Pain Serves A Purpose
followthepath
Explorer
I'm not sure, but I think emotional pain serves a purpose. It may warn us to prepare adequately for the future or warn us to avoid certain people. For example, if a person keeps insulting me for no reason, that should be a clue that the person doesn't like me and may do harm to me. But if I don't feel that sting of being insulted I may not avoid the person. Continuing to have contact with the person may lead to me getting hurt physically. Does that make sense?
Don't people have to suffer at least a little bit to learn from mistakes and make wise decisions? Am I correct in equating pain to suffering? And if I am correct that pain is necessary, should I still seek Enlightenment? Thanks everyone. I apologize if this question has already been asked.
Comments
Buddhism doesn't mean not experiencing emotions or pain. It means learning better how to deal with it, how to react to it, how to recognize it for what it is, and the part we play in it, and so on.
Also, enlightenment isn't really something a person is supposed to seek. It is (in my opinion and learning) what we already always are. We just have to uncover it. You don't have to not feel in order to do that.
Liking someone and being liked is also, strictly speaking, Suffering.
All emotions we cling to, and.become attached to, be they fear, pain, joy, anger, grief, happiness, are fundamentally, fuel for suffering.
This is the fundamental teaching in the 4 Noble Truths
That all our suffering comes from being unhealthily attached, and clinging desperately to, the ephemeral, transitory, impermanent nature of all things, including emotions.
All pain of any emotional kind, is self-inflicted.
Pain is not a signal, or warning of anything, other than one showing you that you are perpetuating your own suffering.
Physical pain serves the purpose you mention, @followthepath, but emotional pain is something we do to ourselves. Even if our pain is the response we have to an action perpetrated by someone else, only we can control that emotional reaction and our attachment to it. Physical body pain is a warning system of sorts to let us know something is going on that needs to be tended to, and to keep us from further causing injury to that body part. Emotional pain, in a way, can be similar in that it tells us what we need to tend to. It doesn't say nearly as much about the people around us as we tend to believe it does, though. Going about life wondering if someone is going to hurt you is a product of your mind. If someone repeatedly insults you, you have a choice to make about whether you will keep that person in your life in some way, or not, but it doesn't have to come loaded with emotional baggage.
I think liking someone has to do with Buddha energies. Specifically there are five Buddha energies: knowing, wanting it all, feeling, doing, and beeing.
Liking someone has to do with wanting to feel. It can be any number of suffering states, but is also felt in sublime states such as the brahmaviras: kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity.
There is nothing wrong with liking as long as clear vision is there. In other words ignorance is the culprit. If there is no ignorance then no karma is created and no craving.
Buddhism, IMO, makes a distinction between pain (which is inevitable and vital to our physical and interpersonal functioning) and suffering (which is created by resistance to that pain). Christopher Germer has a cute little equation: Pain x Resistance = Suffering
This is an excerpt from Ezra Bayda's Being Zen that was among the very first things I posted on New Buddhist several years ago:
The Buddha replied, “Sir, it’s like this. All human beings have eighty-three problems. It’s a fact of life. Sure, a few problems will go away now and then, but soon enough others will arise. So we’ll always have eighty-three problems.”
The Buddha said, “My teaching can’t help with the eighty-three problems, but it can help with the eighty-fourth problem.”
If you ask any recovered alcoholic, I'm sure most would agree that their rock bottom was an absolute gift. We often call it 'the gift of desperation' and it's that which forces us to look for a spiritual solution to our drinking problem. I'm sure that similar stuff drives people into Buddhism/Dharma too.
In A.A. literature it says "Pain is the touchstone for all spiritual growth". I'm told if I don't grow spiritually I may drink, and to drink is to die. I'm not sure how true all that is, but it could be something useful to believe in.
@followthepath You have gained an important insight. Some people do search for "enlightenment" as defined by freedom from pain, both emotional and physical. But do you really want to sail through life unable to feel anything? Because being unable to feel grief means being unable to feel joy.
pain is the result of our own wrong doing in the past
what we have to do is
accept it with equanimity and try to do right things only here after
reading Buddha's Teaching and thinking over what you have read is one way of doing right thing
doing meditation is another
helping others (within your means) is another
never hurt others (people and animals)
you can do Insight meditation on your physical pain
should I still seek Enlightenment? Thanks everyone.
I think so.
Reminds me what some wise man said once. Forgot his name. He said "Whatever cannot be learned through enlightened reasoning, must be learned through pain"
Which means emotional pain, mental pain, etc. is not necessary to learn important things.
If you had the wisdom of enlightenment, you would know what is proper to do or not do, via that wisdom.
What do you consider enlightenment will bring?
To me this does not make sense.
The simple emotional reaction to pain is avoidance. I find that avoidance is hardly ever a reasonable reaction... but that statement was made using my reason whatever worth it may have....
*Guilt does have the opposite affect because the pain is caused by avoiding so that one avoids avoiding.
Pain is a good way to control people. There is a purpose right there.
@Grayman, who is doing the controlling?
Whoever they let. Whoever has control of what we allow to be important.
Thank you all for responding. Now that I've learned that I should accept my pain rather than being averse to it, does that mean that I'm Enlightened?
LOL! Any masochist has learned to accept pain, and people can cling to their mental pain as well. Learn to let go of the pain and pleasure both that life brings you and experience them as the impermanent experiences they are, and you'll have a good start.
Enlightenment is a title other people put on you. Don't worry about that. The Buddha was awakened, is probably a better way of looking at it.
>
hardly Now that I've learned how to cook Lobster thermidor, it doesn't make me a chef.
You need to understand, accept practise and implement everything constantly before you can even consider Enlightenment as a possible end...
And there's an awful lot more to learn, and a whole lot more of the Buddha's teachings to wade through, too....
(Is the question a troll post...?)
I have quoted Zen psychotherapist David Brazier referring to Enlightenment before, but some insights bear repetition:
"Enlightenment is a cathartic experience which occurs when a person deeply realises the extent to which they have been running away from reality and surrenders to this possibility of living a full and meaningful life in whatever circumstances they find themselves. [...] To stand on the other shore is not so much to go to a different world as to see this world from a different standpoint. The bodhisattva is not saying 'This world is terrible: let me help you escape from it.' He or she is saying 'Come and look at it this way and you will have a quite different and much more satisfactory experience.'"
You might have accepted intellectually that you should accept your pain, but there's a huge difference between knowing that you have to accept your pain and actually living that acceptance every hour, every minute, every second of your life.
If it were so easy, all of us here in the forum would be enlightened already.
You can't change the affliction with which life presents you. But you can change how to relate to that affliction. And that power of choice is a commitment you renew with yourself every second of your life.
Buddhism is not about escape from suffering. It is about acceptance of suffering and finding your sealegs in the ocean of affliction, as I like to say.
It does not mean that you have to passively put up with a person that inflicts pain on you. It means that you have the choice of how to react to that person's behaviour. What you choose to do is up to you.
Hi followthepath
,
Thank you for your post. I love your post. It is very interesting.
My views on your post are as follows.
Pain to help us learn from mistakes - Yes, I agree with you. If there was no pain, we would have no motivation to become wiser.
Pain = Suffering - I do not think there is an universal answer to this. Each person has their own views on whether pain is the same as suffering.
Pain is necessary = To be honest, in my view, it depends on what type of pain you are referring to. There are many different types of pain such as physical pain and physical pain can be categorised into different types of physical pain and the same for emotional pain.
Keep in mind, these are my views and they are not the correct answer. Your questions has an infinite number of ways to answer.
Yes, Pain IS suffering.
But as illustrated in this Sutta, there are two kinds of 'pain' and two kinds of 'suffering'. (or three kinds of suffering, if one wishes to be pedantic...)
Welcome, by the way, @Rainbowstar; you joined us a year ago, but this is your first post.... nice to finally have you aboard!
I was tweeted this message a couple of days ago, which seems to just fit the thread:
"You change for two reasons: either you learn enough that you want to, or you've been hurt enough that you have to." (Unknown)
I think this is a strange way to put things. A lot of suffering (perhaps all of it) comes from ignorance, and ignorance is not a choice, AFAIK. You can choose to be lazy in investigating your ignorance, but IMO this is not the same as inflicting pain upon yourself.
Ignorance may not be a choice, but to REMAIN in ignorance, is.
Emotions are defilements of the Mind.
One can feel Emotions, but one does not have to succumb to them.
Transcending Emotions, and understanding that their perpetuation is a self-inflicted pain, is an important factor on the Path.
Sorry upekka, its not as simple as that.
According to Buddhadharma..which differs from Hindudharma and Jainadharma in this respect, what we experience in this life at any moment has a variety of causes.
Buddhism talks about the 5 Niyamas Niyama can be translated as 'restriction'.
The first is Utu-Niyama
which is more or less what we mean by physics and chemistry.
The second is Bija-Niyma Bija are seeds. It is what we mean by genetics.
The third is Kamma-niyama ..which is karma.
The fourth is Dhamma-Niyama..anicca, dukkha and anatta.
The fifth is Citta-Niyama which is roughly what we mean by psychological factors.
So it will be seen that Karma/Kamma is only one causal factor to explain pain or any other experience we have.
All the niyamas are interactive with each other, so Karma is likely to be in the mix..but
The Buddha said that it was important not to speculate about the causes of what is arising.
However you are spot on about the Buddhas advice about the way we respond to circumstances, including pain.
Emotional pain may be like physical pain. When there is a pain somewhere in your body, your doctor may be able to diagnose the problem. Emotional pain needs to be diagnosed too. One suffer a bit or a lot and each has its lesson to offer. Pain probably spurs the lesson to be learned. Without pain, we could learn too; but then, we probably becomes indifferent and cannot be bothered.