If God is Love, why does suffering exist?

[Chives99]

Why create pain and misery and suffering? If God is all loving and loves itself, Why create problems that lead to people seeing the world as not as perfect, Is it to embrace oneself in a unlimited way even if one is suffering? why does god want to experiences these  states? Surely a god that wants to create perfect reality woldn't have suffering and misery in it?

[ivankiss]

50 minutes ago, Chives99 said:

Why create pain and misery and suffering? 

Why indeed.

50 minutes ago, Chives99 said:

If God is all loving and loves itself, Why create problems that lead to people seeing the world as not as perfect

There are no people, only God.

Pain and suffering exist because they can. If they could not, Infinity would not be infinite, but limited. Even if there was literally everything but pain and suffering in existence... that would still be a limitation. 

50 minutes ago, Chives99 said:

 why does god want to experiences these  states? 

Why indeed. You don't have to ask anyone else. Just yourself.

50 minutes ago, Chives99 said:

Surely a god that wants to create perfect reality woldn't have suffering and misery in it?

From God's point of view, there cannot be imperfection. Pain and suffering are part of the big picture. Perfect puzzle pieces. It's just that one does not tend to be as conscious and intelligent as God to see things that way.

 

Edited December 12, 2023 by ivankiss

[Thought Art]

Cuz you wanna have the yin and the yang the up and the down. Part of the ride for an immortal being. 
 

God loves suffering. God loves not loving suffering. Pain and suffering make reality feel REAL.

[Breakingthewall]

It seems that the design of the cosmos is that. what exists eats itself. The original particles join together and form simple atoms and these join together, destroying part of themselves, creating more complex matter and energy by eating themselves. Life also devours itself to create more complex forms. These forms are in permanent war for survival. Life is in permanent boiling, and the catalyst for its reactions is in part suffering and destruction, which is the seed of new creation. 

Edited December 12, 2023 by Breakingthewall

[Yimpa]

After having an awakening experience a couple nights ago, I started experiencing physical sickness the next day and today. It’s great to have such vastly different experiences in such a short period of time. 

[Yimpa]

 

[Breakingthewall]

Suffering is the engine of change, and humanity's main characteristic is to change at an enormously accelerated speed. Nothing that we know has existed is so unstable, changing, in accelerated evolution. If life is a slow-cooked stew, humanity is microwaved, and its suffering is such that it exceeds joy. Being human is shit 😅. Being a bird or a fish is an existence that has much more beauty and joy than suffering, but being human in most cases has a very low and contaminated joy and a very deep sadness and pain. It is the change. The collective ego is instead unleashed, there is no stability, nothing firm to settle on.

Human history is basically horrible, but its evolution is magnificent. the two things are related. We are soldiers, servants of a greater cause. We inherit shit in large quantities, and our suffering is greater than our joy, but perhaps things are changing, a plateau is approaching, the war is over and humans will be able to rest and be a little happier.

[gettoefl]

you suffer because you want things to stay the same

when you were in heaven nothing changes and you like that

now you have to deal with all this stuff ever changing

namely suffering is the price you pay for your netflix subscription

just give it up or just stay tuned for more

[Leo Gura]

Suffering is your attachment to finite things.

Without suffering you'd be dead/Infinity.

Edited December 12, 2023 by Leo Gura

[Ajay0]

7 hours ago, Chives99 said:

Why create pain and misery and suffering? If God is all loving and loves itself, Why create problems that lead to people seeing the world as not as perfect, Is it to embrace oneself in a unlimited way even if one is suffering? why does god want to experiences these  states? Surely a god that wants to create perfect reality woldn't have suffering and misery in it?

 

 True love will result in Self-awareness, which brings detachment from the temporal objects, events and people of the world which are of an impermanent nature.

Suffering arises because of inordinate attachment to the impermanent elements of the world which is bound to change.

Quote

The Self, our Being, is awareness. ~ Sri Muruganar

Nearly all mankind is more or less unhappy because nearly all do not know the true Self. Real happiness abides in Self-knowledge alone. All else is fleeting. To know one’s Self is to be blissful always. ~ Ramana Maharshi

Purpose of suffering is to connect you to your Self (Awareness). It indicates that you got carried away by all the transient things around you. ~ Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

 

[Breakingthewall]

47 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Suffering is your attachment to finite things.

Without suffering you'd be dead/Infinity.

You can go a certain time without suffering and you will not dissolve into infinity. 99% of human suffering is not intended to prevent you from dissolving into infinity. 

But yes, ultimately the reason for suffering is the survival of the individual and the species, especially the species. Evolution to optimize survival

Edited December 12, 2023 by Breakingthewall

[Javfly33]

Because God might not know how to handle himself.

People assume Reality just is and it knows itself 100% perfectly. Well no, it does not happen like that. Is an evolution/discovery of each embodied energy in each being.

You have to water the seed of intelligence

[vibv]

12 hours ago, Chives99 said:

Surely a god that wants to create perfect reality woldn't have suffering and misery in it?

Wrong. Without pain and suffering it wouldn't be possible to create that level of beauty that this world entails.

Suffering is temporary, but You are infinite. So you may suffer for a while - even intensely - but in the end it will be dissolved in a way that leaves God completely untainted.

What can you do if it doesn't feel that way RIGHT NOW? Relax, and learn to trust in yourself.

[Dabidoe]

I think the movie Silence encapsulates this feeling well. It's one of the hardest questions of religion and philosophy is how can god allow this injustice to occur? I think the answer is that our definition of injustice is small-minded and lacks omniscient level perspective.

A simpler example I think is how many animals kill and eat eachother, all forms of life compete for resources constantly. How can ALL of that be bad? Our view on attachment to life as sacred is kind of a western philosophy. If we embrace the concept of life as a whole rather than individual life then death, misery, suffering serve a grander purpose. 

So death, mayhem, destruction may suck for us in the moment but what if the end result is worth it?
 

 

[enzyme]

I think for most people to truly understand peace there needs to be some level of deep suffering beforehand.  Would peace still be peace if there was nothing to oppose it?

Of course this can be very subjective - some people suffer over money, while some have only maybe $200 in their account or perhaps nothing at all and they are some of the happiest people you can meet.

Relative to the big picture, suffering has its place as it can drive people to pursue the path to enlightenment.  I remember first getting into self-help because of my bad habit with alcohol which was starting to affect me mentally and it inadvertently lead me to spirituality a few years down the road.

[Leo Gura]

13 hours ago, Breakingthewall said:

You can go a certain time without suffering and you will not dissolve into infinity.

Rationalize all you want but this is a fact:

If you got rid of all suffering everyone you love would be dead.

[Yimpa]

14 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Rationalize all you want but this is a fact:

If you got rid of all suffering everyone you love would be dead.

Everyone would be LOVE?!

Sign me the fuck up!

[LostSoul]

@Leo Gura You mean all subjective suffering from direct experience of ''mine'' or all suffering from the ''universe''

[Breakingthewall]

57 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Rationalize all you want but this is a fact:

If you got rid of all suffering everyone you love would be dead.

If a level of suffering is, let's say pleasant, is it suffering? When people talk about suffering they usually talk about rumination, self-inflicted mental torture. This can disappear completely and reality will not disintegrate.

You speak of suffering referring to the resistance of a finite being to stop being finite, in this case it is true, that resistance is necessary, without it not even a bacteria would be a bacteria, but that is a tolerable and beautiful suffering. The suffering of compulsively thinking that your ex-wife is a son of a bitch who deserves to die is a ruminative, ugly, disgusting, typically human suffering. It could dissapear and nothing will happen

[UnbornTao]

16 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Suffering is your attachment to finite things.

Without suffering you'd be dead/Infinity.

And/or Gotama as the legend goes.