Just as a beggar or a needy person is an aide to the cultivation of our generosity and openheartedness — if you don't have anybody who needs you, how can you be generous? — likewise people who bring us adversity are another indispensable ingredient for awakening. They are aides to the cultivation of something we absolutely need: wisdom, forbearance, and the integration of these. In that specific sense we may even feel gratitude there.

B. Alan Wallace, The Four Immeasurables