Permanently Deleted

                      • mxnoodles [she/her]
                        ·
                        3 years ago

                        It might be helpful to make a distinction between “pain” and “suffering” in this context. Pain is inevitable; suffering is in part determined by how we react to the pain.

                          • mxnoodles [she/her]
                            ·
                            3 years ago

                            There are probably a few ways you can reduce your reaction to pain, but I think changing or reframing your reaction is more the goal (again, at least in this context) than eliminating a reaction entirely. Buddhism is one framework out of many where people work skillfully with the desire that surrounds pleasure and pain - every breath I take is fulfilling an inevitable need, but I don’t need to be controlled by a resistance born of the idea that I won’t always be breathing, or an attachment to the idea of breathing for the rest of all eternity.

                            There are definitely people, particularly some western buddhists, who are similarly controlled by a desire to become completely free of the emotions and needs that encompass the human experience - within their own framework, this desire feeds their suffering.