Search results for: "Dukkha"
- For the Cessation of DukkhaPali has a single word, dukkha, that covers a lot of words in English. This can create problems for a translator, but it also created problems for the Buddha, in that he had to distinguish between different kinds of dukkha. And he had to combat the tendency to glom them all together. As he said, our basic reaction to dukkha—pain, suffering, stress, whether …
- Sensitivity & Skill… Here again you’ve got a Pali word that has many ranges of meaning, dukkha: everything from really harsh suffering up to a very subtle sense of disturbance or dis-ease. I was reading a piece recently where someone was saying that there’s only one way you can translate dukkha, and that’s as “suffering.” Nothing else captures its essence. But that would …
- To Comprehend Suffering… And right view, of course, is the four noble truths, focused on the issue of stress, suffering—dukkha is the Pāli term. In its ordinary, everyday meaning, dukkha means “pain.” Sometimes you hear it described etymologically. Du- means “bad”; kha- can mean either “the hub of a wheel” or “space,” the idea being, in the first case, that it’s like a hub that …
- Stress… There are some people who translate the word dukkha as unsatisfactory, which is not a very satisfactory translation. Things in and of themselves are not unsatisfactory. They become unsatisfactory only if we try to use them for a purpose, and they don’t meet that purpose. But they are stressful in and of themselves, and that’s what the word dukkha means. There’s …
- Choosing Sides… Then all of a sudden, there was a passage where, in the original, Ajaan Chah talks about how important it is to understand the truth about dukkha, stress or suffering, and the cause of dukkha, so that you can learn how to stop the cause and, in that way, stop suffering. But the translation said you want to learn about dukkha because that, in …
- All Fabrications Are StressfulI was asked a while back: “How is it that Buddhists can say that ‘All things are unsatisfactory,’ when we haven’t experienced all things?” Actually, he said, “How can *you *say that?” And I replied, “Well, I don’t say that things are unsatisfactory.” To begin with, “unsatisfactory” is a strange translation of the word dukkha. Dukkha means pain, suffering, stress—the whole …
- Dhamma Is a Quality of the Heart… Even dukkha: He defines dukkha as the five clinging-aggregates, but your understanding of what the word covers is going to change as you practice. It’s going to get more refined. Things that you regard as pleasure right now: Ultimately you’ll see that they have their stress. They can entail dukkha. But for the time being, as long as they seem pleasant …
- Take Nothing for Granted… So you’re going to control your attention and your intentions to try to understand, “What do I do that’s causing suffering?” And here the word “suffering,” dukkha, can spread from heavy suffering to very light. This is a problem in the English language. We don’t really have a word that corresponds to the full range of dukkha. I know some people …
- Two Types of Dukkha… So it’s important that we see that there are these two types of suffering, two types of dukkha: the suffering in what are called the three characteristics, the suffering that’s in inconstancy, and then the suffering in the four noble truths, which comes from craving. When you take care of the second one, the first one is no longer a problem. So …
- Monologue on the Breath… Where is there discomfort, suffering, stress—however you want to translate *dukkha. *There are different levels of dukkha, so you can think of it as spreading out among these words. Sometimes it’s simply a little bit of stress or a little bit of discomfort, a sense of construction or tightness. Doesn’t feel like any great suffering. But it still qualifies as a …
- Seriously Happy… But again, are you serious about your happiness? Do you really want to be happy? As the Buddha said, it’s through our experience of suffering or stress, dukkha, that we look for a way out. Like sukha, dukkha has lots of meanings: suffering, stress, pain. This is what motivates us and gives us the conviction to practice. So you have to learn how …
- Peace vs. Clinging… Just as the Buddha has many meanings for sukha, he also has many meanings for its opposite, *dukkha: *stress, suffering, pain, dis-ease. He starts out by illustrating different types of dukkha that we’re all familiar with, and then he gets to the essence. We’re familiar with birth, aging, illness, and death, being separated from things we like, having to live with …
- Facing Pain… The important thing is to realize that the word dukkha, which means stress or pain or suffering, has two basic sorts. There’s the sort that comes with the fact that you’ve got a body, and the body keeps changing. It’s dependent on conditions, and when those conditions interact with one another, they don’t always lead to pleasure. That kind of …
- Learning from What You Do… The dukkha or suffering of the three characteristics is something that’s built into things. But the dukkha or the suffering and stress that comes from craving—the dukkha of the four noble truths: That’s something that doesn’t have to be there. That’s something you can change. And learning to see the distinction between these two forms of stress requires that …
- Timeless Practice… The word he uses in Pali, dukkha, can mean anything from gross physical suffering, gross mental suffering, really intense anguish, all the way down to subtle levels of stress. Even in blissful states of mind that are fabricated, there’s going to be some stress, there’s some dukkha there. So the word dukkha covers all of that range. The basic meaning in everyday …
- Make the Most of Right Now… Sometimes the Pali word for stress,* dukkha *is translated as unsatisfactoriness. There’s a way in which that’s right, but a huge way in which it’s wrong. Dukkha means pain, stress, suffering. It’s unsatisfactory because there is something better, but taken on its own, when you say that something is unsatisfactory, it sounds as if you could simply change your standards …
- Pain & Patience… The Buddha was unique in his time in that he focused on the question of pain, suffering, stress—that’s what the word *dukkha *is—as the main issue in his teaching. And it’s interesting that he never tried to define it. He didn’t try to pin it down. You see some of the commentaries where they try to define dukkha based …
- Using What You’ve Got… This is why, when the Buddha uses the word dukkha in the three characteristics, it’s not quite the same as dukkha in the four noble truths. The three characteristics are just the way things are in and of themselves, but the suffering in the four noble truths is something that’s created by craving and ignorance. That’s something you can do something …
- To Comprehend Suffering… The second kind is the stress in the four noble truths, dukkha, which can also be translated as suffering or dis-ease. That, the Buddha said, we have to comprehend. And he gave us tools for comprehending it: the five aggregates. If there’s any stress weighing the mind down, you can know for sure that it’s because you’re clinging to any …
- Patient & Inquisitive… After all, the duty with regard to stress or suffering, dukkha, is to comprehend it. So you don’t just sit there with the dukkha; you try to understand it. The Buddha’s teaching a combination of solidity and curiosity here. The solidity gives you ballast. It also reminds you that as you’re exploring, as you experiment, you can’t just say, “Well …
- Load next page...
