You looked everywhere, there was suffering...

Imagine what it would be like to be among the 6 million+ of your people--young, children and old, being herded to their death camps and gassed? Their suffering was not the usual kind like we do have now once in a while. But their suffering -- it was unlimited. It was not the suffering while being alive as we do feel sometimes; not the suffering of individuals who rise up against oppression or poverty, which some people clamor for.

It was the suffering of absolute, terrifying fear. The suffering of 6 million people who had no choice, trapped by those who seek to remove them from the face of the earth, called "annihilation".

Imagine with the suffering of 6 million innocent people whose purpose was just to live and that their children should live. Yes, I'm referring to the suffering of the Holocaust.

Suffering as such is never the purpose of life; it is not even an aim of life. Do you ever ask yourself, why are people around you suffering? Would your impulse be is to help, to save, and to comfort?

Addiction is a choice by anyone who can get out of its trap.

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*Inspired by "White Nights" by Menachem Begin, 1977
Memorial Day, 67 years of Israel since 1948

I think that was very well said.

The suffering around me completely breaks my heart. It kills me when I can't help. And when I can it never feels like enough.

Sometimes it's easier to close your eyes, stick your fingers in your ears, and hum "this old man".
But ignoring it never makes it go away. As soon as you open your ears and eyes, its there again.

I agree, with kana_marie beautiful, yet sad reminder of the suffering others have endured in the past and in the present. It may be true that "Addiction is a choice by anyone who can get out of its trap." But the question remains, how do you or a loved one get out of this trap? How do we create a future without suffering for either ourselves or loved one? I think, it is why we participate in this forum. We are looking for this answer, or trying to encourage and help others to the best of our ability, with good intentions. But here's the issue for me. Not one answer fits all solutions.

I think once you become an addict, if you are too deep into it, then the harder it is for you to recover, like being sucked by quicksand. That's why people should never even dare experiment with drugs, because if they got hooked, then it's either they recover or get worse until the drugs get to claim their lives.

"Suffering as such is never the purpose of life; it is not even an aim of life. Do you ever ask yourself, why are people around you suffering? Would your impulse be is to help, to save, and to comfort?"

People suffer around us all the time. It's either through self made choices in life or the ones handed down to us. Now would I help others that are suffering? Absolutely. I have to help others as people who helped me.

It is really hard to be surrounded with lots of people suffering and harder I think if those people did those to themselves that is why they are suffering. Right that we have a choice, whether to be part of the suffering/problem or be part of the solution.

Everyone of us is suffering. Everyone of us is experiencing pain. The problems/difficulties may vary from one person to another, but the sad fact is, we're all suffering. And sometimes, we really can't do anything about that.

We take our lives for granted as simple situations seem to complicate us beyond return. When you look back on sufferings of people who survived or sucumbed to attrocities such as genocide, it can make us appreciate our own lives and really rethink what we believe to be unbearable.

Suffering is a consequence of cruelty or unfortunate circumstances. No-one chooses to suffer, it just happens. Those who do punish themselves probably have a good reason for it. However, there's no way to know what it feels like until you come to experience it. Imagining is easy and convenient but it's not the real deal. We'll only know what's in the sufferers minds if we are the sufferers ourselves. That's the sad truth behind this.

Suffering is a part of everyday life. The choices that we and people on the ouside looking in affect that. I would definetly help others that are suffering. That goes without saying. It's all about giving back. Sharing the knowledge that was ahanded down to you. Careing about your fellow man.

Well said. Suffering is hard to endure and hard to witness. Some people cannot bear to face it, and therefor shy away while those that suffer stand in need. I think if there is anything good about suffering, it is that once you have experienced it yourself, a door in your heart opens and you can feel the suffering of others. When you feel others' pain as your own, you feel more compelled to take action and aid in the fight against the suffering of all. We can only dream of a day that there is no more suffering at the hands of others, but until then we must continue to allow ourselves to feel the pain in order to work toward eradicating it.

I've held on this old sage's saying, "Don't withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in the power of your hands to do it." We will always know what to do at the right time, in the right moment.

I think this is the whole duty of humanity, isn't it? Thank you. No one is an accident who is placed anywhere any time. Everywhere is an opportunity for doing good.

We live in a world full of contradictions or, to be more euphemistic about it, binary oppositions. You see love and hate, creation and destruction, tolerance and intolerance, goodness and evil, triumphs and failures, happiness and sadness, mistakes and redemption, and what have you. If you take one from the other, this wouldn't be the same world anymore and us humans will quickly run out of reasons to keep on living. So word to the wise: let's live our lives with a grain of salt and do all the good that we can.

Yes, there's so much suffering in the world, but this should not take you down of move you aback. In fact, this instead should serve as your inspiration, to be not a cause of suffering of other people. You shouldn't be a cause of suffering, most specially to the ones who are dearest to you.