"I suffer due to my ego and my selfishness. If I became unselfish, how could I suffer?"
-- Tao Te Ching
-- Tao Te Ching
I understood this quote better after it was explained some in
The Parallel Sayings by Richard Hooper. That book explained that suffering is incurred because we want something. Whether we want money, fame, good health, to be left alone, whatever, we are unhappy because we are always thinking about what we don't have and believe hat we can't be happy until we get it. If we can learn to not be attached to these wants and desires, then our suffering will disappear because we will have become content with what we have right now. The focus is on being present, being grateful for what is happening right now, being a part of a process and relieving any mind sets telling you that something has to be a certain way. I think your outlook changes, too, in how you go about life, in that at first when you are unhappy because of your mind set you were trying to change everything yourself and were constantly fighting various events happening to you, but if you can put a degree of detachment between yourself about the outcome, then you start to trust more in the Universe and that everything will work out naturally, so you do not need to spend all the mental and physical energy trying to change what is going on around you.