My Conclusions About the Human Being
Armando Menéndez Suárez.
President of Fundación DAF
INTRODUCTION
I have spent half my life trying to understand the human being. I have observed it through medicine, through compassion, through suffering, and through beauty. I have walked through hospitals, hermitages, slums, temples, and deserts, and in all these places I have found faces asking, “Who am I?”, even if they did not say it in words. Today, in this imaginary space, I call upon the wise to share my conclusions. Not as one who delivers a lecture, but as one who, at the end of the day, sits quietly by the fire…
MY CONCLUSIONS ABOUT THE HUMAN BEING
- The human being is torn between the longing for eternity and the awareness of death. We live between the thirst for the infinite and the fear of disappearing. From this fracture arise religion, art, and violence.
- The ego, though necessary, easily becomes a prison. We identify with masks we call “I,” and in defending them we may kill or die.
- Suffering is the true spiritual initiator. Nothing reveals the soul more than contact with limits, with loss, with helplessness. Only those who have suffered deeply can look with tenderness.
- Love is not a feeling, but a way of being present. To love is to be fully there, without invading or fleeing. It is the most radical gesture of freedom and humility.
- Religions have been great maps of meaning, but also ideological prisons. When they forget they are merely fingers pointing at the moon, they end up worshipping the finger.
- The human being needs consolation, but not just any consolation. It requires one that does not infantilize or steal its lucidity, but allows it to pass through pain with dignity.
- There is no redemption without community. We are relational beings. Even the loneliest mystic dialogues with the echoes of humanity. Solitude is only fertile when inhabited by the deep “we.”
- All authentic human growth involves dispossession: losing certainties, letting go of security, ceasing to claim ownership of the truth.
RESPONSES FROM THE WISE
Socrates:
“You speak well, my friend. Only he who knows he does not know is close to wisdom. Your conclusion about the ego echoes my questions: are you truly that ‘I’ you defend, or merely its shadow?”
Buddha:
“Suffering as teacher, yes. Noble is the one who acknowledges it and does not cling. Your words are like leaves falling from a wise tree: they do not resist, they surrender.”
Jesus of Nazareth:
“You said that to love is to be present. And that is the Kingdom. To be with those who weep, with those without a name. You have seen with your heart. And the heart sees God.”
Friedrich Nietzsche:
“I applaud your denunciation of slavish religiosity. But do not forget: even love can be a pretext for resentment. Love all things with solar fury, even the abyss.”
Simone Weil:
“Your insistence on the dignity of suffering moves me. But remember: grace descends only when we do not seek it. The human soul must not possess but await.”
Carl Gustav Jung:
“You have looked within. You have descended into the collective unconscious without fear. You are an alchemist of the human. Do not fear the shadow: it is part of the gold.”
Raimon Panikkar:
“You have honored traditions without idolizing them. That is intercultural wisdom. Christ and Buddha, as you name them, do not exclude each other: they recognize themselves as mirrors.”
Albert Einstein:
“Your mention of wonder is accurate. Without it, there is no science nor ethics. The human being must surrender to mystery without renouncing responsibility.”
Rabindranath Tagore:
“Beauty as a form of love… that is what you practice, dear friend. Your words dance like verses. The universe is a poem that longs to be heard.”
María Zambrano:
“You have chosen poetic reason. You have crossed the night without asking for formulas. I recognize you in the trembling of one who does not impose his truth but offers it like bread.”
CLOSING
After speaking, I remain silent.
Not because I have nothing more to say, but because I have understood that the deepest word is shared silence.
Thank you, wise ones, for listening to me. Perhaps nothing I have said is “the truth.” But if it was born of love and sincere searching, it already possesses dignity.
I withdraw in peace, knowing that the human being remains a mystery. And that it is worth continuing to love it, even when we do not understand it.
