What is the root cause and remedy to human suffering?

Answer 1

According to Michael Webb article which was published in April, 2006 "The cause of suffering is actually not the presence of pain or the lack of pleasure. Instead, the cause of suffering is rooted in how we respond to the fundamental dissatisfaction. Suffering is not the same as pain. We can't deny pain, but we can be free from suffering.

Suffering comes from how we handle the fundamental dissatisfaction. The dissatisfaction can never go away because it comes from being sentient in the physical world. Nothing in the physical world ever lines up exactly. How we respond to the feeling caused by that mis-alignment is what matters.

The root cause of suffering is that we repeatedly try and fail to get rid of the fundamental dissatisfaction. It's the trying and failing that causes the suffering. A person stops suffering by realizing concretely that the fundamental dissatisfaction is always present, and perhaps even more importantly that the dissatisfaction is itself also hollow and unsubstantial.

Pain and pleasure are natural facts of life, which all animals feel, but the condition of suffering is unnecessary.

REMEDY

Faith is also the Remedy for Suffering:

Faith is essential to live every minute of this life on earth. If Christ is with you, in you!, you have to be in this life full of enthusiasm and joy and love, no matter what happens. But you have to be aware of it and actualize it, trusting in Him, in every occasion or circumstance of your life... in everything, just do your best, and then, trust in God all the way, it is the formula that never fails, the one given by God to Joshua (Jos.1).

If you ever feel sad or worried, it is because you forgot at that moment that Jesus is with you. In fact at that moment you are in sin, and the greatest sin in the Bible which is "is not to trust in God": In the Old Testament it is called "prostitution against God" (Is.1:21, Jer.2:20). St. Paul says, "whatever does not proceed from faith is sin" (Rom.14:23).

To trust in power or money or our abilities, instead of trusting in God, is a prostitution against God, it is to throw ourselves in the hands of other, trusting in that other, and that's prostitution!. And this is the worse sin, and the one we usually do not confess.

The only reasonable response to the existence of suffering is confidence in God’s promises for eternity: Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. . . . Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. . . . Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. [Matt. 5:3-10]

Answer 2

I would also argue greed. Desire is not the root cause of suffering because healthy desire brings about the will to change and grow. Greed can only hurt both yourself and others. The remedy for greed is love because love brings about selflessness. It is impossible to make someone love or teach them how or why to love. Love is something an individual must accept themselves. Many think that love is in a book, so they read religious texts and self-help books. Love is created through empathy. You can only look at suffering so long before you start to empathize. Many close their eyes at suffering. I guess we would have to put the greedy with the deprived until the love is born.

Answer 3

There are many causes to human suffering.
Physical disabilities is suffering, others about us can cause suffering and we can cause suffering in ourselves.
Pain is suffering
People cause pain either physically or emotionally toward others,and then we can psychologically cause suffering by how we hold on to painful memories.
The remedies depend on the suffering doesn't it but if each and all were able to learn to help themselves then two of those three not need be in our lives.

Answer 4

Desire and pride, the two aspects of ego, are the root cause for our suffering. The remedy therefore is to root out our ego. Now that is neither easy nor possible to achieve completely. Thus, we should strive to continuously reduce our ego. One way to do this could be to keep reminding ourselves all the time that we are really small and minuscule in this huge and diverse universe and therefore we can not aim too big nor can we allow ourselves to be fooled into overconfident or overzealous personality. When we begin to feel small, we would learn to handle small small things and that would ensure happiness to a large extent.

Life is really about taking care of small things and leaving larger issues to the will and wisdom of the Great power, that is, this universe or nature!! If we can accept that position, we would certainly multiply our degree of happiness.

Answer 5

The 'root cause' is our primitive level of the technology required to avoid and cure fatal diseases. Our immaturity in recognising and dealing with 'bad' people. And the academics and scientists that hold back on new and progressive ideas in fear of being ridiculed by their peers. 'Time', I suppose, is the only true remedy, as long as we are aiming for and heading in, the 'right' direction. A world body of very carefully vetted and selected, totally un-biased, extremely intelligent, educated and level headed people, who can fully research the basic theories that are taking up valuable space, time and finance, which could go a long way to reducing human suffering, by accepting or rejecting them. The colossal amounts of time, effort and finance that must be wasted by biologist, trying to prove and convince people of the validity of the theory of evolution, and the creationist's equally fanatical efforts that would be better directed directly at reducing human suffering.

Answer 6

Buddha asked the same question and found that the root cause of human suffering is the desire for worldly things of enjoyment.
As a remedy he prescribed austerity, charity and piety.

Answer 7

Expectations from life is the root cause of suffering.
Acceptance is the remedy.

Answer 8

Good question.Hard to say,i believe it is our wild lowly desires. One can't have too much of anything, the same goes for our desires. My guess is piety and self control would be the remedy for it. In islam we call it "nafs"(lower nature/ desire) and we are encourage to fast and have patience and all that to have control over it, the almost similar methods of buddhists overcoming "samsara"(universal suffering), so i sort of try to do that. The solution isn't ascectism, but staying in the means.

Answer 9

Hello, Yoichi!

The answer to this metaphysical question was perhaps put best, by none other than Homer Simpson, brilliant scholar that he is:

Homer toasted the following: "To Alcohol.... The Cause Of, and The Answer To, All Of Life's Problems"

Think about that for a moment...... let it sink in.......

Answer 10

desire

"Four Noble Truths

1. Suffering exists
2. Suffering arises from attachment to desires
3. Suffering ceases when attachment to desire ceases
4. Freedom from suffering is possible by practicing the Eightfold Path "