Search results for: "Suffering"

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  2. The Buddha Meant What He Said
    The Buddha said several times that all he taught was stress and the end of stress, or suffering and the end of suffering—however you want to translate dukkha. His very first sermon started with the topic of stress and suffering. His last teaching was on the path to the end of suffering. He really meant what he said. The issue of what causes … 
  3. Mindfulness the Gatekeeper
     … The first duty, with the first noble truth, is to comprehend suffering. Now “comprehending” here means understanding suffering to the point of dispassion. Ordinarily, we wouldn’t think that we’re passionate for our suffering, but as the Buddha said, suffering isn’t something that just happens to us. We actually go out and do it. We cling to things, thinking that it’s … 
  4. A Message for the Universe
     … The end of suffering is also through effort. It’s through suffering through a difficult practice sometimes, that you do get release from suffering. We don’t like to hear this, but it’s a message for the whole universe, that if you don’t put forth an effort, you’re just going to be riding on the results of your past efforts, and … 
  5. Categorical Truths
     … As the Buddha says, the truth here is basically that your suffering is in the way you cling. You cling to the body, you cling to your feelings, your perceptions, your thought constructs; you cling to consciousness of the senses. Wherever you cling, that’s the suffering. This is called a noble truth because when you understand your suffering in this way, you see … 
  6. Meaning in a Meaningless Universe
    There are several times when the Buddha said that all he taught was suffering and the end of suffering. One time, as he was walking through a siṃsapā forest, he picked up a handful of leaves and asked the monks which was greater: the leaves in his hand or the leaves in the forest. They said, “Of course, the leaves in the forest are … 
  7. You Can’t Eat the Buddha
    You Can’t Eat the Buddha August 7, 2008 When you come across a situation where a friend is in pain or suffering, in mental distress, and you can help the friend overcome the pain, get over the distress, it gives rise to a very good feeling in the heart. The problem is that there are other times when we’re with other people … 
  8. Go in Brightness
     … Otherwise, as we run into suffering in life, we fall into what the Buddha says are the two reactions to suffering. One is bewilderment: Where does this come from? Why is this happening? Why is this happening to me? And then a search: Is there somebody out there who knows a way to put an end to this suffering? There are a lot of … 
  9. Stop Squirming
     … Otherwise, we’re not going to be able to comprehend suffering at all. When we can’t comprehend it, we won’t know exactly what’s causing it. Actually, the Buddha divided suffering into two sorts. There’s suffering in the four noble truths and also suffering or stress in the three characteristics. The stress of the three characteristics is something that’s simply … 
  10. Helping Yourself by Helping Others
     … There’s going to be suffering. Other people have bodies. They have the same problems. Their sufferings may be different in their details but the basic principles are the same. We’re all suffering. And so nobody gains anything by piling more suffering on other people. And notice that goodwill and patience go together. The word for patience in Pali is the same as … 
  11. The Graduated Discourse
     … You realize that you’ve been complacent all along and you’ve suffered for it. How much longer do you want to suffer? It’s sensing that suffering: That’s what makes the mind begin to be a little bit pliant and willing to develop heedfulness. Heedfulness, of course, is the basis for the five strengths, and the first of the five strengths is … 
  12. Establishing Priorities
     … The causes of suffering can be changed, which means that you actually can put an end to suffering. The Buddha’s approach was not to simply accept suffering as a given in life, that it has to be that way and we simply learn how to accept it and that’s the end of the problem. He saw that suffering can actually be brought … 
  13. The Pursuit of True Happiness
     … to comprehend suffering, to understand what’s creating such a burden on the mind.” He had discovered that there are two kinds of suffering: the stress in the changefulness in things in life, but also the unnecessary stress and suffering we cause ourselves over those changes. That’s the issue, because once that second suffering is wiped out, the changes don’t impinge on … 
  14. The Forerunner of All Things
     … What he’s saying is that you have the opportunity not to have to suffer from the horrible things in the world. If the end of suffering required that everything in the world be perfect, it would never happen. We have to learn how to not suffer in the midst of a lot of noise, a lot of activity, a lot of unskillful intentions … 
  15. A Good Example for the World
     … And so when you think of all the suffering out in the world, the appropriate response is one, samvega: the realization that the things that people are doing to cause suffering, you’ve been doing as well, and if you don’t get your act together you’re going to be contributing more and more to the suffering. You’ve got the opportunity now … 
  16. Facing Pain
     … What’s not inevitable is that you have to suffer from it. The suffering is optional. What we have to learn is how to separate the two. It turns out that the optional part of the suffering, the second kind of dukkha, is what the mind adds through its cravings. And it’s not inevitable. In the Buddha’s image, it’s like having … 
  17. Common Ground
     … But when you come right down to it, we are the same.” In other words, we all want happiness, we’re all suffering. The details of the kind of happiness we think we want and the details of the way we suffer: Those are different. But when you get down to the common structure, it’s all the same. After all, what do the … 
  18. Your Desire to Practice
     … His teachings were for people who realized that they were suffering and that the suffering was coming from their own actions—and that it was something they’d have to cure within themselves. Because, after all, where is suffering? Show me your suffering. I can’t see it. You can’t see mine. It’s something that each of us feels in a very … 
  19. The Noble Path to Happiness
     … the question of where there’s stress and suffering, and what’s causing it, what you can do to put an end to it. This was always the Buddha’s primary concern. He wasn’t concerned about the true nature of things in and of themselves. He was concerned about the problem of suffering: why it’s happening, what can be done to put … 
  20. Right View & Right Resolve
     … realizing that when the Buddha’s talking about suffering and the cause of suffering, he’s pointing right at your heart; and not only the suffering that you know you’re experiencing, but also the ways in which you’re causing it about which you’re not so very clear. If you’re heedful, you realize, “Okay, I need to be more clear about … 
  21. The Tools of the Path
     … Some people say that the Buddha doesn’t have you accept anything unless you know it to be true, but you don’t really know the truth of suffering, or the cause of suffering, or the cessation of suffering, or the path to the cessation, until you’ve actually done the duties appropriate to these things. So when you first learn about them, it … 
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