Creative Guidance-IASbaba, Inspirational & Educative Articles
Going Beyond Suffering:
The Self uses the mind and thoughts to communicate ideas to you. The core desire to awaken is not the desire of your mind; it is always the desire of the Self. You want to break away from the noise and clutter of the mind, and you want to break away from the disturbance of the body. You want to go beyond suffering: Mental, physical, emotional, and every other kind of suffering. Your mind doesn’t even know what Awakening is. As a matter of fact, your mind doesn’t even know that it exists for it to think about Awakening.
The desire to go beyond suffering is an existential desire that is already within you. Whether you meditate or not, whether you accept the spiritual path or not, throughout your life you will seek different ways of going beyond pain and suffering. Isn’t that what the entire journey of life is about? Isn’t the quest of man to go beyond some form of personal suffering? Isn’t going beyond suffering the reason why people try to escape by drinking alcohol, taking drugs and participating in extreme sports? Isn’t our desire for an adrenaline rush directed toward overcoming some of the pain and suffering that is already within us?
Going beyond suffering is a daily task. If the temperature is too hot and you want an air conditioner, but you don’t have enough resources to buy one, you work toward getting one. If you can’t walk everywhere you need to go, you work to buy a car. Every step you take in life is basically to go beyond some kind of suffering. You can do all sorts of things to make yourself more comfortable, but all of these are temporary fixes that need your constant attention. The only true permanent solution is going deep inside and understanding the true meaning of suffering.
“This article is a part of the creative endeavor of Nirvana Foundation and IASBABA.”
