08/15/2025
Words of Wisdom Wednesday again!
I came across these words by Edie Summers and I wanted to share them with you for a very specific reason. Edie Summers developed ME after a skiing accident, and is now a well-known speaker and author in the wellness sector, with her book ‘The Memory of Health: A Journey to Wellbeing.’
These words resonate with me because of the use of the word ‘suffering’. I am often chastised for talking about suffering. I am told I should avoid that word. The clients that I work with are ‘suffering’. Chronic illness causes a lot of ‘suffering.’ yet I am told that this is no longer a PC word.
It’s as though in this modern world, we are very uncomfortable with the concept of suffering. We don’t want to look it in the eye. We don’t want to confront another person’s suffering. We want to believe that suffering doesn’t exist, because that is more comfortable for us.
But it is not comfortable for the person who is suffering! They feel misunderstood, they feel unheard. Because the truth is, that people suffer. Many chronic illnesses cause suffering at times. And that needs to be acknowledged. When we deny our own or another being’s suffering, we deny the reality of experience. We are allowed to feel suffering. In fact, the Buddhists would argue that suffering is an inevitable part of human existence. The reality is that we will all experience suffering at some point. If not through chronic illness, then through bereavement, divorce, redundancy.
We will all know suffering; it cannot be avoided. And that is ok. It really is! Suffering is a human experience that we can move through, just like any other. When we ignore suffering, when we stuff it under the carpet and we don’t acknowledge it, we don’t talk about it, that’s when suffering becomes toxic.
There are few people who are willing to look at another person’s suffering. To acknowledge it, to bear witness to it, to sit with it. I know when I was experiencing the most acute suffering of my illness, there were few people who wanted to be around me. I could see that they didn’t know what to do, what to say, and I am so lucky that they didn’t avoid me. But so many people experience the pain of rejection and abandonment on top of their suffering.
So, these words really struck a chord with me. Because my mission now is to sit with those who are suffering, to acknowledge their suffering, so that they know they are heard and understood.
