-suffering-
I've been thinking quite a bit about This War and the lives that are being lost. Whence upon I stumbled over a really great section of a book I'm reading that I feel is highly relevant.
'What is happening', Hag Latif asked one day of his great-grandson.
'It is el Harb - the war.'
'Who makes this war?'
'El nussara - the infidel.'
'Against whom? And why?'
'It is infidel against infidel. Who knows why?'
---Paolo Caccia-Dominioni, An Italian Story
This makes total sense to me and, I believe, has given me a greater understanding, a greater peace about the inevitability of mankind's insistence upon killing one another. It is, I believe, the only way for me to feel without being overcome with sadness for the entire "human race". The bible states that Man is the craeture created Most Like Him, The Father; indeed it says that we were cast in His image. If this is true then that only proves the Buddhist First Noble Truth (of the Four Noble Truths):
"What is the Noble Truth of Suffering? Birth is suffering, aging is suffering, sickness is suffering, dissociation from the loved is suffering, not to get what one wants is suffering: in short the five categories affected by clinging are suffering."
We will always suffer. Life is suffering. The cessation of suffering is my goal and always will be. If there is even the slightest chance that someone, somewhere will be helped by This War then to me it's okay. This War will continue whether or not I like it so I might as well be comfortable with its existence.
We're put on this Earth to suffer and to try to bring about an end to such suffering. We aren't that good at it. His Holiness the Dalai Lama has devoted his life to the cessation of suffering; internally, within others, indeed throughout the world.
It is up to me to do the same on whatever level I am able. It starts inside. We cause much of our own internal suffering. We choose it. "The pain you need" is the pain you have. You want it so it exists.
Yes, we are here to suffer and to end that suffering so tonight my thoughts rest upon the inevitable Truth of compassion, the only real cure for suffering. Compassion is what is on my mind tonight. Let it be tomorrow and every day after. My life is really meaningless without empathy and compassion. I feel renewed, a sense that I have in my sight a goal now.
I wish to cease mine and your suffering by the use of a compassionate heart and an empathetic mind. Only in death shall suffering cease, only in new life does compassion continue.
Goodnight, sweet reader. I leave you with a text written by the 7th Dalai Lama from "Song of Spiritual Change":
"Hundreds of stupid flies gather
On a piece of rotten meat,
Enjoying, they think, a delicious feast.
This image fits with the song
Of the myriads of foolish living beings
Who seek happiness in superficial pleasures;
In countless ways they try,
Yet I have never seen them satisfied."
'What is happening', Hag Latif asked one day of his great-grandson.
'It is el Harb - the war.'
'Who makes this war?'
'El nussara - the infidel.'
'Against whom? And why?'
'It is infidel against infidel. Who knows why?'
---Paolo Caccia-Dominioni, An Italian Story
This makes total sense to me and, I believe, has given me a greater understanding, a greater peace about the inevitability of mankind's insistence upon killing one another. It is, I believe, the only way for me to feel without being overcome with sadness for the entire "human race". The bible states that Man is the craeture created Most Like Him, The Father; indeed it says that we were cast in His image. If this is true then that only proves the Buddhist First Noble Truth (of the Four Noble Truths):
"What is the Noble Truth of Suffering? Birth is suffering, aging is suffering, sickness is suffering, dissociation from the loved is suffering, not to get what one wants is suffering: in short the five categories affected by clinging are suffering."
We will always suffer. Life is suffering. The cessation of suffering is my goal and always will be. If there is even the slightest chance that someone, somewhere will be helped by This War then to me it's okay. This War will continue whether or not I like it so I might as well be comfortable with its existence.
We're put on this Earth to suffer and to try to bring about an end to such suffering. We aren't that good at it. His Holiness the Dalai Lama has devoted his life to the cessation of suffering; internally, within others, indeed throughout the world.
It is up to me to do the same on whatever level I am able. It starts inside. We cause much of our own internal suffering. We choose it. "The pain you need" is the pain you have. You want it so it exists.
Yes, we are here to suffer and to end that suffering so tonight my thoughts rest upon the inevitable Truth of compassion, the only real cure for suffering. Compassion is what is on my mind tonight. Let it be tomorrow and every day after. My life is really meaningless without empathy and compassion. I feel renewed, a sense that I have in my sight a goal now.
I wish to cease mine and your suffering by the use of a compassionate heart and an empathetic mind. Only in death shall suffering cease, only in new life does compassion continue.
Goodnight, sweet reader. I leave you with a text written by the 7th Dalai Lama from "Song of Spiritual Change":
"Hundreds of stupid flies gather
On a piece of rotten meat,
Enjoying, they think, a delicious feast.
This image fits with the song
Of the myriads of foolish living beings
Who seek happiness in superficial pleasures;
In countless ways they try,
Yet I have never seen them satisfied."