The Four Noble Truths

“In a world of tension and breakdown it is necessary for there to be those who seek to integrate their inner lives not by avoiding sorrow and anguish and running from their problems, but by facing them in their naked reality and ordinariness.”  - Thomas Merton 

There are two kinds of suffering.  There is the suffering you run away from, which follows you everywhere.  And there is the suffering you face directly, and in doing so become free.  Of all the maps of Buddhist psychology, the Noble Truths, which teach the understanding of suffering and its end, are the most central.  The whole purpose of Buddhist psychology, its ethics, philosophy, practices and community life is the discovery that freedom and joy are possible in the face of the sufferings of human life.   -  Jack Kornfield

The Four Noble Truths

1. To live means to suffer.
Suffering.

2. The origin of suffering is attachment - the attachment to the desire to have (craving) and the desire not to have (aversion).
The cause of suffering.

3. The cessation of suffering is attainable.  Nirvana, baby.
The end of suffering.

4.  There is a path to take.
The path.  (Ed. Note: There are eight steps to take to get through the fourth step, or something.  I can barely keep four things straight in my mind.)

I've looked up the definitions of pain and suffering, and found them to be remarkably similar.  Lot of cross-breeding.  A more nuanced look at the words would separate the concepts by defining pain as a physical reaction to a stimulus in our world - and thusly unavoidable - and suffering as focusing on the pain and trying to avoid it - apparently avoidable, to some higher life form than me.

Pain is inevitable - suffering is optional.