[AikiDale]

A MASTERFUL ILLUSTRATION

An aging master grew tired of his apprentice complaining, and so, one
morning, sent him for some salt. When the apprentice returned, the
master instructed the unhappy young man to put a handful of salt in a
glass of water and then to drink it.

"How does it taste?" the master asked.

"Bitter," spat the apprentice.

The master chuckled and then asked the young man to take the same handful
of salt and put it in the lake. The two walked in silence to the nearby
lake, and once the apprentice swirled his handful of salt in the water,
the old man said, "Now drink from the lake."

As the water dripped down the young man's chin, the master asked, "How
does it taste?"

"Fresh," remarked the apprentice.

"Do you taste the salt?" asked the master.

"No," said the young man.

At this, the master sat beside this serious young man who so reminded him
of himself and took his hands, offering, "The pain of life is pure salt;
no more, no less. The amount of pain in life remains exactly the same.

However, the amount of bitterness we taste depends on the container we
put the pain in. So when you are in pain, the only thing you can do is to
enlarge your sense of things . . . Stop being a glass. Become a lake."

[carinab]

So that's my problem, I'm not diluted (deluded?) enough....

Sorry, couldn't resist! To add an appropriate response; emotional pain, like physical pain, tells us what is wrong and needs to be tended to, fixed if you will. If you have a button that can be pushed that causes pain, you now know what to re-wire. It can be a useful tool if you allow it to be.

[benos]

That's a great story/lesson Dale - thanks for posting it!

... During the third day of a sessin (3 (18 hour) days of sitting meditation), I had a beautiful experience that relates to the above story. By that time, during every second of sitting, the pain in the legs is excruciating. Gradually, I noticed that the pain didn't seem to be in (or confined to) my legs any more. I was still aware of the sensation I would normally call pain, but the feeling was much "bigger." The sensation was noticeable within a large area, several feet wide and tall, in front of my body. The "pain" was no longer "in my knees," as I was used to feeling it. Actually it didn't feel like "pain" at all - it was just a sensation I was aware of.

Reminds me of a sentence from Krishnamurti: "Pain is the movement away."

I remember, as a teenager in Ohio, playing with that concept when for whatever reason I was shivering/shaking my butt off in some really cold weather. If I focused my attention totally internally, for as long as I could maintain that - cold wasn't cold any longer. As soon as a thought crept in (usually in a couple seconds) - I was cold again. I remember standing in the freezing cold practicing that with a friend. We kept looking at each other in disbelief - we truly were not cold - for whatever length of time we could maintain "it." We weren't sure what "it" was... if anything it was the absence of thought.
be

[BigDave]

To tag onto Brian's story, I used to deal with summer heat and humidity the same way. One summer were hand weeding a 1+ acre EPA soybean trial. It was about 110 F with the heat index. By all accounts - miserable. After years of working in the fields, I had figured out that if I ignored the heat (more or less) I wasn't hot, I was just there. My boss, on this day, would say about every 2 minutes - "damn, its HOT." I thought to myself, "yeah, I had almost forgot." Too bad I hadn't quickly figured out a way to ignore my boss as I did the heat.

In those situations, now that I read this and reflect a bit, it isn't that the sensation is different (good/bad, hot/cold, etc.) , but my thoughts and reaction to it are.

[Rikarin]

benos, on Jun 17 2005, 04:40 PM, said:

Reminds me of a sentence from Krishnamurti: "Pain is the movement away."

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Wow. You totally lost me there.

[short_round]

AikiDale, on Jun 16 2005, 08:07 PM, said:

. . . Stop being a glass. Become a lake."

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... or become a Recess peanut butter cup.

[XRe]

Rikarin, on Jun 17 2005, 10:14 PM, said:

benos, on Jun 17 2005, 04:40 PM, said:

Reminds me of a sentence from Krishnamurti: "Pain is the movement away."

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Wow. You totally lost me there.

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I take this as.... Growth involves change to a new state. Change can be viewed as moving away from one state/behavior/point-of-view and moving to a different one. Change on any real level always seems to involve pain of some sort (phyiscal, emotional, spiritual). That pain *is* the act of moving away from the old thing and towards the new thing.

Heh - when I workout, I whisper the other old one to myself.... "Pain is weakness leaving the body...."

[benos]

short_round, on Jun 18 2005, 01:58 AM, said:

... or become a Recess peanut butter cup.

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...mmm

[carinab]

Quote

Heh - when I workout, I whisper the other old one to myself.... "Pain is weakness leaving the body...."

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My personal favorite is the one my coach used to lay on me, "Pain is temporary, death is permanent." That one has seen me through a lot including child birth!

[BigDave]

carinab, on Jun 19 2005, 03:46 PM, said:

Quote

Heh - when I workout, I whisper the other old one to myself.... "Pain is weakness leaving the body...."

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My personal favorite is the one my coach used to lay on me, "Pain is temporary, death is permanent." That one has seen me through a lot including child birth!

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When I workout (esp bike or eliptical at lactic threshold) I remind myself that I need to hold on and keep going. The pain will end and I'll be okay when its over, but it won't kill me. And, if it does (kill me), either way the pain will be over.

[short_round]

carinab, on Jun 19 2005, 06:46 AM, said:

"Pain is temporary,

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... glory is forever.

[ParaJoe]

Pain is weakness leaving the body.

When I was in tech school in Pensacola, FL, the Marines used to say this all the time. I got in trouble for asking how much weakness is in the body and when will it be gone because I'm tired of the pain. They weren't too happy. Those crazy fools actually enjoyed running 5 miles.

[GuildSF4]

I like these ones:

Pain is the body letting you know you are still alive.

The mind will quit long before the body. (From military training...)

I can also say that when I am working on something (mentally or physically) I don't normally feel the pain (or heat/cold) it is like it is not there until I think about it again.

[brother bad]

the key is not minding the pain.

i've had chronic headaches for many years that vary in intensity and effect (the result of meningitis). after taking all sorts of meds and trying this and that, i've learned to not pay attention to them.

overall, it works very well.

[Nolan]

AikiDale, on Jun 16 2005, 07:07 PM, said:

Stop being a glass. Become a lake."

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Great post!

So all I have to do is become the Ass (Donkey) and stop being just the exit orifice!


Nolan
Skilled, but otherwise unremarkable according to Post #26

[Singlestack]

Pain is life

[brother bad]

'life is suffering...'

[Flexmoney]

Quote

'life is suffering...'

Quote

Pain is life

Those are interesting perspectives. And, it is interesting that we often choose to make those associations.

Another aspect...relativity. Comparing one thing to another. The thing we choose as the baseline for the comparison seems to influences that perspective.

I often would think about hot and cold. We (humans) can survive, adapt, and even thrive in a wide range of climite conditions. Even so, at the extremes, we tend to express discomfort.

I've wondered what would happen if we lived in an "ideal" climate. Moderate most of the time. Perhaps we would then find that a 10 degree swing in temperature was extreme?

[benos]

I like your add Kyle.

Relativity is our basis of reality.

Depending on their capacity to understand, the Buddha taught different things to different people. His general, most popular teaching was (something like): "Life is suffering; suffering has a cause, and the cause is desire. Eliminate the cause of suffereing and you eliminate suffering." Now that's a pretty good teaching because the subtleties of desire undermine many of our efforts to be happy, or at the least just to live peacefully. But to those capable of understanding at a deeper level, he also taught that the somewhat abstract principle of relativity - subject and object, this and that, coming and going - is in itself an illusion, and has no basis in true reality. Now that one will sink you into a state of pondering...
be

[Putty]

Desire resides in a modus of inoperability without a component carrier or “nidus” This “nidus” resides in a consciousness that promotes freedom from constraint when in a vacuum devoid of vitality. Remove the vacuum and nature fills the labyrinth of the mind with survival embedded throughout millennia, and you have resultant desire borne into the modern era where most if not all needs are met, and only the material intangibles lead astray the weak without balanced guidance. This formally denounced misaligned perspective is an ingrained, and genetic survival trait that has cast a shadow over many psyches whereby their continued momentary happiness hinges upon their ability to want and have of anything. Reality is here and now and is unavoidable in our material state.

[Rick]

"Stop being a glass. Become a lake."

[/quote]


Most of us have become a lake...The Great Salt Lake..............Hmmmm