The Arising of suffering and the Ending of suffering

Ajahn Sundara is Buddhist nun, she  went to live at Amaravati Monastery where she participated in the establishment of the Nuns’ Community and training. In the mid-nineties she spent over two years in Thailand practicing in Forest Monasteries. For the last 15 years she has taught and led meditation retreats in Europe and North America.

The points i learned after reading- her article on Dhamma talk given during
a Thanksgiving retreat in California, USA (2002) and  developed  a understanding of my own mind and which could practice some of the teachings which she mentioned in these talks. 

What  could  I understand from this article  which is again  to my(understanding) conditioning of mind  is :

 1) I could identify the suffering and begin to look it very closely.

2) The root cause of suffering and i could able to see the suffering in reality when it is happening- which make me wonder that i never saw it while the suffering itself.

3) Who  is understanding actually , who is the know er i could able to identify it. Who is it that is thinking inside this mind? Who is it that is suffering in there? Who is it that conjures up this strange train of thought?’is really wonderful to know in myself.

4) The natural pattern of the deluded mind is to think that suffering happens outside of oneself – that there is something or someone out there to blame: ‘The reason why I am upset is...’..These lines hit me like a bullet that's 100% truth we are always caught up  in this blaming so easily to others isn't it?

5) We have to look at painful things..I have repeatedly applied this point and practiced it looking into the eyes of the pain and challenge it was so true like she said that it will die its own natural death, i have seen myself the pain gone when me looking straight into the eyes of the pain and challenge it,it was  dis-comfortable to fight the hurdle  which resulted that the challenge has not changed but the way of looking the hurdle has certainly changed which make to see things in a different way now ..a way where am not attached to the pain. so learned not to have pain from pain, realised that we are more bothered with a feeling of pain that i am having pain, more than the real pain.

I  have just reproduced the thoughts and talks said by Ajahn sundara, my sincere salutation to her experience and service rendering to the society to make learn people like me, though we are connected yet we been connected now.

I have not imposed my interpretation over her talk to understand what she said according to your condition of mind and your perceptions you will understand it, am sure her potent thoughts will leave you spellbound joy and compassion, if you are a practitioner it would easy to understand where you got struck up , and make you ease instantly.

Ajahn Sundara

 Thanksgiving retreat in California, USA (2002)

This is the third night of our retreat. What is the result so far? Have you made peace with yourself? When we first look closely at the human mind, we may experience suffering from our approach to the practice itself. We may struggle to make peace with ourselves. We may experience tiredness or confusion. We may suffer – without understanding the roots of suffering, without knowing how to let it go, how to let it die its own natural death. Why is this so? It is because the mind looks for safety, and often, its first recourse is to try to distract itself – to forget. Its second is to rationalise poor conduct. We do this out of habit without awareness or understanding. 

 In this Dhamma practice, we can’t really lie to ourselves. It doesn’t work. We have to look at painful things. Usually, we don’t want to see our habits or our delusions; consequently, it’s hard to be  Ajahn Sundara¯at peace with them. But, when the mind is shaken out of habit by the harsh reality of grief and crisis, we can wake up! Though we would not ask for a major crisis in our lives, that could be precisely what compels us to turn away from our tendency to follow desire, selfishness, or blind habit – to turn away from the world and towards the Dhamma. We want to identify with what we imagine we are: the thoughts coursing through our minds, the feelings that arise in our hearts, the sensations of our bodies. We want to be ‘good’, ‘pleasant’, ‘worthy of respect’. So the first step in this practice is to challenge that sense of who we think we are.

How do we do that? By questioning, by investigating: ‘Who is it that is thinking inside this mind? Who is it that is suffering in there? Who is it that conjures up this strange train of thought?’ The natural pattern of the deluded mind is to think that suffering happens outside of oneself – that there is something or someone out there to blame: ‘The reason why I am upset is...’ Each of us can fill in the blank with our own story; someone or something outside of ourselves has hurt us, irritated us, upset us. We come closer to the truth by recognising that we’re upset, because our minds are generating  random or obsessive thoughts that can feel very disturbing. We do not feel in control or in a state of equilibrium. So we attempt to find order in our mind by changing or adapting to our conditions. That’s part of being a social creature: we try to ‘fit in’. That’s what happens in monastic communities sometimes, some lay people come, and after a time may think La Grande Illusion . ‘The monks and nuns look happy and peaceful, and they are beautiful without their hair; I want to be like that, so I will shave my head too!’ We had to make a rule that women are not allowed to shave their heads until ordained.

The Buddha said not to waste energy looking critically at other people, wanting them to change. Instead, we need to focus our energy observing our own behaviour, our own mind, and our own self. His teaching points to a way of approaching and understanding the self which is not caught, not deluded, not agitated by what goes on in the mind. It is not grasping and, at the same time, it’s also not pushing away. It’s the Middle Way, which is another way of saying the enlightened way. Perhaps we want to think of nothing, to have no thoughts, just endless bliss and perfect peace. But this is also delusion, only a more subtle form. Ajahn Chah said that being stuck in peace is a lot worse than being stuck in suffering. When we’re stuck in suffering, at least we know that we want change; at least we know we want to be free from of it. One of the obstacles on the path of the holy life, the brahmacariya life, is the desire to have a blissful mind; it’s not that difficult to achieve with the strong cultivation of concentration. In fact, bliss is inherent to the mind itself; it’s not that far away from us. But if we allow ourselves to attach to bliss, then we may forget the Four Noble Truths and the path to liberation. We end up stuck in tranquility, without wisdom. I don’t mean to say practice should not take us to a place of peace and bliss. If it does, that’s great. But it should be  Ajahn Sundara¯ recognized for what it is. Even the happiness of a peaceful mental state, the Buddha said, is suffering – we habitually cling to it, and we suffer. Instead, we can use it as a foundation on which to investigate the nature of our mind and the characteristics of phenomena – but we must be careful that we do not then become unmotivated to contemplate the truth of our existence.

So it’s important to know how to practice correctly, to understand both the means and the goal of our practice. The goal, as the Buddha said, is Nibba¯na, the ending of all our misery. The Buddha knew profoundly the needs of human beings. He encouraged us to observe what is closest to us – our mind, with its thoughts, its feelings, its perceptions – and to realize that they’re not what they appear to be, or worth

taking refuge in.

The Buddha taught that clinging to desire will always be unsatisfactory. If the body is sick, attaching to the desire of not wanting the body to be sick only creates more suffering. That thought is a form of denial of the experience of sickness. Similarly, if your mind is not concentrated or feels confused, then refusing to be with that lack of concentration or confusion is abusive, in the sense that it does not allow you to see

things as they are – to penetrate the truth as it is, free from all judgments and all clinging. Even grasping after the desire to make oneself ‘good’, or to try to make others ‘good’, can give rise to abusive thinking.

From a mindfulness viewpoint we can see that which is suffering. And we can see that mindfulness has nothing to  do with any particular train of thought. This is important to realize because you’ll never liberate yourself unless you allow the mind to be as it is. For example, if your conditioning is to be irritated, impatient, heartless, lacking in compassion – how are you going to liberate yourself if you cannot recognize these aspects of yourself, or if every time you look at these things you crush them, push them down, suppress them?

This is where the Buddha asks us to begin the practice. We start by observing our thoughts, feelings, moods, and perceptions – all the activities in the mind. If a feeling of jealousy comes up, we notice that it arises and passes away. Selfishness, meanness, hatred and other painful mental states also may arise, and likewise will pass away. Happiness, feelings of love and joy also arise and pass away. As we accept the momentary

reality of those states, we’re able to let them go. Then we begin to recognise and understand our experiences as they are, instead of wishing them to be otherwise. To observe ourselves takes courage and fearlessness. How many of us can just listen, simply listen, to the manifestation of pain as it arises and until it ends? Our habitual way is often quite extreme and simplistic: I like/I grab, I don’t like/I kill.

The level of response can be quite aggressive. Or, it may be more refined – maybe you don’t kill, but there’s still aversion; maybe you’re not averse, but there’s still irritation. From feeling peaceful, relaxed and calm, you suddenly feel irritated. How do we respond when this happens? Do we remember

the goal of practice?

The goal is to release the mind from suffering. The means  is awareness, our capacity to observe ourselves and the activities of the mind, without any agenda. However, if you come  from a deluded perspective, you will notice that there is an agenda, however subtle – as soon as something unpleasant is felt, the mind sends immediately the message of aversion, ‘This should not be here – get out!’ The same applies to that which is pleasant, that which we like: ‘This should be here – always!’ We need to understand that those reactions are arising in the mind most of the time.

Another aspect of the practice which can be quite confusing is that the more determined you are to do something good, the more challenged you may become. Let’s say that you determine to do something wholesome and you will notice that, not long after that, Ma¯ra (the Buddhist personification

of evil) will come along and test you. One year, when I was a novice, I resolved to refrain from eating any chocolate for a certain period during the three month ‘rains retreat’. We didn’t have much, maybe a few squares from time to time, so it was not a massive renunciation – but I decided to give it up anyway. From the day I took this decision, about a week before the rains retreat began, what arose in my mind was:

‘Will I be safe? Won’t I murder somebody? Will I become violent and start beating people up?’ It was Ma¯ra telling me that if I give up that piece of chocolate, my world would collapse – an illustration of the power of the forces we have to deal with!

Our good fortune is knowing that the more we practice and gain insight into this experience of suffering, the more we become confident in observing our experiences as they really are – seeing them as impermanent (anicca), unsatisfactory (dukkha) and ‘not self ’ (anatta).

Our identification with suffering is very strong – we get sucked into it, and it’s really hard to pull ourselves out. We might think that as we practise the mind should really come together and be more peaceful, but that’s not always the case. As we deepen our practice, we become aware of deeper layers of the mind’s conditioning and conceit, and can sometimes be more forcefully challenged. Ajahn Chah used to say, the most important questions to ask every day are, ‘Why was I born?’ and, ‘Why am I here?’ So what are we here for? What is the goal, the purpose of this practice? Should we make a list of what we don’t want to be ( jealous, angry, selfish, confused), and a list of what we do want to be (good, patient, kind, virtuous, wise)? Where does that leave us? How much chance is there to actually let things go? With mindfulness, instead of taking a position for or against any states of mind, we notice their coming and going. As we see their arising and passing away, they start to lose their intensity, their substantially, and we’ll see them as energy – ‘empty’. Do you understand? If we use this approach for everything that we encounter in our practice, then nothing will be a problem. It’s a matter of being patient and allowing the symptoms and the cause of our suffering to be seen as impermanent. Nothing arises in the heart without causes. If we stay patiently with the symptoms, we may get in touch with the causes at a deeper level. Sometimes, for example, if we stay with anger long enough, we’ll see the fear that lies behind the anger. But if we’re obsessed with getting rid of anger as quickly as possible, we won’t see that it is prompted and generated by some kind of fear.   

The Buddha said there are only two things that manifest in the mind: the arising of suffering and the ending of suffering. A pretty miserable programme if you don’t see it from the right perspective of non-grasping. Where’s the joy and happiness in that? Well, there is joy and happiness, but it’s not the joy and happiness that comes from a deluded view. True joy and happiness come from the freedom of knowing  that whatever arises in the heart is not worth clinging to. Whatever you cling to will make you fearful that you’ll lose it; you cling to the desire not to lose something you like and then, you cling to the desire to get it back. And there it is: dukkha!

During my early years of training, I remember having an insight that made me skip down the lane at Chithurst – even though skipping was not allowed. I remember being very happy – knowing that there is no happiness and that I would never be ‘happy’ again! I felt so joyful, prancing up and down with this insight. What I had understood so very clearly at that moment was that I would never be fooled by happiness. La Grande Illusion .

When happiness came, I would feel it totally, when it went, I would not suffer. Many years later, I heard that one of the great meditation masters in Thailand had a sign at the entrance of his monastery that said: ‘What joy it is to know there is no happiness in the world.’ Of course, I got fooled again many times. But once you have the insight you can never be completely fooled again. Insights are the point of transformation when the heart knows, really knows, for itself – beyond teachings, beyond teachers, beyond anyone. When, through wisdom, you have true insight, you don’t need to rely on any external authority.

When the Buddha says that we must understand dukkha, he means that when we do really understand it we will never be fooled by suffering again. Only when the Buddha really understood dukkha, its causes, its ending and the path leading to the release of suffering was he able to proclaim that he was

free from dukkha.

The reason I say all this is to encourage you to continue seeing everything that is taking place on this retreat as a gateway to insight. The key factor in your practice is to find a strong refuge in awareness, however you are able to do it – whether you use your body to cultivate awareness, your breath, a word like ‘peace’ or ‘buddho’, or the movement of your feet in walking meditation. The simpler you keep it, the more clearly you will see the mind. This is what enables the wisdom of the mind to cut through its own delusions.

Upasika¯ Kee, a respected female meditation master in Thailand, said that there is nothing more fun than getting a handle on the kilesas, the defilement's in the mind. When they arise, ‘kill them off...that’s  Vipassana’, she says. She did not mean that we should really kill anything, but that we should develop a sharp mindfulness to free the mind from all its delusion. Mindfulness acts like a knife cutting through the misery we carry around. Enjoy your journey during this retreat. When you get up in the morning, whether you feel utterly wretched or you feel like you are going to transcend it all in one day, whatever you feel, that is a gateway to enlightenment. In the early morning, you go to the sink, brush your teeth feeling cold and miserable: ‘Oh no! Sitting and walking all day! Let’s go back to sleep!’ You start getting dressed – it’s so cold and miserable: ‘I think I’m going to declare myself sick today. I’ll put a note on my door: DON’T DISTURB!’ Notice that this is the mind going through its Ma¯ra stages. It is becoming ‘ma¯raic’! You have to remember that Ma¯ra is always around the corner – he tempted the Buddha for 45 years. Who is Ma¯ra? One of the great Sufi poets said that if you want to know the devil just look at yourself. It’s so true, isn’t it? We get often fooled because the devil is not necessarily so terrible looking, it can also be quite a sweet manifestation. When we look at ourselves we’re not that bad, are we? The devil can look quite nice a lot of the time. I like the way one of our senior teachers once described delusion. He pointed out that there is nothing more comfortable than delusion. If you want to know delusion, look at your comfort zones. There is something very cosy about being deluded.

A well known teacher said once that people can spend a whole day thinking stupid thoughts without a flicker of doubt, but ask them to be mindful of one inhalation and they go berserk. Isn’t it strange? We can indulge in selfish, destructive things all day long in small and big ways without any qualms.

Often, it’s not until we awaken that we notice the damage of unskilfulness and its destructive results. Remember: the practice is to develop the means to free ourselves from unskilfulness, and the goal is liberation from all suffering. The Buddha keeps reminding us to be observant, and to be mindful in all areas of our life, of all our actions and thoughts – all of them, the good and bad. He doesn’t ask us to judge what we experience, or reject those that are painful. He doesn’t ask us to do that. Wisdom itself knows this –

without pushing anything away or holding on to anything. This is the Middle Way, the path of non-grasping, non clinging.

It is the end of ‘la grand e illusion’.