What *is* the purpose to all this suffering?!
I just read that one of my favourite blogosphere cats, Lolo (Lautrec) , has died. He'd been ill, but it turns out he was full of cancer. His human is devastated and I feel devastated along with her. There is no end to suffering. What is the point? What is its purpose? I don't believe in a personal deity that has a "plan" for humankind, or for all Beings. Many do, and can reason away suffering, can believe in a joyful afterlife to make up for the crap in this reality. Others say that our suffering leads to spiritual growth, that everything is a lesson, that we progress through spiritual levels until we achieve some sort of enlightenment. Yeah, I used to feel that way till I bottomed out in clinical depression about 8 or 9 years ago. Now I pretty much think that all of life is meaningless, that when you're dead, you're dead. Yet I'm not so arrogant as to think I'm correct, that I have the answers to life's mysteries. Frankly, I find it r...