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I'm really stuck on the truth of impermanence ....
jae
Veteran
Can anyone explain it to me simply please?
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NOTHING lasts forever; get over it.
And this too shall pass.
Sit and meditate. Observe your thoughts. No matter how hard to try, they bounce around, continually change. In fact, if you look inside of you for anything that isn't moving, changing, appearing and disappearing in you mind or body, you see that it's all churning. There is no fixed component. What the implication? There is no self, no soul! Now traditions diverge. Most traditions then go on to say, well, you reincarnate the same as before, same as if you have an eternal soul, except we just call it non-self and stop asking questions. I take the stand that no self means no soul, nothing interesting after we die. The consequence of that is that we need to find peace with that by developing equanimity, stop clinging so tightly to that soul we don't even have. Our delusions about what we really are is causing us to be so miserable. (again traditions really, really diverge on what we *really* are, but the gist that we are unhappy due to a misunderstanding about what we *really* are is a common theme)
Another consequence of constant change is that everything you like will go away and everything you are trying to avoid gets worse and vica versa too-- it's not all downers, but as soon as you succeed in putting some distance between you and what you hate, and drawing close to what you like, it all gets undone again. If that is true, then why are we on this stupid rodent wheel and how do we get off? We stop it by stopping the hate and the grasping, by realizing that the stuff we hate and want so much isn't so permanent and it is not worth chasing it. Once we give up the chase, we've got equanimity and peace, Buddhist happiness.
Or you say Namu Amida Butsu 10 times and go to heaven and don't worry about impermanence, which ever works for you, there is more than one answer to the question. 84000 gates to the dharma. I should figure out how to make that a signature.
LIFE is a series of moments... moments of happiness, sadness, hunger, fullness, pain, well-being, confusion, clarity, etc etc etc, on and on and on ...
Once you realize that trying to "cling" to the good moments, (or wallowing in the bad ones), Well, that's really what causes one's 'suffering'. At that point you understand the concept of impermanence. It is all about fleeting moments.
Be aware, be in that moment, be appreciative of each and every moment, then move on.
Just as an aside, (I know this must drive some folks around here crazy when I - or a few others - say this, but) One doesn't only live the Dharma IN meditation... one [tries to live] the Dharma in all activities and thoughts, all day, every day.
Some Buddhists don't formally sit and meditate at all, or only very infrequently.
Meditation is a tool that can be both invaluable or insignificant - depending on your own personal needs, goals and spiritual aspirations.
The buddha taught that all compound things have 3 aspects to their nature.. they are impermanent ( ever changing, not lasting forever), they are unsatisfactory(they dont bring lasting true happiness) and they are not-self(they are not me, myself, or I, there is no permanent ego-entity, just one that is impermanent and ever changing.)
now the trick is to see all this with our own experiential knowledge, that is called wisdom, as opposed to intellectual knowledge like we learn from a lecture or a book. This comes with practice. Don't worry too much if you don't UNDERSTAND it.. practice so you can SEE it.
But cars rust, vegetation and animals biodegrade over time. See that table in front of you - it Can be broken and divided until the table no longer exists. Any object you perceive is impermanent. You are impermanent. I am impermanent.
Impermanence is a fundamental truth of everything that exists.
What then can give you something to ground your true being. If your self is impermanent, what can you rely on?
Buddhism doesn't try to conceal the truth that you are really pure awareness. Your self does. Buddhism establishes practices that enable you to experience your true nature. The problem is it is really empty of anything of any substance and you can only rest in it in a present moment of mindfulness. But what joy it brings when you can.
Not sure if this helps at this time.
Yes, 'just thinking'. That will take you (us) far
Lama Shenpen Hookham
Summary: Looking at impermanence with a sense of wonder and delight.
A student writes:
"I don’t seem to be able to get anywhere with the meditation on impermanence. Even at its simple level it doesn't help me give up attachment, I just kind of brace myself for the inevitable pain."
Lama Shenpen:
Meditation on impermanence is actually meditation on truth. It is waking up to what is true and that is what makes it delightful. I think perhaps you go about it in a too heavy handed way rather than with a sense of wonder.
Student:
"It’s not that I’m denying impermanence. I’m just not sure how one gives up attachment while in samsara without giving up caring and feeling, which I’m not prepared to give up."
Lama Shenpen:
I sense that you have somehow picked up on the meditation on impermanence as something you 'ought' to do in order to get rid of your 'bad' attachment. So you need to really get the right touch.
Attachment is a mistake because it destroys happiness. Meditation on impermanence is not in order to destroy happiness, but to enhance it and destroy unhappiness.
We are not trying to give up happiness and pleasure. We are trying to give up the cause of suffering.
Student:
"And even the deeper explorations of impermanence, which take me to the realisation that nothing is really arising or going, don’t really touch me somehow."
Lama Shenpen:
Again, I suspect that you do it with the same heavy handed approach of thinking you ought to be doing this in order to get rid of something, rather than opening up to it in an open-ended wonder.
I suspect you tend to come out of it thinking, 'Well, OK, it’s not there but, so what?'
That is not the same as coming out of it astonished, wondering how that can be. How can it be that there isn't anything anywhere and yet it is so clear and distinct and vividly real? If you really open to it there is no way that it cannot touch you deeply!
Meditation on impermanence is a constant source of inspiration and wonder.
In my experience it doesn't seem to matter how deep and subtle my meditation gets, the tendency to forget impermanence is amazingly persistent. It always clarifies my thinking and lightens my awareness to remember that death might come any time, and yet I still forget.
It’s amazing how each time I remember, I realise I have drifted off it again. It’s so strange. It is not that I use it as a stick to beat myself with, it just keeps shifting my awareness back in line with reality, and that means in every sense, especially in terms of what heart connections might mean.
Lama Shenpen Hookham.
a lot of his stuff around. One of his quotes is the path up is the path down. He is pretty cool. Have fun, Dennis
thanks to all and hello Invinsible_Summer....
Funny @Dennis 1...I know a guy that always says 'the sun comes up and the sun goes down' I always thought he was very happy in his own skin but I've never thought to ask him his beliefs.....
When I caress her form, it is evident and almost permanent.
But if I am honest then I do not know what this is.
Each concept in life comes with its opposite.
If you say solidity then with that is fluidity. If you say knowledge then there is mystery.
Impermanence in its deepest aspect is the simultaneous arising and passing of appearances.
So personal example. Dealing with a break up, dealing with meeting new people, dealing with trying to find ground, trying to capture something be it love or comfort, seeing through it all, hunger, focusing on my butt touching the bed and the fingers touching the keyboard, thinking about if this will actually help you, listening to the noise of the space heater.
So as a continuum of experience there is impermanence. But even then if we examine deeper we recognize that there are no entities or objects to be impermanent but rather the appearance itself is impermanence. This is a very subtle but profound point that cannot really be understood intellectually.
Everything is so throughly impermanent that nothing is actually amounting to anything or making anything. Like zooming into a fractal. There seems like there is movement, but none of it is a somethingness or nothingness.
One can take impermanence to be truth, which is useful. Or it can be used as a method, which is useful. At the end of the day what we are looking for is the sheer fact that life itself is change. And its bitter, but at the same time its beautiful. Because then naturally all things renounce themselves.
Change is only a problem if we are clinging deeply to fixed entities such as myself and others. But if we can loosen that grip we can find openness and spontaneous activity. We can flow as nothingness into nothingness, and finally live our lives as if on the crest of a jazz note, or making love to a beautiful woman.
And yet karma isn't ignored either. This becoming is karma as well.
And to be honest I don't think writing this to you is giving you anything worthy. tldr: you're better off sitting with that question of impermanence burning into your body. There isn't really any other way. Philosophy or even religion are modes of concretization. The balance to that is being body and mind in totality.
The next question is what are conditioned phenomena ?
all of our bodies are made of the matter from earth. This matter ist steadily changigng,
sometimes more or less. One of Gotamo Buddhos immedeate monks, Sariputto expressed it so:"The objektive changes of matter are being felt subjectively as suffering." This suffering is Birth,Death, old age,sickness,grief, lamentation, sorrow,indespair, being seperated from beloved one and being together with someone you don´t love.
We get rid from all of it if we do the 8fold pat that Gotamo Buddho gave us.
sakko
I get the logical explanation of the word itself... it was the application to my thought processes I was struggling with ...my question was too vague ...thanks for all the comments though
@Caz ...hi nice to meet you
I've heard stories of Ajahn Chah going down the line asking monks how they are doing, and whatever the monastic answered he would say " that is uncertain".
I tried doing that in normal life, when someone says " hey man how are ya" in passing... people look at me with a weird face HAHA.
If nibbana is a thing, it must be conditioned.
If nibbana is nothing, then why talk about it at all.
If you want to be even more confused, wrap your head around these.. I cant haha..
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/ptf/dhamma/sacca/sacca3/nibbana.html
"There is that dimension where there is neither earth, nor water, nor fire, nor wind; neither dimension of the infinitude of space, nor dimension of the infinitude of consciousness, nor dimension of nothingness, nor dimension of neither perception nor non-perception; neither this world, nor the next world, nor sun, nor moon. And there, I say, there is neither coming, nor going, nor stasis; neither passing away nor arising: without stance, without foundation, without support [mental object]. This, just this, is the end of stress."
"There is, monks, an unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated. If there were not that unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated, there would not be the case that emancipation from the born — become — made — fabricated would be discerned. But precisely because there is an unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated, emancipation from the born — become — made — fabricated is discerned."
Where water, earth, fire, & wind have no footing: There the stars do not shine, the sun is not visible, the moon does not appear, darkness is not found. And when a sage, a brahman through sagacity, has known [this] for himself, then from form & formless, from bliss & pain, he is freed.
Those who do not accumulate and are wise regarding food, whose object is the Void, the Unconditioned Freedom — their track cannot be traced, like that of birds in the air.