Thank you everybody, I agree with much of what you said. I think we sometimes want so badly for things to work out, for people to be happy and not suffer (including ourselves), but that's where acceptance comes in, knowing when my efforts are not helpful and also when it's really not my place anyways.

When I was young, I used to think that injustice and pain and suffering was only limited to strangers, some people miles away from me in hospitals, in war zones, in prisons. I used to try to stay away from all that stuff, from news, from learning more about it because it made me feel powerless. I was happy that I had my family. But I think even as a child, I knew my family had problems. It is only when my sister was hospitalized that I could not longer deny it. I was faced with all those bad things, right up close, no place to hide. It's like hearing about children or animals who are abused. You read the stats, it's awful but easy to forget. But then you someone abused right in front of your eyes and you can't do anything about it (legally or socially or whatever reason), and that hurts.

The other day my roommate was watching the nature channel and I told him to change it. But then I told him to get it back. This is life I thought. Lion eating a gazelle. I should harden myself. Life is violence, powerful and powerless. That's nature. People are the same. Why expect more from them? Why expect that their having a choice or consciousness or freedom of decision means they decide in a way to reduce suffering. They may. But they may not.