Dukkha

The First Nobel Truth of Buddhism; Dukkha. Dukkha= all life is, or leads to, suffering. I believe that suffering is a major part of life and without suffering we could never truly experience the same kind of highs that come from a joyous experience.
In my life I have certainly experienced suffering. I first really experienced it when I was six and my cat Spot died. I experienced suffering once again when my Papa, the man whom I admired as a role model and father figure, wasted away slowly and agonizingly in front of my young eyes. The person I looked up to most was ripped away from me by ravenous cancer at a time in my life when I could have used him most. A few years later, the summer after I graduated High School, one of my good friends and teammates wrecked his car while driving intoxicated and lost his life. Yet more tragedy occurred when last year a friend of over 10 years overdosed on prescription medicine and alcohol and never woke up. These are merely the major occurrences of suffering in my life, there are many more (mostly dealing with members of the opposite sex), and the degrees of the suffering varies, but such is life.