Aug 25 1991
We have been moving through the evolution of our spirituality and moved into the noble truth of suffering. It is one of the major teachings of the Buddha. The noble truth of suffering which could be defined as the dissatisfaction or the fact that the world is not of perfect quality. In that is meant the world has many problems yet we as people, try to gloss things over and not notice or ignore the problems. With at that we set our selves up in a false reality and miss true reality. We tend to color the world around us in ways that is not real. So the noble truth of suffering is not to make us depressed or something, it is rather brings us in focus to the world around us.
And from a mahayana perspective where one strives for full enlightenment, that state of realization is fueled by the very clear perception that there is suffering around us, and that perception is certainly seen in other people, is the cause of what makes us then strive to become enlightened. From the enlightened state are great qualities to help other sentient beings.
Coming back to the initial point if we were to get into the noble truth of dissatisfaction, it is beneficial to change ones view point to understand the world a little better. That there is imperfection in the world. That very often a lot of what we call worldly happiness is merely the fluctuation of a greater situation, and therefore one would term oneself as happy. With any persistence with any change we move into though, it becomes unbearable and we need another change to say we are happy. That is in the more objective manner of looking at the state of what you would call worldly happiness, what we have is a constant and fluctuations within that which we term happiness. Well it changes. For example when you are cold, you step into the sunshine, when your body feels warm you feel happiness. But shortly after that, the sunlight gets too hot and you feel uncomfortable, dissatisfaction. Then you have to move to the shade. And then you feel wonderful. But if you stayed in the shade too long, you would again become uncomfortable.
In this way, these fluctuations are termed the suffering of change. And we should move ourselves to understand, that from the worldly perspective, when we observe people, most of the time when they become overjoyed, it is a fluctuation with a situation and on the basis of that, they feel joy. But with the nature of the world, for a short time they will again become dissatisfied with the situation and again seek another experience in their search for the remedy of suffering. So it is a very relative happiness, a very unreliable happiness. So that is the ideal of ones meditation. To try to bring one's mind not to cling, not be intoxicated by simple worldly experiences which are rather mundane and merely a fluctuation within some previous situation.
If you look at yourself and say you would like to be a deeper person with more quality of being, for example, you can identify a person with that nature, would be someone who has the capacity to listen, to have energy for other peoples situations, and have the wisdom to know how to interact, to help that person grow and other people grow around them. Those things we would consider quality person. They come about because someone moves into their nature, who knows more wise and intelligent, their realization is a clear function of their mind. So to help us do that, move out of our delusions and suffering and dissatisfaction.
There are three types of sufferings. The suffering of change, the suffering of suffering, and the all pervasive suffering. They are the three ways of looking at dissatisfaction.
In this way this is the fluctuations, the suffering of change. It os one many ways we should make ourselves to understand what you would term the worldly happiness. ..................
...........just cannot hear properly the tape, too much noise..........

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