“Pain and suffering are linked,
but no more pain does not necessarily mean no more suffering.
There are people who have a little pain and a lot of suffering.
However, there are others who, despite a lot of pain, suffer very little.
What is it that can do this? ”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“Any technique that can help to pacify suffering is wonderful,
but unfortunately only temporary.
Any technique that will develop clarity is precious,
since it contributes to resolving the cause of suffering .”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“Clarity is the ability to see clearly three things and to understand them:
the cause, the effect and that which knows both the cause and the effect.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“There are three responses to suffering:
– to pacify
– to resolve
– to dissolve
It is the level of suffering that will determine the response.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“A good deal of suffering stems from the fact that we often take one moment for the whole story. A particular action done by someone at a particular moment should not be confused with the whole person. The person may have made a mistake and done some wrong, but there were surely other moments, other actions which brought some good.
We should never try to ignore suffering, but we can try to relativize it, see it in a wider context. If the shoe pinches, we should try to find out where it pinches, but also look at the good points. We don’t have to throw it away….”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“How can we evolve in order to change our relationship with suffering?
One important factor is replacement. The capacity to replace something within ourselves by something else will affect our relationship with suffering. If we are incapable of this then our relationship with suffering will not evolve.
For example, if we had a bad relationship with our mother in childhood this may dominate our feelings and thoughts concerning her. Every time we are reminded of this relationship the bad things come to the surface – the way she treated us, what we had to endure and so on. This is the way it happens naturally.
But we can also consider the positive things that must have come out of the relationship, the most important, for instance – the gift of life by the mother to the child. We cannot change the bad childhood experiences, but, if we can replace one way of looking at it by some new way, there may be a change in our suffering.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“We need to evolve.
Evolution is like a river.
When we see the river at the source the water is so clean, so pure, almost blue.
As it comes closer and closer to the ocean it becomes a different river,
we don’t want to go near it because it is so dirty.
This is the natural flow, from up to down.
But where does this river get its water from?
It comes from the snow up in the mountains.
Where does the snow come from?
From the clouds. Where do these clouds come from?
From the ocean where all the dirty water goes.
There is some magic which is done in the ocean.
It can absorb all this dirt and gives such fresh water.
In our tradition, they say that when things get too dirty,
when disorder comes to a limit, when suffering is too widespread,
something will happen.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“Attachment comes through pleasure. There’s nothing wrong with pleasure, but when we no longer have what gave us pleasure, or if there is some threat of losing it, attachment often appears.
Negation is a tendency to resist or reject after something bad has happened. It could be a fact, an idea or whatever, but if we were not comfortable with it, we resist. There is a strong relationship between attachment and negation, like heads and tails of a coin. Strangely, the more we are attached to something the more there is a likelihood to reject it later – when what we were expecting is not forthcoming heads becomes tails!
Fear is a very fundamental emotion which seems to have some special energy that can make it survive on its own. Fear exists independently of objects, they just give it something to fix on, like the wolf in Western fairy tales. There are two types of fear : fear of something, an earthquake, an illness, a wolf etc., and fear of losing something, a job, a loved one, prestige etc.
Fear, negation, attachment and association either alone or together create the conditions for suffering to erupt again and again. Suffering appears, disappears and re-appears forcing us to admit that something is missing and this pushes us to seek how to find it.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“We are all in the strong trap of association,
where everything other than conformity is a disturbance.
It’s almost automatic.
We are unable to accept what is not consistent with the way we function
and we associate ourselves with things by projection.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“What we are seeking is linked to the discovery of faith within us.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“Suffering is basically either the result of
the absence of something that we want, or
the presence of something that we don’t want.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“We usually start seeking because we have
something which we do not want: suffering.
Suffering pushes us to seek.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“When we are seeking pleasure and possession
the mind is very busy.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“Whatever is the source of life is surely the source of freedom,
a source which knows us and cares for us.
It is everybody’s right, and is not beyond us, but within us.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
We are seeking freedom.
We all desire freedom.
But what sort of freedom?
Is freedom to do what we wish?
Are all the people who have the liberty to do what they want really free inside?
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“The desire to have is pushing us to seek things,
but to seek what sort of things?”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
“The heart knows no boundaries.”
– TKV Desikachar from unedited manuscript for ‘What are We Seeking?’
