Soul Surfer: A True Story Of Suffering

Nobody wants pain or suffering. How can we know joy without suffering? When everything is going well, individuals have very little reason to question their philosophy of life. That is why when suffering occurs, it compels people to ask “how can i can make sense out of this? What am i missing? Why is this happening?,” or even “what is the meaning of life now?”. Suffering throws a person’s current identity into questioning, allowing the consideration of changing. Movies and songs portray suffering in different ways. To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in suffering - Friedrich Nietzsche. The Movie Soul surfer by Sean McNamara depicts positive philosophical notion of a girl confronted by suffering attempting to find meaning

13 year-old Bethany Hamilton who is a champion surfer who was born to be in the water. But after a fun night out night surfing and what should be a fun day in the water, she is attacked by a shark and loses her arm. Rushed to the hospital, she remains calm, and maintains her faith in God. Now she has to re-learn how to do everything with only one arm - including how to surf. It will take her friends, family, and her Christian faith to get her back into the water, with great perseverance she learns to accept her tragedy and with unyielding determination she becomes champion

Of course we have to believe that something good is going to come of it. The belief that something good will come of our suffering is psychologically healthy. It is not, however, the same as the belief that God causes our suffering, we have free will and it is our choice to do whatever we want but it always comes with consequences, good and bad. Soul surfer illustrates the transformation of suffering from negative to a positive experience, moving from a level 2 to a level 3 view of suffering. Level 2 helps tolerate an unpleasant situation to overcome struggles, but it doesn't always include positive effects. It doesn't help change the view of the person on their life or towards others but instead helps them tolerate the unpleasant situation. This may be seen as positive but, only for a short period, it’s saying “hang in there, don’t let the bad times get you down.” it’s not the same as saying “good will come out of this suffering”. The former is helpful but only temporary, while the latter is life transforming in the long term. A level 2 perspective of positive effects will end up being overrun by the negative long term ones such as closing one off to the world, and to other people, bitterness, self-pity, hatred and hardness towards others. This is why a level 3 is needed, it encourages growth in humility(detachment from ego), greater awareness of the goodness, and mystery of the other resulting in greater compassion ( the