American psychotherapist and Buddhist teacher Sylvia Boorstein writes in In the Face of Fear, Buddhist Wisdom for Challenging Times (2009):
Life is difficult, the Buddha taught, for everyone. Suffering he said, is the demand that experience be different from what it is. Of course we do what we can to address the pain. Sometimes illnesses are cured. Sometimes relationships are mended. Sometimes losses are recouped. Sometimes, though, nothing can be done. The Buddhas teaching of liberation was that peace of mind is possible, no matter what the circumstances.