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Life Worth Living is an initiative of the Yale Center for Faith & Culture at Yale Divinity School.
What is the role of suffering in a good life?
James Baldwin on Embracing Suffering & Each Other
Life Worth Living Team
"This is why one must say Yes to life and embrace it wherever it is found ..."
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After acknowledging the heavy burden of racism, Baldwin pens a clarion call for the acceptance of life in all of its suffering—and our duty to do it together.
Quote + Question + Context
What is the role of suffering in a good life?
James Baldwin wrote his essay “Nothing Personal” in 1964. Originally published in collaboration with photographer Richard Avedon, the essay is a 20,000-word incisive critique of American society, addressing the social ills of racism, isolation, and widespread despair. At the end of the essay, after acknowledging the heavy burden of racism, Baldwin pens a clarion call for the acceptance of life in all of its suffering—and our duty to do it together.
Quote
[.alt-blockquote]“It is a mighty heritage, it is the human heritage, and it is all there is to trust. And I learned this through descending, as it were, into the eyes of my father and my mother. I wondered, when I was little, how they bore it—for I knew that they had much to bear. It had not yet occurred to me that I also would have much to bear; but they knew it, and the unimaginable rigors of their journey helped them to prepare me for mine. This is why one must say Yes to life and embrace it wherever it is found—and it is found in terrible places; nevertheless, there it is: and if the father can say, Yes, Lord, the child can learn that most difficult of words, Amen.[.alt-blockquote]
[.alt-blockquote]For nothing is fixed, forever and forever and forever, it is not fixed; the earth is always shifting, the light is always changing, the sea does not cease to grind down rock. Generations do not cease to be born, and we are responsible to them because we are the only witnesses they have.[.alt-blockquote]
[.alt-blockquote]The sea rises, the light fails, lovers cling to each other, and children cling to us. The moment we cease to hold each other, the moment we break faith with one another, the sea engulfs us and the light goes out.”[.alt-blockquote]
[.alt-blockquote-attribution]—James Baldwin, “Nothing Personal”[.alt-blockquote-attribution]
Questions
- How would your experience of pain change if you accepted it as temporary?
- How has your heritage helped you survive the rigors of life?
- What would it mean to fully accept the idea that your faithfulness to your society must not be broken? What would it mean to never cease to hold each other?
- What does it mean to accept suffering? How do suffering and love connect with each other?
Context
- James Baldwin's “Nothing Personal”
- Life Worth Living: A Guide to What Matters Most, Chapter 11: …And There’s No Fixing It
Quote + Question + Context
What is the role of suffering in a good life?
James Baldwin wrote his essay “Nothing Personal” in 1964. Originally published in collaboration with photographer Richard Avedon, the essay is a 20,000-word incisive critique of American society, addressing the social ills of racism, isolation, and widespread despair. At the end of the essay, after acknowledging the heavy burden of racism, Baldwin pens a clarion call for the acceptance of life in all of its suffering—and our duty to do it together.
Quote
[.alt-blockquote]“It is a mighty heritage, it is the human heritage, and it is all there is to trust. And I learned this through descending, as it were, into the eyes of my father and my mother. I wondered, when I was little, how they bore it—for I knew that they had much to bear. It had not yet occurred to me that I also would have much to bear; but they knew it, and the unimaginable rigors of their journey helped them to prepare me for mine. This is why one must say Yes to life and embrace it wherever it is found—and it is found in terrible places; nevertheless, there it is: and if the father can say, Yes, Lord, the child can learn that most difficult of words, Amen.[.alt-blockquote]
[.alt-blockquote]For nothing is fixed, forever and forever and forever, it is not fixed; the earth is always shifting, the light is always changing, the sea does not cease to grind down rock. Generations do not cease to be born, and we are responsible to them because we are the only witnesses they have.[.alt-blockquote]
[.alt-blockquote]The sea rises, the light fails, lovers cling to each other, and children cling to us. The moment we cease to hold each other, the moment we break faith with one another, the sea engulfs us and the light goes out.”[.alt-blockquote]
[.alt-blockquote-attribution]—James Baldwin, “Nothing Personal”[.alt-blockquote-attribution]
Questions
- How would your experience of pain change if you accepted it as temporary?
- How has your heritage helped you survive the rigors of life?
- What would it mean to fully accept the idea that your faithfulness to your society must not be broken? What would it mean to never cease to hold each other?
- What does it mean to accept suffering? How do suffering and love connect with each other?
Context
- James Baldwin's “Nothing Personal”
- Life Worth Living: A Guide to What Matters Most, Chapter 11: …And There’s No Fixing It
Pairings
Our responses to life's big questions are meant to form a coherent whole—a vision of life worth living. A response to one question will fit well with certain responses to other questions, but it will be incompatible with others. We've provided the "Pairs Well With" and "Pairs Poorly With" sections for this article to help you consider these questions of coherence.
Pairs Well With
- A modest assessment of humans’ power to prevent suffering
- The idea that we are fundamentally (inter)dependent creatures
Goes Poorly With
- Staunch individualism
- Technological optimism
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