The firstnoble truth describes how life has suffering running through it and in thesecond truth Buddha gave some of the reasons for this suffering. There is notjust one cause of our suffering, as there is not one cause of anything. Thingscome into being through a series of causes and conditions, and that is the samefor our suffering. However, there are three main things that cause us emotionaland psychological suffering, namely, the three poisons. They are clingingdesire, anger and aversion and unawareness.
In the Dhammapada it states:
‘The one who protects his mind from clinging desire, anger and aversion and unawareness, is the one who enjoys real and lasting peace’.
Clinging Desire
Not all ofour desires cause us suffering; only the ones we cling to. We may have a desireto help people, a desire to reduce our suffering or to improve ourselves. Aslong as we are not clinging to these desires there is no problem.
So, desireon its own isn’t the problem. The problem is our clinging and grasping at thethings we desire. We wrongly believe that material things and people, such asfamily, friends and loved ones, can make us permanently and truly happy.However, if we take the time to investigate, we will find that these desireseventually lead us into a feeling of discontentment, sadness and loss. Why isthat? It is because we have grown attached to the people we love or the thingswe own. Again, there is not a problem with loving the people close to us; thesuffering starts once we get attached to them, believe they will be with usforever and their thoughts and feelings for us will never change. This simplyisn’t the case.
You cantest this theory out. Think of a time when someone not very close to you died.How did you feel? I expect you expressed your condolences but didn’t have toomuch sadness. Now think of a time when a member of your family, a friend or aloved one died. How did you feel? I expect you were devastated and extremelyupset for a long time. So, what is the difference between these two deaths?Attachment. You were not attached to the first person and so did not suffer alot when they died, but you were attached to the second person, and yourclinging attachment is what caused you so much suffering.
We getattached to our belongings and believe they make us happy. We think we can buyhappiness. The problem with that is our desires are never ending. Once we havesomething new, we start wanting something else. We never quite manage to buythe happiness we are so desperately seeking because there is no happinessinherent in material things. We just project happiness onto an object and thencling and grasp at this imaginary happiness, and we eventually suffer once theobject is stolen or stops working.
There isno problem in wanting things and trying to make our lives more comfortable; theproblem is clinging and grasping at these desires. So do not stop loving thepeople close to you or stop wanting to improve your life believing Buddha toldus to do that—he didn’t.
Ourclinging desires lead us to act in certain ways, such as being proud, jealousand protective, and this in turn leads to our discontentment. This is becauseour clinging desires lead us into action, which in turn leads us intodiscontentment. It is a vicious cycle. Buddha said:
‘From desire action follows; from action discontentment follows; desire, action and discontentment are like a wheel rotating endlessly’.
To breakthis cycle, we have to see that clinging, grasping and getting attached topeople and material objects brings us suffering because things are compoundedand are subject to change. If we can truly embrace this point and apply it toour daily lives, we will be able to reduce the suffering caused by this poison.
Buddha stated, ‘Human desiresare endless. It is like the thirst of a man who drinks saltwater: he gets nosatisfaction and his thirst is only increased.’ This is surely something weshould be reflecting on.
Angerand Aversion– Aversion is the opposite to attachment andanger leads to hatred, discrimination, aggression and a lack of compassion. Noneof these are helpful. With desire we want to cling to objects, but withaversion we do the exact opposite. We spend all our time and energy trying topush the thing away we do not like. As with desire, we just need to let go, nothold on to this aversion. Don’t engage with it, hold it or repress it – simplyacknowledge you have an aversion for it, understand that it is causing harm toyourself and others and find a way of letting it go.
Buddha said this about anger:
‘This fury does so cloud the mind of man that he cannot discern this fearful inner danger’.
Some say that anger isnatural and should be expressed at all costs. This is because most people onlysee two ways of dealing with anger, that is, express or repress. Both areunhealthy. If you constantly express it, you will find that after some time itwill become a habit and you will react angrily all of the time. If you repressit, you are just storing up trouble for the future. You may be able to keep itdown for some time, but eventually it will surface and may even come back moreviolent and hurtful.
Anger is such a destructiveemotion because we engage with it and let it take control of us. So, the Buddhahad a different idea. He advised us to look at the anger and see where it comesfrom. It is not to be dealt with but observed. If we do this, we will see thatit stems from our exaggerating the negative qualities of someone or projectingnegative qualities that are not actually there, on to someone or something.
Two of the best ways ofcounteracting anger is patience and acceptance.
Patience—Thisis something we should cultivate. The best advice is to try and walk away fromthe situation that is making you angry. If you cannot do that, then you shouldnot react straight away, but should first try counting to ten and spend alittle time reflecting on the situation. This will give you the space to calmdown and see things more rationally. Of course, this is not a simple thing todo when one is wrapped up in the moment, and this is where patience comes in.The most hurtful things are said in the heat of the moment, so defuse thatmoment with patience.
Youcould try watching your breath for a moment, use your senses to engage withwhat you can see, hear, smell, taste and touch or you could try reciting theword patience over and over again. All of these will give you a chance to calmdown and build patience.
There is no evil like anger, and no courageousness like patience.
Acceptance—Thisis accepting that people are the same as we are. Everyone is struggling to findtheir way in life. We strive for happiness, and so does everyone else. If wethink in this way, a feeling of warmth, empathy and compassion will arise inus. If we are empathic or compassionate towards others, it is harder to getangry at them. This, again, takes time to master but is something we are allcapable of.
Unawareness
Unawarenessis a lack of understanding of the true nature of things, which leads us intowrong views. Buddha stated:
‘Because of their unawareness, people are always thinking wrong thoughts and always losing the right viewpoint and, clinging to their egos, they take wrong actions. As a result, they become attached to a delusive existence’.
Aswe are unaware of the true nature of the world, we start clinging to objects,people and ourselves, which leads to wrong actions and causes us to growattached to our perception of reality.
Impermanenceis something we understand on an intellectual level, but it is not how we liveour lives. That is because we are unaware of the true implications ofimpermanence.
Whatever isborn is impermanent and is bound to die.
Whatever is stored up is impermanent and is bound to run out.
Whatever comes together is impermanent and is bound to come apart.
Whatever is built is impermanent and is bound to collapse.
Whatever rises up is impermanent and is bound to fall down.
So also, friendship and enmity, fortune and sorrow, good and evil,
All the thoughts that run through your mind – everything is always changing.
(Taken from ‘Words of My Perfect Teacher’ by Patrul Rinpoche)
All compounded things are impermanent and if welook closely, everything is compounded. So, everything is impermanent. This mayseem negative or depressing but actually it is a breath of fresh air. Let meexplain.
The definition of compounded is ‘something thatconsists of two or more things combined together.’ As I have just stated, allphenomena are compounded, and that includes you and me. Just think for amoment, is there anything in this universe that isn’t compounded? As of yet wehaven’t found anything.
The point Buddha was making here is that anythingthat is made up of a combination of other things will eventually fall apart. Itwill come into being when the various causes and conditions are right, it willexist for a certain amount of time, and then it will disintegrate – this is thenature of all things, this is impermanence. It is an undeniable and inescapablefact of life.
Impermanence isn’t a word we readily warm to, andit would be much nicer for us to believe that everything is permanent. But thissimply isn’t true, and in order to stop our suffering, we need to acknowledgethis fact. The reason we do not like to hear about impermanence is because itbrings up visions of sickness, pain, disintegration and death. We get ahorrible sick feeling in our stomachs because we equate impermanence with loss– loss of a loved one, loss of our friends or even loss of something as trivialas our iPhone. So, it is vitally important for all of us to understandimpermanence.
Why is it important? What are the benefits of understanding it? It means wewill achieve freedom from fear, freedom from suffering and freedom from panic,because when we know things are not going to last, we are free from any fear,agony or pain of losing something or someone.
Our mistaken belief is that things come intoexistence on their own, and last forever. This kind of mistaken belief causesus to cling to worldly possessions, such as material objects, the search forpleasure, recognition, honour and so on. It causes pride, attachment, aversionand arrogance to grow within us because we truly believe things are here tostay. We grow completely attached to the concerns of this life.
So, it’s a relief when we finally understand thateverything is impermanent, and we can’t do a thing to change that fact. We cannow let go and relax our grip on things – that’s a real breath of fresh air!
Impermanence is not only true for pleasurable things,but for painful things as well. Maybe someone you care for has died or leftyou, and you are sad and lonely. These emotions are also impermanent and sowill, after time, also change. All the things we have aversion towards willonly last a short time. Like the morning dew, it will all soon change anddisappear.
Like the dew that remainsfor a moment or two
On the tips of the grass and then melts with the dawn.
The pleasures we find in the course of our lives
last only an instant, they cannot endure.
(Taken from ‘Thirty-Seven Practices of All Buddha’s Sons’ by Thogme Zangpo)
So, the first noble truth stated that there is suffering flowing through our lives, and the second truth explains some of the causes. In the third truth Buddha explains that there is freedom from suffering.
This truth is called byvarious names, such as nirvana, liberation, enlightenment and so on. It ishotly debated these days. Some think that if you reach nirvana you will neverbe born again, others think you will be reborn, but you can pick where. Forpeople who do not believe in rebirth, they see it as something we can achievein this lifetime. I have no idea who is right and who is wrong – it maybe theyare all wrong.
People think that nirvana islike heaven, full of happiness, the opposite of this world. They image thatthere, the sun shines brightly every day, only ‘good’ people are around, onedoesn’t have to work, there are no money worries, everybody is friendly, andevery moment is filled with happiness.
However, this is just aprojection of our dualistic minds, trying to fill heaven with all the things welike best. But what about all the things other people like and we don’t? Iwould want a heaven where no one eats meat, while others would want one wherethey could eat a big fat juicy steak every day. Do we each get a heaven of ourown? I believe if people really gave some thought to their concept of heaven,they would understand they were just changing one conditioned world foranother. That way, heaven, like this world, would be equally impermanent.
I am just going to give myown thoughts here and you can decide for yourselves what you believe. I willshow you that there are two good bits of news in this third noble truth.
I feel that the best word to describe this third truth is awakening. We awaken from the sleep of unawareness. I do not see the process of awakening as some mystical or metaphysical thing.
Buddha said that awakening is the ‘highest happiness’, but he wasn’t talking about the mundane happiness we strive for in our everyday lives. He was talking about absolute freedom from unskillfulness, freedom from craving, attachment, desire, hatred and unawareness. All of this we can achieve in this lifetime by truly understanding the four noble truths and following the eightfold path. Once we start meditating on these teachings and turning them from knowledge to wisdom, we will start to change our actions of body, speech and mind.
This state of being awake canbe reached by anyone, whether they call themselves Buddhist or not, in thisvery lifetime – you just have to put the effort and hard work in. That’s thefirst bit of good news.
The second bit of good newsis we do not have to die to become awakened. It can be obtained during thislifetime. Death is irrelevant to this process. People feel like this life isfull of discontentment and causes them nothing but suffering, and the only wayout is death. They feel at death they will be miraculously transported to abetter place. But the third truth is not talking about a place; it is thecessation of the three poisons, namely, desire, anger and aversion andunawareness. The Buddha defined it as ‘perfect peace’, or a state of mind thatis free from craving, anger and other afflictive states. We can find thisperfect peace in this body, on this planet and in this lifetime.
I honestly believe the thirdtruth isn’t talking about a metaphysical thing, it isn’t a place to go to andwe do not have to die to realise it. We just need to put in a huge amount ofeffort so we can extinguish our afflictive states of mind.
I will leave you to reflect on this third truth, so you can decide which version makes the most sense to you.
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