Buddhism, pain and pleasure are not the same

I'm personifying Buddhism in the title of this blog post. But really I'm talking about how Rob Burbea viewed the Buddhist approach to dualities in his book, Seeing That Frees: Meditations on Emptiness and Dependent Arising.

As noted in recent posts about the book, I like the way Burbea explains his subject, though sometimes he can be too Buddhist-geeky for my less-committed-to-Buddhism taste.

However, today my yellow highlighter kept making question marks in the margin as I read two chapters about "The Dependent Arising of Dualities" and "The Fading of Perception." I found much to like in the chapters, but also some that I didn't like.

Which meant I wasn't acting in accord with this statement of Burbea:

We could also say that in those ways of looking there is a measure of insight into non-duality, since the duality between objects and consciousness is seen to be false. Moreover, since in that view all objects, whatever their appearance, share the same essential nature, implicit too in this non-duality is the non-duality between things which seem to be opposites.

At first I thought that quotation was fine, since I viewed it in the way that Alan Watts often would talk about dualities such as good and bad, up and down, pain and pleasure, and such.

This uncontroversial perspective is that dualities, by definition, require both of the "duals" in order for either to exist. Good, by itself, would be meaningless. Good needs bad in order to stand out. Ditto for bad. So good needs bad, and bad needs good.

But then Burbea quotes the Third Zen Patriarch as saying, "Make the smallest distinction [between things], however, and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart." Burbea explains that rather cryptic utterance as meaning that we should "practise, over and over, a dropping of any preference for any pole of any duality that presents itself."

So we shouldn't prefer good over bad, or pleasure over pain, or love over hate, because preferences involve clinging, and clinging indicates that we haven't grasped the Buddhist tenet that actually the person clinging lacks a self that could possess the object of desire, and objects lack inherent existence anyway, which makes them not really real.

Now, later Burbea backs off the whole "dropping of any preference" thing, which is good, because it strikes me as both undesirable and impossible. After all, wanting to drop all preferences is a desire, a clinging to a Buddhist ideal. So is wanting to no longer want.

At the end of the second chapter I read today, Burbea said something that didn't elicit any question marks from me, since it made much more sense.

In realizing for ourselves this dependent arising and fading of phenomena, understanding its implication of emptiness, and then gaining some familiarity with viewing things directly as empty, a range and freedom of view is opened up to us. Describing how he practised, the Zen Master Lin Chi said:

Sometimes I take away the person. Sometimes I take away the situation or the thing. Sometimes both. And sometimes neither.

By 'taking away' is meant 'seeing the emptiness of'. Thus, among the options he listed, the first corresponds to a way of looking that sees the emptiness of self; the second to viewing phenomena as empty; the third to a lens that sees both the personal self and phenomena as empty; and the fourth takes both self and phenomena at face value.

Not impelled to always pick up and use the view of emptiness, free to look in any of these ways, we are freer, as understanding matures, to respond to any situation in any way that seems most helpful and appropriate.

This fits with my recent post, It's best to respond to most problems, not react to them. Reactions often are habitual and instinctual. In contrast to more thoughtful responses, reactions tend to be rooted in unthinking emotion or how we're used to dealing with a situation.

If a supposedly "spiritual" person is used to appearing as if they don't care about what happens to themselves or to others, because they've supposedly attained such an exalted level of detachment from worldly affairs, then they're going to act uncompassionately when say, a friend or family member is having a tough time and needs their help. 

I noticed this sort of behavior frequently during the 35 years I was an active member of an India-based religious organization, Radha Soami Satsang Beas, headed up by a guru.

The RSSB teachings would approvingly quote the words of Jesus in Luke 14:26, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple.” 

I thought that was a horrendous attitude, that a goal to leave this world behind and attain the glories of heaven required a commitment to detach from normal human activities, concerns, and attachments. I'd see RSSB disciples become rigid, dogmatic, and robotic as they tried to look like how they thought a devoted RSSB disciple should.

As Burbea says, our real goal should be to respond to situations in the most helpful and appropriate way. If that means crying along with someone who has just suffered a painful loss, then we should shed tears along with them. If it means celebrating with someone who has just experienced a highly pleasurable event, then we should share their joy.

The foundation of spirituality, the ground floor on which all else must rest, in my view is acting like a decent average human being. Without that base, whatever lofty structures we construct in our search for meaning will be deeply flawed.

Put another way, a genuine sinner is much more appealing than a fake saint. 

Comments

[SantMat64]

The verse you copied from a Christian website comes with a qualifier.

In Luke 14:26, Jesus delivers a challenging message to His followers: "If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple."

The qualifier: "This verse can be difficult to understand, especially given Jesus' teachings on love and compassion elsewhere in the Gospels. However, the key to interpreting this verse lies in understanding Jesus' use of hyperbole and the cultural context of His time. In the context of Jesus' ministry, the term "hate" is not meant to be understood literally but rather as an expression of prioritizing one's commitment to Jesus above all else, even the closest family ties. Jesus is calling His followers to a radical commitment, urging them to put their allegiance to Him above any other loyalty."

You accuse the members of RSSB of being callous to the suffering of others. I've not seen or heard of any evidence of this callousness from satsangis, either to family members or to the public at large. What I have seen and heard about is RSSB's commitment of service to the sick and the poor.

From whence did this commitment to helping others come from? Paradoxically, it came from the RSSB ethos of doing God's will and seeking first the kingdom of heaven. This ethos isn't by any means exclusive to RSSB, as it's a major feature of most religious folks.

That said, I admit that's it's not at all uncommon for the apostate from a religious group to be deemed persona non grata by its believing members. This is true from the tiniest cults to the major world religions. In respect to the family though, it's usually the ardently believing parents or siblings who are the "haters" and who view the apostate relative as a traitor to not only God but to their family tradition and ancestors.

Also, most of us who joined a Sant Mat or similar culturally fringe religion experienced that kind of disapprobation from our family members. Even if we can to see that our choice of a religious sect was naïve, I have to think that we are correct to favor our honest ideals above that of the wishes of our relations.

[Karam]

Pain is the absence of freedom. Gurinder singh dhillon and his rssb cult are the very opposite of freedom - they imprison your mind body and soul. He takes your mind by asking you to commit to the 4 vows, which fill you with fear, guilt and shame. He takes your body as he tells you to do seva (slavery which is work for no benefit to yourself, but the cult empire and lucifer dhillon have everything to gain). He also takes your soul as at the time of your death he, kaal, fools you disguised as the fake ass baba of beas, where you are devoured, raped, and your memory whipped. Your soul is then put into another body to suffer pain of rssb voodoo ways- which gurinder singh dhillon, a demon, gets great pleasure out of. Gurinder singh dhillon, kaals puppet, your days are numbered , you will face your karma.

[Ron E.]

Burbea mentions that: - “…it is also relatively common for this awareness to be referred to, for example, as the 'Ground of Being', as the 'Cosmic Consciousness', 'Big Mind', 'The One Mind', 'The Absolute', 'The Unconditioned', or 'the Unfabricated'.” And further adds: - “And since a sense of divinity often permeates experience, a practitioner may begin to speak in theistic terms.”

This is what the term ‘Ground of Being’ points to – Speaking of his awakening the Buddha (allegedly) said: - “This Dhamma I have reached is deep, hard to see, difficult to awaken to, quiet, and excellent, not confined by thought, subtle; sensed by the wise. But people love their place; they delight and revel in their place. It is hard for people who love, delight and revel in their place to see this ground: This conditionality, conditioned arising. And also, hard to see this ground, the stilling of inclinations, the relinquishing of bases, the fading away of reactivity, desirelessness, stopping, nirvana.”

Stephen Batchelor comments on this primary teaching of the Buddha in a dharma talk “A Fourfold Task,” recorded on May 30, 2014: - “That what the Buddha woke up to was not something unconditioned, something transcendent, something other than this conditioned world, but he woke up to the principle that animates life itself. We might call this today causality, cause and effect—it’s much the same, in a way. It’s the recognition that everything that arises, arises out of previous conditions, and those previous conditions arise out of previous conditions, and in later Buddhism, you occasionally get this in the Pali texts, this is under-stood as somehow beginningless. There’s no creator who started it all. This is just the process of life itself.”

‘People love their place’ refers to our particular culture, the time and place of upbringing, our nationality, generally our habitual patterns of thinking and beliefs – all the various conditioning behaviours we automatically absorb from birth and throughout life. ‘Ground’ refers to the ground of conditionality, that place from where all our reactive thoughts and actions arise. Yet, this ground, this habitual reactivity toward life is not necessarily fixed. Through (perhaps) awareness or meditation, reactive patterns can give way to a more responsive or considered cultivation of ground.

Batchelor refers to this aspect of ground: - “But what is the ground that gives us, as it were, the freedom to make the new future? And that’s the other ground: The stilling of inclinations, the relinquishing of bases, the fading away of reactivity, desirelessness, stopping, nirvana. Nirvana is that space within ourselves that’s not inflected or determined by our impulses, habits, reactivity, and so on, and that allows the possibility of another way of life which is called the Eightfold Path…”

[Spence Tepper]

Hi Brian
You wrote:
"I thought that was a horrendous attitude, that a goal to leave this world behind and attain the glories of heaven required a commitment to detach from normal human activities, concerns, and attachments. I'd see RSSB disciples become rigid, dogmatic, and robotic as they tried to look like how they thought a devoted RSSB disciple should."

Consider that when we see problems in others this may, to some degree, reflect back upon ourselves. Yes, there are dogmatic people, rigid people, but if that fills our consciousness, perhaps it is because we ourselves are more attuned to respond in a similar fashion. It can only be feedback for the person observing this.

It doesn't take away you observation, but perhaps you are focused on those type of people. The world of RSSB or any organization may include people very kind and generous. Afterall, somehow that organization created the largest COVID hospital in the world to serve a population that sorely needed it.

This is the problem with trying to respond to what we see, and not to react. To be responsive and compassionate, sensitive, is also balanced with centeredness, wholeness, mindfulness. And observation of the world and ourselves requires intense stillness. We must silence our stream of judgments to see things as they are in their whole state, and our role and connection to them all.

Once you understand that the pain of every individual around you is your pain also, and you are part of that, naturally, you will help. It is all you can do. But from where do you draw the strength and power to do so?

Withdrawing Within.

Whatever failings the human condition has, everyone has the power and strength to move forward within themselves, and to at the very least the degree to help someone else in need. To tap into that strength may require, every day, withdrawing from everyone and everything else in the world. Then, that experience within will bring you right back out to help and complete your responsibilities.

"If I am not for me, who will be?
If I am only for myself, what am I?
If not now, when?"

Hillel

[Spence Tepper]

Now, about pain. Who can stand by and allow anyone else to suffer? We look at Ukraine and ask, appalled, how could anyone choose to invade another nation? What could possibly justify the loss of human life?

Nothing. There is no justification morally. But by cause and effect, it has happened, and persists.

What causes anyone to lash out at others? It happens when they are so caught up in the wrong they feel has been done to them, that they lose all personal responsibility to treat others as they wish to be treated...with the love of a brother or sister. And so, you see people harming each other all the time. They have lost all perspective.

Yet to see this happening when people right here in our home struggle to feed their children and get essential medical care, even life-saving medical care, puts to shame political interests, religious interests, philosophical interests, and financial interests.

To see things from a higher perspective, we must make a commitment to first change ourselves. To get ourselves right free of dogma.

Unfortunately, in that process of gaining a greater understanding, we begin to see that people everywhere are caught up in things they think are truly, materially, important. But from the outsider's perspective, those are meaningless things, of zero intrinsic value.

That perspective can guide us, help us to act in a helpful way, not react in a way that may just escalate the problem further.

So, the ability to withdraw, even from our own attachments, our own reactivity, is a critical part of actually helping anyone else. And along the way we find other things far more important than worldly attachments. Those higher, better, inner things, that power and insight, peace and strength, sanctuary and library, coach and guiding hand, is within. And having developed it, it is portable. It goes with us wherever we go. It is far more valuable than these transitory, material things. And that strength helps us help others in dealing with the material things required to function.

Helpfulness and personal development go hand in hand.

So how did you withdraw from your own thinking today?
And how did you help someone else today?

Submission itself is a great pathway to accomplishing both.

[Sofia]

Pain and pleasure are definitely not the same… 😂

But the immunity to pain and pleasure would be experienced the same.

And that would make life a bit dull.

[Roger]

Peace of mind is realized only when you no longer hide behind one of the many masks you have been wearing all of your life.

Discovering authenticity within the conditioned personality is not easy.

We are trained from birth to please and not offend, and to say and do what our society and time period declare is right, By doing such, others will like us, admire us, and the potential for conflict is reduced.

Because this approach to life is based on inauthenticity it may ease tension on the surface in our dealings with others, but subconsciously it causes worry, in case we are discovered to be faking it.

Being liked, loved or well thought of may well be an inherent survival mechanism but the hidden cost is that the mind can never be at peace with itself, others and the world around it because it has to remain on guard to prevent us from being a closed as frauds.

The authentic self is discovered in solitude where the pretense can be dispensed with.

But that is just the first phase.

The second phase is accepting who you actually are, without fear of being criticized.

The third phase is living within the integrity of that authenticity without worrying what others think.

The fourth and final phase is the realization that there is not even an authentic self to worry about.