drugo Posted October 12, 2009 (edited) "suffering" is based on the Latin word paschō, which translates crudely as 'to live'. Passion, pathos, sympathy, empathy and pathology are all words which are direct derivatives of paschō. How do you view the suffering which is in your own personal struggles? " My view is that 'common-people' in the West tend to have a myopic view on life, a kind of one-sided stance hypnotized by the idea of "happiness". "Happiness" as some sort of absolute ideal which every other faculty is subordinate to, including paschō. Maybe it's better to embrace both "happiness" and paschō equally as simply fundamental. But maybe suffering is simply a type of unnecessary hindrance we should all aspire to avoid? Edited October 12, 2009 by mooksha Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
FoleyLane Posted October 13, 2009 I was brought up in the east but still have an idealized view to life being 'happy'. Although i have been greatly influenced by the western world during by upbringing in both good ways and bad. So maybe i picked up this idea from my western influence or maybe i picked it from my father whose name is 'Joy'. Either ways, as of now i think joy is finding a balance b/w happiness and paschō. Seems hard to accept 'suffering' but that just maybe because of years of negative connotations put onto it. Good thing you underlined the word Passion, as i believe that passion brings some suffering along with it, but the suffering is often subdued or quietened by the 'spirit' that also comes with passion. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
nabraxas Posted October 13, 2009 yeah, agree w/FoleyLane. there can be no recognition ov happiness if there is no suffering to contrast/balance it to. Without the pain there'd be no learningWithout the hurting we'd never change. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
botanika Posted October 14, 2009 The man who is happy with nothing is the man who has everything. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
FoleyLane Posted October 14, 2009 The man who is happy with nothing is the man who has everything. That can have two completely opposite meanings. I like it very much. Anyone know a word that can describe- a sentence that has dual meanings? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
drugo Posted October 14, 2009 That can have two completely opposite meanings. I like it very much.Anyone know a word that can describe- a sentence that has dual meanings? multivocality Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
coin Posted October 14, 2009 for thousands of years spiritual teachers have said that pain + resistance = suffering... pain + surrender/acceptance/acknowledgement without judging = just the pain i.e. suffering is craving/clinging and aversion/resistance... so if you live your life by what you desire to happen, happens = me happy what you desire not to happen, does not happen = me happy - what you desire to happen, does not = tears, drama what you desire not to happen, does = self pity, tantrums... "why me??!" "why not me??!" the craving and aversion are the same in the middle is surrender/acceptance - allowing whatever is, to be Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mac Posted October 14, 2009 (edited) in the middle is surrender/acceptance - allowing whatever is, to be Apathy =, indifference, the suppression of emotions such as concern, excitement, motivation and passion. <<wiki Edited October 14, 2009 by mac Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
coin Posted October 14, 2009 there is no need for suppression though...whatever arises is whatever arises Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
drugo Posted October 17, 2009 pain + resistance = suffering...pain + surrender/acceptance/acknowledgement without judging = just the pain Thanks for laying the phenomenology out so simply coin. Following your logic, I feel that I seem to be resisting heaps of shit at the moment. I feel like I am constantly pushing and pulling amongst myself my past, my family, friends and community. Kinda like how Camus put it, I feel like I'm pushing a giant stone up a hill and upon reaching the top I watch it role to bottom of the hill and begin pushing again [enriched by each struggle, thought I'm not sure if Camus' inter-war period pessimism would follow the enrichment part]. Follow the lyrics: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBHKuQe4j44 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
coin Posted October 17, 2009 that will always happen when we get caught up in the (discursive, egoic) mind and our personal "storyline"...my life so far and the story of me. it's an infinite mine of worry and unease. it mostly involves swimming (drowning?) in an ocean of imaginings of past and future...lying in bed at night, reliving memories of the past with commentaries of "why did s/he do do that?" "why did that have to happen?" "why can't it be that way now?" "if only i had said ... " etc or playing out possible future scenarios filled with anticipation, expectation, etc. "it isn't supposed to be this way!" we have our senses to fully connect with the present moment, which is really the only reality there is...that the past is a body of sequential events that lays behind us and the future ahead of us, is really an illusory construction of the mind. the best (only) real place to start bringing acceptance (dropping the resistance) is in the present. see how liberating it is. i'm definitely not a therapist, so obviously it's just my opinion, but you might find it beneficial to commit to doing some daily mindfulness practice. mindfulness of the breath and mindful "body scan" are the mainstays of mindfulness pratice. it won't take long (using the concept of time again ) to start experiencing more ease & flow rather than strugle and the uphill battle maybe i should say that a lot of people get 'stuck' on the idea that this surrender/acceptance (it's an embracing even) is saying that a really messed up situation is ok...that this approach is so passive...that is not the case at all. it is simply a way of saying "what's happening is happening" "things can only be the way they are" so why fight it.. which frees up all the energy that might otherwise be tied up in denial, resistance, ego drama, mental tantrums, etc. like learning to swim...you can make a lot of noise, kick and flail and struggle and still barely stay afloat, but relax into it and find the flow and it becomes so very easy. you can act more appropriately & more effectively and lessen your suffering in the process. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
paradox Posted October 17, 2009 suffering is a state of mind. it can be hard to realize you always have a choice. it takes practice to change the habit of turning something 'unpleasant' into 'suffering.' thats all suffering is. a habit of mind. something unpleasant is simply another something like the infinte somethings that are occuring everywhere every second. it's our minds which interpret it as unpleasant, so with that interpretation comes resistance & to resist what absolutely IS & cannot be changed in this moment is suffering. & the tendancy to interpret & then resist is simply a deeply ingrained habit. this state of mind is strongly intertwined with the illusion of our 'self.' our 'self' is the experience of being seperate from all that is & to be seperate, we feel alone, we feel vulnerable & we feel we are constantly under the threat of our own annihilation. instead of accepting what simply IS in this moment, pleasant or unpleasant, then making efforts to change what CAN be changed, in it's madness & fear the 'self' resists what IS in this moment which inevitably leads to suffering. almost everybody does this but it's simply a deeply ingrained but nontheless comletely insane habit of mind. the good news is we just have to change our habits. to create happiness or suffering takes the same amount of effort. we just need to find the right things to put our energy into. unfortunately many of us seem to need quite a bit more suffering before we realize we truly don't want it anymore & so make a different choice. i really do feel that when you're ready a teacher will come. or a realization, or some vital peice of info which will open our minds to our own capabilities. so we have to prepare ourselves so we CAN be ready & that person or thing doesn't pass us by. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
stiched up Posted October 17, 2009 its just balance conected to your ego i find many egoic things hard to deal with but this is normal i find this with meditation too whenevr i reach new levels of concouisness i seem to have challenging experiances following Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
drugo Posted October 17, 2009 (edited) Thanks for all the quality responses especially xodarap and coin - your thoughts touch on a profound question I have been 'suffering' over for some time now. I'm still not sure how I feel about the experience of suffering. I not sure if i think it is necessarily an obstacle of ego, or an unnecessary hindrance, so to speak. ego finite being: is really an illusory construction of the mind almost everybody does this but it's simply a deeply ingrained but nontheless comletely insane habit of mind. I agree completely that our egostic finite existence is a type of illusion, but maybe I feel that being egoised in this realm has its reason and value for being. I think that through traversing the mountains of morality and ethics, values, and the suffering involved in being a human that lives in a finite world, in the process, we develop better understandings of ourselves. Gnotis te auton (know thyself) as the Socratic dictum or Delphi saying goes. I think that, possibly, this illusion of ego, body, senses, social relations etc offers a rich context to grow spiritually and that suffering should be embraced as a fundamental part of this process, not something we should try to rid with, say, single point concentration or other powerful techniques. Maybe we need a to balance the soul and the ego in order to learn what it means to be an egoised being in this particular type of existence. I'm not sure of this idea though, I have been 'struggling' to make sense of it for some time now. I guess i just value other people, family, rich ego experiences of love, connection, nature too much to think that its all simply an 'insain habit of mind'. But maybe our disagreement if more a product of language than philosophy and spirituality. Maybe your 'unpleasantness' is my idea of 'suffering' xodarap. The suffering in my life has become more of an energy to harness and manifest dreams than wallowing in some sort of self-indulged depression. peace Edited October 17, 2009 by mooksha Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
paradox Posted October 18, 2009 (edited) yeah i reckon it probably is a language thing i totally see where you're coming from in that last post. my post wasn't really directed at your specific experience, just my ideas about the subject concerning the human struggle in general when i say 'an insane habit of mind' i'm talking about the habit we have of resisting what simply IS right now in this moment. what IS in THIS moment simply is what IS! lol, to resist the utterly unavoidable ISness of this moment is insane! the experience we are having right now, whether we interpret it as pleasant or unpleasant, is simply another experience & like every other experience it is temporary. it is only our sense of self which in it's vulnerability as a seperate fragment of the whole, feels threatened by this 'unpleasant' experience & so resists it without realizing that to resist this moment is futile. to continue to do something utterly futile over & over again & each time expecting a different result is insanity. if we could only view our experience of this moment from a more objective point of view, rather than from the extremly limited view of of our 'self,' which is merely our thoughts about who we are, we would be able to observe our 'unpleasant' experiences as just another of the ever-changing experiences we can & do have without personalizing it & victimizing ourselves with a story we make up in our heads about how hard done by we are. if we can observe our experiences from a perspective of an impersonal conscious phenomenon (which is much closer to the 'truth' than our 'self') we would let these experiences be the way they are in this moment knowing full well that like everything else in existence it is temporary & will soon pass. after all there is no use doing your head in over an exprience which is highly ephemeral, which everything we ever experience is. hmmm, language is so easily confusing.... i think we, as self reflective animals (as oposed to other animals who perhaps funcion at a more automatic instinctual level) who consciously exist primarily in this physical 3 dimetional realm we all are so familiar with, rely on this ego-istic mode of consciousness to enable us to function in this world. so we can comunicate & funcion within our communities & societies. i think the 'self' is an adaptation we as self reflective social creatures have made in order to fuction efficiently in the world we have created. point is, the self & the mind are tools & do not represent whatsoever the whole 'truth' of our being, but are simply a part of us which we use for specific purposes, not dissimilar to our hands or other apendages. they are extremely useful tools! the insanity that i'm talking about is that we've gotten these tools confused with who we are. the tools have taken over & now we're completely controlled by our 'self' & the fear & feeling of seperateness the self necissarily entales. the mind is only one aspect of consciousness. the mind & the self can be obverved objectively. so who or what is doing that observing? Edited October 18, 2009 by xodarap Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
paradox Posted October 18, 2009 (edited) ... Edited October 18, 2009 by xodarap Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Maurice Posted October 18, 2009 Anyone know a word that can describe- a sentence that has dual meanings? Paradox? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
JDanger Posted October 18, 2009 ^Nah, a paradox is where you have two conflicting propositions that you hold as true inspite of the contradiction. Kinda like "there is no meaning yet everything is meaningful". On that note, thank you all for this thread Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ThunderIdeal Posted November 21, 2009 (edited) . Edited November 21, 2009 by ThunderIdeal Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
drugo Posted November 21, 2009 mookshai doubt you were actually asking that question? i like my sig anyway. I don't understand you man. What question? sig? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ThunderIdeal Posted November 21, 2009 as the question was actually asked by somebody else, i am removing my post. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
reptyle Posted November 27, 2009 metaphor...parable... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Salviador Posted December 3, 2009 Omg coin, diggin what you say brother, where is your basis of knowledge.. buddhism? Very curious to find out Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
The Dude Posted December 4, 2009 (edited) like learning to swim...you can make a lot of noise, kick and flail and struggle and still barely stay afloat, but relax into it and find the flow and it becomes so very easy. you can act more appropriately & more effectively and lessen your suffering in the process. Jesus Christ! you can write up a nice metaphor! Allegory / Metaphor / Paradox = understanding reality methinks. A metaphor of metaphors, a pattern of patterns, a symbol of symbols; a fractal reality. I suppose I'm well acquainted with the waters, what they are and the metaphysical theory of noospheric buoyancy, still need to learn to swim however. --- [edit] re: etymology,Possibly nothing to do with the formation of the word but I still see the connection of Passion to Passiveness.. the "Pass" part Passion = total emotional possession, so in this instance mindfulness is passive letting the emotion be the active. One cannot be totally detached and in their mind nor entirely embodied in their egoic, emotional dramas, well you can but that lacks balance, so as always, the middle path. Another thought, the passion of the christ (so i've heard) is one long movie about his physical suffering, or the suffering of the soul embodied in physical form. Passivity, passion and suffering are the same limitation we try to transcend upon death (letting go of the ego). Edited December 4, 2009 by The Dude Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
coin Posted December 6, 2009 yes Salviador...buddhism / advaita vedanta mostly Share this post Link to post Share on other sites