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Four Noble Truths: Dukkha (2 of 5) Understanding Suffering

Continuing today with the second of five talks on the First Noble Truth, the noble truth of suffering. The task mentioned by the Buddha for the First Noble Truth is to understand it, to fully understand it. That's a different relationship than many people have with suffering. The idea that we should stop and really get to know it better, to study it, investigate it, and really understand it is maybe counterintuitive. We want to get rid of it. We want to stop it, turn it off, escape, attack it, or do something.

Of course, the purpose of Buddhism is to not suffer. So yes, it's okay to have a wish for the end of suffering and not to suffer. But one of the wise ways of doing that is, from our ledge of peace—some kind of ease and equanimity—to be able to turn towards the suffering. To be with the suffering in a way that helps us to understand it in a deep way.

The wording of the First Noble Truth in its simplest form is: "This is suffering." But the full sentence that often comes with it is: "One understands this is," or "One knows this is suffering." The word here is more "know" than "understand," because understanding can suggest something more complicated. One understands where it comes from, all the elements of it, the consequences of it, and the whole ecology of suffering. Whereas to "know" implies something very particular: just to recognize, "Oh, this is suffering."

That's a clue to the Buddhist approach to this thing called suffering. We're learning how to be present for it, to see it in a way that is equanimous^[1]. To see it in a way that, in being present for suffering, we're not adding more suffering to it. We're not reacting to it, attacking it, attacking ourselves, being angry, or collapsing into despair. The ability to sit upright—metaphorically at least—without collapsing, without pulling away, to just see suffering right in the eyes: "Suffering, I see you. This is suffering." That's a difficult task, but that is the task of Buddhist practice.

Slowly, as we build a practice, build our capacity, and build the ability to be grounded, centered, and rooted in ourselves, we find our ledge. We find our nest, we find our sea legs (as in the story yesterday), so that we begin to be able to find a place to breathe quietly. To breathe, look, be relaxed in a certain way, and really, honestly look at our suffering and what's going on.

For some people, hearing that this is the task of Buddhism brings huge relief. They grew up in a society or family that was all about avoiding suffering, pretending it's not there, denying it, or somehow interpreting it in ways that made it different than what it was. To actually get the message that yes, this is suffering, and yes, let's talk about it, let's be with it, let's look at it, is powerful. But not so we "suffer better"—that's not the point of Buddhism. The idea is not to just be with your suffering so you suffer well. We might suffer better in the sense that we suffer without all the extra layers. We don't suffer more, but we suffer without all the extra waves of reactivity. To understand suffering, that is the task.

It's interesting to note that the word for suffering is dukkha^[2]. This word is translated into English in a variety of different ways. It's nice to have the different translations because each one points to a different angle and a different perspective on this thing that we call suffering. We might be able to take dukkha, and also the English translation "suffering," as a broad umbrella term—a term that encompasses within it many component parts or different aspects of this human experience. Some of it is very mild, some very big, but there are all these different aspects to it, and the different translations give us different perspectives.

Now, some of you might feel, "Well, that's nice, but isn't there just one meaning for what the Four Noble Truths are?" Some teachers and books you read will give you one explanation for what the Four Noble Truths are. But in fact, down through the centuries, there have been many explanations. "Well, let's go back to the Buddha and get his one explanation," you might say. If you go back to the suttas^[3]—his teachings—he didn't have just one explanation. By my count, he had five different ones. Some are very similar, but some are quite different from each other. The ones that are usually taught as the Four Noble Truths are just one of those five, and some of the others are never really referred to in teachings. So, there are many different perspectives on this. You'll see as we go through these days and weeks on the Four Noble Truths that I'll offer different perspectives.

For now, I want to give you some of the common English translations. First, it's important to understand that the word dukkha is an adjective, not a noun. As an adjective, its literal meaning is "painful." By usage, it comes to have other meanings and associations, but the core meaning is pain or painfulness. That pain is almost like a metaphor for all the forms of suffering human beings can have. It points to whatever dukkha is in our psychological, emotional, or physical world; it's something that we contract around or something that hurts us.

We get a very different understanding of the Buddhist teachings if we translate dukkha as "painful." For example, there's a very common teaching that things like birth, old age, sickness, and death are dukkha. Sometimes people translate it as: birth is suffering, sickness is suffering, old age is suffering, death is suffering. In that translation, the word "suffering" is a noun. So, one noun is equivalent to another noun, which leads to all kinds of philosophical challenges.

If we translate it as an adjective: birth is painful, old age is painful, sickness is painful, death is painful. Now we're talking about something many people can identify with. Birth is other things besides painful, but it is painful. Old age is other things besides just painful, but it is also painful. Sickness is also painful, and death and dying can also be quite painful in one way or another.

For the Buddha to say this, I'm touched in a very deep way. I'm a little bit in awe. My appreciation of these ancient teachings goes up much more when I consider that back in the time of the Buddha, they had no anesthetics. There was no aspirin, no novocaine, no anesthesia, and no palliative care to let people die painlessly in the way that we can now. We have a lot of wonderful medicines that can help us be much more comfortable while we're dying if the dying is difficult. The idea of pain was something very acute in the ancient world, and people had to learn to live with it and be with it. So when they say that birth is painful, they mean it. Old age is painful, sickness is painful, death is painful. Grief, mourning, distress, and anguish are painful.

Sometimes another translation into English is the word "stress." Birth is stressful, old age is stressful, sickness is stressful, death is stressful. Mourning, grief, pain, distress, and anguish are stressful. This is a raw, experiential association for the word dukkha. It has the advantage of being more physical, without any evaluation of whether it's right or wrong, good or bad, appropriate or not appropriate. It's just stressful.

One of the people who translates it this way told me once that one of the most stressful things in a person's life, apparently, is getting married and the marriage ceremonies. Hopefully, it's also a very happy time, or the happiest day of a person's life, but apparently, there can also be a lot of stress associated with it. Even wonderful things can have stress, and people can be exhausted at the end of it. The idea that stress can follow us around in all kinds of ways—even in things that we look forward to and love to do—shows there can be stress involved. Understanding the wide extent to which stress is part of our life goes beyond what many people think of as "suffering."

In fact, it also applies to very deep meditation practice. As the practice of meditation goes deeper and deeper and becomes more concentrated, we experience some of the most happy, blissful experiences possible for a human being. Paradoxically, the more concentrated, still, and wonderful the meditation is, the heightened sensitivity there is to stress. Some teachers will say at the depth of the quietest, most peaceful, and nicest kind of meditation you could ever imagine, "Okay, now look for where the stress is. Look for where there's a little tension, a little bit of pressure." The degree of stress is ridiculously light, and in ordinary daily life, one would never notice this subtlety of stress. But those are the last remnants of stress in a mind that is otherwise very peaceful. It's a very useful instruction to see that also as dukkha. Even in those states, we continue the process of letting go.

When we translate dukkha as "suffering," I don't know how it is for you, but for me, that has a very strong emotional association. "Suffering" feels like an emotionally heavy word. "I'm suffering" feels holistic, emotional, full, and existential. It has a feeling of totality to it in my mind and heart. "I'm suffering" feels almost like the totality of who I am. Whereas stress, we can have stress. Sometimes I feel like my eyes are stressed if I'm leaning too much over the computer, but the rest of me is quite happy. But suffering has a sense of totality, an emotional totality to it. Sometimes it's a little difficult for people to get their minds around the word "suffering" because it's so big.

Another translation—the last one I'll mention that can be quite popular—has a more intellectual or philosophical association. To say it more precisely, it's evaluative in nature. It has to do with making an evaluation, constructing a philosophical or intellectual understanding that's a little bit removed from direct experience. Pain can be really about direct experience. Stress can be really about direct experience. Suffering—exactly how much is direct experience or how much is evaluative or conceptual, that's part of the discovery process of mindfulness.

But this last translation, which is more intellectual, also has a more universal quality to it, and that is translating dukkha as "unsatisfactory." The way it is evaluative or intellectual is that you have to explain in what way it is unsatisfactory. Pain, you don't explain in what way it's pain; you just know it's painful. Stress is maybe the same way. Suffering may be a little more complicated, but "unsatisfactory" clearly is more complicated because it requires some explanation. It requires an understanding that's more than just feeling or sensing that something's unsatisfactory. It begs the question: unsatisfactory in what way?

The usual explanation from people who choose this translation is something like: If we're searching for lasting, reliable happiness and peace, we won't find it in the particular experiences, objects, or things of the world, including the objects and experiences we can have within ourselves. Nothing that can be directly experienced as a particular concept, idea, or experience can provide lasting happiness, because it's impermanent. It's inconstant. It comes and goes, appears and disappears.

Any attempt to hold on to something, thinking, "This is it, this is what is going to make me happy," will fall short. I remember once very clearly when I was about twenty years old. I had a very nice summer, and I was ecstatic by the end of it—very, very happy. I remember having the thought, "I'll never be unhappy again." Then just a month or two later, I was more depressed than I've ever been in my life. So much for the idea that I would always be that way.

In deep meditation, and also in ordinary life, people come to the wisdom to understand that what they were holding on to—expecting it to make things great, happy, or satisfying for them—is fleeting. It's not lasting. It doesn't live up to its full promise, and so many people are disappointed. What made them happy at one point in life no longer makes them happy later in life. Because it's fleeting, people who are always looking for something outside themselves, or some experience that will "do it," will just go on the search for another experience, another thing, and another thing.

The Dharma isn't about finding some thing, some experience, or some idea that brings happiness. Rather, it's about discovering an absence of a thing. It's to discover the freedom, peace, and happiness that comes from the absence of clinging, the absence of thirsting, being compulsive, grabbing, and holding on. This includes very strong resistance to things. That absence of resistance, the absence of clinging, grasping, and attachment is reliable if we can let go fully. The purpose of really getting to know suffering, to really see it clearly and understand it, is part of this project to come to the absence of suffering, to let go of clinging in a very deep way.

That's what we will look at over these days and weeks as we examine the Four Noble Truths more deeply. I hope this explanation is helpful and lays the groundwork for what's going to come. Thank you for being part of this, and I look forward to our time tomorrow.