Sunday, January 11, 2009

Answers

Yesterday, while I was talking to a friend of mine about the last days of our student life and our memories of this place, we started discussing about the attachment factor. Her question was whether suffering is a cause for attachment or attachment is a cause for suffering.

In my view suffering is the cause for the attachment. One starts making continuous efforts to end the suffering and then after some time it becomes a part of the life and when the time comes for an end one starts missing it and only then the realization comes of getting attached to it.

But then I thought that attachment may also be the cause of suffering. One gets hurt only when he is not able to separate himself from the things/persons that have become a part of one’s life.

Arghhh…the answer is difficult. I think it’s like a vicious circle which never comes to an end and everyone chooses the answer according to his/her own comfort.

 

11 comments:

Nabs said...

Hi Isha... According to m ... attachment is the cause for suffering...The more you have attachment towards all worldly things and people around... the more u feel depressed while leaving them.... Once you get over all these then according 2 Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs u are walking towards the path of Self Actualization......

Unknown said...

the answers to some questions are better left unanswered. n ur write up has one such questions. Its indivdual human perception which would reason for the logic ... n each of us can have one of our perceptions n logic.. anyways.. a good point brought forward as we all are the end of our academic life, experiencing pain n joy at the same time...

Isha said...

Thanks Nabs and shilpa :)

nea said...

My dear girl, I think you have got it all wrong. Attachment can never be attributed to suffering. When you get attached to someone or something its because it gives you joy, happiness and you find solace in it.

Once you leave the thing you are attached to, you miss that feeling of familiarity and in your quest for a replacement you may feel your suffering.

The only other way you might feel you are suffering is if that attachment of your hurts you in someway you didn't quite expect. Then again, it is only your attitude towards the attachement that changes causing a feeling of suffering.

I think its pretty messy anyway. I just wouldn't attribute sufferings with attachments. And I hate it when people say don't get attached you'll get hurt. Heck if you never get attached you'll never know what it was like living the joy and the happiness

Nirvana said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Isha said...

@ nirvana, i will appreciate if u read the question again which i have tried to answer and then the answers i have tried to give...for ur convenience i am explaining again...
attachment is a close adherence that binds a person... with attachment comes affection. also, we all have expectations from self... however we also have expectations from relationship.. when one falls short of expectation, it gives us pain.. but we suffer when we make our attachement indispensible.
expect from others .. they are a part of ur being... however suffering arises from the cord called attachement.. for if there is no attachment there is no emotion no relationship.

pooja said...

its a never ending question ...also some questions dont have answers ...when buddhism and oshoism couldnt solve this ..who are we ?
as per the masters here :P ....where did expectations come into the picture ? it sounds like some theory from rab ne bani di jodi :lol lol

Travel with Manomay said...

Temme first is attachment and suffering wrong or right. I dunno from theories or by any sayings of gr8 men but when i think from my heart its that beautifull feeling which creeps and then overhelmes, makin me stand in a paradoxical situation to submit myself to the GREED the most inane trait of humans, that we long or either pragmatism or more simpler being practical.

To make it clear itss sumthing which we long for and hence in this process get attached, but as never ever anything reverses itself so is that time ... ultimatly what comes is so called suffering which has been personified as on a darker side.. The talks of nirvana, renunciation, parivrajakta, moksha is all set agains this simple world attachment,, TO free ourselves from thiss which as far as i know cant be and rather strangely according to me shud'nt be. Speaking of suffering it could be turned into something which we could have cherished and loved as a sweet memory, but the GREED or rather the demand for more i.e. to demand an exact replica of the time spent and a certain addiction to a personified feeling takes over and then starts sadness and bereavment.
-->So its all your will either to njoi the so called suffering.
-->Take stride and love whatever you had in your life and undersatnd the audacity of attachment.
-->Detach yourself which surely you can do if u want to, as this addiction is too hard to resist.

Baaaaki sab upar wala jane :P

Nithya said...

so much has already been said...wat else can i say. but i do agree with ur part isha that wen the parting time comes even the worst place or thing makes u sad.
probably humans get attached to things very fast.....

Raghu said...

Well, you like suffering because there is a comfort in it, i mean u r so attached to a thing that u dont want to lose it and losing it will cause pain because u think u cannot live without it. But the fact is, u have drawn a comfort zone around urself where you dont want to look beyond it.

If u can understand yourself clearly, get into it without attaching anything to it then there exists no suffering, it is pure discovery where u will find the beauty associated with ur life in freeing ur attached thoughts and living a more satisfied life.

One suffers because one is attached to a thing/thought. The moment u see the truth in that thing/thought then attachment disappears automatically. If u accept the truth as it is then there is no suffering. You dont have to go in search of ending things, u just have to release them by finding the truth in it.

Mukul said...

interesting discussion here,

i agree with nea.

attachment is the cause of suffering but it also brings you a lot of happiness[this is why we try and cling to good things and people and plsces and feel horrid if we are seperated.] i guess the trick would be to love everything for the happiness it brings with it, for the variety it beings into our lives and the experience it provides us. and when the tide turn, we must move into yet another quest for such a thing/person/place/situation or seek to find happiness in what we have. life is an unending quest for happiness. it gives us purpose. when we are without purpose, we are stagnant and we are truly,DEAD.

okies, hope this wasn't a big bhasahan. :D