The 8 Worldly Concerns
Jeroen
Luminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlands Veteran
I came across this in Lion's Roar, and it seemed interesting. I've not seen them mentioned anywhere else, but apparently they were written about by Nagarjuna as an attempt to classify the attachments and aversions that attach us two samsara. So it's four hopes and four corresponding fears.
1 & 2: Happiness vs. Suffering
Once we have happiness, fear arises, for we are afraid to lose it. When suffering arises, no amount of wishful thinking makes it go away. The more we hope for it to be otherwise, the more pain we feel.
3 & 4: Fame vs. Insignificance
We are obsessed with fame and afraid of our own insignificance. When it dawns on us how hard we need to work to be seen as someone special, our fear of insignificance is only magnified.
5 & 6: Praise vs. Blame
We need to be pumped up constantly or we begin to have doubts about our worth. When we are not searching for praise, we are busy trying to cover up our mistakes so we don’t get caught.
7 & 8: Gain vs. Loss
Just as we are about to congratulate ourselves on our success, the bottom falls out. Over and over, things are hopeful one moment and the next they are not, and in either case we are anxious.
Perhaps interesting to discuss people's experiences with these?
Comments
These are described in the Lokavipatti Sutta:
"Gain/loss,
status/disgrace,
censure/praise,
pleasure/pain:
these conditions among human beings are inconstant, impermanent, subject to change.
Knowing this, the wise person, mindful,
ponders these changing conditions.
Desirable things don't charm the mind,
undesirable ones bring no resistance."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an08/an08.006.than.html
From the Anguttara Nikaya
Loss and gain, disrepute and fame,
Praise and blame, pleasure and pain-
These things are transient in human life,
Inconstant and bound to change.
The mindful wise one discerns them well,
Observant of their alterations.
Pleasant things do not stir his mind
And those unpleasant do not annoy him.
All likes and dislikes are dispelled by him,
Eliminated and abolished.
Aware now of the stainless, griefless state (nirvana),
He fully knows, having gone beyond.
Some of the questions Ven Chodron asks are:
Think of specific examples in your life of each. Do they make you happy or confused? Do they help you to grow or do they keep you in prison?
I disagree that when we have happiness, fear of losing it automatically arises. When I'm having a good day, or am enjoying a quiet, contented moment, I simply appreciate the moment without any expectation about the future. I take it as it comes. If I'm feeling a little bliss, I think, "Oh, how nice! Some bliss is happening." Like a special treat that comes your way. If a friend gives you a gift, you don't suddenly begin expecting every day will bring a gift, and start fearing disappointment. You simply express gratitude for the pleasant surprise, and get on with your life.
The fewer expectations you have, the more magical life can be, when positive things come your way. How realistic is it to expect happiness all the time?
Pema Chodron, in her book "When Things Fall Apart," calls The Eight Worldly Concerns, Eight Worldly Dharmas:
Development of equanimity is the key not to be swayed by the pairs of opposites and rising above them.
In the Dhammapada we find:
"Just as a mighty boulder stirs not with the wind, so the wise are never moved either by praise or blame."
And in the Mahamangala Sutta, we find again:
" To live in the world
with your heart undisturbed by the world,
with all sorrows ended, dwelling in peace,
this is the greatest happiness"
Amazing.
Such insights before psychology and then some.
I very much like what @Dakini said. Questioning Nagrajuna, who is sometimes called the 'the second Buddha' is the way to go.
In essence we have to acknowledge duality in the mundane self and go beyond it.
This is 'dharma combat' or 'dharma jihad' (holy internal warfare). Hearing the great teachings. Dissecting, comprehending, assimilating AND going beyond them. Thinking for ourselves.
The view we have of ourselves is our worst enemy. Everyone has made up a persona, a mask that one wears and we don't want to see what's behind it. We don't allow anyone else to look either. After having had a path moment, that is no longer possible. But the mask, fear and rejection come to the fore. The best antidote is to remember again and again, that there's really nobody there, only phenomena, nothing more. Even though the inner vision may not be concrete enough to substantiate such a claim, the affirmation helps to loosen the grasping and clinging and to hang on a little less tightly.
We have heard about disenchantment and dispassion as steps on the path to liberation and freedom. They cannot have meaning and impact unless there is a vision of a totally different reality, one which does not contain the world's manifoldness. When one sits in meditation and starts thinking, that's the temptation of diversification and expansion (papanca). The Nibbana element is one, not manifold. One could say that it's **empty **of all that we know. Until that is seen, the world will keep calling, but we need not believe it all.
http://www.buddhanet.net/ayyatalk.htm
Yes, so the next question is how do we develop equanimity? According to the Lokavipatti Sutta it is about seeing how transient these conditions are, and that seems to depend on maintaining mindfulness.
Clearly it isn't. Perhaps it is more about recognising that happiness is transient, so we appreciate it more when it arises? Suffering is also transient, though it sometimes doesn't feel like that when we are going through it.
The whole aim of Buddhadhamma is a progression towards equanimity: coming to terms with the three marks of existence, developing a reflective mind to see reality as it is, rather than as we want it to be, seeing through the delusion of these pairs of opposites.
Sure, the challenge is developing equanimity.
Wouldn't equanimity naturally arise as you find ways to reduce clinging and aversion?
Yes, it would. So how to reduce clinging and aversion? I think it comes back to insight, in which case the next question is how to develop insight.
The approaches I've encountered in Buddhist lore suggest that reducing clinging and aversion has a range of different recipes. Clinging to material possessions is countered by meditating on impermanence, while clinging in the form of sexual attraction is countered by not-beautiful meditation. That is more finding and contemplating a principle that is in opposition to the exact facet of clinging that you wish to reduce. It is not exactly direct insight, although arguably it is using the insight of others to expand your thinking and change the way you react.
The reduction of aversion, to me, is more to do with sympathy, kindness and insight. Generally within the things that you are feeling aversion towards there are still elements you can sympathise with, if you look deeply. Within for example blame there is the element of correcting behaviour that has gone too far in a certain direction, a potentially valuable thing if you can accept it with humility and discernment... so it is possible to even accept blaming statements as something constructive. Or within aversion to someone who has done you wrong, you can find sympathy if you can discern their suffering, the patterns of unhappiness which drive their behaviour.
My method so far has been to use insight to find an area of clinging, and then to find a meditation to reduce it. To date i have found more clinging than aversions, and while it is certainly leading to greater peace and equanimity there is a question exactly how it relates to the Eightfold Path...
And whether this approach can be applied to the Eight Worldly Concerns will be an interesting direction to investigate
I'd imagine he is speaking more to external happiness, the type most people talk about when they say they are happy or what makes them happy. Like children, they receive a new item, they love it for hours or days, and then it's no longer the best thing ever and they want something new. People, in general, are mostly that way. Always looking for the next "hit" of happiness. People who know better understand it differently, they tend to live more content and joyful lives rather than the standard of happiness that most people have. I think that is the type he is addressing rather than the people who understand it is really not that way. I think most people know we cannot be happy all the time. But it doesn't stop them from trying. It supports our entire economy, this idea that you can always get or do something to make yourself happier. If everyone understood things differently the whole mess would fall apart. What a wonderful gift that would be!
I'm not sure there is much difference between external and internal happiness
it all happens in the mind. The body, your bed, the trees in the forest outside don't care a jot whether you desire that Porsche... it is in your mind that the desire arises, and that the momentary feeling of happiness is generated when you satisfy that inner urge, or the unpleasantness of thwarted longing when practicalities place your desire out of reach.
When you think about it all of the eight worldly concerns are triggered by external factors. Even things like praise and blame come from words spoken or written by others, as much an external factor as the Porsche.
I like Porsche's... but i don't need one
Yes and we understand that because we investigate mind. Most people do not. That is what I meant. If you go around town and ask the random person, they are going to separate it into external and internal. Cars, house, jobs, kids, pets, vacations=external sources of happiness. Learning how to be content=internal happiness.
But there is still a difference in that understanding what it is and how the mind creates it all. That understanding frees you from believing that cars, houses, pets and vacations will truly bring you happiness. Most people believe they need more of those things to stay happy. They don't understand that happiness lies in the mind. It is created by us. Not given to us. But if people understood that, the masses that strive for so much out of happiness in the same way children do for new toys would have a better understanding. But they do not. And I think when looking at the 4 pairs of words it is more addressing lay people who lack that understanding yet as a way to get them there. I think western society is buried in all of these things and we largely use them to define ourselves and our lives and our success. But we shouldn't, and here, we know that even if we aren't quite there yet. But most people do not. Thus the heavy amount of striving and then misery when failure ensues.
The practice of the Brahmaviharas (lovingkindness, compassion, altruistic joy and equanimity) are a good way to work on mental defilements.
The Anapanasati Sutta (the Sutta on the full awareness of breathing) and the Satipathana Sutta (the sutta on the four establishments of mindfulness), promise that the practice mindfulness of breathing promote detachment and objectivity in our daily life.
In section 4 of the Anapanasati Sutta we read:
At the end of the Satipathana Sutta, we read:
This is why awareness or calm mindfulness is often the first form of insight into our reactive, mindless, meandering life.
Inner space, the final frontier, to boldly go where no one has gone before ...
Gate, Gate, Paragate, Para Sam gate Bodhi svaha
Gate, Gate, Paragate, Para Sam gate Bodhi svaha
Gate, Gate, Paragate, Para Sam gate Bodhisvaha.
Bodhi Svaha
That is reminiscent of working with the 5 hindrances, where you cultivate the opposite.
What works best for me is maintaining an awareness of the transience and conditionality of these "worldly winds", the sense it is all just stuff which comes and goes.
Working with the 5 hindrances might be an alternative to working with than the worldly winds.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_hindrances
It takes unremitting Right Effort to liberate a defiled mind, that is, to prevent the unwholesome unarisen mental states from arising, to relinquish unwholesome mental states that have already arisen, to prompt the arousal of mental states that have not yet risen, and to maintain wholesome states that have already arisen.
To abandon the arisen unwholesome thoughts, cultivating the opposite, as @SpinyNorman suggested above is one way.
The maintain arisen wholesome states, you appeal to the seven factors of enlightenment: mindfulness, investigation of phenomena, energy, rapture, tranquility, concentration and equanimity.
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/piyadassi/wheel001.html
At this present moment in time ....Hillary & Donald make up two of these concerns ....so it would seem
No more Hillary and Donald soap opera, @Shoshin, please.
Samsara is painful enough as it is, and this is our sole respite for a bit of decent Dhamma...
@DhammaDragon
If only the Dharma were that simply....However the Dharma is the Dharma and there's no escaping it, it permeates all aspect of ones life...(at times in a very subtle way) and when it comes to the 8 Worldly Concerns, for many Americans (and no doubt non Americans alike) thoughts of "Hillary & Donald" tend to evoke these feelings...
I guess the aim is to take all things with a pinch of salt...That is, not take things too seriously....especially what comes out the mouth of politicians ....
The Farting Trumpet and Hilary Wee-mail pantomime is certainly a cause of suffering to me.
Apparently, when we run out of relevant Dhamma information, the duetto nicely fills in the void...
Meanwhile, back in Dhammaworld... has anyone noticed that a lot, perhaps the majority, of entertainment such as television shows are plays on the Eight Worldly Concerns? You identify with a character and feel pleasure at their happiness, displeasure or aversion at their suffering, and so on.
Even something like a heist movie is powered under the hood by a wish to see the characters you identify with, and by extension yourself, gain a large amount of money? If you didn't feel desire for money much of the motivation in the film would disappear.
The Eight Worldly Concerns are part of the package inherent with the fact of being human, @Kerome.
They encompass the predicaments, the ordeals, the pettiness of the daily human life, so they necessarily make good stuff to fluff up literary and film archetypes.
I think it is more that the Eight Worldly Concerns are an attempt to classify what draws and repels us - so in effect what motivates us. And providing motivation for characters is a key element in entertaining stories of all kinds... they communicate themselves to the viewer. So the thought occurs to me that in effect there is a trend, if only by accident, to wrap more parts of dhukka into stories, much more than you normally encounter while living a similar slice of an ordinary life.
In my life, happiness and joy are OK! I think the problem is when we become attached to this, or to anything. A lot of people push the equanimity thing, and I can see the benefits, but it can become forced and phony too. Best thing is to just be ourselves, be in the moment, and not have a fixed viewpoint about anything.
I used to go to a Zen Center in Portland and any time you asked the teachers something, or even responded to what they said in a conversation, there was this abnormal time lag while they processed what you said before they answered. I think that sort of thing is missing the mark completely. No spontaneity, no Zen, no real life sort of thing. They reminded me of robots.
Nearly everything in the entertainment and media realm works off desire. This gets to people at the gut level, which is where advertisers and propagandists live. It's very effective! I got rid of the TV long ago, and am very particular about what sort of movie or news source I look at. Plus, people have become conditioned and acclimated to violence and suffering, or worse, have become detached from it, which causes directors and producers to keep making things more violent and shocking to get through to people. If you showed most of what goes on in the internet, TV or movies to someone that was not accustomed to looking at this they would be horrified, which is the normal reaction.
This is all just a part of what is going on in the entire world due to people not being enlightened. It's actually exactly as it should be in a cause and effect world. Operating from delusion, desire and fear, we get the world that we have. It's up to us, one act at a time, to push it the other way.
I reckon Willy Shakespeare helped the Buddha write the suttas. They were both English gentlemen after all.
I find these kinds of parallels in the world fascinating... where you find a whole profession, Hollywood scriptwriters, who try to find the perfect way to hook you into a dhukka-powered storyline... and on the other hand you find a whole religion who try to find the cessation of dhukka.
I don't think the intention of scriptwriters is to intensify the degree of our hooks.
Rather, they simply limit themselves to describe how the craving mind works.
I don't believe I said that they did
but they certainly seek to exploit it to its maximum effect.
One of my cousins is a film maker, and he's said that usually the goal is to make the audience feel something. To bring them out of their boring everyday lives to feel something on a more extreme level, even though in real life it's not really real. It's really quite interesting to observe your reactions in your body even if you know in your mind that obviously it's not real. We watch Walking Dead, and the first episode this seasons (and the finale last spring) were so stressful I could hardly sit and watch. I turned my head more than once. And I watch Game of Thrones without trouble! But it was interesting to think about, how our body reacts to stimuli even when we logically know it isn't real. As much as it was uncomfortable, I have to say it takes quite a bit of writing and acting to make people respond that way. But I think many people make a mistake in not comparing their lives to it. They take too many "which character are you on the Walking Dead" quizzes on Facebook or something
I enjoy some entertainment, but I don't watch a lot of tv or movies. But i like good writing, I like a good story. Game of Thrones is a great story. Happy Potter is a great story. Walking Dead is a good story. I enjoy comparing books to movies and my reactions and immersion in them. But I prefer real life all the time, even the "boring" days.
Taṇhā..........Middle way..........Dosa