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April 30, 2025 - Dennis Prager Show
03:37
To Fully Live, You Must Suffer
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But I know from all the talks I have given how helpful it has been for people to realize that you don't have to be bubbling all the time.
That's not normal.
That might be manic.
The fact of the matter is, it is normal to have...
Great bouts of sadness, to have a lot of unhappiness, that is par for the course.
That is what life entails.
Now, if you're always unhappy or worse, depressed, it is something to certainly look into.
But what I really work at, this is the key difference here, what I work at in the book and in my talks is not to make people happy.
It is to reduce, and here come the operative words, to reduce gratuitous pain.
There is normal amount of pain in life.
Absolutely.
The only way to avoid it is to watch television constantly, which is why I think people do.
It's a numbing device, television, and I have a deep, deep antipathy to television.
It is normal to experience pain.
What I work against is gratuitous pain, where it's just unnecessary.
Why are you suffering?
Suffering is normal.
Dostoevsky put it, Very directly.
To live is to suffer.
And that is true.
And by the way, to fully live is to suffer even more.
If you really want to live, after all, I talk, for example, to singles, especially single men.
I have a talk, which you may want to give to single men that you may know.
It's called The Case for Marriage.
And coming from a single man, excuse me, a married man who was a single man, who totally identifies with where they're coming from, it has some persuasive power.
But one of the things that I make clear is that I don't promise you endless happiness through marriage and family, but the question that you really have to confront is do you want to grow?
Do you want to live life fully?
And the more fully you live life, the more you will suffer.
That's just a fact of life.
It's something, if you want marriage and you want children and you want other things in your life, the more you bring into your life, the more pain you will have.
That's a fact.
It doesn't come painlessly.
If people knew that, maybe there would be a lot less marriage to begin with.
Maybe people do go into marriage thinking, ah, this is the end of my ills, now I will be happy because he will make me happy.
One of the silliest things anyone in the world could ever possibly believe, but nevertheless, or even funnier, Well, we're not having a great marriage, so we'll have a kid.
Then we'll really be happy.
Which is perhaps the single stupidest thing a human being could utter.
I can't think of a more silly idea in the world than let's have kids, that'll make us happy.
Kids, kids bring joy, there is no question.
But my argument for kids is not you'll be happier.
My argument for kids is you will live life more fully.
But it will bring immense amounts of pain.
Right?
Yes, it's one of the statements I make, which is least controversial.
I must say, people just going, huh, huh, huh.
That's the general view.
You see, you know, one of the joys of speaking is I get to see you, you don't.
You just get to see me.
And it is, one day, Brent, we have to do it vice versa.
We have to record from here.
Just have all the reactions going, "Oh God, is that true?
Oh God, is that true?"
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