suffering builds character? examples?

Question

are there any famous or accomplished people that fit this philosophy? or any characters in books. thanks

Answer 1

most of all blues musicians

Answer 2

Job, in the Bible, had his will tested by having all his property and family destroyed

Amazon women would have their breasts burnt off so as to better wear armor.

An old Greek once stood in the battering surf, with lighting striking all about, and shouted into the pounding waves for hours and hours so as to strengthen his speaking voice.

In more recent times a writer once placed tobacco under his eye lids to help keep him alert.

Military training uses the tactic of forced marches to instill a little "spirit of the corps" and backbone into what might otherwise be weak willed troops

In the 21st century, the thought of building character brings, palsy, gout attacks, indigestion, shivers and fainting spells to the ones with no direction to their life

Answer 3

Suffering is like a furnace: it refines the gold and burns impurities. If you see all great people in history, all have gone through sufferings, and this makes them different from the rest. Abraham Lincoln failed many times before he eventually became US president, Einstein was considered as a stupid boy, the electric bulb inventor Thomas Alva Edison 'could not pay attention' when he was in school, Mahatma Gandhi saw injustice before he became humanitarian soldier. In fact, it is those bad experiences which have motivated them to do better.

Of course not every people who have gone through suffering will have better character. Only those who can overcome the downhearted feelings that will make benefit of his sifferings.

Answer 4

Another way of looking at this is to think of experience as building character. However, I don't subscribe to the character model of thinking.

Our identities are somewhat different to our experience, skillsets etc. You didn't define 'character'. Often people see strength of mind, confidence, wisdom etc. as character, yet these are somewhat different to our identity. That being said, there's no physical part of ourselves that is our real self, that we know about.

And we always have choice as to how we respond to stimuli that are outside of us. We could suffer and become full of hartred, we could suffer and become more at peace with the world and others etc, etc.

Answer 5

The stoicism of Yahoo answerers who sift through the "Books and Authors'" section looking for questions unrelated to ****ing Harry Potter!

Answer 6

Extremely spoiled people don't have any character! (e.g. Paris Hilton).

Look at every culture which has suffered at the hands of another...