I do not doubt that suffering is character building. But what sort of character does it build?
I shan't bore you with details but recent events left me in search of a silver lining.The life-affirming, gets you out of the bed, tapes your heart back together sort of thing.
Have you any in stock? I'll take two. No? Well, that’s ok.
You often hear well-wishers say that suffering is character building. What I heard less often is the description of the character being built. I had a vague memory of an article headline by Nicholas Lezard that promised to shed light on this particular issue. Having read it, I find it unsatisfactory. Musings on life without central heating amidst the Scottish wilderness offer valuable lessons but not the sort that help right now. Something tells me I’m going to have to draw my own conclusions on this occasion.
Suffering is character building. This statement has the same nauseating quality as a gleeful assertion that all things happen for the best. There is a presumed inevitability about the statement that promises growth following a period of torment. Inevitability of change I can accept, it is the inevitability of improvement that I take an issue with.
As far as I can tell, there are three possible outcomes to suffering, two of these are mutually exclusive - depth perception, ego-centrism and empathy. Depth perception is a given. In a world where only one food exists, one would struggle to appreciate delights of ice cream in the absence of broccoli. By the same token, soaring heights of joy offer a point of comparison to the depths of anguish, or, in my case, shallows of disquiet.
What one does with this finer taste for things, good and bad, determines the outcome of the suffering. Viktor Frankl put it best when he wrote 'Suffering in and of itself is meaningless; we give our suffering meaning by the way in which we respond to it.' Desire to withdraw is the natural response to suffering. It's an act of self-preservation. As any child who has ever experienced toothache will know, pain can be blinding. When pain is the primary feeling, the world itself ceases to exist and only self remains. In that state, the utmost desire of self is to deafen, numb, and self-efface. To borrow from Milan Kundera, 'suffering is the university of egocentrism'. Our opinions may differ on this but ego-centrism doesn't sounds like an improvement to me. It certainly won't do as a silver lining.
A more hopeful source of silver lining is empathy, with its promise of greater understanding, patience and humility. Just as one can surrender to pain, one can also aim to understand and find one’s place in it. Best of us can aim to control it too. There is a shadow of perseverance there, of purpose, of hope against hope.
Camus wrote 'One must imagine Sisyphus as happy'. It's a problematic statement but I remind myself that my need for a silver lining outweighs the need for a debate. For a time being at least, I am travelling with Camus.