Suffering - the human condition?

I've struggled since I was a very young child to understand suffering and why it is the human condition. A large majority of people in the world spend their entire lives in suffering (millions of people starve to death each year - so many never once in their lives know comfort, safety, or love). Even those of us who are fortunate to have family, food, shelter, and abundant love are still undeniably affected by the suffering that results from life circumstances - car accidents - death of loved ones - illness - random violence. I don't think there is any way to avoid suffering if you are alive, so I try to find the beauty in it - to appreciate it - to have it help me grow and contribute to my experience in this life - but it's really hard. Mostly it makes me angry - it makes me sad - it makes me want to devalue everything else in life and even life itself, and I struggle against this.

Lately I have contemplated a possible answer to my questions about suffering - suffering exists most keenly when we feel alone and hopeless. Even when circumstances are horrible, if we are sharing our experience, in love and openness, with another person, we don't suffer as much - it is bearable, and, maybe, sometimes even beautiful, because we share it with another human being, and in doing so we create a connection with that human being. To me, those connections with other people are the most precious, valuable, and beautiful things in life and why I love to live. But it's hard for me to connect with another person when I'm suffering - I want to be left alone - I feel weak, sad, angry, powerless - and I don't want other people to see - I want to hide. If we could just abandon that illusion of separateness and everything that comes with it - fear of judgement, of loathing, of rejection - and we could view ourselves as connected - as one - then suffering might no longer be the human condition. If we know that we are not alone- anything we experience as suffering, countless other people have also experienced.

One of my favorite lyricists and musicians is Maynard James Keenen (lead singer of Tool and A Perfect Circle). In one of his songs (called Parabola), he says:

       This body holding me reminds me of my own mortality.
       Embrace this moment. Remember. We are eternal.
       All this pain is an illusion.

In another song (Reflections), he writes:

       So crucify the ego, before it's far too late
       To leave behind this place so negative and blind and cynical,
       And you will come to find that we are all one mind
       Capable of all that's imagined and all conceivable.

Now - I just have to figure out how we get there.