A poetic inspirational song that addresses the question "Why do people suffer?" and what's to be gained from life's difficulties.

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Inspired by my own struggles dealing with devastating personal loss in many areas of my life.

Did I have to dance with death
Before my life could find me
Did I have to change
To return to who I am
Did I have to fall apart
To pull myself together
Do we have to suffer so
So that we might grow?

Did I have to lose my way
Before I found where home was
Suffering the fall to grasp
How hard it is to climb
Groping through the darkness
To find illumination
Do we have to suffer so
So that we might grow?

Did the emptiness
Make the space for wisdom
And numbness give the sense
How much there is to feel
Did my trials serve a purpose
Lessons leading toward a goal
Did they grow my soul?

Was I stripped of all I own
To learn love’s all that matters
As loved ones passed
Create the strength to carry on
And bounce back high though
Beaten, bruised and battered
Do we have to struggle
Do we have to strain
Do we need the anguish and the pain
Do we have to suffer so
So that we might grow?

...Oh, grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change
The courage to change the things I can
And the wisdom to know the difference
Oh, grant me the serenity
The serenity, the serenity.