The first of the four noble truths speaks of suffering. Basically, living entails suffering. At no point in our lives can we say that everything is perfect. If indeed that thought arises, the subsequent thought is of how long our happiness will last. Thus, suffering has again arisen and our moment of complete happiness is shattered.

Undaunted, hope springs eternal and it is our human nature to want suffering to end. In one sense, I guess we could say that history is the recounting of how humans have largely tried to end their own suffering and, occasionally, the suffering of others.    

So as humans, we want the suffering to stop.

But instead of trying to root it out, the vast majority of people focus on covering it up. As soon as someone is uncomfortable, they take medication to cover the discomfort or pain. People try to numb themselves to suffering as they sit mesmerized by television programs and movies crafted to pull in the viewer so they become ensnared by the images before them. People turn on their computers to aimlessly surf the Internet or forget themselves in computer games. They do not play with someone in the same room who they can talk with, but with a passive computer monitor. They wander through malls, buying on impulse things that stand a fifty-fifty chance of being tossed in the trash within six months. People fill their lives with activities so they will not have to sit quietly and acknowledge that things are not right. That they are suffering: mentally, physically, and spiritually.

The only way to end the suffering is stop running away from it or hiding it or burying it. The way to end it is to acknowledge it, analyse it, find the underlying cause and deal with it. Wisely.