Is Meditation Designed To Keep Us From Feeling Positive ?

[With English interpretation] Ven. Pomnyun Sunim's Answer to Is meditation designed to keep us from feeling positive emotions?
Selection from Sunday Meditation with Ven. Pomnyun Sunim. meditation q&a [Week 10] (June 14, 2020)

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Transcript

So, I understood venerable Pombino's words last time when he said the meditation was not designed to dull the emotions but give us perspective to react with clear thoughts to different situations rather than reacting with negative emotions. Can you apply the same principle to the positive emotions? It's meditation designed to keep us from feeling positive emotions. So, Let's take an example. This is an ethical precept. Help others. That is up to you as an option. So, To help others is a good thing. But just because you choose not to help others does not make you into a bad person. So, Helping somebody else is a choice that you can make either for or against. But if it feels good to help others then you can choose to help others. But to not harm others is not a choice. Not harming others is something that is mandatory. So our emotions can both be positive or negative. But we always want to hold on to the positive but not really want the negative. But if you look back on your life, The good always comes with the bad emotions. So, This cycle of good and bad, Buddha calls it reincarnation. Cycle of birth and rebirth. So, This positive emotion, Joy that you speak of is not sustainable always. So if you feel joy, It always comes with its association with bad. And that's because what you call joy or what you even call suffering, They share the same root of desire. So, Basically there are two sides of the same coin. If your desire is satiated, Then you have this sense of satisfaction which is good. If your desire is not satiated, Then you have this sense of dissatisfaction which is bad. However, In this life we live, All our desires cannot be satiated. That's why we always live in the midst of positive or negative emotions. So instead of vacillating between the positive and negative, If we want to really resolve ourselves from this suffering permanently, Then we have to free ourselves from this sense of desire. And if we free ourselves from desire, Then suffering cannot occur. But if that happens, What we call joy today also disappears. So the definition by which we describe the state of nirvana is a state where suffering has dissolved. From a philosophical perspective, Buddhism looks at the sense of joy as an associated inevitable part of the sense of suffering. So the ideal state in Buddhism is a state of calm in which neither suffering nor joy occurs. But in reality, In everyday life, You need to get rid of eradicate bad emotions, Negative emotions, Because it becomes a source of suffering to us. But positive emotions like joy doesn't become an immediate target for dissolution. So you can just let it be. While letting it be, But if you pursue the sense of joy, Then you have to acknowledge the ineffably it will follow with the sense of negative emotions. To summarize a bit, The negative emotion, You should try to tamp that down, Not let it occur. And if it does occur, Then try to dissolve it as soon as possible. But as long as you don't attach yourself to the pursuit of these positive emotions, Because that attachment will lead to suffering again. So in other words, You should definitely not harm others, But you can always choose to help others if it makes you feel good. A little concerned that the example is that analogy is not exactly right to this.