The Origin of Suffering

An excerpt from a teaching called Eight-fold Path by Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo

I have known of cases, it is very rare, and beautiful to behold of people who have gone through terrible terrible suffering and have used that as a way to become strong.  In fact there are entire cultures of people who through tremendous need to survive and tremendous suffering, have found some way to become strong through that suffering rather than to let that suffering take them down.  But that’s very rare.  Most people react to suffering as though something outside had occurred to them, and they were merely standing there.  They don’t understand the relationship of cause and effect, and how karma prevails, and always is exacting. If you give rise to any cause, that very effect will occur.  We don’t realize that, and so we react in an odd way.

What causes our reaction is our deep attachment and desire for things to be as we wish.  For instance, if we have to live on beans and rice all week because we don’t have enough money for steak and potatoes, we might think, “Oh this is terrible suffering.  This is just so terrible.  But then another person might say, “I really dig beans and rice.  Take the Beano and you’ll be fine.  What’s the problem?”  I’m being funny now, but you get what I’m saying.  It’s really your reaction.  One person can have some catastrophe happen to them, and they will use that almost as a guru to pull themselves up by the bootstraps and get stronger.  But most of us don’t.  We react because we don’t have our heart’s desire.  So, if we lose a relationship that is very dear to us, a death happens or loss of friendship or loss of love, when we really look from a practical sense at what changes in our lives as a result of the loss of this person, most of it is manageable usually.

What’s really terrible is our own pain.  Our own pain is caused by our attachment to that person and our desire to be with that person.  Attachment to a person or a desire to be with a person is not necessarily a bad or unethical thing, but understood within the context of the Buddha dharma, we must understand that too much attachment and not enough unconditional positive regard for all sentient beings – placing all of our hopes and desires on one person or maybe a small family – means that our suffering will be very great at the time of losing that relationship.  We know that whatever comes together must also separate.  Whether it is in life or in death, nothing remains and everything is impermanent.

It is our reaction that causes us to suffer.  One person can lose a job or a position and totally flip out, and ruin the rest of his life simply by the thoughts and activities that he takes while he is not stable or in good shape.  Then another person can take a challenge like that, examine himself, and say, “What’s going on here? Maybe I should change this or that about myself?”  There are many ways to react, and what the Buddha has taught is that the suffering is caused by desire and attachment and the purpose of practicing the Buddha dharma is to pacify and lessen that desire and attachment.  Another way to put it is to see through its narcotic effect.  We want what we want.  It stimulates us and makes us happy.  Then we want more.  But if we really examine the desire and attachment, we’ll find out that most of what we cling to is relatively unimportant and in the end, will bring us suffering because we are too attached to it.  So, the Buddha taught that the origin of suffering is attachment and desire.

© Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo