Those of you in touch with your spiritual side, could you please help me with a question?

[TinySocks]

Sorry if this question sounds childish, but I am really struggling to find an answer and make sense of things.

Can someone explain to me why is it that life gives so many obstacles and difficulties to lovely good people who only deserve to be happy, while other people who are...well lets say, NOT very nice seem to go through life without a struggle?

It just doesn?t seem fair. Is there an answer to this?

perhaps. i think that before you are born, you basically have meeting with your guides and plan your life - this does allow for free will and decsions that you wil make at the time.

I would say there is no rhyme or reason to it. We are all just bumbling along trying to do the best we can and should do the best we can.

If you consider yourself a happy accident in the cosmos it can be quite liberating.

fransmom, but most probably no soul meeting with their guides would plan for a life of unhappiness?

If there is no reason for it, how do people that suffer terrible bad luck find comfort in the knowledge that it is all just an accident?

**just wanted to point out that despite a few hiccups in my life I am happy and consider myself immensely lucky; My question is in reference to other lovely people I know who seem to have everthing going wrong.

Expecting things to go 'right' is a false expectation from the start. Life is dangerous and difficult to navigate. Suffering and pain are a natural part of life. People who are blessed with (temporary) good fortune should be grateful for as long as it lasts.

HI cyber! so in your opinion we will ALL go through suffering at some point in our lives? And be happy while we wait? I am not just talking of the type problems that we all have, but real heartbreaking struggle, rock bottom, bad luck, that some people seem to have.

I listened to a Dale Carneige Stop worrying programme yesterday, he said

focus on the 90% in your life that is good and forget the 10% that is bad

people very frequently focus on the bad aspects 10% on their life and forget the good 90%

Count your blessings not the crap

Certainly can't explain. It's rough, but it's just the way it is. If there is any moral order governing the universe, I don't believe any of us are in a position to comprehend it anyway. Our best bet is to do what we can to create our own moral order with whatever means we have at our disposal - reason, empathy, love etc - and try to live accordingly. Or as Kurt Vonnegut put it: "we are here to help each other through this thing, whatever it is."

But how can you justify children being seriously sick? There's no religion that can give a decent reason for that.

I agree with you. The instinct to protect ourselves from danger/suffering is so strong that it turns into a belief that we can protect ourselves even when all the evidence is to the contrary. This kind of magical thinking is probably enshrined to some extent in all religions, but also I think in many other aspects of culture. The idea that we are powerless against the effectively random forces that cause disease, death etc is just too unbearable to accept, so instead we like to think that somehow "good" people should receive good fortune. It is a fairy tale.

Sorry to the op - this probably isn't helping. But I think that lovely good people will probably always be happier on some level than those who are habitually malicious or selfish regardless of the misfortunes they may experience.

There are no answers here on earth, we only have the questions for now . Rilke put it in a better way

"Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day.'

Locked rooms, airtight compartments... NOW moments, not dim past or unclear future.

By facing problems in the present then you deal with them in the present. Taking care of your future. It helps to organise thoughts and day to day life better.

Of course hurtful, painful situations occur. That is Life, you cannot have Life Mother without the Death Mother.

Pain teaches us more, makes us sit up and take notice.

Pain wants us to notice so we deal with it.

The more we defer pain and not accept it, we humans fall into confusion and misunderstanding of what pain is teaching us.

Even if we cannot figure it out - when we take action, deal with airtight TODAY, NOW moments, stand in a place of Power and not defeated attitudes, then through action and motion, life flows and moves on, rather than stagnating and becoming drama, and prolonged suffering.

Fair is a human invention, Life and Death are existence, and fair is nothing to do with their equation.

The Final Mother

When women understand their Ultima Madre, or final mother, they can build altars and fetishes of these powers. When they feel the influence of Crazy Woman or the Death Mother, in the form of depression or gloom, they can light candles and burn copal and honor her great power, the dark side. You see, her intent only defines your goodness and beauty. By honoring the dark side, you destroy her power over you. Then she can't take you.

Zoila
Jaguar Woman

Psalm 73 v3-17 (this guy was asking your Q's hundred's of years ago!!)
"...I saw wicked people doing well. They are not suffering;they are healthy and strong. They don't have troubles like the rest of us; they don't have problems like other people...so why have I kept my heart pure?Why have I kept my hands from doing wrong?I have suffered all day long; I have been punished every morning.....I tried to understsnd all this, but it was too hard for me to see until I went to the temple of God. Then I understood what will happen to them."

I think all of us have these Q's sometimes TinySocks and there are no neat answers. But I think it helps to know that there's a bigger picture. We are not random events in a crazy universe. We are people created and loved by God, and He has plans for us that stretch into eternity. So when life is hard and seems unfairly so, turn to Him. And the 'NOT very nice' people will also meet God and the consequences of their actions.

Thanks to all for your responses. And very reassured to know that some clever guy asked this question (is such an eloquent manner) hundreds of years ago!

caf1, regarding what you said:"And the 'NOT very nice' people will also meet God and the consequences of their actions" . Isn't God supposed to be forgiving, understanding and pardon all our sins?

I was having a "deep" conversation with my sister about this the other day. She has gone through extremely difficult times and turned to spirituality for answers. In her view there are NO sins (she doesn't believe in religions). We discussed the case of that horrendous man in Austria that kept his own daughter locked up/raped. I told her that surely that was a sin, and he deserves to boil up in hell for eternity. But in her opinion he must have had some terrible experiences during his childhood to turn him into this domineering, controlling person, so although he did wrong, we have to understand that life circumstances made him the way he is.

I cannot get my head around it.

I'd say it's up to God to judge people, but it's up to us to keep others safe from danger. If I came across someone who was a danger to others, I'd want to ensure he/she couldn't do any more harm.

A heck of a lot of people had appalling childhoods. Mine was pretty scary. They choose not to rape or murder or steal. I don't buy the idea that people always have no choice about something like that, personally. There was a good article in the paper the other day where a guy had gone 'under cover' amongst men who were assaulting children. Those men would always, always tell judges and social workers that they had a terrible childhood and were really sorry and would never do it again. But when they got back to talk to him, they'd tell him how they'd managed to fool these stupid people that wanted to think the best of them, and of course they would still hurt children. They enjoyed it, they said. And they enjoyed fooling the judges.

As for what happens to people after death, I think people can choose to walk away from God's offer of heaven, by choosing hatred and bad behaviour and refusing to truly be sorry for what they did. The offer from God is there, but I believe we have to do what Matthew 25 says - feed the hungry, help those who need it, etc - and love each other and love God. We're demonstrating our belief that way, otherwise "belief" is just a word, nothing more. If someone gets into heaven still wanting to attack other people and not bother to help them, I can't see how that would work.

Here's the same dude who wrote the other psalm ages ago, I think he says it well!

"He has taken our sins away from us as far as the east is from the west. The Lord has mercy on those who respect him, as a father has mercy on his children" Psalm 103v12

God forgives anybody who's truly sorry and gives them the power to subsequently be a different person so that real change takes place. We all have this opportunity but we don't all choose it. Hence the tragic events of the Austrian man. WE however can make a difference in our own little worlds by experiencing what the dude above wrote and knowing God as our father, which is way cool.

LittleSocks, these are big and good Q's for us all to think about so well done in raising them! I hope your sister comes through her difficult times v soon

amber, I totally agree with you. So many people that have gone through very tough times do not choose to inflict the same hardship on to other people, if anything many of them use their experiences to help others. But there are people who are not strong enough (mentally speaking) and just cannot get away from what happened to them.

There is very rich man in a developing country who managed to steal all the money from a fund using loopholes in the system. This guy is very happy now in Miami, enjoying his bottles of champaign, while some of the people that had invested in this fund lost everything. Some of them were pensioners that had all their savings in this fund, there is also this woman who was saving to send her son to university. (I was one of the people affected, but thankfully not as badly as some other people).

And I ask myself, how can this man get away with it, and all those poor pensioners be left with nothing. I want this man to pay for what he's done in THIS lifetime, not when we're all dead. My wishful thinking is that karma really does exist, but I don't see it happening.

By the way caf1: regarding my sister, I think going through such a difficult patch was the best thing that every happened to her, she has found the answers she was looking for, she is over it. She is a happier person for it. I still wish people like her wouldn't have to suffer so much.

My cousin who is deeply religious, explains it this way. If you have faith, and do good deeds, you become a target for the devil who wants to lure you away. The devil wants to ensure you have such a crap time you turn away from God and turn away from good, harden and stop caring about others.

I dont think I agree, but that is one explanation...

I think you choose your life before you are born. You choose a difficult life to learn from it. I think lif is meant to be a learning experience (good and bad)

When you die you get to assess your life and what you learnt.

Since my mum died I have become a lot more interested in spiritual stuff.

I do want my life to be easy and comfortable but I realise that my difficulties are my challenges and that I learn and grow through them.

I am open to the idea that perhaps I chose some of my challenges before I came here because I wanted to develop certain skills, patience, acceptance, humility perhaps.

And you never know, maybe people with a very difficult life chose it because they are advanced souls who wanted the challenge of a difficult life?

I have huge respect for the people I know who are managing to live a difficult life in a positive way, it is very humbling to be with them.

I think we are all connected in God and that people doing bad things will have to answer for not rising above their weaknesses (which of course isn't easy) and we'll all have to deal with it in the end but in the context of the mercy, understanding and forgiveness of God.

That's what I think anyway.....who knows though!

x posts fizzbuzz

I would agree with fizzbuzz.
I think that you have a purpose in life and lessons to learn. I don't think we are just here to bumble along and when we are dead that is it.I don't have any answers as to how it works! I think that if you don't learn the lessons then you will be presented with them again.
I like the Spanish proverb 'take what you want said God-but pay for it'. It isn't immediately obvious, but I think people will have to pay in the end.
Just a thought, but if we all had happy lives all the time how would we know we were happy?

I have had some tragic and testing times in my life but they have changed me, probably for the better.

Well I'm gald I started this thread, it has given me lots of food for thought.

Abbey, I have no doubt in the mind that difficult times make us stronger and usually change us for the better.

But my question was more with regards to people who are just cruel, selfish, bullies, who are not suffering. They are sailing through life happily with everything they need managing to inflict pain on others without a care in the world.

Thanks everyone for answering!

When you meet those pompous bullying people, who define themselves by their material possessions as being superior to everyone else I don't supose you think I wish that was me do you? Even if you think that that it would be nice to have their income.

When I get a case of the 'why me's' I turn to the beauty around me, I live in a former industrial area, now green and clean, surronded by mountains and trees, I look at the flowers I grew, the food I've grown.
Above all else, I give deep and grateful thanks for my family, we've come through hard times, but love each other and stand by each other through everything that life throws at us.

I had a breakdown a few years ago and in a way I feel that it was worth the suffering to realise that there are good things in life.

If you are interested do some research into spirituality, you'll be drawn to a path that has meaning for you and that, while it won't prevent bad things, will help you to gain a sense of yourself as part of this wonderful world.

PS I had a dreadful day yesterday, due to arthritis dropped my mobile on the floor twice!! broke the screen! then opened the greenhouse door and it fell off and all the glass smashed.

I was really upset but did a meditation last night and it helped me to calm down.

Also I sometimes have to not listen to the news as I feel overwhelmed. I've always felt it is my 'duty'to be abreast of current affairs but have realised that I need to protect myself sometimes. It's hard as I'm addicted to R4.. but I'll be choosy about what I listen to and play misic for a few days!!

Sorry too long

I don't think death is the end (but I don't believe in the traditional idea of heaven, or spiritualists contacting those on the other side), but I think that the cruel, selfish bullies will be forced to see the error of their ways. However it is just perhaps wishful thinking!!
Life is perhaps like a game of cards, some people get a much better hand to start with, e.g beauty and brains,but it how you play them that counts. People with a lousy hand can come off well and those with a brilliant start can throw it all away. Perhaps at the end you have to account for what you did.(Or possibly it is all random after all!)