"We can't always dictate
our personal
circumstances,
but we are always free to choose to what we will commit our lives. One
can allow life to be used by
the circumstances
or one can take
the circumstances
and choose to be free. Each of us makes the choice to either be
fascinated by
the soap opera,
the folly of being human, or to
celebrate life,
the dignity of life, and the worth of each individual. Because each of
us is, in the final analysis, nothing more than
an ordinary human being,
a man's unique story is ultimately trivial. Life can always be told as
a story, but no matter how engrossing, what difference does a story
make? Relieving another's suffering, contributing to another's joy is
certainly one of the
great privileges
in life, but even this is not in itself uncommon. I've tried to live
my life so that my life could be a place where the truth could go to
work. Will the insights into the nature of being human, and beyond
that, new possibilities of being for human beings result in any
lasting value for life? Only time will tell. If there is anything
uncommon, it is not the man but the ideas that have taken root in the
life of the man."
...
"There is suffering in life."
... Lord Siddhārtha Gautama Shakyamuni of
India
aka
the Buddha
(often misquoted as "Life is suffering.")
I'm browsing
the internet,
searching for a suitable quote or two for an essay I'm working on, the
theme of which is how we deal with and manage suffering when we
encounter it in life. One well known quote attributed to
the Buddha
appears again and again, and it's this: "Life is suffering.".
Now I've alit (if you will) on this quote many, many times over the
years, but I have not been
rigorous
in my inquiry into what it's really saying to (and for) me ie not until
now.
This time, I start inquiring into / asking myself the question "Well,
is life suffering?", and what I get to is actually no, not
really, it isn't. Life is not suffering - at least life is not
suffering all the time (don't take "Life is suffering" too
literally). Look: sometimes life is joyous, sometimes life is tedious,
sometimes life is boring, sometimes life is overwhelming. And yes,
sometimes life is suffering. But the implication that life
is suffering ie that life is always suffering
like a permanent characteristic imprinted on its DNA? ... no, I don't
get it that way - which means it's either the quote itself or my
interpretation
of it, that is off.
To be respectful, to grant respect where respect is due, "Life is
suffering" is, after all, supposedly one of
the Buddha's
great quotes, about which I wouldn't want to get into an argument /
disagreement with him ... which lends credence to the conclusion that
it may very likely be my
interpretation
of the quote that's off, not to mention all the
interpretations
of all of the sources and commentators on
the internet
of
the Buddha
supposedly saying "Life is suffering.".
Now engrossed and intrigued, I search further, coming across references
to another (similar) quote, one which is also attributed to
the Buddha.
This time it is "There is suffering in life.". It's not life
is suffering. No, this one is there is
suffering in life. Somehow the latter is the more palatable
of the two, the one to which I can almost hear myself saying "Yesss
...", whereas about the former I can only muster a "What can he
possibly be implying by that, Laurence?".
Then as I search even further, I notice that many of the motley crew of
sources and commentators on
the internet
are
eschewingthe Buddha
ever actually uttering the classic "Life is suffering" at all in the
first place ("'ello, 'ello, what's this then?") and that what he
actually said was "There is suffering in life" which then became widely
misquoted (given our penchant for a certain
absence of rigor)
as "Life is suffering.". Now I don't know if that's actually true or
not ie I don't know if that's what really happened or not. But engaging
with this distinction does afford me a certain opening and flexibility,
allowing me to deal with any suffering I encounter in life
(a context for this: "There is suffering in life") without being
stuck with it (a context for that: "Life is suffering").
It's now a matter of
compassion
for me for those with whom there's suffering going on in their lives,
to carve out this distinction - and to carve it out again to remind
those who already got it but who, in the face of suffering, may have
(temporarily) forgotten it. With "Life is suffering", there is no
respite when there's suffering. But with "There is suffering in life",
there is room for respite even while suffering is going on.
That's right: with "There is suffering in life", there's respite when
suffering ends ... and ... there may even be respite
concomitant with ie at the same time suffering's going on
(with "Life is suffering", neither of those options are available). So
even if we don't know the exact words
the Buddha
used, this inquiry will be valuable whenever there's suffering.
