Desire Appears To Create Pain, And Pain Appears To Create Desire
Two very central experiences in life for us all. Let’s look at how this is so together.
…upon a brief inspection at what it means to be in any form of pain, we find an immense and profound truth of life…, that the experience of any type of discomfort or displeasure which manifests as various degrees and forms of pain, invariably generates and sustains desire within in us.
How Pain Appears To Create Desire
When we’re in any form of pain, discomfort, or some state of general all-around displeasure and/or dislike be it physical or psychological, we want it to end immediately. Indeed, if we didn’t want it to end could we still say that we’re in a state of displeasure and/or dislike at all? It seems that the state of constant yearning for something to exist other than what presently is in existence is actually the source of the discomfort. The pain appears to be being generated by the wanting of “the opposite” of what actually presently is, or stated differently, by the lack of acknowledgement and acceptance of what presently is.
When we’re in the throngs of pain, all we know is that we just want the experience to stop, so we want the negation, negative, or the opposite experience immediately. We want to immediately cease being “uncomfortable”, and start experiencing the presence of “comfortable.” Therefore, the desire associated with pain appears to be due to both, the yearning for the absence of discomfort, as well as the yearning for the presence of comfort which may be seen as two sides of the same thing, each as the “inverse” of the other. Both of these forms of yearning may be observed to fundamentally boil down to the same thing — “wanting”, and isn’t “wanting” the same thing as “desiring?”
Let’s see what the all-knowing google has to say about the definition of “desire”:
de·sire
/dəˈzī(ə)r/noun
a strong feeling of wanting to have something or wishing for something to happen.
“a desire to work in the dirt with your bare hands”verb
strongly wish for or want (something).
“he never achieved the status he so desired”
So there we again have it…, wanting = desire.
Therefore, upon a brief inspection at what it means to be in any form of pain, we find an immense and profound truth of life…, that the experience of any type of discomfort or displeasure which manifests as various degrees and forms of pain, invariably generates and sustains desire within in us.
And so therefore causes one to conclude that:
pain = desire.
As a brief aside…, what appears to follow as true from the above two equations is also the equation:
wanting = pain
This observation is also pretty interesting. This can be seen as true because they both have desire in common.
When we want something — again, doesn’t matter what it is… could be anything… just fill in the blank — the experience appears to manifest as a form or type of “yearning” that varies in intensity all the way up to “burning” as most humans could probably attest.
How Desire Appears To Create Pain
If it is true that pain equals desire as appears to be the case, then let us see if the inverse is also true. Let us now look at how the nature of desire also creates, and is therefore equal to — pain.
As we’ve just observed together by looking at the nature of pain, when we’re in the throngs of pain we experience the desire of wanting to not be in pain. So let’s look together at what it means to “want something.”
When we want something — again, doesn’t matter what it is… could be anything… just fill in the blank — the experience appears to manifest as a form or type of “yearning” that varies in intensity all the way up to “burning” as most humans could probably attest. This mild to severe form of mental anguish and burning appear to be being generated by the present state of not having or not possessing a desired thing. So it would appear that the pain of desire is the pain of “not having”, or is the pain caused by the yearning, craving and burning for something other than what is. Therefore, desire appears to manifest as yearning for the presence of the currently absent desired thing. In the case of pain, it was the desire for the absence of pain, and in the affirmative sense, it is the desire for the absence of the presence, or just simply the desire for the presence of a thing. Again, we appear to be caught in the wanting of the opposite of what presently is. Hence, fundamentally, desire appears to create be the pain of “absence.”
Desire may also be seen to create to create the pain of “presence” in the following ways. As far as one may consider anxiety and fear forms of pain, once one obtains the desired thing there can be a tendency to feel anxiety and fear over loosing the possessed desired thing. And then there is the pain that comes with being addicted to a desired thing. This pain usually takes the form of severe psychological and/or physical pain that results from one’s continued engagement in a certain desired behavior that they know is harming them, but their desire for the experience of the drug(whatever it is — could be anything) is greater than the pain they receive from using it. Sort of like us.
Therefore, we once again we appear to have:
desire = pain
So these two phenomena appear to be quite intimately linked, so much so and in such a way so as to cause one to conclude that they are really two sides of the same “one” coin.
OK… I see it, but now what? What can I do about it?
This is again, another trap we fall into when encountering truth that pulls us back into non-truth. Are minds are automatically and mechanically programmed and conditioned to solve problems. Our minds immediately see this as a problem. And so what is a problem? Something to be solved no? And what does “solved” typically look like? Doesn’t the whole mental structure usually take the form of “something is not right”, or “something is wrong, and so it must be put right?” (whatever “right” and “wrong” may be defined as) Does this at all look familiar to you yet?
it is precisely “the doing” in the form of desire that continues to create the original problem, because the very act “of doing” or “desiring” presupposes that there is a problem in the first place.
When we make a “problem” out of anything, we’re just creating more desire, because we want to change what presently is, and this “want” manifests as a mental division between “what is” and “what should be”, and hence has the propensity to generate mental conflict as desire and pain.
After one then sees this, they may then logically conclude that the “thing” that can be done about all of this is again, precisely the opposite, which is to “do nothing.” Again, this is due to the fact outlined herein that it is precisely “the doing” in the form of desire that continues to create the original problem, because the very act “of doing” or “desiring” presupposes that there is a problem in the first place.
Therefore, the only “thing” that can be done, if anything is to just become aware of all of this. Become aware of it moving inside of us. Just “observe” the interplay and relationship between these two seemingly separate things. See it moving in the moment. “See” how they are really one. This “seeing” is all the “doing” that is required for a most incredible transformation in one’s consciousness that is really beyond description, words, and thought, and therefore also time.
Is any of this true?
Please look to see if you can see what is being point to here for yourself. Observe like a scientist, impartially. If you’re partial to something other than what it is you’re observing while you’re observing, then you’re probably not really observing, and if you’re not observing then you have no chance of “seeing” and then really changing.
