Our suffering stems from ignorance. We react because we do not know what we are doing, because we do not know the reality of ourselves. The mind spends most of the time lost in fantasies and illusions, reliving present or unpleasant experiences and anticipating the future with eagerness or fear. We cannot live in the past; it is gone. Nor can we live in the future; it is forever beyond our grasp. We can live only in the present.
“There is a sphere of experience that is beyond the entire field of matter and mind that is neither this world nor another world nor both. Neither arising, nor passing away, nor abiding, neither dying nor rebirth. It is without support, without development, without foundation. This is the end of suffering.” -Buddha
There is no “I”, no permanent self or ego. The ego is an illusion created by the combination of mental and
physical processes. Having explored the body and mind to the deepest level, one sees that there is no immutable core, no essence that remains independent of the process, nothing that is exempt from the law of impermanence. There is only an impersonal phenomenon, changing beyond one’s control.
© 2020 Ayreen Khan All Rights Reserved
