What makes struggle and suffering essential in our lives?

[HMD]

So, I was in the rabbit hole of trying to figure out how to give meaning to struggle, and I came across the question: Why is struggle necessary? I know for a fact that everything God created is perfect, so struggle is not a bug. But how? To make us appreciate things that are the outcomes of struggle? So that ease could exist alongside it as a duality? 
 

What I am trying to get at is perhaps if I understand why it’s there, then maybe I would be more motivated to struggle and weed out any laziness. 

[Leo Gura]

Try playing your favorite video game on God-mode, use all the cheat codes, and see how long it holds your interest.

Edited March 8 by Leo Gura

[HMD]

@Leo Gura Fortunately, I have already done that. I was so excited and addicted to this game (Bloon TD) and deleted it within 15 minutes of hacking it, with great regret. I never even thought about it again until today. 

Maybe if there was no struggle I would have killed myself. It's a gift. 

Edited March 8 by HMD

[Flowerfaeiry]

Basically because, through the struggle you prove to yourself your amazingness

[UnbornTao]

I'd say you do, for the most part, not as blame but as fact. For example: Doesn't it seem that in the very act of dividing things into good and bad experiences -- which is necessary for you, by the way -- it already gives rise to struggle, among other things that you do?

A rock doesn't seem to struggle. Why is that? What is the case for us such that struggle can occur?

Edited March 10 by UnbornTao

[HMD]

@UnbornTao Yeah that’s something I am wrapping my head around. Struggle seems to happen for us humans only. Like you said, a rock apparently doesn't struggle, it just is. No resistance. 

[HMD]

@Flowerfaeiry Can you please elaborate on this? 

[UnbornTao]

22 hours ago, HMD said:

@UnbornTao Yeah that’s something I am wrapping my head around. Struggle seems to happen for us humans only. Like you said, a rock apparently doesn't struggle, it just is. No resistance. 

And it seems to apply to living beings in general; we humans are just very prolific at it. It goes deeper than resisting one's experience, doesn't it?

Asking "What within our experience isn't completely at ease and free?" creates a contrast to better see the dynamic of struggle. 

Edited March 9 by UnbornTao

[AION]

Imagine going to the gym and only look at the weights but not working out because if you start pumping some iron you might suffer.

The real suffering is to see others make progress and looking at yourself not making progress because you don't want to do the work.

Life is basically a gym to develop your soul. And to shine like a star knowing you will fade one day anyway, but just shining not the less for the glory of God.

Edited March 8 by AION

[Verg0]

Here a few quotes by Meister Eckhart who have helped me clarify suffering a bit: 

Nothing is sharper than suffering, nothing is sweeter than to have suffered.

 

If you love God and are ill-in God's name! If your friend dies in God's name! If you lose an eye-in God's name!!

 

Whether it be sickness or poverty, hunger or thirst, or whatever it might be whatever God has ordained or not ordained for you, or whatever God gives you or does not give you, all this is the best for you.

 

Every day we raise our voices and exclaim in the Our Father, 'Lord your will be done!' And when his will comes about, we get angry and are not at all satisfied with his will. Yet whatever he does should please us best of all. Those who really do take this as the best remain, in all circumstances, fully at peace. Now sometimes a thought comes to you and you say: 'Alas, if it had only turned out differently, things would be better.' Or 'If it had not happened this way, things might perhaps have turned out better. As long as you think this, you will never gain peace. You should take [God's will] as the best.

 

If you want to be son of God and you do not want to suffer, you are all wrong. In the Book of Wisdom, it is written that God tests and tries whether a man is just as men test and try gold and melt it in a furnace.6

 

Some people run in front of God, some next to God, some follow behind God. Those who run in front of God are the ones who follow their own will and do not want to acknowledge God's will. This is simply base. Those who go beside God say, 'Lord, I want only what you want. But if they are sick, they beg that God might want them healthy. This one can let pass. The third group follows behind God; wherever he wishes they follow him willingly, and these are perfect. About this St John says in the Book of Mysteries, "They follow the lamb wherever he goes (Rv 14:4). These people follow God wherever he leads them, in sickness or in health, in fortune or misfortune. 

 

Love God as much in poverty as in wealth; care for him as much in sickness as in health. Love him as much when being tried as when not, and as much in suffering as when free of suffering. 

 

If you really want to know whether your sufferings are your own or are God's, this is what you should observe. If you suffer for your own sake, however this may be, the suffering hurts you and is hard for you to bear. But if you suffer for God's sake and for his sake alone, the suffering will not hurt you and will not be hard for you, because God is carrying the burden. This is really true! If there were a man who wanted to suffer for the love of God and purely for God alone, if all the suffering came down on him at once that all men have ever suffered and the whole world had as its common lot, that would not hurt him or be hard for him, because it would be God who was carrying the burden. If someone loaded a hundredweight on my neck and then someone else supported it on my neck, 1 should be as glad to carry a hundred of them as one, because it would not be hard for me, nor would it hurt me at all. In a few words: Whatever a man suffers for the love of God and for him alone, God makes this easy and sweet for him. 

 

 

Hope that helps. 

[Princess Arabia]

Try separating a finger from your hand. Imagine you have succeeded (mentally). Now imagine trying to put it back on all by yourself. Wouldn't that be a struggle. 

That's what's happening here with the human energetic experience. We are trying desperately to put that finger back on not realizing it was never separated to begin with - just in imagination. 

We are suffering because we believe we are separate from the whole and it is a very painful experience. Quite different from when the body hurts itself. Those sensations are real and is felt because of identification  with the body, but the mental pain the mind suffers is being generated from the thought of it being a separate experience and the belief it holds that it must make things right because this isn't perfection already.

[Breakingthewall]

The reason for the struggle and suffering is evolution, it is the way that this dimension of existence that we call life has found to increase its complexity and depth. There could be other infinite dimensions of existence where there is no suffering or war, and there are forms of life where the suffering is very low. In humans it is exceptionally high and complex because our evolutionary speed is extreme. In lizards the suffering is very low and simple because they evolve very slowly.

There could be beings from higher dimensions, or simply different ones that find a way to increase their complexity other than through war. The possibilities are endless.

[HMD]

@Verg0 Thanks for the input. 

What I am getting from this is that suffering/struggle when tied to a higher purpose (for God) becomes easier. And anything that comes your way while serving God is bearable. Because it's for a higher purpose. That's one way to give meaning to it. 

[HMD]

@Princess Arabia Yeah, if you just go back to being one with everything, the struggle component kinda fades away. But that's entering the domain of the absolute. 

But to make shit happen, to get results, you have to be in the relative domain. I know the distinction between the absolute and relative is imaginary, but it's really important to get things done. 

Now, if you master the absolute (Understand that you are not separate, among other things) and then come back to the relative, the struggle feels natural. There is no bias (or at least you are good at eliminating the bias).

This connects well to what @UnbornTao was saying earlier. 

Does this resonate with ehat you were trying to say? 

[HMD]

@Breakingthewall Yeah, through simple observation, one can see how suffering and struggle lead to leaps in evolution.

Yuval Noah Harari insightfully argues that our evolution is fundamentally tied to our capacity to create fiction, be it money, corporations, or other constructs. Once we envision a fiction, like our ideal self or a future goal, we must alter our behavior to transform that vision into a tangible reality. This process, however, often brings about suffering.

We might wonder why nature or a higher power imposes this burden of struggle on us when striving for transformation. I believe it is to ensure that we approach our creations with care, thoughtfully considering what is truly worth pursuing and what ought to be let go. Alternatively, we could view this struggle as a test from nature to determine how deeply we desire something.

[Sugarcoat]

Trying to adopt a mindset to see struggle as essential or worthwhile somehow is a sneaky way of trying to struggle less. So you’re trying to reduce the suffering at the end of the day. Nothing wrong with that as it’s the natural reaction. I’d say struggle just is, suffering just is, and whatever mindset you adopt about it is just an extra add on to make you feel better somehow 

[Ishanga]

On 3/7/2025 at 7:01 PM, HMD said:

So, I was in the rabbit hole of trying to figure out how to give meaning to struggle, and I came across the question: Why is struggle necessary? I know for a fact that everything God created is perfect, so struggle is not a bug. But how? To make us appreciate things that are the outcomes of struggle? So that ease could exist alongside it as a duality? 
 

What I am trying to get at is perhaps if I understand why it’s there, then maybe I would be more motivated to struggle and weed out any laziness. 

Struggle, as is Suffering is a choice, you can say that the Survival aspect of Life, the DOING aspect of Life is challenging at times because these things require not just Your actions being correct and inline with perfection and God/Absolute, also the others have to be inline and such... As an example, I live in a 5 million+ city, everyone here has plans, they go out to achieve and succeed in their plans for the day, but if 5 million ppl are going this simultaneously in a small area like a city, then what is the result? Conflict and Chaos, because sooner or later the plans that ppl have conflict with each other, I want to go to the park, so do 5K other ppl, it only has 300 parking spots, what happens?? Chaos of course... Replace the word Struggle, and use Challenges, these situations are Challenging Your Spiritual resolve, do I accept the Inevitability of Chaos within myself, if I do what happens, I have no stress response, more clarity, intelligence and resourcefulness rises up, this leads to less chaos for Me personally and more clarity and harmony in my Experience.

So Struggle/Suffering is Unconsciousness at play, One is living life by Accident, not on purpose, so if You switch to doing it Consciously, then You have no Suffering/Struggle, life opens up, and now it is just a game, You play it by the rules set up but go untouched by it, Your still Peaceful of Your own nature, life is at Ease (not easy but at Ease), and You make of it what You choose to make of it, not by accident!

[Breakingthewall]

47 minutes ago, HMD said:

@Breakingthewall Yeah, through simple observation, one can see how suffering and struggle lead to leaps in evolution.

Yuval Noah Harari insightfully argues that our evolution is fundamentally tied to our capacity to create fiction, be it money, corporations, or other constructs. Once we envision a fiction, like our ideal self or a future goal, we must alter our behavior to transform that vision into a tangible reality. This process, however, often brings about suffering.

We might wonder why nature or a higher power imposes this burden of struggle on us when striving for transformation. I believe it is to ensure that we approach our creations with care, thoughtfully considering what is truly worth pursuing and what ought to be let go. Alternatively, we could view this struggle as a test from nature to determine how deeply we desire something.

It seems obvious that life evolves through war between species and individuals. It is a slow evolution in which through the generations the genes mutate creating new structures.

In the human case, it happens that in addition to the essential living being, another dimension of existence appears and comes to life: the mind. The human is a hive entity that feeds the collective matrix.

Initially limited to tribes reduced in number, then to civilizations composed of millions and now thanks to technology billions are connected to each other feeding the matrix, which evolves millions of times faster than material life. Suffering is proportional to the evolutionary pace, since evolution is adaptation, and adaptation requires a previous state of maladaptation which is synonymous with suffering. 

I would say that after the extremely accelerated pace in a minimum period of time, a few thousand years, which at an evolutionary level is very little time, a plateau phase will occur where humans will be adapted to the cosmos and their suffering will be less in several orders of magnitude. But who knows, of course.

Edited March 9 by Breakingthewall

[Ishanga]

5 minutes ago, Breakingthewall said:

It seems obvious that life evolves through war between species and individuals. It is a slow evolution in which through the generations the genes mutate creating new structures.

In the human case, it happens that in addition to the essential living being, another dimension of existence appears and comes to life: the mind. The human is a hive entity that feeds the collective matrix.

Initially limited to tribes reduced in number, then to civilizations composed of millions and now thanks to technology billions are connected to each other feeding the matrix, which evolves millions of times faster than material life. Suffering is proportional to the evolutionary pace, since evolution is adaptation, and adaptation requires a previous state of maladaptation which is synonymous with suffering. 

I would say that after the extremely accelerated pace in a minimum period of time, a few thousand years, which at an evolutionary level is very little time, a plateau phase will occur where humans will be adapted to the cosmos and their suffering will be less in several orders of magnitude. But who knows, of course.

Agreed, I estimate the same, in about a few thousand Years we will evolve past this super Egoic stage that has been around since day one, but will we make it that far, that is the question, I don't know, but with the power of todays tech we cannot wait for thousands of years.. Years in the past it was just simple weapons and localized areas, which meant I would be oblivious to what was happening in the middle east wars living here in Canada, it would not and cannot affect me, but today it can, so that is the problem, we don't have the time to evolve as slow as we used to with the power that is available at hand, not just via countries at war, but individuals can destroy other lives from far away distances, so now the most important Action and Doing that has to take place is the rising of Human Consciousness, the biggest problems are Human problems/challenges, if we were to all disappear today, the Earth would be fine, but since we are becoming more populated and still super Unconscious and Egoic, it can destroy us faster than normal evolution, and the technology and know how to raise Human Consciousness is more available now than ever, we just have to choose IT!!

[Breakingthewall]

@Ishanga  

When in the history of mankind, in a war in which hundreds of thousands die and the balance of the world is at stake, have the powers abstained from using all their military power? It has never happened before.

This means that real, total, annihilating war is impossible. It would annihilate humanity and this makes it unprofitable. There is less and less war, think of the last century, the one before, and so on until prehistory. War was constant, genocidal and total. Now it is a game of chess that at a given moment is revealed as a stupidity that harms everyone, but if nukes didn't exist, the world would now be something similar to the Warhammer novels.

Perhaps this is the last war, evolution dictates it so, since the available weapons are impossible to use without dying.

Edited March 9 by Breakingthewall