A story of a man struggling with depression after his wife's death and finding meaning in his suffering.
How reframing the question of 'what would have happened if you had died first?' helped the man see the purpose of his suffering.
The importance of finding meaning in our lives and how it gives us the strength to endure pain and suffering.
英語の和訳です。お願いします！！
Once, an elderly man consulted me because of his severe depression. He could not overcome the loss of his wife who had died two years before and whom he had loved above all else. Now how could I help him? Well, I refrained from telling him anything, but instead confronted him with a question, "What would have happened if you had died first, and your wife would have had to survive you?:" "Oh," he said, "for her this would have been terrible; how she would have suffered!" "You see," I replied, " such a suffering has been spared her, and you have spared her this suffering - to be sure, at the price that now you have to survive and mourn her." He said no word but shook my hand and calmly left my office. In some way, suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice.
Of course, this was no treatment in the proper sense since, first, his despair was no disease, and second, I could not change his attitude toward his unchangeable fate because from that time on he could at least see a meaning in his suffering. Our main concern is not to gain pleasure or to avoid pain but rather to see a meaning in our life. That is why we are even ready to suffer, on the condition, to be sure, that our suffering has a meaning.
