Suffering of impermanence

General discussion, particularly exploring the Dharma in the modern world.
Post Reply
yinyangkoi
Posts: 138
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2021 1:41 pm

Suffering of impermanence

Post by yinyangkoi »

Even though I have a great life, filled with happiness and love, there is suffering when I realize it's only temporary and eventually this body will grow old and sick and die. Everyone I love will die, everything that brings me happiness will be gone. All the beautiful flowers will wither and die. I appreciate every moment, yet impermanence haunts me. How to transcend this suffering?
User avatar
FiveSkandhas
Posts: 917
Joined: Sat Jun 29, 2019 6:40 pm

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by FiveSkandhas »

The four noble truths and the eightfold path are great places to start.
:anjali:
"One should cultivate contemplation in one’s foibles. The foibles are like fish, and contemplation is like fishing hooks. If there are no fish, then the fishing hooks have no use. The bigger the fish is, the better the result we will get. As long as the fishing hooks keep at it, all foibles will eventually be contained and controlled at will." -Zhiyi

"Just be kind." -Atisha
Knotty Veneer
Posts: 967
Joined: Thu Apr 12, 2012 1:50 pm

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by Knotty Veneer »

yinyangkoi wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 8:58 am Even though I have a great life, filled with happiness and love, there is suffering when I realize it's only temporary and eventually this body will grow old and sick and die. Everyone I love will die, everything that brings me happiness will be gone. All the beautiful flowers will wither and die. I appreciate every moment, yet impermanence haunts me. How to transcend this suffering?
What you are describing is the human condition. Clinging to what we like and pushing away what we don't like. Trying to make permanent what is inherently impermanent.

To over come this, reading and study are good but you really need to start with a regular meditation practice. Find a teacher in a recognised school and learn a meditation practice that will help you understand how the mind works, how to slowly dissolve the habits of attachment and aversion, and the idea that you are a permanent self.
This is not the wrong life.
yinyangkoi
Posts: 138
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2021 1:41 pm

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by yinyangkoi »

Knotty Veneer wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 9:32 am
yinyangkoi wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 8:58 am Even though I have a great life, filled with happiness and love, there is suffering when I realize it's only temporary and eventually this body will grow old and sick and die. Everyone I love will die, everything that brings me happiness will be gone. All the beautiful flowers will wither and die. I appreciate every moment, yet impermanence haunts me. How to transcend this suffering?
What you are describing is the human condition. Clinging to what we like and pushing away what we don't like. Trying to make permanent what is inherently impermanent.

To over come this, reading and study are good but you really need to start with a regular meditation practice. Find a teacher in a recognised school and learn a meditation practice that will help you understand how the mind works, how to slowly dissolve the habits of attachment and aversion, and the idea that you are a permanent self.
Yes I have been meditating and studying for years, I also have a teacher, I also have dissolved the idea that there is a permanent self. But I am still sad that it's only temporary and that my family and friends will die
Knotty Veneer
Posts: 967
Joined: Thu Apr 12, 2012 1:50 pm

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by Knotty Veneer »

yinyangkoi wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 10:15 am
Knotty Veneer wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 9:32 am
yinyangkoi wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 8:58 am Even though I have a great life, filled with happiness and love, there is suffering when I realize it's only temporary and eventually this body will grow old and sick and die. Everyone I love will die, everything that brings me happiness will be gone. All the beautiful flowers will wither and die. I appreciate every moment, yet impermanence haunts me. How to transcend this suffering?
What you are describing is the human condition. Clinging to what we like and pushing away what we don't like. Trying to make permanent what is inherently impermanent.

To over come this, reading and study are good but you really need to start with a regular meditation practice. Find a teacher in a recognised school and learn a meditation practice that will help you understand how the mind works, how to slowly dissolve the habits of attachment and aversion, and the idea that you are a permanent self.
Yes I have been meditating and studying for years, I also have a teacher, I also have dissolved the idea that there is a permanent self. But I am still sad that it's only temporary and that my family and friends will die
It is natural to be sad at the loss of your family. I have lost both parents and my wife this year so I can relate big time to that. But it is the way things are. There is nothing to do to change that fact. Wishing it was different serves no purpose.

Practices like the 5 Remembrances and Atisha's 9-point meditation on death I have found useful in helping me get used to the fact of my own and my loved ones' mortality.

I have found it helpful too to realise that everyone knows or will know the grief of losing loved ones - it is part of being human. It helps to know I am not alone in my grief and, what's more, that my sorrow can be a bridge to understanding the sorrow of others. My suffering can be used to develop compassion and so it is not entirely pointless. Instead of focussing on my own sorrow I can see it as a means to reach out to others in the same position.
This is not the wrong life.
User avatar
PadmaVonSamba
Posts: 9448
Joined: Sat May 14, 2011 1:41 am

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by PadmaVonSamba »

yinyangkoi wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 8:58 am Even though I have a great life, filled with happiness and love, there is suffering when I realize it's only temporary and eventually this body will grow old and sick and die. Everyone I love will die, everything that brings me happiness will be gone. All the beautiful flowers will wither and die. I appreciate every moment, yet impermanence haunts me. How to transcend this suffering?
Examine why it makes you sad.

In other words, look at why that thought evokes that particular emotion.

The thought of separation doesn’t make me me sad. I worry that my family will be okay when I am gone.

One thing that dawned on me is that we are surrounded by death all the time. We just don’t realize it. Everything from meat consumption to leaves turning brown in autumn and falling off trees, to our immune systems killing off bacteria.
EMPTIFUL.
An inward outlook produces outward insight.
Jeff H
Posts: 1020
Joined: Mon Sep 01, 2014 8:56 pm
Location: Vermont, USA

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by Jeff H »

I don’t mean to sound insensitive, but do you really want them to live forever in their present bodies, where they, too, suffer from the same sense of loss you are expressing and all the other pervasive sufferings? Your intense compassion is a wonderful stimulus to utilize the opportunity you have now, while you’re briefly alive, to understand and address the causes of all this suffering. You can grow your compassion into bodhicitta.

Personally I think Dharma is the only positive action we can take. The reason for death is renewal. You can think, everything has its moment in the sun but then it must go to make room for the new. The questions for a Buddhist are, how will I use my moment? How will I prepare for what comes next? What is within my power to reduce the suffering of others?
Where now is my mind engaged? - Shantideva
User avatar
PadmaVonSamba
Posts: 9448
Joined: Sat May 14, 2011 1:41 am

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by PadmaVonSamba »

yinyangkoi wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 8:58 am … everything that brings me happiness will be gone.
Actually, what the Buddhist teachings suggest is that it really isn’t these externals that are what bring happiness. The happiness comes up from inside you. It is an experience produced by your own mind, by your own perception of things.

I’m not exactly sure how to apply that in a practical way to your plight. But I’ll share what I heard a lama talk about one time.

He used the example of greeting a dear loved-one at the airport, someone who you hadn’t seen for many, many years, and you are so happy to see each other that you run up and hug each other as tightly as you can, and what you experience is the most wonderful joy.

But then, suppose that for some reason you were now both stuck together, like glued together. Even though you would still be hugging, now that exact same thing that brought you unimaginable happiness two minutes ago is now an uncomfortable and frightening situation. Suppose you could never become unstuck and you had to tendon like that forever?
This is an exaggerated and fanciful example, of course, but it makes the point that it isn’t the other people or the flowers that are the source of the happiness you experience. So, then, what is the source?

Grief over the loss of a loved one, a friend or relative, or even a pet, is probably the most painful of all human emotions. Ironically, however, the experience of grief rests on recalling the happiest of memories. In fact, the happier the memory you have of someone who has died, the more suffering from grief you experience.

So, it isn’t even the events themselves, or the memories that you’d think are the sources of happiness. The same memories can bring great sadness.

Another thing to ponder is that everything you think about another person is a memory from the past. Even if we are talking face to face right now, our experience is not really of the present, but of the immediate past. And the person you were then, and the person the other one was then, are both in the past.

Every moment what we were before provides the conditions for what will be in the next moment. There really isn’t a continuous self.
EMPTIFUL.
An inward outlook produces outward insight.
Giovanni
Posts: 765
Joined: Wed Nov 18, 2020 11:07 am

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by Giovanni »

yinyangkoi wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 10:15 am
Knotty Veneer wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 9:32 am
yinyangkoi wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 8:58 am Even though I have a great life, filled with happiness and love, there is suffering when I realize it's only temporary and eventually this body will grow old and sick and die. Everyone I love will die, everything that brings me happiness will be gone. All the beautiful flowers will wither and die. I appreciate every moment, yet impermanence haunts me. How to transcend this suffering?
What you are describing is the human condition. Clinging to what we like and pushing away what we don't like. Trying to make permanent what is inherently impermanent.

To over come this, reading and study are good but you really need to start with a regular meditation practice. Find a teacher in a recognised school and learn a meditation practice that will help you understand how the mind works, how to slowly dissolve the habits of attachment and aversion, and the idea that you are a permanent self.
Yes I have been meditating and studying for years, I also have a teacher, I also have dissolved the idea that there is a permanent self. But I am still sad that it's only temporary and that my family and friends will die
It IS sad. Buddhism does not say that we should be so detached as to be numb. Or not feel the sadness inherent in life. The dharma of the Buddha says that all of these things must be seen in a much bigger context. All things arise and pass including our joy and sadness. We can learn to be friends with both without holding on to them.
User avatar
明安 Myoan
Former staff member
Posts: 2855
Joined: Thu Feb 09, 2012 7:11 am
Location: Portland, OR

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by 明安 Myoan »

Thinking about how to best help others within your life as it is.
The Buddhas also have insight into impermanence, but respond by teaching the Dharma and responding to the suffering of beings. Why is this? :shrug:
Namu Amida Butsu
User avatar
Johnny Dangerous
Global Moderator
Posts: 17092
Joined: Fri Nov 02, 2012 10:58 pm
Location: Olympia WA
Contact:

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by Johnny Dangerous »

yinyangkoi wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 10:15 am
Knotty Veneer wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 9:32 am
yinyangkoi wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 8:58 am Even though I have a great life, filled with happiness and love, there is suffering when I realize it's only temporary and eventually this body will grow old and sick and die. Everyone I love will die, everything that brings me happiness will be gone. All the beautiful flowers will wither and die. I appreciate every moment, yet impermanence haunts me. How to transcend this suffering?
What you are describing is the human condition. Clinging to what we like and pushing away what we don't like. Trying to make permanent what is inherently impermanent.

To over come this, reading and study are good but you really need to start with a regular meditation practice. Find a teacher in a recognised school and learn a meditation practice that will help you understand how the mind works, how to slowly dissolve the habits of attachment and aversion, and the idea that you are a permanent self.
Yes I have been meditating and studying for years, I also have a teacher, I also have dissolved the idea that there is a permanent self. But I am still sad that it's only temporary and that my family and friends will die
I think there was a Zen teacher who’s death koan just said something like “it is painful”.

Well, it is. Some teachers say that kind of sadness is the beginning of real faith in the teachings.

It is a bitter pill for many people, and I think it’s people’s biggest stumbling block with Buddhism.

Impermanence is not bad news for anything but grasping though. It’s easy to become nihilistic at this stage, where one is focused on the…negative part of impermanence or emptiness teachings.

There’s also a side that’s awe inspiring, where the nature of impermanence is an effulgent display, but typically it comes later, and is more difficult to explain.
Meditate upon Bodhicitta when afflicted by disease

Meditate upon Bodhicitta when sad

Meditate upon Bodhicitta when suffering occurs

Meditate upon Bodhicitta when you are scared

-Khunu Lama
Knotty Veneer
Posts: 967
Joined: Thu Apr 12, 2012 1:50 pm

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by Knotty Veneer »

Johnny Dangerous wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 4:05 pm There’s also a side that’s awe inspiring, where the nature of impermanence is an effulgent display, but typically it comes later, and is more difficult to explain.
I remember spending a week of a longer retreat about 20 years ago just meditating on death and impermanence, and indeed I had that awe inspiring experience. Awe that there was something rather than nothing, that everything I encountered would disappear but yet was vivid and real in the moment. That it was all the more precious because it would not last.

I think being downhearted that we will be parted from our loved ones eventually, is to waste the time we have with them. It is wondrous that they are in our life. We need to tell them we love and appreciate them everyday and take the time to enjoy their presence while we can.

I told my late wife I loved her everyday and took the time to be grateful she was in my life. Now she is gone, sure, I miss her terribly but I have no regrets since when she died we had nothing left unsaid.
This is not the wrong life.
User avatar
Johnny Dangerous
Global Moderator
Posts: 17092
Joined: Fri Nov 02, 2012 10:58 pm
Location: Olympia WA
Contact:

Re: Suffering of impermanence

Post by Johnny Dangerous »

:good:

One of the biggest things Buddhist practice has done for me is to make me appreciate life more fully in itself, free of narrative..,and be less shaken by death. It’s still painful, of course, but being mad at death is like being mad at gravity.

I remember this quote from (I think) Dogen from my Zen days that was part of the closing Gatha iirc:

“Life and death are of supreme importance. Time swiftly passes by and opportunity is lost. Each of us should strive to awaken. Awaken! Do not squander your life.”

Of course it tied in so well with the Four Thoughts contemplations as well. Here is one of my favorite Pali writings on impermanence:
“Guhatthaka suttaniddeso” wrote:

Life, personhood, pleasure and pain
—This is all that’s bound together
In a single mental event
—A moment that quickly takes place.
Even the spirits who endure
For eighty-four thousand aeons
—Even these do not live the same
For any two moments of mind.

What ceases for one who is dead,
Or for one who’s still standing here,
Are all just the same aggregates
—Gone, never to connect again.

The states which are vanishing now,
And those which will vanish some day,
Have characteristics no different
Than those which have vanished before.

With no production there’s no birth;
With becoming present, one lives.
When grasped with the highest meaning,
The world is dead when the mind stops.

There’s no hoarding what has vanished,
No piling up for the future;
Those who have been born are standing
Like a seed upon a needle.

The vanishing of all these states
That have become is not welcome,
Though dissolving phenomena stand
Uncombined from primordial time.

From the unseen, [states] come and go,
Glimpsed only as they’re passing by;
Like lightning flashing in the sky
—They arise and then pass away.
Meditate upon Bodhicitta when afflicted by disease

Meditate upon Bodhicitta when sad

Meditate upon Bodhicitta when suffering occurs

Meditate upon Bodhicitta when you are scared

-Khunu Lama
Post Reply

Return to “Dharma in Everyday Life”