TBH, I find those terms worse. And the more I think about it, infuriatingly so. (So I apologize in advance for the following cynical rant :) ). Sure, they so

TBH, I find those terms worse. And the more I think about it, infuriatingly so. (So I apologize in advance for the following cynical rant :) ). Sure, they sound superficially more compassionate. But in reality they are defeatist, victimizing, agency-removing euphemisms that do a wonderful job of clouding the underlying issues. If you are that far into problems as described by various posters in this thread, pain and suffering are symptoms, and if that's all you're looking at, you're only going to treat those. (Ain't drugs nice?) Realizing you're "broken" is the first step towards identifying what exactly it is that's broken - and towards any further steps actually fixing it. (And yes, your environment and your relationship with it often is the part that's broken, too). And it's not only the self-image I'm talking about - I'm definitely not in the "they can only help themselves" camp. But it's oh so much more convenient to go for the symptoms (or switch the channel) when you're looking at people "in pain"...