Reflection on War Attadanda Sutta

This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Reflection on War Attadanda Sutta ~ Maria Straatman. It likely contains inaccuracies, especially with speaker attribution if there are multiple speakers.

The following talk was given by Maria Straatmann at Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, CA on March 14, 2026. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.

Reflection on War Attadanda Sutta

Good evening. It's wonderful to see you all here. Today, I have been giving a lot of thought to the idea of violence and war. I've been very disturbed by the most recent eruption of violence in the Middle East. I call it an eruption because it's not a beginning. It's been going on for so long, but now it's all of a sudden bigger and more violent. Depending on when you start, 7,000 protesters were killed since the beginning of the year in this same country. And now we're bombing that country.

It's really easy to get tied up into right and wrong about all of this. The thing that I noticed about it was that this disturbance I had was really sadness. Really sadness. Sad that violence is so commonplace. I'm sad that we're drawn into another round of killing and hostility. It's been happening in our country, in every country. Wars get started and they kind of dribble on. It's a quagmire of violence.

I worry that we've become inured to it. That we just pass it out of our sight. Can I take in Iran and Ukraine on the same day? No, I'm going to only look here. I'm not going to look there. Or I'm going to stop feeling because it just is too painful. We become calloused and despairing. We begin to ignore the loss of life as an unintended consequence, sort of ignoring the fact that it's violence.

The Attadanda Sutta

So, I went to a book. This is The Buddha Before Buddhism^[1]; it's a translation by Gil Fronsdal^[2] of the Book of Eights, a series of suttas^[3] that are written in verse form. I went to it because there's a large part of it that has to do with the development of peace—how does one achieve peace? It seemed like that's what I was looking for. But it turns out there is a section called the Attadanda Sutta^[4], which is a discourse on violence.

The way this particular sutta is set up, first of all, it's all in verse form. I'm going to read some of it to you, but I don't think it's going to be too painful. So, please bear with me. Suttas can be very painful. The way this is structured is the Buddha himself had been looking around and became distressed by the amount of violence in his world, that wars were ongoing. People were fighting, people were in trouble all the time. He began to look at it, and so the first section is about his personal experience and what he saw.

Then the next section begins by saying, "And these are the instructions." What follows is a section that was intended to be chanted or repeated, a series of admonitions: "This is what you do to become free of violence, to become free to experience release." Gil translates the word that is used here, Nibbāna^[5], as "full release" because they didn't want to get it confused with some exalted state, but just release from suffering and agitation.

So, that's how it's structured. I'm going to read this to you, and I'm going to have to use my other glasses because I can see better with them.

"Violence gives birth to fear. Just look at people and their quarrels. I will speak of my dismay and the way that I was shaken. Seeing people thrashing about like fish in little water, and seeing them feuding with each other, I became afraid. The world is completely without a core. Everything everywhere, things are changing. Wanting a place of my own, I saw nothing not already taken. I felt discontent at seeing only conflict to the very end. Then I saw an arrow here, hard to see, embedded in the heart. Pierced by this arrow, people dash about in all directions. When the arrow is pulled out, they don't run and they don't sink."

The Buddha, in looking at his own distress, his own tendency to see despair and the ongoing round of violence, discovered the arrow in his own heart. What follows in the instructions is how to get rid of that arrow in your own heart, in our own hearts, in his heart.

"Here the trainings are recited. Don't pursue what the world's knotted up in. Having fully pierced sensuality, train in your own full release. Truthful, not impudent or deceitful, anger-free, and never speaking divisively. A sage will overcome avarice and the evil of greed."

Uncovering the Arrow

The key word here is truthful. You have to be willing to see what's going on. Sometimes when we see violence, the first thing is, "It's got to stop, and it's that person's fault, or it's that belief, or it's that thing, and I know how to fix it." We become attached to that way of taking care of the pain that we feel, totally losing track of "Ow," because we become afraid. I start looking elsewhere.

"One should conquer drowsiness, laziness, and sluggishness and not live negligently. A person intent on full release should not be conceited. One should not be pulled into false speech or become enamored with physical forms. One should fully understand conceit and refrain from a violent life."

The first Buddhist precept^[6] in an ethical life is "do no harm." If we begin to fixate on doing no harm, we might not notice the violence that we do to ourselves in shutting ourselves down, in closing ourselves off, in not allowing ourselves to feel the sadness, the pain, the impact.

"One shouldn't delight in the old or prefer the new. One shouldn't grieve what's lost or cling to what's attractive. Greed I call the great flood, and desire a swift current. Objects of awareness are moving waves, and lust is a quagmire difficult to cross. Not deviating from truth, sages, Brahmans stand on dry ground. Giving up everything, they are said to be at peace."

If greed is the great flood and desire a swift current, standing on firm ground through truthfulness, not deviating from truth. Sages stand on dry ground, giving up everything, they are said to be at peace. I'm going to skip down here a little bit.

"What was before, let it wither away. What will be later, do nothing with it. Not grasping what's in between, you live in peace."

Too often we decide, "This is what this means. This is what it has to be. This is how to solve this problem. This is a problem. This needs to be solved. This is your fault. This is my fault. If I were better..." All of those things are extra. I don't mean that one shouldn't reflect on how one is, or how the world is, or how one can affect change in the world, but grasping on "This is the solution. This is the answer. This is the fault." This is the arrow. This is the arrow that pierces your heart and doesn't allow you to be with whatever is truly here.

"Not taking as mine anything that is name and appearance."

My name, my clothes, my car, my house, my family.

"By not taking as mine anything that is name and appearance and not grieving what doesn't exist, one is not diminished in this world. Who doesn't say 'this is mine' or that anything belongs to others doesn't experience selfishness and doesn't grieve thinking 'I have nothing.' When asked, I say the benefit of being unshakable is being even-minded everywhere and being without cruelty, greed, and agitation. For one who knows, who has no agitation, there is no karmic^[7] accumulation. Abstaining from karmic activity, one sees safety everywhere. Sages do not say they are inferior, superior, or equal to others. Peaceful, unselfish, they neither embrace nor reject."

This is key: they neither embrace nor reject. They don't say, "This is mine, my thought, my solution, my way. I won't have that." In a way, it's a call to not even push away violence, but to see violence, to see agitation in ourselves.

Making Room for Sadness

When we harden ourselves against violence... I think I'm going to take these off so I can see you. I have a choice of seeing what's on the page or seeing you, and I prefer seeing you.

The dangers that we face when we face violence have to do with how we see the consequences of that. How we react, how we set ourselves, how we meet what comes up. When we harden ourselves against violence, we give up a flexible and open heart. When I say, "Not acceptable," and I'm building up anger and ill will in my heart, how can I find peace? How can I even stand up for peace when what I'm doing is building up hate and anger in me? When I'm doing violence to my own heart?

This morning, when I was thinking about being sad, I originally thought I was going to come and talk to you about grieving because I was grieving. And I asked myself, what was I grieving? Was there something I thought existed that I had lost? When I saw really clearly, I realized that my heart was breaking. My heart was breaking that people are still being killed. Regardless of who's right or wrong, people are being killed all over the world. Lives are being lost. People with families, people with dreams, people with lives they don't get to live, and it breaks my heart.

Once I had done all kinds of trainings, maybe 20 years ago, there was a graduating process, and we sat on a chair, and people got to ask us questions. Somebody asked me, "What do you do when your heart is breaking and there's nothing? You have no answers." And I said, "I let my heart break."

I've thought about that answer for well over 20 years. It comes back to me. It's not easy to let your heart break. Sometimes I can do it, and sometimes I'm not able to do it. Sometimes I need to protect myself. I need to say, "No, not this time." But it's only in allowing our hearts to actually be impacted by things as they are that we can be true. We want to cling to happiness. We want to be able to say, "It shouldn't be happening this way. It can't be happening this way." But it is happening this way. So now what do I do in the face of this is what's happening? I first have to say, "This is what's happening." I first have to allow that to be true. I have to not pretend it's not true.

Cultivating Disenchantment and Release

Too often we fail to see the drift of the mind toward ill will. This morning, when I was busy thinking about how sad I was and how brokenhearted, I failed to notice that I was becoming quite irritable. My poor husband walked right into the middle of that irritability. As I was about to open my mouth, I thought, "Wait a minute. It's not him you're angry about. And what do you mean you're angry? I thought you were busy being sad." I had to notice this is what's actually happening. What's actually happening is I'm very irritated and jagged, and I have to see that so that I don't take it out on him. I have to see this is what's happening.

When we begin to see this is what's happening, we become disentangled from the reactivity of the mind that just wants something else to be going on, that doesn't want this to be true. We see, "Okay, I'm caught up in this and I'm not even catching it." But when we see it, we become disenchanted. We're able to say, "I don't have to do that. I'm still kind of... but I don't have to behave this way."

When we become aware of the mind and how it affects what we're doing, we can pick up on it and we can say, "Oh." We can't do anything about the fact that irritability is now here, but we don't have to feed it, and we don't have to blame somebody else, and we don't have to blame ourselves. We just have to see, "Okay, I have a hair trigger right now." And if I can get back to the feeling of irritability and the fact that there is something I wish was not true, then I can say, "Ah, I'm wishing that wasn't true," and I can actually have compassion for myself.

"Ah, this is what's happening." This results in a softening of the heart, a removing of the arrow. Instead of building up more ill will by snapping at my husband, I'm able to say, "Okay, not so much. Not so much."

In times like this of uncertainty, and the vast amount of things that are true in our lives that we wish were not true, or that we wish were better, or that we wish we had more of, acute sensitivity to what is true—acute honesty—is extremely important.

"Oh, look at me snarl. Okay, I don't want to snarl, but I feel snarly. Yeah, well, that's just a feeling. I get it. But along with snarly, the sun is shining, and I don't have to react, and I don't have to be snappy. I don't have to. I feel that way, but I don't have to cultivate that." I can say, "Ah, damn this war." I can see when I want to witness and don't want to see. And I can tell when I'm trying to run away, when I'm transferring my displeasure into an inappropriate place. I don't have to judge myself for that. I can say, "Oh boy, yep, I don't have to."

I can leave myself open to being totally disenchanted and arriving at a place of release. It's over. I don't have to hold on to it. Make room for the sadness that you feel. You don't have to get on the floor and roll around in it, but acknowledge it when it's there. Acknowledge, "Ow, that hurts." That snub, that injustice, that hurt. You can be hurt without developing revenge. You have to see when that trigger happens.

If we allow reflection to let us see, "Ah, this is the trigger for me. This is the thing that's setting me off," I can care for myself. I can say, "Oh boy, that's a hard one." I don't have to get lost in praise or blame: "I'm doing a great job" or "I'm doing a terrible job." I just hang out with it. I can be in a place of less reactivity. I can channel myself into more truthful and compassionate ways. I can think of the Buddhist precept to do no harm and ask myself if I'm harming myself and if I can free myself from that.

Embodying Equanimity

When I thought about this, I thought, "Okay, I'm making this all about me, and I started out with war. How did this get to be about me?" But you see, if I don't have peace in my heart, what I give to all of you is something entirely different. It's not consistent with my intentions. What I give the people around me is not peaceful and easy. It's choppy and snappish and full of ill will, because that's where I'm living.

Today, I was thinking about this and working on it in myself, noticing what was coming up and how I was dealing with it, and how the attitudes were changing. Shortly before I came over here, someone dear to me started telling me about something that is an ongoing story. My view is they take on too much responsibility, and their view is, "This is my responsibility." You can get this, and it's an ongoing thing that we talk about all the time. There's a tendency in me to say, "Do we have to go through this again?"—shortness. But because I was thinking about this all day today, I said nothing, and I just sat there. Suddenly, it occurred to me to say, "This really bothers you, and I'm really sorry for that."

Instead of my trying to fix it and change it and fix it for him, I acknowledged how he felt about it. The interesting thing was this sense of ease I had in my own heart, not what I did for him. Then I was able to look him in the eye and not be reactive to this thing that I find so irritating—this tendency to take on too much responsibility. I could feel between us a softening and a losing of the edge.

This is what we need to do. This is how we get to full release. We need to come to the place where we can say, "Yeah, things are not great. Things are not bad. I am neither accepting nor rejecting. I'm not grabbing it, and I'm not rejecting it. I'm saying this is how it is. I see it. I see it the way it is."

I have a practice that I do, which is an equanimity^[8] practice. When I'm feeling mostly that I'm kind of out of control, that I don't really know how to meet this moment, I do this equanimity practice. So, I'm going to repeat these words for you:

"My suffering or lack of suffering depends on my own intentions and actions, not what others may wish. Despite what I may wish, things are as they are. May I see things just as they are. May I meet the arising and passing away of all things with equanimity and balance."

I've been known to repeat these phrases thousands of times just to remind myself, like the final verses of the discourse on violence. This is how one should be in the world. This is how a wise person meets the world.

May you find, when you consider violence, that you don't want to take it on. You don't want to pretend it's not there. You want to be able to meet it with all the truthfulness of its impact on you, so that what you can hand back to someone is not reactivity, but compassion, generosity, and ease. Because it is only if we truly embody these virtues that we can impact the world. May you all be at peace with the world. Thank you.

Q&A

So, those are my thoughts for the night. I hope it wasn't too depressing. I feel better than I did this morning because I've been thinking about it a lot. Does anybody have any thoughts, questions, objections, comments?

Question: Thank you for a wonderful and very timely talk. I have a very simple question, which is, you said in your talk sometimes you just have to let your heart break. I think that that was an answer to a question, but I didn't catch what that question was.

Maria Straatmann: The question was, "What do you do when your heart is broken and there's nothing you can do?" It happened to be either a chaplaincy^[9] course or an end-of-life counseling course that I was taking. And it had to do with how you deal with people's problems when you don't have a solution for them and there's nothing else to try.

Question: Thank you. Your talk moved me very deeply, and I really appreciate it.

Maria Straatmann: Great. I think one of the things that I've discovered is that we're not as delicate as we sometimes think we are. Having one's heart broken is definitely considered not something you want, right? We don't want our hearts broken. But all of us have lost people. All of us have lost relationships. All of us have lost dreams. We face these changes in life all the time. It's a consequence of just being alive. We die.

And if you let your heart break, go ahead and let it break. Don't hold too tightly to how things should be. You find that you are actually more resilient than you think you are. That you have more strength than you think you have. That you have more wisdom than you knew. Because you are being true to the experience that you have, and not to some fantasy of how it should be, or you'd like it to be, or it could be, or any of the other ways that we stretch our experience.

I did say you couldn't roll around on the floor in it. [Laughter] That doesn't help. Making it yours doesn't help. But knowing when you feel it keeps your heart open and available. It makes you available to your own life, and this is crucial.

Conclusion

So I have no poem tonight. I always have a poem, but tonight, no poem. Tonight, it is only that final stanza:

"Sages do not say they are inferior, superior, or equal to others. Peaceful, unselfish, they neither embrace nor reject."

Good night.