I agree with Chris and his friend Leonard, and would echo that and
re-echo the Buddhist credo that attachment is the root cause of all
suffering.
Buddha's teaching is all about relieving suffering by dropping
attachments. Attachments are desires and expectations directly
associated with your sense of self. Zen practice is about dropping
attachments by first realizing the self is an illusion and then through
continued practice dissolving that illusion.
No self = no attachments = no suffering.
...Bill!
--- In [email protected], "Joe" wrote:
>
> Chris,
>
> Is that addressed to Suresh, to me, or, as you write, to humanity?
>
> ;-)
>
> --Joe
>
> PS My friend Leonard, an author on Anger, and Zen, teaches that anger
is caused by an irrational expectation not being fulfilled. For
example, someone takes the parking space at the supermarket that you
were carefully aligning your car to pull into, and a guy in a small car
just speeds ahead of you and slips in. You feel angry. Now, what if a
Cow had strode into that space, instead, and sat down: Would you feel
angry? The difference is that you expected the fellow in the
compact-car to show you some "respect", ...which, unfortunately, ...is a
wholly unreasonable expectation. Whereas, the Cow, well, she doesn't
even know how to drive! Leonard's book is, THE COW IN THE PARKING LOT.
The book even includes exercises for the reader. Now, I would say,
Leonard's "cause" of anger is the view from the point of view of
Delusion. If viewed from Awakening, I would say that anger is caused by
bewitchment with a personal "self", and by concomitant causes and
conditions which exacerbate that. Buddhism teaches that it is due to
Ignorance, Hatred, and Greed.
>
> > Chris Austin-Lane chris@ wrote:
> >
> > Dude just sit for a while and observe the dark side of humanity
boiling up
> > inside yourself.
> >
> > Perhaps I am atypically angry but I have certainly got angry
impulses in
> > myself - times when my system wants others to be sorry, to regret,
to
> > suffer for ignoring me.
> >
> > >
> > >Dear Suresh,
> > >
> > > Thanks for considering to tailor your posts to the topics of
interest on
> > > this specialized group. It helps us all, I think. When we visit
this
> > > group, our ears and eyes are keen to find topics that bring us
here and
> > > bring us together, around the topic(s) of Zen.
> [snip]
>
