Catch 22 of relief from craving.. Any veterans?
Jeffrey
Veteran
I put this in beginners although I want veterans to chime in. The reason it is in beginners is that everyone on their first day of Buddhism knows what craving is. Unlike 'bodhicitta' or 'non-duality' we all know craving.
I was very strung out because I had a great time. I played a new video game and it is like a wonderful adventure.
So I was strung out very frantic in daily routines like trying to do my laundry and being impatient with it. Like indignant that I had to pick up the sock that fell.
I am a terrible writer so I probably can't explain this.
Just then I meditated out doors on a lovely spring day. It felt so good, my attitude and body reverted to wholesomeness. But of course there was an end to the feeling of peace. And then there are just all of these things I use to try to get back to a good feeling. A hard cider. A cup of tea. You can form good relationships to tea and coffee and not over use them. You can play a video game in balance with your life. You can eat right and exercise. All wholesome things.
But there is always that end to the afterglow of wholesome things. The meditation comes to an end.
So the catch 22 is that once we do find peace we suffer from craving that peace as if it is ours. As if it is something that we possess. And then when it is gone there is that anxious feeling to get something good that makes us feel good. I think right mindfulness is finding the middle way and remaining wholesome. I use that word wholesome to mean in balance and without neurotic craving. But whatever feeling of peace we get we are inevitably flung back into samsara. We can get a back rub and it is the best feeling ever. Next day another back rub doesn't satisfy us though maybe it is better than none at all.
So any veterans on this topic? I wonder how many people like me notice the catch 22?
Basically that wholesomeness is easy come easy go. Where do I go from here?
Comments
The craving is not the problem.
The problem is that you are assuming that the craving has an owner..
how does knowing it has no owner benefit me?
It doesn't. If it did it would have an owner.
Its just stuff. It rises. It passes. Its not you.
Refine the wholesomeness.
Most of us have preferences. We are not karmically empty of existence, so we practice those experiences that lead to less dukkha . . . if and when we can. Wholesomeness is more emptying, whilst some activity is more enticing but ultimately entrapping . . .
:wave:
"Craving," "compassion," "ego," "attachment," "emptiness," "enlightenment," "delusion " "wisdom," "ignorance," "love," "anger," "joy," "sorrow" ... just keep an eye on things. See what happens.
One strategy I have found is to limit enjoyable behaviours so they don't become addictions. Like have tea only when you wake up or perhaps a few times in the day rather than whenever you want a pick me up. Take a hot bath only once or twice a week. Otherwise it gets to be disturbing of my peace to be craving.
Be careful. Craving too little leaves us with one less need for samsara awareness....
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Remember the Middle path for middle way walking.
There certainly are meditative states that have a peaceful or happy outcome. It is said that absorbtions in the Brama-viharas leads to eons living in the formless realms.
My point is that even the happiness that comes from many 'wholesome' things ends and we can be left with the craving for them.
While certain activities lead to greater happiness or pain than others the ultimate aim of Buddhism is to find an end to the up and down altogether.
since everything is conditioned, so they change as per the change of their causal conditions. the problem is not with the 5 aggregates, the problem is the craving and clinging to the 5 aggregates - in other words, the problem is the identification with the 5 aggregates as self.
I can't quite see how depriving yourself of activities you enjoy could impact on your craving. These activities are not harmful either to yourself, not to anyone else. If in this sea of affliction we can find a respite to do things we enjoy doing, especially perfectly harmless things, why should you limit them?
Craving to me has a negative connotation, like getting hooked on an addictive harmful substance, or trying to prolong experiences or feelings which are negative either to yourself or to others. Eating a cookie because you simply enjoy it is one thing. Gobbling up a whole package just because you are trying to make up for an inner feeling of lack is another.
You meditated, you felt okay. You don't need to hanker after repeating the same experience tomorrow. Simply, when tomorrow comes, you sit down again and enjoy again your meditation.
Only you can know if something is a craving or clinging. For some people, having one beer, one cookie, one cup of tea can still be a craving/clinging behavior. For others, it is not. In some sense, it's hard to draw a line because some things we need to do to survive or to get along in our society, can be seen as a craving. But it's all about the attitude you have towards that item/event, not the item/event itself. Much of what we crave in the western world is really entertainment and distraction rather than anything else. We are taught so much that moving more and more, faster and faster, getting done as much as possible in every moment, is of vital importance. And that when you have a down moment, we are conditioned to try to fill that moment in with something else. It's why so many people grab for snacks in the evening when they are watching tv. Most tv is so mindless, that we are still looking for something to fill that void after a busy day, so we multitask in mindlessly watching tv while we mindlessly stuff ourselves with food. It's all about trying to fill a moment of time with something because doing "nothing" is unacceptable.
When I am feeling most distractable, I usually know that if I shut off the computer, tv, etc and just sit, that it'll help immensely. But one could also look at that desire to shut everything off and sit in silence as a craving, too.
I think we have to be realistic and balanced. Hunger is a craving brought on by biology, so is sexual desire. Partking in food or sex is not what is "bad" it is when we partake of them unskillfully, as Dharmamom said, that it becomes a problem. Obviously, @Jeffrey you already know this so I'm a little bit unsure where you are coming from.
It is ok to enjoy life and the little things it offers. When it turns into a problem is when we are clinging to those things in an attempt to never suffer. "if i drink a lot of tea, eat a lot of cookies, and take a bath twice a day, I'll stay happy rather than be suffering" is vastly different than having a cup of tea with a cookie after a bath and just enjoying it, letting go, and moving onto the next thing. There is always an end, like you said. Samsara/life isn't about always holding onto the wholesome as a way to dispel the non-wholesome. Samsara/life is about both of them, and being able to accept them both and go through them both with some sense of grace and dignity and intelligence. It means accepting those good things in life. But also accepting the not-so-good things and knowing how to work with them. It's about not being overtaken by the nice things in an effort to escape the icky things. It's also about not being overtaken by the icky things and to allow ourselves to enjoy the nice.
I have read every answer up to now, and all reflect the catch 22...
However as a buddhist you should reflect on the fact that karmic rules apply to your conditioned body in a simple yet reproducible way; always they should be regarded as just conditions of the moment.
But it would then be just and wise to reflect on how those conditions cause you to act in the next moment.
Unless you can be a cause to alter or change the next conditions? ? ? ?....
Om
@dharmamom, that's the sort of thing I am talking about. It isn't like deprivation of things altogether, but it is only having 5 cookies the night you bake them warm. Not 20. And not bake cookies every day. If you get hooked on something you can seriously do senseless things. I don't want to talk bad about my friends and family, but there are examples of people 'overdoing it' on food, alcohol, smoking, shopping. video gaming and so forth. They found a special thing they enjoy, but they (me) pursue it to the point of suffering.
@karasti, I think I failed to make my point. My point is that even when you feel good about something then that feeling ends. You think "oh gee I am really getting the hand of meditation and renunciation". And right then the dead hand of mara kills your spiritual realization and it is just craving of 'advancement' or 'safety from harm'. I think how you view it is different for people. Some people just want peace and some want achievement. Some people want to help others. The point is even when we do something good 'mara' steals that realization and more suffering comes up.
I think men tend to use their heads a bit too much and rationalize things beyond rationalization. I, for one, don't think of my Buddhist practice in terms of advancement. I don't see it in a linear process with an "Enlightenment" banter at the end of the path.
When you think you "are getting the hand of meditation and renunciation," as you say, all of a sudden you're sucked back to square one. Well, yes, it happens.
You think you've come a long way in your practice and all of a sudden you have this major blowout with your husband in the evening. Well, yes, it happens. After all these years I think I should know better and yet it happens.
You'll never be totally sheltered from craving and suffering. And Mara will always be lurking somewhere within sight. We have to live with that.
We can still lead meaningful lives despite all the craving and the suffering. I don't see life in terms of suffering and it's not because I'm in denial. I just try to focus on the things I can change and accept as best I can those I cannot change. I work with what is at hand the moment it presents itself. No big goals nor big ideas. Just one step at a time.
Mara is your friend. Suffering is your friend. @dharmamom expressed it well.
I don't think it's a catch 22 because the craving has never left. It's just been appeased by pleasant feelings. When we get what we want, we feel good. When we lose what we want, we feel bad. It's all craving through and through. Craving for good feelings is just as much of a craving as is craving for video game entertainment, good tea, etc.
So the solution is to uproot it with wisdom, rather than just seeking out the experience of pleasant feelings. How to do that I think is just a matter of continued practice.
Thank you for your comment, @lobster. I wrote the post in a rush on my way out early this morning and have been worrying that I might have incurred in yet another misunderstanding.
@Jeffrey, I meant it all in a good sense. Maybe I'm wrong, but just noticed that it's usually you men who love to grapple with intellectual concepts and (in MHO) get too caught in them. That's all.
There is only craving - no good or bad variety. However, craving is not the reason for rebirth. Ignorance is. After ignorance has been extinguished, craving may remain. It is like a habit that refuses to die even after you've realized it has to go. Still, this residual craving isn't the cause of rebirth. This point has to be understood, or our time will be wasted in getting rid of craving (rather than getting rid of ignorance).
Craving is the fruit of Ignorance; once Ignorance has gone, Craving cannot exist. Craving occurs due to Ignorance. How can you continue Craving, when you are no longer Ignorant?
How can you continue Craving, when you are no longer Ignorant?
Some of us manage to find ignorance as a continuum rather than a complete annihilation. It is a bit like the 'perfect' Tao, always in balance and always changing. Or the perfectly Wise . . .
And now back to the ideal . . .
In the 19th cent., people didn't really know much about the ill effects of smoking. There was ignorance. Later on knowledge of these effects became apparent. Still, it didn't stop the craving of countless smokers. Meaning, the eradication of ignorance was no guarantee that craving would also cease; the former, however, is a guarantee that there won't be subsequent births. But craving will continue until the present birth comes to an end.
Simply having knowledge does not ensure one is no longer ignorant. Knowing and understanding are not the same, and neither is realization the same as either of those. My grandma started smoking when she was 20. She is now 88. She stopped smoking after a long hospitalization. Despite being told many times, she chose to remain ignorant about the harms of smoking. Even after being told she had to quit because she had COPD caused by smoking, and had lungs 75% smaller than they should be, she still maintains smoking caused her no harm. She has the information. She chooses not to believe it. She is still ignorant despite knowledge. Dispelling ignorance via information requires that the person accept and believe what they are being told. That only works to some degree. Ignorance is not truly dispelled until experience has a hold.
Ignorance can become tolerance via knowledge. Which can become acceptance via experience.
Notice I capitalised my words;
I was speaking of Ignorance in the sense of a complete non-understanding of the 4NT....Once that Ignorance is quashed, knowing that Craving is the basis of our suffering, we can transcend Craving.
I should have explained myself better, but sometimes, people take things too literally.
On the other hand, perhaps I am spending too much time among the serious-minded....
No, I disagree with your assessment here.
She was no longer ignorant. But she CHOSE to ignore the information.
That is quite different.
That's an 'ignorance' of foolishness (small 'i'), not an Ignorance of Not-Understanding.
Choosing to not believe something is not the same as being ignorant of it.
Yes, that is true. In her case (which I did not describe well since I was on my way out the door) she chooses to remain ignorant because she flat out refuses to completely listen to the information. In the past, she refused for 40 years to even go for a checkup because she knew she would be lectured about her smoking. It wasn't pure ignorance born of totally not knowing, but it was chosen ignorance by refusing to allow the information into her brain that might make a difference. Having all the information and making a choice is one thing. Refusing to hear information because they don't like what it says is (to me) a type of ignorance. Just like people who hold beliefs that those of other races or sexual orientation tend to hold ignorant attitudes despite all the information being available that relates to the prejudices they hold, and so on.
Behave like there is more than enough of what you crave. Giving the object of your craving helps.
If you are conscious throughout the process of a feel good state.
Then that process can be replicated using visual thinking, auditory thinking, and sensations. You literally can tune into it because it's written in the alaya.
That's very difficult for most because deconstruct hasn't been done. So that's the I got it, I chase it, I lose it, I suffer more recoil you're talking about.
So actually what one must do is deconstruct then create. Deconstruction can be done in various ways. Essentially the idea is equanimity and cutting through concepts. In doing so what is solid becomes fluid. And then the energy is freed up to be used if one is conscious enough. If one isn't conscious then that energy can back fire and become a bigger hassle. So basically the recoil effect again.
As long as there is a momentum to get away from a bad something to a better something that is going to be the path and fruit of one's journey.
Hence the paradox of becoming. The buddha focused on conditions and insight primarily and used everything else as a prop.
As we know the chase for bliss didn't work. Liberation is freedom from bliss as well.
But on the way there one can be skillful with the positive. And even after liberation the bliss is useful as well.
What you need to do is a couple things. Cut all external support. Focus completely on the feeling sense and how that interacts with thoughts. In doing so you can learn how suffering occurs on this level. Deconstruct and then reconstruct the positive by the knowledge you gain from deconstruction. you just do the opposite.
Then you use the positive as a ground to focus on insight and cut it all away.
These are just orientations. Find the variables that work. Sometimes its letting go. Sometimes its doing nothing. Sometimes its focusing on imagery and felt sensations. Sometimes its focusing on impermanence. Sometimes its just constructing a felt sense of good and just falling in love with it. Sometimes its ignoring suffering altogether. Sometimes its diving head into suffering and seeing what it offers. I highly reccommend getting a feel for what pushing and pulling feels like with attention in the body. And learn to relax that into equanimity. That as a base allows for more experiential investigation.
This is a great video that goes into specifics about the problem. I wish you well friend.