What's the root cause of suffering?

[Someone here]

The Buddha said it's "Desire ". 

What do you think? 

[mandyjw]

Not wanting to suffer. If you resist suffering you create it, as suffering is resistance. Resistance to and unto itself.

Suffering is not different from physical pain, you have pain when something is off, when something isn't right, suffering in the same way is guidance. It lets us know when we are thinking and acting on behalf of a separate self. 

[Someone here]

6 minutes ago, mandyjw said:

Not wanting to suffer. If you resist suffering you create it, as suffering is resistance

There is a paradox/contradiction here.. You implied that the resistance is to an external suffering thats already separate and independent. Then you say it's the resistance that causes suffering. But resistance to what? To an already existent suffering. Then it can't be the cause of it. 

If you bite your tongue.. Does the mere sensation cause suffering or your unwillingness to experience it??  Why does resistance to certain experiences exist in the first place? 

[mandyjw]

@Someone here ? What's the difference between guidance and resistance? If I'm guided to not go in a certain direction, but I continually push up against the barrier trying to smash it down, I create the resistance, whereas if I use that guidance simply to inform where I DO want to go, and what I DO want to focus on, resistance becomes guidance. 

If we believe that the resistance is to something external we may rebel against it and want to free ourselves from it. This is the fighting against the barrier, which actually is the creation of the barrier because it is not actually imposed on us, or external. But if we realize that the guidance is only essentially guiding us to what we DO want, we quickly go in that direction and no longer fight against it. 

In this case I mistake the barrier for the thing I want, I want to be free of the barrier, when it reality, the barrier is guidance born out of the freedom I already am. When I learn to take my focus off what I do NOT want and realize that there is no exclusion and no imposition, I turn my focus to what I DO want and in the realization that the focus itself is my freedom, I become what is desired, I realize that I already am what I desire. 

[cookiemonster]

Ignorance leads to lack of freedom leads to suffering.

I have the freedom to put my finger in the candleflame, and the freedom to take it out, hence even if it hurt like hell it wouldn't be suffering as it was voluntary. Moreover, if I didn't know how to remove my finger from the candleflame then I wouldn't have the freedom to take it out, and hence we arrive back at suffering.

Therefore ignorance is the root.

 

[Someone here]

12 minutes ago, mandyjw said:

 If we believe that the resistance is to something external we may rebel against it and want to free ourselves from it. This is the fighting against the barrier, which actually is the creation of the barrier because it is not actually imposed on us, or external. 

Again you deny external source of suffering and reduce it all to resistance. I don't resonate with this. 

I gave you a concrete example but you just skipped over it. 

From my experience.. Which migh be different from yours... Life is the house of illusion.. of narcissism.. of love. If you can't submit to that.. and if you're not efficient enough.. you're gonna get kicked out soon. Life cares.. but death doesn't. Life wants you to spread delusion.. to spread love. It's all fine. Maybe you don't belong here. Maybe you're already dead. Who knows?

Life is also the house of duality. of balance... of opposites. You can't just go and live in the extremes. Like this everything is love nonsense. You gotta always level down to where things are at. The more paradoxical and complicated you are.. the more blessed you'll be. Life worships complexity and it walks over simplicity. Deny that and see. You will die.lol 

[mandyjw]

@Someone here It's ok, let it out. 

[Someone here]

20 minutes ago, cookiemonster said:

Ignorance leads to lack of freedom leads to suffering.

I have the freedom to put my finger in the candleflame, and the freedom to take it out, hence even if it hurt like hell it wouldn't be suffering as it was voluntary. Moreover, if I didn't know how to remove my finger from the candleflame then I wouldn't have the freedom to take it out, and hence we arrive back at suffering.

Therefore ignorance is the root.

 

How is voluntary suffering not suffering? 

[Someone here]

@mandyjw lol.. Is that you in the GIF ? 

[cookiemonster]

8 minutes ago, Someone here said:

How is voluntary suffering not suffering? 

 

Because if it's not a problem then it's not suffering.

For example, BDSM is not suffering. Torture is.

[Vzdoh]

Fundamental lack of self love and self acceptance 

[mandyjw]

15 minutes ago, Someone here said:

@mandyjw lol.. Is that you in the GIF ? 

Why yes, it's the wall I made for myself and named Someone here.  

[Tim R]

It would be wrong to reduce the cause of suffering to "desire" - because then I ask: "what is desire?".

And a looong rat tail would follow. And this rat tail turn out to be a circle. Suffering doesn't have any one cause, it's not a linear, but a circular chain of causation. All elements of which arise simultaneously. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pratītyasamutpāda

This idea of the 12 fold chain of dependent origination is a key idea in Buddhism. 

Buddhism is a dialectic method, i.e. it's like a dialog between a teacher and a student.

"I suffer and I want to stop suffering."

"Desire is the cause of suffering."

"ok, so I must stop desiring. Sh*t, I now desire to stop desiring."

"Don't desire any more than you can."

"well, I'm still desiring and I don't know how to stop. I can't stop desiring, I can't not stop desiring, whatever I do, I'm desiring. I'm trapped and I can't do anything about it. F*ck!"

What the student needs to see is that the solution to this problem lies in the simple discovery that the self he thought himself to be - is not real. 

And then he escaped suffering. Why? Because suffering only exists and is only a problem, as long as there is an "I" that can suffer. Suffering is a result of "I". It's a result of resistance, aka survival. But when there's no one left to survive or to resist, suffering seizes to be. 

[kinesin]

The root of suffering is in wanting things to be different than they are.  Total acceptance of all eventualities is the key to freedom from suffering.

Note that 'freedom from suffering' doesn't mean that bad things won't happen.  This isn't magic.

[sethman]

being irreligious 

[Intraplanetary]

simple, identification with the ego. The more you become aware of you being a mental construct the less you suffer.

[Nahm]

4 hours ago, Someone here said:

The Buddha said it's "Desire ". 

What do you think? 

Got a reference / resource on that?

[Godhead]

5 minutes ago, Nahm said:

Got a reference / resource on that?

Doesn't the 2nd noble truth say something along those lines? 

[Nahm]

@Godhead

I’d say it implies it yes, but the second without the third leaves the second out of context… with the third going on to say that it is not desire in and of itself which is or is the cause of suffering, but clinging / thought attachment in regard to ‘separate things’ and seeking fulfillment in that way. 

[kai0]

The concept of hell or suffering has always been a central part of almost all the major religions but it doesnt seem nearlyv as important in nowadays new age culture for no apparent reason, so you will likely find better answers if asked in a christian church or maybe from jordan peterson who doesnt (at least) seem to have a very good reputation around here, and what they'll basically tell you is that God created hell to punish the devil for his sins so if yuo want to understand that in simpler terms and in reference to your question God is the source of suffering and the mechanism in which suffering manifests is through the devil or otherwise known as selfishness and so basically the buddha and jesus seem to agree that desire of the individual is the source of suffering

Edited June 15, 2021 by kai0