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As we head into our 10th season, we’re continually humbled by how far this conversation has traveled. We’ve had listeners tuning in from more than 120 countries around the world, and that global community means a great deal to us. From time to time, we’ve invited feedback, comments, questions, and curiosities—and we want you to know that invitation is always open. If you’re willing, we’d love for you to click on the comments and share a thought or a wonder. We’ll keep everything private, and we promise we won’t respond directly. Your reflections simply help shape the ongoing conversation
In this podcast, we continue our ongoing exploration of the relationship between uncertainty, anxiety, and suffering, turning our attention more deliberately toward suffering itself—how it arises, how we interpret it, and how it can become a catalyst for wisdom rather than a source of ongoing distress.
We begin by revisiting the anxiety continuum, moving from concern to worry, anxiety, and ultimately panic. Using several real-life stories, we examine how suffering shows up differently at each point along this continuum—not only as an emotional experience, but as a story we tell ourselves about what is happening and what it means.
In this episode, suffering becomes the central focus. Rather than treating suffering as something to eliminate or avoid, we explore how different wisdom traditions understand suffering as an inevitable part of the human condition—and, when approached wisely, a profound teacher.
To ground this exploration, we draw insight from five influential wisdom voices and traditions, including the Buddha, the Stoics, and depth psychologist Carl Jung. Each offers a unique perspective on how humans relate to pain, uncertainty, and meaning.
A key part of the conversation centers on Jung’s description of the stages of life—particularly his distinction between the morning, noon, and afternoon of life. We explore how much of our early life is driven by achievement, control, and certainty, and how the “noon” of life often brings heightened anxiety when those strategies stop working. Jung’s afternoon of life, however, invites a different posture: one marked by integration, acceptance, and a deeper capacity to hold suffering without being defined by it
Episode 117 invites listeners not to bypass suffering, but to slow down, examine the stories they are telling, and consider how suffering—held with awareness and compassion—may be shaping them toward greater wisdom.
