Search results for: "Suffering"

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  2. The Reasonable Path
     … That was when he realized that logic was not the key to end of suffering. Ultimately he found the middle way, a balanced path, a reasonable path. It takes virtue, concentration, and discernment, and puts them in a reasonable context. The Jains often complained to the Buddha that his precepts were sloppier than theirs. But again they took the idea of harmlessness to totally … 
  3. Mindfulness over Time
     … Do they lead to suffering or away from suffering? If they’re leading to suffering, what can you do to stop? Where is the cause, where’s the nutriment? Watch things over time. When you understand mindfulness in the right way, that helps you do that, because if you were 100% in the present moment, you wouldn’t even have language. You wouldn’t … 
  4. Becoming
     … And the reason the Buddha focuses on these and not on other issues is because the nature of action is important for understanding why we suffer and how we can stop suffering. There’s the kamma that leads to suffering; there’s the kamma that leads to its end. So we’re here trying to understand what action is all about, what action does … 
  5. Look at Yourself
     … When you start looking at the suffering in the body and the mind, you’ll see that some things are your duty, that you really do have to look after, and there are other kinds of suffering that you have to let go. The suffering or stress that’s involved in the fact that things simply change: That’s part of nature, something you … 
  6. Free Sources of Energy
     … If you do it in ignorance, there’s going to be suffering. If you bring some knowledge to it—in other words, you start thinking in terms of the four noble truths—you see that you’re suffering not because of the chores outside or the fact that you’re tired. You’re suffering because of craving and clinging. That puts a different cast … 
  7. Questioning Your Conviction
     … So conviction basically means conviction in the power of human action, at the very least, to make a difference between whether you’re going to suffer and whether you’re not going to suffer, and ideally, conviction in the power of human action—your human action—to lead to the end of suffering. As the Buddha encouraged you, if he could do it, others … 
  8. Determined to Make a Difference
     … Once the mind settles down, then you focus it on the question: “What am I doing that’s causing unnecessary stress and suffering, and how can I stop?” That’s the essence of discernment: “What am I doing that’s causing this?” You’re looking toward your own actions as the cause of suffering. You’re not simply watching things arise and pass away … 
  9. The Buddha Didn’t Play Gotcha
     … Your understanding of why there’s suffering in the world is skewed, or your understanding of why you’re suffering is skewed. You spend all your time just focusing on your breath and not wanting to do anything for anyone else anywhere, not wanting to be bothered by the world. You have to realize that it’s not the world that’s bothering you … 
  10. Cheerfully Ardent
     … The same with the path and the cessation of suffering: You don’t do the cessation of suffering. You do the path: virtue, concentration, discernment. The release that comes—that’s going to be the result. You don’t do release, but to get the path to be the middle path you have to try, make mistakes, and be willing to have a cheerful … 
  11. Noble Right Concentration
     … The second truth, craving, is the cause for suffering, and it’s coming from the mind. The fourth noble truth, the path, is not the cause for the cessation of suffering, but it takes you there. And it, too, comes from the mind. When the Buddha laid out dependent co-arising, it was all about causes and effects immediately present to awareness. This is … 
  12. Turning Points
     … It centers on the question of why we suffer, and how we can put an end to suffering. That’s a very humane question. It’s not a question imposed on us from the outside or some higher force. It’s a question that springs up basically every time we choose to act: What can we do to find some pleasure? It’s interesting … 
  13. Immediate Knowledge
    All the things we need how to put an end to suffering are very close things, things we can experience immediately. On the one hand, there’s the pleasure and pain we experience. On the other, there’s the question of what the mind is doing. What is your mind doing right now? Is there any connection between the two, between what you’re … 
  14. Freedom Through Painful Practice
     … We think suffering is our enemy and craving is our friend. He said if you can learn to look at the pains of life, look at the sufferings of life, and gain discernment, you can free yourself from them. In that way, they’re your friends. As for your cravings, you have to learn how to dissociate yourself from them and be very leery … 
  15. How to Use the Teaching on Kamma
     … We’re using this principle to see that as long as we’re engaged in this process of wandering on, there’s going to be suffering. You make other people suffer; you make yourself suffer. Over and over and over again. So why not get out? The Buddha is offering this possibility. It is possible to get out. He shows the way, as we … 
  16. Your Higher Power
     … When the Buddha talks about the causes of suffering—craving and the fact that suffering itself is a clinging—he’s basically talking about addictions. And his way of dealing with addictions is to break them down. Where’s the feeling? Where’s the perception?—in other words, where is the image in your mind? How does the body feel? What chatter is going … 
  17. Honesty
     … The big problem in our lives is the ignorance that leads to suffering, and a lot of that ignorance is willed. It’s not simply a matter of not knowing; it’s not wanting to know. This is why the Buddha put ignorance and craving together as the causes of suffering. There are certain things we don’t like to admit to ourselves. We … 
  18. Meditation Prep
     … But in the midst of doing difficult things, you don’t just suffer through them. You’ve got to figure out, “How can I get through this without suffering?” That’s where you start learning how to be ingenious. But the important thing is that you remind yourself, okay, you can stand this; whatever’s coming up, you’re not going to get blown … 
  19. Respect
     … for putting an end to suffering, for looking exactly where suffering comes from in our own actions, and for training ourselves so that we can stop doing those things that cause suffering. So what does it mean to have an attitude of respect? It means, for one thing, that we pay full attention to what we’re doing, that we use care. Respect is … 
  20. Discerning Actions
     … You have to see that you’re suffering, and you have to see that it may be dependent on your actions. Or maybe you don’t focus so much on the suffering but simply on the fact that the happiness you have doesn’t satisfy. There must be something better. That’s the beginning of discernment. The Buddha recommends that you then go and … 
  21. The Strength of Heedfulness
     … When he gained knowledge, the question was what to do with it, how to use it, how best to use it, particularly, for the sake of putting an end to suffering. That’s a sign of his heedfulness: realizing that we live in a world where our actions do make a difference between whether we’re going to suffer or not. It was conviction … 
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