The following notes have been excerpted from the book, The Essential Nectar: Meditations on the Buddhist Path, by Geshe Rabten.
Introduction
In the previous meditations, one recognizes the sufferings of the ill destinies of hell beings, pretas, and animals, and by contemplating Refuge and Karma one learns how to avoid such rebirth.
However, through further meditation, we find that even the higher states of samsaric rebirth are unsatisfactory. They are transitory by nature and even if one is born into such a state one can fall back into an ill destiny.
Meditating on the Sufferings of Human Beings
Four great sufferings are bound up with human existence – birth, aging, sickness and death. In the course of our rebirths, we experience these again and again.
The Suffering of Birth
From the moment of conception on, the embryo is already a human being. Though smaller than us, it has feelings, and given its situation, it will experience suffering most of the time and happiness only on rare occasions. We can easily see that to be constricted in such a narrow, dark, wet space as the womb must be unpleasant. Being very feeble, its bones not properly formed and hardened and its skin very tender, the foetus is extremely sensitive to the sufferings of its environment.
After nine months of this suffering, the baby has to leave the womb – when the time is ripe, they can no longer stay inside. Coming out through the tight passage, squeezed between bones, is very difficult – sometimes the baby has to be pulled out by a doctor or midwife. And while the mother may have access to pain-killing drugs, there is no injection of morphine or the like to make it easier for the baby, although they are much more delicate and sensitive. This time is therefore one of very great suffering. For animals too, birth is suffering – a lamb being born, for example, has no midwife to catch him, but just falls on the ground. We cannot remember being born. We think that death will be great suffering, but actually the suffering of birth is much worse. [Memories of birth and death experiences recovered under hypnosis support this assertion. See Wambach, Life Before Life, Chapter III.]
We should not listen to this as a story about someone else, but take it as applying directly to ourself. We have been through this in the past and will have to go through it again.
The reason we cannot remember our birth is the very intensity of the suffering, which inhibits the memory of it. We can observe the same phenomenon with regard to intensely painful situations that we experience later in life – sometimes we cannot remember such an incident at all; sometimes the memory is unclear.
The Suffering of Aging
With every day that passes we come closer to our death, the appearance of our body gradually approaching that it will have when we are dead. This gradual change is aging.
We can all see the changes outwardly: we lose your youthful complexion, our hair whitens or turns grey, our body bends so that we cannot stand straight, and we walk unsteadily even on flat ground.
When we are young, our flesh is firm and fills out the skin, but as we age, this pleasant appearance is lost and our skin hangs down in wrinkles so that our face, limbs and body are like an uneven field. Our teeth fall out, so that although we crave for nice food, it is very hard for us to eat it. Our speech that was once strong becomes quavering so that others can hardly understand what we are saying; our mind is less clear than it used to be, and we tend to be forgetful.
All our faculties lose their power – we cannot see or hear clearly, sitting down and getting up are difficult. Wherever we go, people think “He’s just an old man,” and treat us with scorn. We can no longer eat the food we like, because our digestion cannot cope with it.
When we were young and good-looking, people were happy to be our friends, but now we are old and unattractive, no-one cares. We see that most of our years have fled and are constantly aware that death will soon be upon us.
Maybe we still want to go out and have fun, climbing mountains and so on, but we are no longer able to – we are just stuck in a room, maybe in an old people’s home.
This is our situation – if we die, the problem is we do not know what kind of existence will follow; but if we live on as an old person, that too is difficult.
Thus samsaric existence is by nature difficult, and we must direct our mind towards Liberation.
We should not limit our contemplation to the words of the text, but imagine the whole situation we may experience as an old person. For example, if we married when we were young and beautiful, just looking at each other and seeing how our partner has deteriorated makes us feel depressed.
The Suffering of Sickness
Sickness can come upon us suddenly, the elements of our body becoming unbalanced so that our body becomes full of pain and we must stay in bed, unable to move. Day and night we groan with pain that seems to go on for ever.
Perhaps we shall die suddenly from a car accident or a heart attack, but otherwise we inevitably face a painful process of death from disease.
Nowadays the pain of terminal sickness may be relieved by drugs such as morphine, but these do nothing to cure you. One is not allowed to eat the food one likes, because the doctor says it will be harmful; instead, one is given food one dislikes.
To try and cure the sickness quickly, doctors may operate, but in serious illness the chances are this will not help, but bring only more suffering.
When our health is disrupted by serious illness, to see our friends, possessions, house, servants or relatives no longer makes us feel happy, but they seem like enemies, disturbing to our mind. There is also the constant worry that maybe this illness will lead to our death.
We must contemplate these teachings again and again, thinking that although we may be young and healthy at the moment, still we are subject to sickness.
When there are just a few blue patches in a cloudy sky, one is sure that if one is in sunshine at the moment, this will not last more than a few minutes.
Our present situation of being free of sickness and not in the process of dying is like this brief sunny interval.
We attach a lot of importance to trivial shortcomings in our food or our living place, but these things are negligible compared to the realities of our situation, which we ignore.
The Suffering of Death
We age quickly and are bound to die. It is useful to imagine the ways we could die. We may meet a sudden death, or a slow one, with a gradual physical worsening.
In the latter case, we get into bed for the last time; medicine is no longer any use, having prayers said and pujas offered will not prevent death coming.
Those who look at us can see we are close to death, and we ourself also understand this. With all hope of living cut off, our mind is full of sorrow; whether we are at home or in a hospital ward, our relatives who visit us weep, and we too cry, from our present suffering and from fear as to what will happen to us.
Some people have no chance to speak when dying – some indeed are unconscious – but some are able to pronounce a few last words, tell their wife to look after the children or whatever.
At present we can speak freely, but close to death the tongue becomes hard and blue and one cannot move it, or even if one can move it a little the sounds that emerge are unintelligible.
Seeing that the person we are trying to speak to does not understand makes us more frustrated and sad. When others try to speak to us, even if they speak right into our ear, their voice seems to come from very far away and we cannot grasp the meaning.
As the visual faculty degenerates, the people around our bed seem to be very remote, as if we were looking up at them from the bottom of a deep hole.
As the elements of the body are gradually absorbed – its solidity, its moistness and cohesion, its heat and power of transformation, and its motility – various signs manifest, such as the nose becoming smaller, the mouth drying up, and the eyes becoming fixed, staring rigidly into space.
Watching many people die, I have often observed these signs myself.
Breathing becomes difficult; exhalation is stronger while inhalation weakens and eventually stops altogether.
Recognizing that one is separating from friends, relatives, possessions and all one holds dear brings acute sorrow to the mind. In addition, one feels regret for the mistaken actions one has committed and one’s failure to make the best use of this human life.
Spirits can gather round, trying to make us die as quickly as possible and steal our remaining life for themselves. We may experience signs of our future destiny. This can be seen in a dying person from the sounds he makes, his facial expressions, and the way he moves his arms and legs about.
To avoid regret at the time of death, we must spend all our time in worthwhile actions while we can, mindfully avoiding mistaken ones.
When we reach the point of death, it will be too late to do anything.
For a Dharma practitioner, too, it is better to die alone, not surrounded by friends and relatives who disturb one and make one feel frustrated, but contemplating the Dharma.
One should keep the mind tranquil, free of attachment and regret and conceptualizations. Milarepa said:
Without a vigil around my corpse,
Without lamentation over my death,
If I could die in solitude,
The aim of this yogin will be fulfilled.
(The Life of Milarepa, translated by Lobsang P. Lhalungpa)
While it is hard for us to practise as Milarepa, we should try in accordance with our capabilities to see this life meaningfully.
The Suffering of Meeting the Unpleasant
These sufferings of birth, aging, sickness and death would not be so bad if we only had to experience them once, but we are forced by the power of our defilements to undergo them constantly, again and again.
In fact, there are all kinds of unpleasant situations that we do not desire but still are subject to – for example, experiencing physical pain or mental distress, being deprived of our possessions, or our friends or our country being harmed.
Our country suffers in war, our family is afflicted by quarrels, individually we suffer pain and disease, all regardless of our wishes.
These troubles weigh us down and make us confused and depressed. This is the fundamental nature of samsaric existence. Understanding this, we should realize how samsaric existence is unsatisfactory.
The Suffering of Separation from the Pleasant
When with people we like, we wish to stay with them always, yet although we do everything to avoid separation, it is certain that it must come.
We would like to be always together with our wife and children whom we love very much, but conditions arise that force us to separate from them.
We live in a pleasant country that we do not want to leave, but somehow we are forced to go elsewhere.
Even if we do not have to part from our family, country and so forth before death, it is certain that we shall have to do so when we die. This is our situation.
The Suffering of Seeking What One Wishes and Not Obtaining It
There are many things we wish for, but these wishes are hard to fulfil.
We may wish for possessions and not get any, wish for work and find none, wish to accomplish something and be baulked.
A farmer works his fields and wishes for a good harvest, but fails to get one.
One marries, hoping to raise a prosperous family, but it does not work out.
Unable to accomplish their aims, people become depressed; some even become crazy or kill themselves.
Meditators too may decide to practise in order to achieve certain realizations, then be unable to meditate as they want. Then they become depressed, strain too much, and develop lung.
Not only do we fail to meet our aims, but situations we do not want fall on us all the time. We must understand that all this is of the nature of samsaric existence – there is no state of happiness in samsara that we can call satisfactory. These sufferings [of human beings] we can experience directly.
The General Sufferings of Samsara
When we become aware that we are going to have to die, we feel a certain unease and fear. But we must realize that it is not only in this life that we shall die, but we face the same prospect again and again, until we attain Liberation. This is surely rather frightening.
We have to die, and after death we have to reappear in another state of existence. Our body will not always be of agreeable aspect like our present human form; when we see certain creatures, we may be struck by their grotesque and repulsive shape, but we must understand that at some stage we too are liable to be born with a body like that.
As long as we are governed by defilements, we are bound to experience death and rebirth, time after time.
In this cycle of rebirths, there is no certainty whether we shall be high, as gods, or low, as animals [or worse]. Sometimes we shall be very high, experiencing many pleasures and drinking nectar; at other times we shall be so low that we are forced to eat filth.
At present, as human beings, we protect our bodies and keep ourselves warm with clothes, and when they wear out, we buy new ones; but when we are in the ill destinies, that will not be possible, and our naked bodies will be tormented in manifold ways. Such unfortunate states of existence are perfectly possible for us, for in this life we are creating the causes to be born in them.
We sometimes feel sad because of loneliness in this life, if we lack a husband or wife or friends. But, in fact, we are always essentially alone in samsara —we are born alone and we die alone.
Friends and enemies are uncertain and can change from one moment to the next. Today someone is a close friend whom we see every day, confiding in him all our problems and secrets; but later, with one incident of bad behaviour towards us, even a few words, he becomes an enemy we want never to see again, and if, so much as a thought of him comes into our mind, we quickly push it away.
Another person is an enemy whom we have constantly wished to harm, and even sworn to kill on sight; but sometimes he too can turn into a good friend.
There is nothing stable and reliable in this samsaric existence. Friends and enemies are uncertain, when this life will end is uncertain, whether we shall [then] be in a high or a low state is uncertain.
Therefore, it is better to devote our mind to the practice of Dharma.
Even within one human life, our status is uncertain. A powerful king can become a starving, homeless beggar, mistreated by all – our standard of living can switch from very high to very low even overnight.
We may think we know the people around us well, but really, we hardly know them at all.
We have no idea how we were related to them previously. They may have been our father, our mother, our child, our enemy, our employer, or anything.
The Arhant Shāriputra once came upon a young couple with their child and dog. The husband was eating a fish from the pond nearby; the dog came [to chew the bones], and he beat it with a stick.
In fact, the fish was his father, reborn as a fish as a result of himself catching fish in that pond, and the dog was his mother, reborn as the family pet through attachment to her offspring.
Meanwhile, his wife was nursing their child, who was in reality the reincarnation of his bitterest enemy – a former lover of hers, whom he had killed in jealousy, now reborn as her son because of attachment to her.
Seeing all this, Shāriputra remarked:
[He] eats [his] father’s flesh and beats [his] mother;
[She] holds [their] mortal enemy in [her] lap;
The wife is gnawing at [her] husband’s bones –
At samsara’s features, one wants to laugh.
Thus, our present life is only part of the story: when we take other lives into account our relationships are completely mixed up.
Such is samsara. Since no samsaric situation is satisfactory, we must turn our mind away from samsara and towards the attainment of Liberation.
Source: Rabten, Geshe. The Essential Nectar: Meditations on the Buddhist Path. Edited by Martin Willson. Somerville, MA: Wisdom Publications, 2014.
Mind Is the Source of Happiness and Pain
Mind is the forerunner of all actions;
All deeds are led by mind, created by mind.
If one speaks or acts with a corrupt mind,
Suffering follows, as wheels follow the hoof of an ox.
Mind is the forerunner of all actions;
All deeds are led by mind, created by mind.
If one speaks or acts with a serene mind,
Happiness follows as surely as one’s shadow.
(Buddha, The Dhammapada)
(1) Remember a disturbing situation in your life. Recall what you were thinking and feeling (not what the other person was saying and doing). How did the way you described the situation to yourself influence how you experienced it?
(2) Examine how your attitude affected what you said and did in the situation. How did your words and actions affect the situation? How did the other person respond to what you said and did?
(3) Was your view of the situation realistic? Were you seeing all sides of the situation or were you seeing things through the eyes of “me, I, my, and mine?”
(4) Think of how you could have viewed the situation differently if you had had a broad mind and been free from self-centeredness. How would that have changed your experience of it?
Conclusion: Determine to be aware of how you interpret events and to cultivate beneficial and realistic ways of looking at them.
(Source: Based on Chodron, Thubten. Guided Buddhist Meditations: Essential Practices on the Stages of the Path. Boulder, CO: Shambhala, 2019.)
“The suffering of beings is mainly produced by the mind. I must free myself from my self-created bonds.”
(Source: Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche. An aspiration given to his students during a retreat in 2010.)