Samsara

Suffering is definitely relative.  For some people life is a daily struggle to survive, for others it may be the failure to find the ideal relationship, job or latté.  I’m not making fun here really.  No matter how well off we are we suffer.  It’s a good idea sometimes to look around and realize how well off we are in comparison.  Even better, of course, to devote some of our resources to helping those who are less fortunate.  The truth, however, is that suffering is universal. 

When things are going well we feel content and happy.  Unfortunately life, existence, nature, or whatever we call it, involves change.  The ancient Greek philosopher Hereclitus observed that, “the only constant is change.”  When we depend upon outward circumstances for our sense of well-being we are always vulnerable to devastation.  Another word for this dependence is attachment.  Attachment is at the heart of suffering.  Deeper still, however, is ignorance.  Ignorance in this sense doesn’t mean lack of education; it means that we have forgotten who we truly are.  We don’t know ourselves. 

Samsara means the continuous cycle of birth, decay, death and rebirth.  It is a cycle that happens every lifetime, but it also happens each day and every moment.  When we were born we entered into this life experience, into this particular physical, familial, socio-economic, cultural and historical context.  Although we are unaware of it, it has all been preconditioned by our past karmas.  On a soul level we have chosen this life experience in order to develop spiritually.  Imagine writing a screenplay full of drama, comedy, action, etc. then submitting it and forgetting about it.  Suddenly you are at the theatre and watching the movie.  You laugh, cry, cringe and groan with each scene completely forgetting that you are the author.  Because it has been so well produced, you become so involved with the main character that you even forget you are actually in the audience. 

The true purpose of human life is to awaken to our true nature.  As Thich Nhat Hahn says, “We are here to awaken from our illusion of separateness.”  The ego-self belongs to the drama.  It is the character we have identified with.  The ego-self is involved with duality.  It loves this and hates that.  Our lives are the tragic-comic dramas of our egos.  We have friends and enemies.  We fall in and out of love with others, experience success and failure, health and sickness, joy and sorrow.  We fail realize that everyone and everything is our Self in disguise.  As we awaken our lives change from drama to love story.  Ego tells us that there is a particular person with whom we will find true love.  Spirit reveals to us that we are love itself. 

There is a wonderful verse from the Bhagavad Gita which gives us a glimpse of what this universal Self-love might be like.  “Enlightened ones,” says Krishna, “look with an equal eye upon one who is intelligent and humble, an uneducated janitor, a cow, elephant or dog.”  A friend once commented that it seems like the enlightened person is indistinguishable from an idiot.  This is the perspective of the intellectual ego.  We have to go beyond the rational intellect in order to know a deeper reality.  Our True Self is beyond mind and intellect.  As we awaken in consciousness we begin to recognize ourselves in all beings.  This is the birth of compassion, the birth of love.

It is also the gateway to freedom, moksha.  Moksha, or nirvana, is the release from samsara.  It is the recognition of the eternal being behind the appearances of life.  When we are aware of our eternal beingness; when we are at rest in Atman, i.e. Self, we have a higher perspective.  We can recognize that this life, this incarnation is temporary while we are eternal.  It doesn’t really matter what kind of past you or I might have had.  Once we awaken to our authentic being we are liberated from that narrative, from that dream.  Attachment will try to take us back there again, so we have to be on guard.

I have found a simple way of understanding non-attachment and liberation in a quote from Victor Frankl, MD, who said, "Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."  Consciousness, compassion, non-attachment and liberation might here be considered as roughly synonymous.  Consciousness develops as we are able to enter that space between stimulus and response; when we practice inner non-attachment.  Compassion and liberation, or moksha, arise naturally when we are able to this.