..续本文上一页lly reflect, it”s the grasping of the sensory world that makes it all go wrong. In itself the material world is all right. There”s nothing wrong with humanity or the universe. It”s the grasping that makes us suffer from it.
The Buddha pointed to this grasping. In the first Noble Truth he said: ”There is suffering.” He stated the problem that we all have: there is this suffering, this dukkha that we all experience. Then the second Noble Truth is that we suffer because of grasping. Then the insight is to let go of things; and then the realization of non-attachment follows. So if there”s peacefulness and calm, then you”re aware of non-grasping. The sense of ”me” and ”mine” depends on grasping things. When you think back in your life, the memory part is from being able to remember moments of grasping. You can”t remember the moments you were not grasping something. So then you”re always having to do things to remember. That”s why excitement, romance, adventure, all these things are so powerful for us because when we grasp them then we have these memories. We feel alive. Human beings identify with and grasp memory as self.
You feel alive when you”re angry and you hate somebody. Indignation makes you feel alive - that you are somebody. Greed makes you feel you”re going to get something you want. To want something and get it gives you a sense of being alive. Envy and jealousy: to be somebody who other people are jealous of is important, isn”t it
To have a better car than the neighbours or to have a beautiful house, or lovely clothes, or be someone who has status in a community - the grasping of that ....
You suffer because you”re always in this position of being somebody. And then there”s always going to be a reaction from somebody else. So if I am a rich and famous person, then the grasping of that perception means that there are going to be a lot of people who want either to challenge me, or take away my wealth, or criticize me. Or people are going to try to delude me, flatter me and make friends with me because they want the things that I have. So that whole form of grasping leads to suffering.
But actually, having status and wealth and a new car and all this - there”s nothing intrinsically bad or wrong with that, but it”s the grasping of it that will bring the suffering. And conversely, with poverty: grasping the idea that I”m a poor person, I”m low class, I”m worthless - grasping that view is suffering.
At least when you think: ”Well, I”m poor and I”m the lowest, meanest, most unlovable person in the society” - at least nobody”s going to envy you for that. But it”s still a position that one”s going to suffer from attachment. When the attachment is seen through, then it doesn”t matter. What your status is, whether you”re at the top or the bottom, or in the middle - these are not the important issues of our life or spiritual development. They”re not important to us.
The Buddha established the Sangha in a way that avoids all that. If you”re from the aristocracy, or if you”re from the working class or whatever, when you come into the Sangha it”s of no importance. You”re just Sumedho Bhikkhu, Sobhano Bhikkhu, Sucitto Bhikkhu - you”re just bhikkhus, and you don”t know whether they were Lord so and so, or Prince of Princess, or any of these things. Such things are of no importance in the holy life. But in worldly life, to have a Ph.D., to be someone who”s well-educated, or who comes from a good family: these are highly valued by people in the society.
Or they”re criticised. You can be an egalitarian, thinking: ”I hate the aristocracy - Lords, Ladies and Counts and Countesses - it”s all rubbish.” But that means that you still think it”s something. To call it rubbish means that you actually believe it is something important - b…
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