How to Understand Life’s Problems and Deal with Them
by To live is to have problems once in a while just as to live means to feel real joy now and then – the success of business, the birth of a child, the victory in a game, the graduation of a son in college, the cure from a disease.
If you’re weighed down by a problem, then you are not accepting it as part of life. Knowing what it means makes it more bearable and easy to deal with.
Many people are repelled by their problems. They then ask themselves, “Why me? I don’t deserve them.” Then, they remember other people whose lifestyle makes them more deserving of their problems and who in fact don’t have them and still continue to enjoy life.
Other people think of their problems as punishment from God. They reflect to these questions: Why me? What did I do to my fellowmen that I’m having this terrible problem? The problem may be a job lost, death of a loved one, a child on drugs, impending surgery, care for the sick and the elderly parents.
Whatever the nature of the problem, we see it as interfering our normal functioning, making us lose balance as we ponder repeatedly the implications of our burden.
Problems do give us pain. Anyone who never knew pain cannot truly appreciate a time of happiness. We experience fullness because we have had this lack. Only an empty cup gets filled.
Problems also strengthen us. They mold our character, which in turn accepts the vagaries and raw impulses of life and turns these into life-giving, life-sustaining forces.
Suffering has meaning. A man who loses his job for no apparent good reason is perhaps not meant for it. He is then forced to look for a job that is more fulfilling in many respects or maybe open a business of his own. A successful, aggressive business executive suddenly cut down by some freak accident and reduced to a state of dependence upon others, even his basic needs and in his situation he might renew his fundamental communion with his fellowmen, especially the lowly ones.
Suffering can spell a big change in our lives, a change into the right direction. Many times, suffering can be a call. A call to exceptional love. A mother who gives birth to a special child, an autistic, is challenged to give that child as fulfilled and as enjoyable a life as it can have, despite its defect. A woman who is forced to take care of her old, sickly parents, saving her parents from heartaches especially when they are about to die.
Repulsion therefore, or worse, loss of faith is not the proper response to have when problems come our way and afflict us.
Heed the call; endure the challenge. Don’t lose hope. Beyond the suffering may be a treasure beyond words.
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