The hardest time to work is when we feel discouraged and overwhelmed. Some things that happen to us in life seem so unfair as to be completely out of all proportion and this makes us want to close our eyes to what is happening. Over time we have become quite skilled at escaping problems when they arise. Unfortunately, if our response to this condition is to stop working and avoid our difficulties then we are only prolonging the problem.
The only way to escape the maze of suffering is to continue observing so that we can find the way out. If we close our eyes, we will never learn how to escape. What does it mean to open our eyes? It means that instead of using our energy to feel sorry for ourselves, we need to observe the situation and the reason that we suffer from it. If we can summon the courage to examine the state of affairs, without trying to lay blame, then we can see how all conditions arise and cease according to various laws of the universe.
One of those laws is the law of perpetual motion. That is, once we set a particular series of events into motion with certain actions that decision not only has an immediate effect on the current circumstance but also has a cascading effect on how we will respond in the future. We sometimes refer to this reality as the habit forming nature of the mind. That is why when we are faced with difficulty we have a golden opportunity.
Instead of shying away from difficulty when it arises we can train ourselves to have the opposite reaction. We can learn to rise to challenges instead of cowering under them. This is a very valuable character trait to develop. In essence, we will be learning how to neutralize all kinds of obstacles even before they arrive. As we develop this character trait over time we will undoubtedly move closer and closer to real happiness.