Suffering Builds Character Quotes

Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude and humility. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure it patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God . . . and it is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we come here to acquire and which will make us more like our Father and Mother in heaven.

Sometimes suffering is just suffering,” she told Gus. “It doesn't make you stronger. It doesn't build character. It only hurts.

It may be true that suffering builds character, but it also damages people

Suffering builds character and impels you to penetrate life’s secrets. It’s the path of great artists, great religious leaders, great social reformers. The problem is not suffering per se, but rather our identification with our own ego: our divided, dualistic, cramped view of things. ‘We are too ego-centered,’ Suzuki tells Cage.’ The ego-shell in which we live is the hardest thing to outgrow. We seem to carry it all the time from childhood up to the time we finally pass away.

Learning to endure times of disappointment, suffering, and sorrow is part of our on-the-job training. These experiences, while often difficult to bear at the time, are precisely the kinds of experiences that stretch our understanding, build our character, and increase our compassion for others.

From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here, that's home, that's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure it patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable.

Suffering builds character. - Miranda Tate

Suffering builds character.” He said that if you are always lolling around and being pampered and life is too easy, then you turn into a spineless wimp, but if you encounter suffering, you learn to face challenges and you get stronger. It sounds like something a grandparent might say, doesn’t it?

People have told me, really more times that I can remember, ever since I was a small boy, how lucky I was, but I have always felt as if I were suffering in hell.

Fateful encounters with a cruel world reveal our character. No human is immune from heartbreaking loss. Regardless of our socioeconomic status, eventually everybody shall suffer a grievous personal loss, a body blow that inflicts pain of inexpressible magnitude.

Nietzsche (ugh) told us, "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." You've been hearing this for years, in one form or another, but let's be specific. Like, if you're hit by a car and don't die, does the car make you stronger? No. Does injury or disease make you stronger? No. Does suffering alone build character? No. These things leave you more vulnerable to further injury. What makes you stronger is whatever happens to you after you survive the thing that didn't kill you. What makes you stronger is rest.

It had a little to do with fate, suffering and what becomes of the broken hearted. Resilience is the main characteristic of champions, strength wasn’t build in a day.

It may be true that suffering builds character, but it also damages people.

The dial on the wheel of sorrow eventually points to each of us. At one time or another, everyone must experience sorrow. No one is exempt. [...] Learning to endure times of disappointment, suffering, and sorrow is part of our on-the-job training. These experiences, while often difficult to bear at the time, are precisely the kinds of experiences that stretch our understanding, build our character, and increase our compassion for others.

No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude and humility. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure it patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God . . . and it is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we come here to acquire

God will spare no pains necessary to bring us into relationship with Himself, even as that may mean permitting whatever pain is necessary to do so. Suffering is the grist by which the mill of faith yields the raw material of new character, greater insight and deeper relationship with God.

Even in the arena of peer-to-peer relationships, men need an encourager. We need that guy who won’t let us give up, quit, or bail. This man knows the true meaning of perseverance and the results of it: Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. Romans 5:3-4

Possess patience to such an extent that you can suffer anything for the church, for your friends, for your neighbors, or for anyone. Remember this: we build character in others as our character is built. As we are pure in our thoughts, are tender and gracious to other people, and possess our souls in patience (Luke 21:19), then people have a great desire for our fellowship in the Holy Spirit.

Motivation, inspiration were not the problem; on the contrary I was always cheerful and workmanlike at the typewriter and had never suffered from what’s called writer’s block; I didn’t believe in it. The problem, if anything, was precisely the opposite. I had too much to write: too many fine and miserable buildings to construct and streets to name and clock towers to set chiming, too many characters to raise up from the dirt like flowers whose petals I peeled down to the intricate frail organs within, too many terrible genetic and fiduciary secrets to dig up and bury and dig up again, too many divorces to grant, heirs to disinherit, trysts to arrange, letters to misdirect into evil hands, innocent children to slay with rheumatic fever, women to leave unfulfilled and hopeless, men to drive to adultery and theft, fires to ignite at the hearts of ancient houses.

Cletus Byron Winston, you are being rude.” I might have my own less than glowing thoughts about my father, but he was my father. He opened his mouth to respond, then snapped it shut and did a double take, his eyes narrowing on me. “First of all, how do you know my middle name?” “Your momma used to use it when you were naughty, when you boys would help her shelve books in the library. ‘Cletus Byron! Stop stuffing Astrophysics Monthly down your pants!’” Cletus grinned. Then he chuckled. His eyes lost some of their zealous focus as he pushed away from the tree and strolled closer. “Oh yeah. She did, didn’t she?” “I felt sorry for Billy, though.” I scooched to one side as he sat down. “His name always confused everyone, like your momma was trying to talk to Shakespeare’s ghost. ‘William Shakespeare, would you please stop Beauford from pulling down his pants in front of the girls?’” Cletus laughed harder, leaning backward and holding his stomach. “I remember that. How old was Beau?” “He was ten. He was trying to show us his new Tarzan underwear. I don’t think he meant any harm.” “He sure did love that underwear.” Cletus nodded and he scratched his beard. “I’m going to have to find him some Tarzanunderwear in adult size.” “So you can torture him about it?” He pretended to be shocked by my accusation. “Certainly not. I don’t torture my siblings.” “Yeah, right.” I gave him my side-eye. “You forget, I’m a people watcher. I know you sell embarrassing pictures of them onstock photo sites. Jethro was griping about it after church over the summer. If it’s not torture, what do you call it then?” He lifted his chin proudly. “I offer invaluable character building opportunities. I help them reach their true potential through suffering.” “Oh, please

I believe the ability to view the agony and discomfort of a miserable and painful situation as a character building and physically strengthening experience. It is what separates the mentally tough from the mentally not so tough. The ability to recognize that in the long run, one’s suffering can be nothing but beneficial in the future when confronted with similar situations. Where many might crumble and quit, others see the bigger picture, persevere, and ultimately become stronger. That’s

The problem, Augustine came to believe, is that if you think you can organize your own salvation you are magnifying the very sin that keeps you from it. To believe that you can be captain of your own life is to suffer the sin of pride. What is pride? These days the word “pride” has positive connotations. It means feeling good about yourself and the things associated with you. When we use it negatively, we think of the arrogant person, someone who is puffed up and egotistical, boasting and strutting about. But that is not really the core of pride. That is just one way the disease of pride presents itself. By another definition, pride is building your happiness around your accomplishments, using your work as the measure of your worth. It is believing that you can arrive at fulfillment on your own, driven by your own individual efforts. Pride can come in bloated form. This is the puffed-up Donald Trump style of pride. This person wants people to see visible proof of his superiority. He wants to be on the VIP list. In conversation, he boasts, he brags. He needs to see his superiority reflected in other people’s eyes. He believes that this feeling of superiority will eventually bring him peace. That version is familiar. But there are other proud people who have low self-esteem. They feel they haven’t lived up to their potential. They feel unworthy. They want to hide and disappear, to fade into the background and nurse their own hurts. We don’t associate them with pride, but they are still, at root, suffering from the same disease. They are still yoking happiness to accomplishment; it’s just that they are giving themselves a D– rather than an A+. They tend to be just as solipsistic, and in their own way as self-centered, only in a self-pitying and isolating way rather than in an assertive and bragging way. One key paradox of pride is that it often combines extreme self-confidence with extreme anxiety. The proud person often appears self-sufficient and egotistical but is really touchy and unstable. The proud person tries to establish self-worth by winning a great reputation, but of course this makes him utterly dependent on the gossipy and unstable crowd for his own identity. The proud person is competitive. But there are always other people who might do better. The most ruthlessly competitive person in the contest sets the standard that all else must meet or get left behind. Everybody else has to be just as monomaniacally driven to success. One can never be secure. As Dante put it, the “ardor to outshine / Burned in my bosom with a kind of rage.” Hungry for exaltation, the proud person has a tendency to make himself ridiculous. Proud people have an amazing tendency to turn themselves into buffoons, with a comb-over that fools nobody, with golden bathroom fixtures that impress nobody, with name-dropping stories that inspire nobody. Every proud man, Augustine writes, “heeds himself, and he who pleases himself seems great to himself. But he who pleases himself pleases a fool, for he himself is a fool when he is pleasing himself.”16 Pride, the minister and writer Tim Keller has observed, is unstable because other people are absentmindedly or intentionally treating the proud man’s ego with less reverence than he thinks it deserves. He continually finds that his feelings are hurt. He is perpetually putting up a front. The self-cultivator spends more energy trying to display the fact that he is happy—posting highlight reel Facebook photos and all the rest—than he does actually being happy. Augustine suddenly came to realize that the solution to his problem would come only after a transformation more fundamental than any he had previously entertained, a renunciation of the very idea that he could be the source of his own solution.

HAPPINESS: "Flourishing is a fact, not a feeling. We flourish when we grow and thrive. We flourish when we exercise our powers. We flourish when we become what we are capable of becoming...Flourishing is rooted in action..."happiness is a kind of working of the soul in the way of perfect excellence"...a flourishing life is a life lived along lines of excellence...Flourishing is a condition that is created by the choices we make in the world we live in...Flourishing is not a virtue, but a condition; not a character trait, but a result. We need virtue to flourish, but virtue isn't enough. To create a flourishing life, we need both virtue and the conditions in which virtue can flourish...Resilience is a virtue required for flourishing, bur being resilient will not guarantee that we will flourish. Unfairness, injustice, and bad fortune will snuff our promising lives. Unasked-for pain will still come our way...We can build resilience and shape the world we live in. We can't rebuild the world...three primary kinds of happiness: the happiness of pleasure, the happiness of grace, and happiness of excellence...people who are flourishing usually have all three kinds of happiness in their lives...Aristotle understood: pushing ourselves to grow, to get better, to dive deeper is at the heart of happiness...This is the happiness that goes hand in hand with excellence, with pursuing worthy goals, with growing mastery...It is about the exercise of powers. The most common mistake people make in thinking about the happiness of excellence is to focus on moments of achievement. They imagine the mountain climber on the summit. That's part of the happiness of excellence, and a very real part. What counts more, though, is not the happiness of being there, but the happiness of getting there. A mountain climber heads for the summit, and joy meets her along the way. You head for the bottom of the ocean, and joy meets you on the way down...you create joy along the way...the concept of flow, the kind of happiness that comes when we lose ourselves through complete absorption in a rewarding task...the idea of flow..."Contrary to what we usually believe, moments like these, the best moments in our lives, are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times...The best moments usually occur when a person's body or mind is stretched to its limit in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile."...Joy, like sweat, is usually a byproduct of your activity, not your aim...A focus on happiness will not lead to excellence. A focus on excellence will, over time, lead to happiness. The pursuit of excellence leads to growth, mastery, and achievement. None of these are sufficient for happiness, yet all of them are necessary...the pull of purpose, the desire to feel "needed in this world" - however we fulfill that desire - is a very powerful force in a human life...recognize that the drive to live well and purposefully isn't some grim, ugly, teeth-gritting duty. On the contrary: "it's a very good feeling." It is really is happiness...Pleasures can never make up for an absence of purposeful work and meaningful relationships. Pleasures will never make you whole...Real happiness comes from working together, hurting together, fighting together, surviving together, mourning together. It is the essence of the happiness of excellence...The happiness of pleasure can't provide purpose; it can't substitute for the happiness of excellence. The challenge for the veteran - and for anyone suddenly deprived of purpose - is not simple to overcome trauma, but to rebuild meaning. The only way out is through suffering to strength. Through hardship to healing. And the longer we wait, the less life we have to live...We are meant to have worthy work to do. If we aren't allowed to struggle for something worthwhile, we'll never grow in resilience, and we'll never experience complete happiness.

Ancient ethics always dealt with three questions. Modern ethics usually deals with only one, or at the most two. The three questions are like the three things a fleet of ships is told by its sailing orders. (The metaphor is from C. S. Lewis.) First, the ships must know how to avoid bumping into each other. This is social ethics, and modern as well as ancient ethicists deal with it. Second, they must know how to stay shipshape and avoid sinking. This is individual ethics, virtues and vices, character building, and we hear very little about this from our modern ethical philosophers. Third, and most important of all, they must know why the fleet is at sea in the first place. What is their mission, their destination? This is the question of the summum bonum, and no modern philosophers except the existentialists seem even to be interested in this, the greatest of all questions. Perhaps that is why most modern philosophy seems so weak and wimpy, so specialized and elitist, and above all so boring, to ordinary people.

Similarly, when you see a character jumping from a 100 story building and landing without hurting a bone, then believe that this is an example of special effects.   Special effects are provided by a few companies that use specialized software to add these effects. Many of these companies are located in India, in Bangalore and Mumbai. Movies like Avatar, Jurassic Park, and many others were sent to India for providing special effects.   Similarly, in Thor, when the main character rotates his hammer and generates a tornado, be rest assured that this is only an example of special effects. In reality, nothing like this happens.   And if you are able to do it, you are a superhuman, like Superman. You have got super-powers to do whatever you want and you can generate such a tornado by rotating your hand, even without a hammer.   So, my sincere advice to you is not to even attempt this. You will end up with a torn muscle, or a fractured hand, or maybe you may even suffer a heart malfunction and eventual death.   Let me not get into the science behind how this happens, but if you are educated enough, you will heed my advice and not attempt this anytime in your life.

Letter to the tech giants: When fame and abundance kiss somebody’s feet before that person is wise enough, he or she is very likely to lose track of what’s necessity and what’s luxury. And modern society is filled with examples of such intelligent stupidity – stupidity that is carried out by apparently smart humans. Because being smart is not the same as being wise. The world has enough smartness, but not enough wisdom to bring that smartness into proper productive practice – and I mean productive practice not sophisticated practice – there is a difference. A person smart enough to visualize a Falcon rocket engine can easily pinpoint the locations of various organizations that spread terrorism, yet the person chooses to explore the space further instead of prioritizing the technological advantages to first fix real issues of the human society that inflict harm to the humans every walk of the way. The world is a miserable place not because we have lack of resources, but because those who have an abundance of resources do not have the slightest idea of true human need. The resources needed for colonizing Mars if put to proper practice can fix the world’s global warming issues – it can fix the world’s climate change issues – it can fix the world’s terrorism issues, yet people are more interested in the pompous idea of living in Mars for whatever reason, instead of paying attention to improving human condition on earth. I am not against technological advancement, for I am a scientist, but my soul aches when I see smart people are dumb enough to chase after illusory glory of doing something different and innovative instead of focusing the powers of their soul on cleaning up the misery business on earth. You can, yet you don’t. Why? Smartness without wisdom is stupidity. You are smart – yes indeed – but I am sorry – you are stupid at the same time. How can you dream of having a cheese burger on Mars when your own kind on Earth is suffering! How can you think of taking rich kids into the orbit just so they can admire the beauty of earth from the heavens, when that very earth is infested with the primordial evils of human character! Awaken the human within you my friend, and pay attention. Awaken the human within and let it consume all the miseries from the world that you live in. Say a member of your family falls ill, would you ignore his or her misery completely just because you want to make life more comfortable for others than it already is, or would you first try everything in your capacity in order to heal your loved one! Be wise my friend, for it is not enough to be smart. You are smart – there is no doubt about that – so utilize that smartness for humanity and heal your own kind. Heal your kind with your capacity my friend. It is wailing for healers – not some delusional faith healers, but real tangible healers. Would you not do anything! Would you not give your soul to fix the broken soul of this world! Arise my friend, Awake my friend and work for humanity, not to make it sophisticated, but to make it peaceful first. Remember, humanity first, then everything else. Peace first, sophistication later. Harmony first, luxury later.

That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there — on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors, so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known

Thanks to our discussion in the last chapter, we can also agree that character is a product of perseverance: “Suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope” (Rom. 5:3–4). I don’t know how that idea strikes you, but it sounds a little backward to me. I would expect that a person with character would find it easier to persevere through difficult circumstances. That makes sense. But how does perseverance produce character? When I look at the world around me, it seems to me that most things actually decay over time rather than grow stronger. The longer we live in our home, the more I see spots that need a paint touch-up. The longer I drive my car, the more I find I need to take it in for tune-ups and repairs. And the longer I live, the more I realize my body isn’t what it used to be! But maybe this process of perseverance leading to character works differently. Surely God is the X-factor. When you add God to the equation, persistence over time builds up character and strength instead of taking it away. Consider, if you will, the snowball. Left by itself, it doesn’t amount to much. It’s just a little round chunk of white frozen water. Yet place that snowball at the top of a steep hill on a snowy day, and things begin to change. If you invest some time rolling that snowball across the ground so it picks up snow and grows into a larger ball, you begin to create something big and heavy. If you invest even more time and energy (this is where perseverance comes in), you might get that ball rolling down the hill. And the longer it rolls, the faster it goes, the bigger it gets. Now you’ve got something powerful. This is a force to be reckoned with. This is when people start running for cover. Your little snowball suddenly becomes a runaway freight train! I believe that equation of suffering, which produces perseverance, which produces character, works in a similar fashion. Our willingness to trust and rely on the Lord in a time of trouble invites His power to work in our lives. The more we trust and depend on Him, the easier it becomes. As the Lord says, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matt. 11:30). Pretty soon our perseverance enables the Lord to add character to our “snowball”—and the more we persevere, the stronger we grow. We find ourselves rolling downhill toward a godly life. It still might be a bumpy ride, but the size and momentum of our snowball just about guarantees that as long as we are pursuing God’s will for our lives, nothing will stop us.

Unconditional blame is the tendency to explain all difficulties exclusively as the consequence of forces beyond your influence, to see yourself as an absolute victim of external circumstances. Every person suffers the impact of factors beyond his control, so we are all, in a sense, victims. We are not, however, absolute victims. We have the ability to respond to our circumstances and influence how they affect us. In contrast, the unconditional blamer defines his victim-identity by his helplessness, disowning any power to manage his life and assigning causality only to that which is beyond his control. Unconditional blamers believe that their problems are always someone else’s fault, and that there’s nothing they could have done to prevent them. Consequently, they believe that there’s nothing they should do to address them. Unconditional blamers feel innocent, unfairly burdened by others who do things they “shouldn’t” do because of maliciousness or stupidity. According to the unconditional blamer, these others “ought” to fix the problems they created. Blamers live in a state of self-righteous indignation, trying to control people around them with their accusations and angry demands. What the unconditional blamer does not see is that in order to claim innocence, he has to relinquish his power. If he is not part of the problem, he cannot be part of the solution. In fact, rather than being the main character of his life, the blamer is a spectator. Watching his own suffering from the sidelines, he feels “safe” because his misery is always somebody else’s fault. Blame is a tranquilizer. It soothes the blamer, sheltering him from accountability for his life. But like any drug, its soothing effect quickly turns sour, miring him in resignation and resentment. In order to avoid anxiety and guilt, the blamer must disown his freedom and power and see himself as a plaything of others. The blamer feels victimized at work. His job is fraught with letdowns, betrayals, disappointments, and resentments. He feels that he is expected to fix problems he didn’t create, yet his efforts are never recognized. So he shields himself with justifications. Breakdowns are never his fault, nor are solutions his responsibility. He is not accountable because it is always other people who failed to do what they should have done. Managers don’t give him direction as they should, employees don’t support him as they should, colleagues don’t cooperate with him as they should, customers demand much more than they should, suppliers don’t respond as they should, senior executives don’t lead the organization as they should, administration systems don’t work as they should—the whole company is a mess. In addition, the economy is weak, the job market tough, the taxes confiscatory, the regulations crippling, the interest rates exorbitant, and the competition fierce (especially because of those evil foreigners who pay unfairly low wages). And if it weren’t difficult enough to survive in this environment, everybody demands extraordinary results. The blamer never tires of reciting his tune, “Life is not fair!

There is no time to waste. Every second is precious. Either you have fun with your life and let your descendants suffer, or you chose to take responsibility of what happens to this world, and give your descendants the stable and beautiful environment in which they can grow and flourish.

Ancient ethics always dealt with three questions. Modern ethics usually deals with only one, or at the most two. The three questions are like the three things a fleet of ships is told by its sailing orders. (The metaphor is from C. S. Lewis.) First, the ships must know how to avoid bumping into each other. This is social ethics, and modern as well as ancient ethicists deal with it. Second, they must know how to stay shipshape and avoid sinking. This is individual ethics, virtues and vices, character building, and we hear very little about this from our modern ethical philosophers. Third, and most important of all, they must know why the fleet is at sea in the first place. What is their mission, their destination? This is the question of the summum bonum, and no modern philosophers except the existentialists seem even to be interested in this, the greatest of all questions. Perhaps that is why most modern philosophy seems so weak and wimpy, so specialized and elitist, and above all so boring, to ordinary people. I think I know why modern philosophers dare not raise this greatest of questions; because they have no answer to it. It is a hole so big that only the courage of an existentialist or the faith of a theist can fill it.

Suffering is painful, distressful, and hard. Why would we rejoice or glory in that? Because we know that God uses suffering to help us develop endurance, which produces character, which produces hope. God designs our sufferings to build us up so that we confidently expect him to do what he has promised.

While Paul undoubtedly draws on this broad notion of the term, his usage elsewhere indicates a more particular understanding. In Rom 5:3–4 he declares that “affliction produces endurance, and endurance produces proven character, and proven character produces hope” (my translation). Observe that Paul links endurance with the formation of character. The following list indicates how he embodies—and is empowered to embody—the character of Jesus. Notice too that Paul connects the endurance that builds character with “hope” (see 1 Thess 1:3). We have already seen that it is his hope in the resurrection that bolsters him in his suffering and self-giving in love after the likeness of Christ (4:7–5:10).

Cain complained to God, “My punishment is more than I can bear” (Gen. 4:13). Resolved to overcome his fate, he tried to build a comfortable life for himself. He started a family and began to build a city (Gen. 4:17). I must surrender my fascination with myself to a more worthy preoccupation with the character and purposes of God. I am not the point. He is. I exist for him. He does not exist for me. Without repenting, Cain set out to overcome the consequences of his sin and to provide comfortable circumstances for himself. In effect, Cain was saying, “Okay, I’m out of the Garden. Ever since you expelled Mom and Dad from Eden and placed that angelic bouncer at the gate to keep everyone out, I realized that I must come to terms with living in a world filled with weeds and thornbushes. But even though I am out of the Garden, I will not lead the miserable life of a nomad. I will do everything I can to recapture as much of the Garden experience as possible. I will build a city, plant a few flowers, and put in a recreation park for my children. I will not keep on wandering about without trying to settle down. I have no higher priority than arranging for my own comfort.” Because Cain passed on this attitude to his descendants, we are now able to contrast two ways of approaching life: Lamech’s (reflecting the ungodly influence of Cain) and Enoch’s (consistent with the godly line of Seth). Lamech declared: “I will build my city! I want my pleasures now.” Enoch said: “I will build God’s kingdom! And trust God to one day build a city for me to enjoy.” Because God cares deeply about his children, many times he chooses to relieve our suffering and solve our problems. But because his love is an intelligent love rooted in what he knows is best for us, he provides us with something more interesting to live for than ourselves. He catches us up in the supernatural reality of living for an eternal kingdom. The question we need to ask is this: Are we merely living, or are we walking with God? As we explore our own lives, we must never get so immersed in ourselves that we fail to remember that there is something far more wonderful to ponder. If I am to reject Lamech’s approach and come to God as Enoch came, I must surrender my fascination with myself to a more worthy preoccupation with the character and purposes of God. I am not the point. He is. I exist for him. He does not exist for me. The question we need to ask is this: Are we merely living, or are we walking with God?Are we merely committed to feeding our own souls, to arranging our lives around getting our needs met, to building our cities? Or are we committed to knowing God, to cooperating with him as loved participants in a plan larger than ourselves, to becoming like the Son whom the Father adores, and to waiting for the city that Christ is building right now? We must learn what it means to come to God, believing that he is good when life doesn’t show it, knowing that he graciously rewards honest seekers even when their souls ache relentlessly. But can we put the lessons of Hebrew 11 more practically? What would our lives look like if we were coming to God as Enoch did?

Suffering builds character and impels you to penetrate life’s secrets. It’s the path of great artists, great religious leaders, great social reformers. The problem is not suffering per se, but rather our identification with our own ego: our divided, dualistic, cramped view of things. “We are too ego-centered,” Suzuki tells Cage. “The ego-shell in which we live is the hardest thing to outgrow. We seem to carry it all the time from childhood up to the time we finally pass away.” Adolescent love gives us the first chance to break the shell. Sexual love makes the ego lose itself in the object it loves. “When the ego-shell is broken and the ‘other’ is taken into its own body, we can say that the ego has denied itself or that the ego has taken its first steps towards the infinite.…The religious consciousness is now fully awakened, and all the possible ways of escaping from the struggle or bringing it to an end are most earnestly sought in every direction. Books are read, lectures are attended, sermons are greedily taken in, and various religious exercises or disciplines are tried.” Suzuki says that sexual love is a vehicle of liberation? A crack in the ego shell? A path to the infinite? At this point, if I were Cage, I would buy the book and take it home.

The dial on the wheel of sorrow eventually points to each of us. At one time or another, everyone must experience sorrow. No one is exempt. [...]Learning to endure times of disappointment, suffering, and sorrow is part of our on-the-job training. These experiences, while often difficult to bear at the time, are precisely the kinds of experiences that stretch our understanding, build our character, and increase our compassion for others.

God is not indifferent to suffering. In suffering He created us knowing, in the moment of creation, the necessity of the crucifixion. Christ suffered that we might have confidence that God understands our suffering. In suffering, God reconciled His beloved to Himself. In suffering, He makes us like Himself …

To believe that you can be captain of your own life is to suffer the sin of pride. What is pride? These days the word “pride” has positive connotations. It means feeling good about yourself and the things associated with you. When we use it negatively, we think of the arrogant person, someone who is puffed up and egotistical, boasting and strutting about. But that is not really the core of pride. That is just one way the disease of pride presents itself. By another definition, pride is building your happiness around your accomplishments, using your work as the measure of your worth. It is believing that you can arrive at fulfillment on your own, driven by your own individual efforts. Pride can come in bloated form. This is the puffed-up Donald Trump style of pride. This person wants people to see visible proof of his superiority. He wants to be on the VIP list. In conversation, he boasts, he brags. He needs to see his superiority reflected in other people’s eyes. He believes that this feeling of superiority will eventually bring him peace. That version is familiar. But there are other proud people who have low self-esteem. They feel they haven’t lived up to their potential. They feel unworthy. They want to hide and disappear, to fade into the background and nurse their own hurts. We don’t associate them with pride, but they are still, at root, suffering from the same disease. They are still yoking happiness to accomplishment; it’s just that they are giving themselves a D– rather than an A+. They tend to be just as solipsistic, and in their own way as self-centered, only in a self-pitying and isolating way rather than in an assertive and bragging way. One key paradox of pride is that it often combines extreme self-confidence with extreme anxiety. The proud person often appears self-sufficient and egotistical but is really touchy and unstable. The proud person tries to establish self-worth by winning a great reputation, but of course this makes him utterly dependent on the gossipy and unstable crowd for his own identity. The proud person is competitive. But there are always other people who might do better. The most ruthlessly competitive person in the contest sets the standard that all else must meet or get left behind. Everybody else has to be just as monomaniacally driven to success. One can never be secure. As Dante put it, the “ardor to outshine / Burned in my bosom with a kind of rage.

Of itself, suffering doesn’t make people better. Sometimes it makes them bitter. But when suffering is mixed with faith and God’s grace, then it becomes a wonderful tool for building godly character (2 Cor. 12:1–10). If suffering alone gave people wisdom and character, then our world would be a far better place, because everybody suffers in one way or another. When we accept our suffering as a gift from God and use it for His glory, then it can work in us and for us to accomplish the will of God.

Despite an overwhelming amount of well-intentioned nonsense that we now teach our children, it actually is not enough to try hard. Yes, it’s good to try hard. It is even better to try hard and—after suffering numerous setbacks and working through hardship and pain and temporary defeat—to achieve, to master. Trying hard builds character, but it is only the achievement that follows the effort that builds true confidence. We teach children that it doesn’t matter whether they win or lose, it’s how they play the game. But this lesson can be taught poorly or well. Taught poorly, this lesson results in children who are careless of the outcome of their actions, who are more concerned with double- and triple-checking their inner state than with measuring themselves against the world. Taught well, though, this lesson makes clear that while the valiant might lose many, many times, the object of the valiant is to persevere until victory.

Learn to admire others; it is the first step to overcome your ego.” “The ego destroys its egoist silently and suddenly, as a termite does.” “The ego is such a bullet that fires all your relations.” “The ego and vanity both hold such invisible fire that flames upon oneself.” “Your ego may hurt and damage you more than others.” Learn how to live and participate in people and society, how to help each other, and how to build harmony and peace among those who have lost their way. It can only be with respect, justice, and equality, without any distinctions. Be aware that your ego can destroy your ability if you focus on your caliber and status; it is a poison, not a remedy. Understand the outcomes and consequences of ego, egoists, and egotism. Read thoroughly to grasp the insight to enlighten your life and ways. “Everyone stands firm with their ego status; thus, I accept that I am zero and that everyone else is a hero, but remember that on every count, zero matters.” “The ego, vanity, jealousy, and other flaws define the imperceptive attitude and fly silently toward self-victimizing.” “Nothing else than the worst and abysmal self-defeat, which elucidates that one fetches and embraces itself to become the victim of ego, vanity, and jealousy.” “An egoist focuses on self-promotion and does not admire others or value anyone else. Unfortunately, such one remains the prisoner of egotism.” “A heart that contains love cannot keep the hate there A heart that performs forgiveness does not recognize revenge In a heart where there is altruism, there is no place for egoism Such a heart demonstrates a pure and real human.” “It proves not a difficult task if one discovers the universe; however, discovering one’s self-ego is the toughest matter, whereas overcoming that leads to a visionary victory.” “To show others, the quotes and sayings of the visionary figures, as a mirror instead of reform own conduct and character, indicates one’s worst egoism unless that reflects and demonstrates not their golden words.” “One can neither understand nor accept and respect others’ logic, view, and insight before overcoming their ego.” “After the jumping out of your ego, you liberate your own, and you see the way towards the values of others.” “The nurturing of morals is the language, and control of the ego is the eye of the soul.” “Surrender your ego to enjoy peace of mind and the beauty of equality and harmony.” “Everyone stands firm with their ego status; thus, I accept that I am zero and that everyone else is a hero, but remember that on every count, zero matters.” “Hatred, racism, discrimination, distinction, and vainglory germinate in the soil of ego.” “When one becomes capable of overcoming desires, hopes, and ego, one learns and understands the faculty of patience.” I Yield Not *** I suffer not from ego I let that not enter my life I yield not my will to avaricious As I am a truth of truths I dream not, impossibilities I become a dream of my dreams Since I exist as a reality Thus, it builds A sweet and lovely pleasure, Peace and calm I dance; I dance Without security Even no one can imagine My link to the spiritual world I am here and there No one is aware I wear and bear Every atmosphere. Deliberately *** I deliberately Become fool I enjoy that To punish My ego It is not strange Nor it is a surprise It is just an idea Of yourself What are you Who are you If my ego rules me I feel myself in the doom If I overcome my ego My ways become bright I see the destiny For that, I am here I deliberately Become fool To let people Enjoy and happy Let them heal Their wounds Caused by themselves Of their wrong deeds I deliberately Become fool To make the people active Put to use their time The great lessons That nowhere One can learn.

No greater opportunity, responsibility, or obligation can fall to the lot of a human being than to become a physician. In the care of the suffering, he needs technical skill, scientific knowledge, and human understanding. He who uses these with courage, with humility, and with wisdom will provide a unique service for his fellow man and will build an enduring edifice of character within himself. The physician should ask of his destiny no more than this, he should be content with no less.

Don’t miss the value in your suffering. Adversity builds character.

The clearest evidence that God’s grace is at work in our hearts is that we do not get into panics.

It's the cold and dead who don't suffer. The living are bound to suffer, for it's through the suffering that healing comes, it's through the suffering that character comes.

Broken (The Sonnet) The most effective people, On earth are all broken. The people with most excellence, Are all broken. There is no excellence without brokenness, For brokenness builds character. Broken, and in agony, that's how we grow, One who knows pain knows to help another. Pain is not our enemy, Pain is what keeps us alert. To avoid pain is to avoid growth, To avoid pain is to keep the heart shut. Embrace pain, and pain will have no hold over you. Once accepted, in brokenness you'll find yourself anew.

How do you build yourself into someone on whom you can rely, in the best of times and the worst—in peace and in war? How do you build for yourself the kind of character that will not ally itself, in its suffering and misery, with all who dwell in Hell? The questions and answers continued, all pertinent, in one way or another, to the rules I have outlined in this book: What shall I do to strengthen my spirit? Do not tell lies, or do what you despise. What shall I do to ennoble my body? Use it only in the service of my soul. What shall I do with the most difficult of questions? Consider them the gateway to the path of life. What shall I do with the poor man’s plight? Strive through right example to lift his broken heart. What shall I do when the great crowd beckons? Stand tall and utter my broken truths.

No harvest without rain.

Night brings light, Injury brings elixir. Gale delivers gallantry, Clouds deliver character.

He is schizophrenic, this is how he was diagnosed with the CIA, and his schizophrenia is his strength, he comes out of a personality, directly impersonating a new one, a completely different one, which he experiences as if he had in it for his whole life. This is every professional agent’s strong point, but it comes at such a high price that it in many cases often ends up in a whiff of insanity. Therefore, they must be monitored and psychologically evaluated on a periodic basis. The last thing the agency wants is a suicidal agent with a message exposing many secrets, or a biased towards their opponents, or a madman circling the streets babbling from here and there. It takes its responsibilities towards them, these people suffer a lot, and the more they train, the more they work, the more professional they become, and the crazier they are. But there was something different about him, which Alex did not miss. Not that schizophrenia that she knew; When sitting with him, talking to him, all the paper reports seem as if they were written about a different person, as if deep down another person about whom no one knows anything yet, and as if all these characters he played are one character as if everything grows from inside him. What she was most concerned about is whether he is honest in being an intelligence agent, or is it a role he plays, as are the dozens of roles he played and plays for the agency. Many doubts revolve around him, officers were unable to manage him, and deal with him. The agency changed the liaison officer with him every few months, he is somewhat out of control, but at the same time, it is unable to terminate his services. The closer the agency got to making that decision, the more he did something that made them stick to it more, creative, distinct, and innovative, that we cannot easily let go of. Until Alex arrived, the only liaison officer he had worked with for years. His condition stabilized, he was no longer that mysterious brawler, she understood him completely, she threw all the reports, papers, and opinions behind her back, and dealt with him directly, without barriers. He was not simply pretending, he was not acting, he was really him. Every character he played, every lie he lied, every mess he made, it was him, without acting. And he said to her, they are all composite characters. If you look at each character, you will find something that connects them to the other, that they are like cubes, I build them on top of each other, I do not play them. What you need is to look at the details, and you will find a fine thread connecting them. He trusted her, and so did she. She became his friend, perhaps the only one in this world until Katrina entered his life. She knows nothing of what happened to him lately, but she knows that man deep inside him at the bottom of the pyramid of the cubes, “he will not hurt me, I trusted him before, I trust him today, his chivalry will not accept treachery, not of this kind, he will not do it”.

Jesus would never allow His disciples to be in a panic. The one great crime on the part of a disciple, according to Jesus Christ, is worry. Whenever we begin to calculate without God we commit sin. “Do not fret—it only causes harm” (Psalm 37:8).

Suffering builds Christian character.

suffering builds endurance, which builds character, which builds hope at least that is our hope that we will not just suffer alone without meaning. your son is the living voice of that hope in his suffering alone that turned out to be hope for the many, the touch of your hand taking the worst the world offers transforming it to good. may it be so.

So how do you think scripts should be read? How can they be read? When I was trying to write the stage directions for publication—in those final few weeks of scramble before we opened—I got really worried about all this. I remember in rehearsals we’d delete chunks of the script because the actors were communicating something effortlessly with a look, so didn’t need the lines I’d written. This script was created for a particular group of actors, but others need to inhabit the roles too. The reader needs to visualize the characters, as does the director. When you’re reading a script for the first time, what are you looking for? JOHN: As a director, the first time you read a new script is very precious. It’s the closest you’re ever going to be to an audience watching a production of this script for the first time. Reading a finished script should allow us access to the story, its characters, and the themes the playwright is exploring. A script can make us laugh and cry. It can take us through the joy of its story and also make us feel deep despair for the suffering of its characters. A script builds towards a fully realized production and an experience that can be shared with the audience.   As a playwright, how much of this full experience do you imagine when you are writing a script? Do you speak the characters’ lines out loud as you type them? JACK: I do worse than that, I move like them. Which, when you’re working in well-known coffee shops and sandwich retailers, can lead to you attracting some strange looks. I find myself twisting into the character and gesticulating like them. It’s all very embarrassing.   The thing that was perhaps most interesting about the process of writing this particular script is that I have never spent more time with actors—ever. Through the weeks of workshops and then weeks of rehearsals we were all in those rooms together for so long, all of us, from the design team to the sound team to the lights. I don’t think any of us have experienced anything like that—I think it probably works out at eight months or so, all in all. What effect would you say that had on what was created? I’m sure it made it all a lot better, but more than that do you think it somehow changed the tone of what we did?

How do you build yourself into someone on whom you can rely, in the best of times and the worst—in peace and in war? How do you build for yourself the kind of character that will not ally itself, in its suffering and misery, with all who dwell in Hell? The questions and answers continued, all pertinent, in one way or another, to the rules I have outlined in this book: What shall I do to strengthen my spirit? Do not tell lies, or do what you despise. What shall I do to ennoble my body? Use it only in the service of my soul.

We have convinced ourselves that suffering builds character. Suffering builds nothing but walls. We settle for beasts when we could have men. All for pride. And that's the biggest joke of all, pups. Best you remember that.' - Lukas the Trickster

Problems, pain, and suffering are all part of the human condition. Not only so we know what happiness is, but also because they build character, change us, teach us.

You must take unconditional responsibility; you need to see yourself as a “player,” as a central character who has contributed to shape the current situation—and who can thus affect its future. This is the opposite of seeing yourself as a “victim,” subject to forces beyond your control. The player is in the game and can affect the result. The victim is out of the game and can only suffer the consequences of others’ actions.

We have convinced ourselves that suffering builds character. Suffering builds nothing but walls. We settle for beasrs when we could have men. All for pride. And that's the biggest joke of all, pups. Best you remember that.' - Lukas the Trickster