Something is always happening to you. And, the mind interjects thoughts and emotions as reactions to these daily situations. Thus, often this overwhelming mental behavior causes suffering because the mind interprets an experience as bad or unacceptable. Let’s use the example of hitting your finger with a hammer to illustrate. You hit your finger and it hurts. This is a fact. But, the mind construes the hurt finger as a drama due to countless reasons that are fictional illusions. Hence, thoughts and feelings attachment themselves to the pain in your finger. This mental behavior then becomes a repetitive pattern, if you are unaware, that might continue for minutes, hours or days. And, this causes the suffering that you feel.
A person hits their finger with a hammer and it hurts. Nevertheless this is pain and not suffering. Suffering is an inflection of the mind in an unaware person that can eventually result in mental and bodily dysfunction. Experiences stimulate the brain. Coincidentally, the mind then tries to interpret, define and label all brain stimuli. Accordingly, this usually causes an unaware person to feel confusion and anxiety during most experience. Why? Obviously, because there is not any sense of conscious presence. Unconscious behavior induces illusions of complexity. But, these illusions are only of the mind and usually not derived from any actuality of presence. Continue reading