On the other hand, it would seem more resourceful, perhaps wise, to use suffering as a vehicle of transformation that allows us to open ourselves with compassion to those who suffer as we do, or even more than we do. It is in that sense, and that sense alone, that we should understand the Roman philosopher Seneca when he says: “Suffering may hurt, but it is not an evil.” It is not an evil when, unable to avoid it, we turn it to profit to learn and to change, while recognizing that it is never a good thing in and of itself.
