to develop the conditions of possibility of a perfected 'society'. This provided the required setting for the aggressive social theology of the Modern Age to drive out the political theology of the imperial eras. What was the Enlightenment in its deep structure if not an attempt to translate the ancient rhyme on learning and suffering - mathein pathein - into a collective and species-wide phenomenon? Was its aim not to persuade the many to expose themselves to transitional ordeals that would precede the great optimization of all things? — Peter Sloterdijk

A warrior of light respects the main teaching of the I Ching: 'To persevere is favourable.'
He knows that perseverance is not the same thing as insistence. There are
times when battles go on longer than necessary, draining him of strength and
enthusiasm.
At such moments, the warrior thinks: 'A prolonged war finally destroys the
victors too.'
Then he withdraws his forces from the battlefield and allows himself a
respite. He perseveres in his desire, but knows he must wait for the best moment to attack.
A warrior always returns to the fray. He never does so out of stubbornness,
but because he has noticed a change in the weather. — Paulo Coelho

No, your worst sin does not consist in what you did to your husband that day; rather it lies in your discontent with God's special creatures, with your fellow men. For this reason you can experience no real happiness....That is a grievous sin, Beret Holm! — O.E. Rolvaag

What I am in search of is not so much the gratification of a curiosity or a passion for worldly life, but something far less conditional. I do not wish to go out into the world with an insurance policy in my pocket guaranteeing my return in the event of a disappointment, like some cautious traveller who would be content with a brief glimpse of the world. On the contrary, I desire that there should be hazards, difficulties and dangers to face; I am hungry for reality, for tasks and deeds, and also for privation and suffering. — Hermann Hesse

The mind and spirit of man advance when he is tried by suffering ... so suffering and tribulation free man from the petty affairs of this worldly life until he arrives at a state of complete detachment. — Abdu'l- Baha

Life is really the only place you can learn the most important lessons about how to get dressed and to be happy. — Caitlin Moran

If you don't have the support and love and caring and concern that you get from a family, you don't have much at all. — Morrie Schwartz.

It is good for us to have trials and troubles at times, for they often remind us that we are on probation and ought not to hope in any worldly thing. It is good for us sometimes to suffer contradiction, to be misjudged by men even though we do well and mean well. These things help us to be humble and shield us from vainglory. When to all outward appearances men give us no credit, when they do not think well of us, then we are more inclined to seek God Who sees our hearts. Therefore, a man ought to root himself so firmly in God that he will not need the consolations of men. — Thomas A Kempis

Understand the suffering of worldly existence.
Abandon its causes of ignorance and selfishness.
Practice the path of meditation and compassion.
Awaken from suffering within Great Peace. — Gautama Buddha

Some imitation is involuntary and unconscious. — Robert Aris Willmott