What Causes Suffering?

As clinicians, we are surrounded by “suffering.” We’re exposed to it daily in our lives and our work. Vicarious trauma, compassion fatigue, and burnout are only some of the by-products of this exposure [1]. “Suffering” is around us in many forms. We get exposed to it through our colleagues, our supervisors, and our supervisees. We get closer to it, seeing it in our friends, our family members, and in ourselves. We see it on social media and in the news. “Suffering” is so pervasive, so universal, and such a persistent and chronic phenomenon that it makes one wonder whether it is not just part of life, part of living, part of being alive, and yes, part of being human[2].

Our 33rd U.S. President, Harry Truman, said, “The reward of suffering is experience.” Michel de Montaigne, one of the most significant philosophers of the Renaissance and one whose writings have a direct influence on some of the best minds of all times, including Nietzsche, Virginia Wolf, Emerson, Descartes, Shakespeare, and Rousseau, added, “A man who fears suffering is already suffering from what he fears.” And Victor Hugo, one of the best-known writers, notably known for Les Misérables and The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, said, “It is by suffering that human beings become angels.”

In other words, some of the best thinkers in the world thought that suffering was just inevitable, part of the fabric of our lives and that there was no way around it.

Is that so? Does living have to include “suffering[3]”? Do we need to suffer in order to become “angels”? Do we need to go through “suffering” in order to get rewarded the medal of experience? Do we have to live fearing “suffering”?

These questions are crucial to us because patients and clients come to us because of “suffering.” Whether the chief complaint is related to depression, anxiety, relationship difficulties, loss, or another type of stressor, what all of them have in common is “suffering.” Even when someone comes to our private practice and says, “I want to understand myself better,” or “I want to do better in my business,” or “I feel stuck,” the moment we look a bit closer, all we find is “suffering.”

What’s with that little nine-letter word? Why is it so powerful? How has it come about? What causes it?

What causes suffering is a key question for all of us to think about. What causes suffering is a question whose answer may seem so obvious that only very few of us will venture to look deeper. What causes suffering is a key question that we have been trying to answer, but we are not giving it the same level of importance that “suffering” seems to have.

Yet, haven’t we all been trying to solve it? Haven’t we all been trying to make it go away, mitigate it, subdue it, or prevent it? But can we really solve a problem without really understanding its cause? Can we solve a problem at its root if we are only addressing its superficial causes?

What causes suffering?

We are going to answer this question fully in subsequent posts. Meanwhile, we would like to invite you to participate in this inquiry, answering for yourself this question: What causes suffering? Look deeper than the superficial causes we usually come across.

The answer to this will completely change how you practice. It will have a profound effect in your life. And it will empower you to have a major impact in the field.