There is a jewish story about the "tree of sorrows".
On the Day of Judgment, each person will be allowed to hang one's unhappiness and sufferings on a brach of the great Tree of Sorrows. After all have found a limb from which their miseries may dangle, they may all walk slowly around the tree. Each person is to search for a set of sufferings that he or she would prefer to those he or she has hung on the tree. In the end, each one freely chooses to reclaim his or her own assortment of sorrows rather than those of another. Each person leaves the Tree of Sorrows wiser that when he or she arrived.
So the moral of the story seems to be that everyone has their fair share of sorrows and you are not given any more or less than others although it may seem so from outside.Does your pain diminish when you see that others also have similar or worse problems? or do we just see the painful reality of sorrow and accept it?
It seems to me that we would choose the same set of sorrows more out of confidence gained from experience - that you have been there before and can do it again rather than take on a totally different set of sorrows whose fine print may not be obvious from the description on the display!
And then, what about those extraordinary beings like Mother Teresa who voluntarily take on the miseries of others upon themselves? Would they chose another set of sorrows than what they have been through?
I hear these words often in film songs where the deluded one tells her /his lover ' let me take your share of sorrows in exchange for my share of joys". I would like to see the choice of these at the tree of sorrows!!