Attachments: How Are We Holding?

This series on attachment represents the third talk on how we cling in daily life and how we can drop in two questions that have the potential to interrupt the pattern of clinging. A practical guide to understanding the Second Noble Truth in our daily life.

Transcript

So,

Last week we were talking about our attachments and how we hold them.

And one of the reasons that I introduced this topic after being away for a month when I was in California in August memorializing both my parents,

I got really familiar again with all the ways that I suffer because I'm holding on so tightly.

It's humbling,

It's humbling to see it,

It's humbling to admit it that without even knowing it,

You know,

In the moment,

Without even really being aware,

I just fell into a habit pattern with my brother.

And sometimes it's interesting,

You know,

Our practice,

It's just going along smoothly and life is going along and we have some patterns,

We have our routines and those routines,

They help us feel safe.

And so suffering and dissatisfaction,

You know,

It's not really happening for us on a really gross level.

You know,

Sort of most of the time we're just kind of like,

Okay,

Cruising through,

Pretty grateful.

But then something happens,

You know,

Your health turns or someone you love gets a diagnosis or someone dies.

Something happens and the world changes like that.

And what do we do?

We go back to like in a split second,

We go back to the lowest point of our evolution a lot of times.

Or if we have a regular practice,

Maybe we don't go that far back because we're learning to see,

We're learning to look.

Maybe the looking doesn't happen right in the moment,

You know,

When we get the news,

We go to reactivity,

Or if we have that disagreement,

But we have this lovely practice,

This advantage of having cultivated mindful awareness in our bodies,

In our minds.

So more quickly,

We start to see,

Oh,

This is where I'm holding.

It's really amazing this practice that we do,

Oh this,

Where am I clinging?

So last week,

Having reflected on our attachments,

And how often we can feel dissatisfaction because of them,

I thought I'd do a deeper dive into what is really the second noble truth.

These four noble truths,

They're often considered to be the central teachings of the Buddha.

So there's the truth of suffering,

We all know that that exists.

The truth of the arising of suffering,

The truth of the absence of suffering,

And the noble truth of the practice leading to the absence of suffering,

To the end of suffering.

So one of the advantages to this framework,

Especially as a foundation for the whole religious tradition,

Is that it doesn't assume or require one person to believe in something that can't be proven or seen or experienced for yourself.

It's not a supernatural belief,

It's not abstract or metaphysical,

You know,

We don't have to believe in some tenant that comes down from the Buddha,

Which can't be proven,

But that we're supposed to believe.

These practices,

This is something that we can really discover for ourselves in our own direct experience.

There is dissatisfaction,

And there is a cause to that,

And that cause is clinging.

And we see it in everyday life.

You can see that when we get impatient,

You know,

We could ask,

What's the cause of this impatience?

Oh,

I'm in a hurry to get somewhere.

Maybe I don't have to be in a hurry.

That desire to get somewhere quickly is making tension in the system.

Do I really need to get there in a hurry?

So the question,

What's the cause of this distress?

Like what is the cause that what is causing me to feel this way?

That simple question can open up the field,

Can reveal something we can do,

You know,

We can do something about this.

We can learn to have a different relationship with the cause.

We can let go of it.

Or we can just let it be.

We could not pick it up.

We could put it aside.

So whatever the cause of our discomfort or dissatisfaction,

It's just what's happening.

It's not does it no longer be is a cause.

It's just something that's happening.

There's a tension and it disappears.

So tanha,

That's the Pali word for clinging or craving.

And it's literal translation tanha,

It means thirst in English.

So it's the kind of desire that occurs with the characteristics of being thirsty.

So imagine being parched,

You know,

Really thirsty,

Desperate for water.

The compulsion that drives our preoccupations with getting something to drink can be really strong.

It could be all that you think about when you're really,

Really thirsty when you're parched.

And this thirst is the cause of the suffering.

So thirst really means that the suffering has this compulsive quality to it.

There's a drivenness.

When desires are really strong,

It's like there's an addictive force,

Which sometimes it's impossible not to give into it.

It's addictive,

Compulsive,

We don't see it even.

And that's part of the reason why there's suffering involved.

Because the desire has tension in it.

And what happens is there's a loss of freedom in this compulsive desire.

So anytime we lose our freedom,

Anytime we suffer,

We feel less,

We're limited,

We have a burden.

There's,

You know,

A challenge kind of like an inner burning,

Which is just not pleasant.

It's the thirst.

So in our mindfulness practice,

We learn to look at the nature of self-desire.

And at the nature of suffering.

We look at what the causes are.

Can I identify where I'm holding?

And this is where meditation is so useful.

Because we learn that whatever is happening in our life off of the cushion,

We learn to let it be.

Just in those moments of sitting,

We're learning to see it more clearly.

We let it show itself,

We see and we be with what's occurring.

So last week,

I had you write down your attachments and see them.

This week,

I'd like you to consider asking the question when you're experiencing something that you don't want or something that you really want but don't have.

See if you can drop in the question,

What is the cause of my distress,

My dissatisfaction?

What is the cause of my sorrow,

My grief?

And more importantly,

And what is my contribution?

There might be other people who we can point to and say this is the cause of my suffering.

Not to ignore that.

But the place where we can have the most impact is what is my contribution to this?

And then we take a good look at it and we hold it in awareness.

Not like we have to change it or fix it,

Just to understand it deeply.

And in doing so,

This is where we begin to find our freedom.

So I'll close with some words from Pemi Chodron.

This is what she writes about it.

Come back to square one.

Just the minimum bare bones.

Relaxing with the present moment.

Relaxing with the hopelessness.

Relaxing with death.

Not resisting the fact that things end,

That things pass,

That things have no lasting substance.

That everything is changing all the time.

That is the basic message.

So thank you for your kind attention this morning.

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