The end of suffering hinges on acknowledging the truth of its existence.”
One should have a positive outlook towards life. One should remain optimistic and joyful. You must have heard these cliche lines from everyone, merely a motivational statement to woo or calm people at some point. If you are suffering from something, the next person will say, keep calm, and you will be fine; it is just a matter of time. You heard those words as encouraging and soothing your mind for some moment, but that suffering keeps coming back. After waiting for some time, days, or months, you find that a particular suffering will end, but a new suffering will knock on your door. You realise that the nature of it is constantly changing. But what is not changing is the suffering itself. It keeps coming in different ways and with different intensities, and it affects you in various circumstances. It means that although we are supposed to seek joy in our lives, it is important to dwell upon our suffering. Why is that?
After attaining enlightenment, Buddha taught the world the four noble truths. The first one is ‘The Truth of Suffering.’ It is not a burden, but its understanding makes it a shift that can lead to joy. If you seek happiness, you must recognise the truth of suffering, its nature, and how to end it. It is like solving a mathematical equation; you must know the algorithm and how to use that algorithm to come to a solution.
The moment a child is born, it cries, which announces the struggle of suffering. The birth itself would be the most significant proclamation that a child will suffer. But this natural world has that power that allows us to eliminate those sufferings. People taught their children how to be happy, give all the material pleasure and comfort by hiding the naked truth, and never bring to children that suffering exists. Because we were taught to talk only about things that soothe our ego. Not the one that is disagreeable to your ego. If you talk about suffering, people say this person is negative and always talk about that cracked-up truth, but we won’t say words that bring negativity. But in reality, the person who has accepted the truth of suffering has taken a step closer and needs to be free from it.
Similarly, children remain unaware of it because they are burdened with material pleasure and cannot realise if something like that exists. When he grows up, he puts himself into the world, which comes with lots of suffering, and he never copes with the world’s real identity. However, if that realisation of the truth happens, nature and the world around us will be so beautiful, favourable, and kind that it will help us get rid of suffering, attain a stage of absolute joy, and live a life peacefully.
The life of Buddha went similarly. As a child and prince of the princely state, he got all the worldly pleasure and comfort, and till he became an adult, he never realised that suffering existed. When he connects to the outside world and looks at people suffering from diseases and other miseries, he sees the people dying — an inevitable truth, and he realises the world he is living in is not reality; it’s an illusion that gives a wrong sense of fullness and happiness. He left home, the comfort and material pleasure. He went to every sage of that time, asked how to get rid of those suffering, and did what they asked him to do. But nothing changed. Then he understood that only through self-awareness, developing wisdom, and looking at his inner world can he reach that awareness stage and attain freedom from all suffering.
The truth of suffering and the source of it has many causes; you need to understand the causes to understand suffering clearly. Regardless of their background or circumstances, each person will experience some suffering in their lifetime. What are the causes of suffering?
- Material Things – The discord between the material things and oneself causes suffering. Living in a tiny house, discomfort from not having a car or a bigger car, even the most minor thing of not having a soft mattress that lets you not sleep well. It makes you restless if light is coming out of the window while you sleeping at night or if things you are not reachable to because of physical body constraints. These are all examples of how our attachment to material things can lead to suffering.
- People – The discord between people around us and ourselves. We suffer from living around people we dislike or are afflicted with and not always living with those we love. Everyone has different ways of handling circumstances, which cause disagreements and conflicts in relationships with other people and eventually cause suffering.
- The Body – The body ages, gets sick and then dies, a natural phenomenon. You must be healthy today but become weak tomorrow. No one can stop this natural process. A bright complexion will diminish with age. The body, if it’s not healthy, causes suffering one after another.
- The Mind – The mind wants to obey rules and control everything. But if filled with greed, anger, and ignorance, it becomes wild and goes out of control. If someone is not listening to you, you get angry. But actually, the one you are not listening to is not someone else but your mind. It wanders here and there and creates mental defilements. Suffering is inevitable if there is disharmony between the mind and oneself.
- Desire – For humans, another cause of suffering is desire. However, we can’t live without desire. A person didn’t and won’t be desireless. But yes, desire can be wholesome or unwholesome. Having an unwholesome desire can involve wanting all material comfort beyond what is needed to live a good life. A position, fame, or anything comfortable, but once we desire more than is required or necessary for healthy living, this desire lets us suffer. Then, there are wholesome desires: right action, serve people, gain wisdom, and work towards yourself to mitigate suffering. Understanding the difference between these two types of desires is crucial in understanding how desire can lead to suffering.
- Views – Our views of how things are, and persons vary with different people. Not understanding which concept, thinking and perception is wrong or suitable leads to suffering, bringing conflict with how people’s views, sometimes with varying systems of belief, way of living, rituals and cultural differences, which leads you to suffer. Our views and perceptions of the world can often lead to conflict and suffering, especially when they clash with the opinions of others.
- Nature – The natural world brings many factors, such as floods, calamities, and droughts, which make it difficult for people to live peacefully; directly or indirectly, natural activities create discord between nature and oneself.
- The Self/Ego – The real deep cause of suffering connected to all other suffering is the self. The factor that generates the sense of ‘I’ or ‘Me’ or ‘Mine’. Our five senses create many mental afflictions and form different perceptions. It inflates the ego so big that we never have love or compassion for others. The self–attachment and the ego do not allow us to look at others as same as us. This is a great conflict and brings much suffering into our lives.
This truth, the realisation that suffering exists in different ways throughout our lives, is an absolute path breaker. Not just going by your egoistic world that blindly tells you to have a bullishness and idealism. Nothing is ideal, as the situation itself changes from moment to moment. Once you accept the reality that suffering exists, you will charge your senses to face it well, and you will not be merely a discussion point on suffering. But we rise above it to comprehend the inception of the suffering, find the path to master it, and be free from a deep ocean of suffering and flow like the lightsome waves into the river to a joyful life.