ENLIGHTENMENT FOR DUMMIES Newsletter – Issue #2: Why do we suffer?

Why do people suffer?

In some cases, it’s obvious. Those living in abject poverty who don’t get enough to eat, have no access to sanitary drinking water, and may not even have a roof over their heads are suffering for obvious reasons. So are people with chronic pain from a traumatic injury or illness. And those in prison who won’t be getting out for a very long time. A spouse whose husband or wife dies, especially unexpectedly, is another example.

We could go on and on but we won’t. The people I want to focus are the ones who don’t have any major, obvious issues that negatively impact their happiness level. They have plenty to eat and drink. They live in a nice house/apartment/condo. They have a loving family. They have more than a few friends. Their level of income is at least middle-class level. This might very well describe you. And me.

So why do you and I suffer? What’s our problem? We all have plenty of “stuff”. Why do we suffer?

The Buddha would tell you and I that we suffer because WE DON’T UNDERSTAND THE NATURE OF THINGS. Because we don’t understand the true nature of the universe, most notably human beings, including and especially ourselves, we suffer because we become attached to our desires.

The first of the Four Noble Truths that the Buddha taught is, “Life is characterized by impermanence and suffering, or Dukkha (insatiable thirst). The second one, which I blogged about at http://wp.me/p2Pija-BD, is, “The Origin of Dukkha (suffering) is attachment to desire”.

We’ll get into the last two Noble Truths in the new issue of this newsletter. In this issue, I want to focus on the first two Noble Truths. So let’s consider if the Buddha really knew what he was talking about in regards to first two Noble Truths. What the Buddha meant is that people suffer because they believe they can possess pleasurable experiences like sexual gratification, the sensation of tasty food, feeling of accomplishment after reaching a goal, excitement from watching a well done movie or high from drugs or alcohol, and so on.

Intellectually we know that it’s impossible to hold onto these experiences forever but there’s an irrational part of us that overrides our intelligent, rational self. It says, “I don’t want to let go of this because it’s pleasurable”.

Look at the flip side of the starving person, an obese person. Do most of the obese people you see and/or know personally seem happier than other people? Do they seem happy period?

Personally I am not or never was obese. However, I, along with my wife Amy, were at one time raging, out-of-control, card-carrying (okay, we didn’t actually carry cards but you get the idea) alcoholics. So we were addicted to drink, not food, but the results were similarly as unfortunate as being addicted to food. For Amy, the result was beyond unfortunate. It reached the level of tragic when she died on November 24, 2006, at the age of 41. She died from internal-organ failure caused by excessive drinking. She, over the course of about ten years, literally drank herself to death.

And as noted in my book, “Overcome Any Personal Obstacle, Including Alcoholism, By Understanding Your Ego” – http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/leewriter – I wasn’t far behind Amy. I lost two jobs in the space of two months (one full-time, one part-time), I lost my wife of over 19 years, I lost our town house to foreclose, and yet I continued to drink. There was no sane, logical, rational reason for me to keep drinking but I did. I was so attached to the desire for drunkenness that it bypassed and overrode my better judgment.

So my personal experience confirms the wisdom and truthfulness of Buddha’s teaching about why we suffer. In your case, you may not be or never was an alcoholic or drug addict yet you probably have periods when you’re unhappy (you suffer). It’s my belief that you suffer because of your attachment to some kind of desire. Examples include:

• MONEY (feeling of power that comes from wealth)

• GAMBLING (desire to obtain money/wealth without having to work for it)

• OBTAIN HIGHER-LEVEL JOB (feeling of having power to control others and have associated higher level of compensation/more money)

• FOOD (pleasurable sensation of taste and of feeling full)

• MATERIAL THINGS LIKE EXPENSIVE CARS, HOMES, ELECTRONIC DEVICES SUCH LATEST SMARTPHONE, HD TV, GAMING SYSTEM AND SO FORTH (feeling of excitement and prestige of having items most others can’t afford)

• AN IDENTITY THAT’S SEPARATE FROM EVERYONE ELSE (you can’t stand being like everyone else, you’re obsessed with being different and therefore better and more important than everyone else)

Undoubtedly I’ve missed some (or many) others. The point is, in general, people make themselves unhappy (they suffer) because they don’t understand they can’t possess things (really it’s experiences) that, by their nature, cannot be possessed. They base their happiness on identifying with (attaching themselves) to things/experiences they really want (desires).

It makes perfect sense to me. If you “don’t get it”, if you don’t understand your own nature, if you fail to comprehend the rules of the Game of Your Life, it’s natural that you won’t succeed. You’ll make yourself unhappy because you’ll be chasing things that you’ll never catch.

The epitome of what the Buddha taught about attachment to desire being the cause of our suffering is Charlie Brown’s futile attempts to kick the football Lucy holds for him. Holds for him until the last instant and then pulls it away.

Human beings in general are like that. A part of us knows what we’re trying to get is impossible but another part says otherwise. The allure of obtaining whatever shiny object crosses our path is too great to ignore. So we try to own the experience of <INSERT SHINY OBJECT HERE>.

And sometimes what we’re trying to possess (hold on to) is a definition of ourselves. We consider ourselves a great guy/gal who <INSERT CAREER OR PERSONALITY TYPE OR TALENT OR SKILL HERE>. And then we add a bunch of demographic facts (age, height, weight, birthplace, place of residence, etc.) and we call that “me” or “I”. We then envision that there is some kind of entity out there in the cosmos that’s got our name attached to it. My challenge to those people, and this includes the vast majority of the citizens of Planet Earth, so we’re talking about billions of adults, is this: CAN YOU LOCATE THE YOU THAT YOU ASSUME IS OUT THERE? Can you find and point out the spot in the ether where “you” are floating?

To learn more about my Buddhist-inspired, Buddha-esque self-help book, please go to http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/leewriter. To learn more about my other writing, including my Buddha-centric screenplay, “After The End”, go to http://leeman999.wix.com/copywriterandauthor.