Search results for: "Suffering"

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  2. New Feeding Habits for the Mind
     … And we want to be happy in a way that doesn’t cause suffering to anybody else, either. This—if the mind is constantly weighed down with aging, illness, death, and separation—is very difficult. Most cruel actions come from people who are suffering. When you see a cruel action, it’s usually coming from the person’s feeling weak, feeling threatened, at his … 
  3. Restraint
     … Now, there may still be a part of the mind that says, “Can’t we see them suffer a little bit first?” You have to ask yourself: Do you want to have that childish part of your mind take over? And what good would be done by their suffering? There are a lot of people who, the more they suffer, the more they insist … 
  4. A Sense of Yourself
     … How discerning are you on the ways in which the mind creates suffering for itself, stress for itself? You can look at it as you meditate right here, right now. The Buddha talks about the disturbances in your mind. How good are you at seeing through them and seeing that you can drop them? The important point of discernment is seeing that the suffering … 
  5. Off the Continuum
     … The use of pain, of course, is learning how to gain insight into the truth of suffering, the truth of stress. And the use of pleasure is gaining nourishment from the pleasure of concentration. Some people complain, when the Buddha starts off with the four noble truths, that there’s a lot about suffering and very little about pleasure or happiness. Well, it’s … 
  6. Do, Maintain, Use
     … But what the Buddha’s asking you to do is to bring that whole process up into the light of day through right mindfulness and right concentration, and then to inform it with right view—the right view that there are things you do that lead to suffering and things you can do that can lead to the total end of suffering. That broadens … 
  7. Totally Secure
     … You’ve gone through all that trouble, created all that suffering for yourself, often suffering for other people, and yet you have nothing to show for it. This is why the Buddha pointed out that one of the major factors in the practice is to understand this process of fabrication. One of the definitions of discernment or wisdom is all-around knowing of this … 
  8. Always Observe Your Mind
     … The causes for suffering are in the mind. The path to the end of suffering starts in the mind, and starts with right view. So the Buddha keeps pointing you back: Observe your mind. Observe your mind. That’s how you grow in the Dhamma.
  9. More Wisdom for Dummies
     … The duty with regard to suffering and stress is to comprehend it. For the cause of suffering, the duty is to abandon it. The cessation of suffering is something you should realize. And the path to that cessation is something you should want to develop. Notice: You want that because of your goodwill, so you try to maintain that attitude as you look at … 
  10. Instructions for a New Monk
     … He found a way and attained the deathless element inside, the release from all suffering—and also release from what they call the effluents. These are qualities that come bubbling up in the mind and lead you to flow along with them and create more suffering and stress as you keep coming back and back and back. He was able to end all of … 
  11. Be Precise
     … We’re doing something in the mind that’s giving rise to suffering, and we’re suffering because of our ignorance of what we’re doing. We also have the potential to do something that puts an end to suffering. To see the difference, you have to focus on what you’re doing. You have to learn how to see your actions in the … 
  12. Everybody Suffers
    Everybody Suffers March 27, 2005 One of my English teachers in high school once said that a sign of a great mind, a great person, is the ability to look past the particulars of your own experience and see the general principles that apply to everyone. Say you’re disappointed in love: You see it in general terms. You’re not the only person … 
  13. Perspectives & Priorities
     … We regard suffering as an enemy and our cravings as our friends, not realizing that the cravings lead to the sufferings. Or, in Ajaan Chah’s image, craving is like the tail of a snake; suffering is like the teeth. We look at the tail and we don’t see that it has any teeth, so we think it’s okay to catch the … 
  14. The Gift of Meditation
     … But how much can you do for the world? And what are the best things that you can do for the world? We all know that we’re suffering and there’s a lot of suffering that comes from external conditions. But as the Buddha said, the suffering that eats deep into the heart is the suffering that we create for ourselves, that each … 
  15. Good Friends Inside
     … If we didn’t have the Buddha as our friend in the holy life, where would we be? We wouldn’t know anything about the possibility of putting an end to suffering. Our sense of our potential as human beings would be a lot more limited than it is. It’s only when you open up your mind to the idea that it is … 
  16. A Rite of Passage
     … In other words, what’s skillful? What’s unskillful? What’s blameless? What’s blameworthy? What leads to my long-term harm and suffering? You look at things as actions and you ask: Where is this action going? Here we’re talking about actions not only on the level of your bodily actions, but also in terms of the things you say and the … 
  17. Nuts & Bolts
     … The first noble truth is not just that there is suffering. Suffering is the things we cling to. We think we’re getting something good out of them and yet we’re suffering. So our ignorance is not just innocently not knowing. We’re lying to ourselves. We’re ignoring all the suffering we’re creating. One of the reasons we get the mind … 
  18. Empathetic Joy Is Ennobling
     … Compassion is for when you see someone else suffering and you want to see that suffering end. You’re not going to take advantage of their weakness, you’re not going to add to their suffering. You may actually be in a position of power above them, but you’re not going to abuse your power. And as for empathetic joy, of the brahmaviharas … 
  19. An Admirable Friend — In Memory of Luang Loong
     … But the suffering is optional. There is pain in illness, there is pain in aging, there is pain in death, but the suffering is optional. That’s our contribution, which means that, because it is our contribution, once we’ve trained the mind, we don’t have to contribute that suffering anymore. So this is an important activity we’re engaged in here. Tonight … 
  20. Relationships
     … to learn to focus in on the issue of suffering that you create through your own craving and how you can put an end to it. This teaching is based on a wish for well-being: the desire not to create suffering. So that’s your basic attitude. Built on that, there’s compassion for people who are suffering. Sympathetic joy for people who … 
  21. Control
     … There is so much in life where we add unnecessary pain, unnecessary suffering on top of the stuff that’s already there. And it turns out that the unnecessary pain, the unnecessary suffering or stress, is what really has a big effect on the mind. We tend to latch on to these things. When we latch on to them, we trap ourselves. This is … 
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