Is suffering essential for a spiritual awakening?

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My interest in the topic of spiritual awakening has flagged a bit, I had mine so very long ago, and really, my life has been one, long, slow, continuous awakening, so the idea that it can happen all of a sudden seems to me to be more on the wishful side of things.

In my mind, you study, practice, meditate, engage, pursue, search, and then one day it just happens. Mine was really interesting and rather spectacular, maybe one day I’ll write a book about it, but it was for me. I have a weird mind that works a weird way, and my awakening weirdly catered to my weird need to understand weird things. It’s hard to relate back to ordinary people, and really, that’s kind of the point.

I’ll tell you what it didn’t involve. Suffering. Suffering can be spiritual, but suffering isn’t inherently spiritual. Nothing is, really, except God Himself.