Which isn’t to say that our lives should become a series of moments where we martyr ourselves without reason, or for some pretend or insignificant cause. For to seek out suffering in a pointless or masochistic way is no better than hedonism, or the pursuit of pleasure, or distraction, all of which distort the things of creation by forcing them to fill some role that we’ve decided to ascribe to them (thus disregarding the purpose they’ve been endowed with) and that helps produce for us some vision we have of ourselves, or that we’d like for others to imagine is true of us, so that we can persist under whatever illusion is, at that time, most precious to us.