Suffering (part 2)

Most people confuse pain and suffering but the Buddha made a clear distinction between the two. He makes the distinction in how two people react to it. Both the ordinary person called "the uninstructed worldling"(assutava puthujjana) and the wise instructed noble disciple of Buddha (sutava ariyasavaka) both experience what he calls pain. The difference is in how they respond to pain.

            "The wordling reacts to them with aversion and therefore, on top of the painful bodily feeling, also experiences a painful mental feeling: sorrow, resentment, or distress. The noble disciple, when afflicted with bodily pain, endures such feeling patiently, without sorrow, resentment, or distress. It is commonly assumed that they are inseparably linked, but the Buddha makes a clear demarcation between the two. He holds that while bodily existence is inevitable bound up with physical pain, such pain need not trigger the emotional reactions of misery, fear, resentment, and distress with which we habitually respond to it. Through mental training we can develop the mindfulness and clear comprehension necessary to endure physical pain courageously, with patience and equanimity. Through insight we can develop sufficient wisdom to overcome our dread of painful feelings and our need to seek relief in [distracting ourselves]..."

             --Bhikku Bodi, In the Buddha's Words: An Anthology of Discourses from the Pali Canon.

                                    The Dart of Painful Feeling

            "Monks, when the uninstructed worldling experiences a painful feeling, he sorrows, grieves and laments; he weeps beating his breast and becomes distraught. He feels too feelings-a bodily one and a mental one. Suppose you were to strike a man with a dart, and then strike him immediately afterward with a second dart, so that the man would feel a feeling caused by two darts. So too, when the uninstructed worldling experiences a painful feeling, he feels two feelings-a bodily one and a mental one."

            "While experiencing that same painful feeling, he harbors aversion toward it. When he harbors aversion toward painful feeling, the underlying tendency to aversion to painful feeling lies behind this. While experiencing painful feeling, he seeks delight in sensual pleasure. For what reason? Because the uninstructed worldling does not know of any escape from painful feeling other than sensual pleasures. When he seeks delight in sensual pleasure, the underlying tendency to lust for pleasant feeling lies behind this. He does not understand as It is the really the origin and the passing away, the gratification, the danger, and the escape in the case of these feelings. When he does not understand these things, the underlying tendency to ignorance in regard to neither-painful-nor pleasant feeling lies behind this."

            "If he feels a pleasant feeling, he feels attached. If he feels a painful feeling, he feels it attached. If he feels a neither-painful-nor-pleasant-feeling, he feels it attached. This, monks, is called an uninstructed worldling, who is attached to birth, aging, and death; who is attached to sorrow, lamentation, pain, dejection, and despair; who is attached to suffering, I say."

            "Monks, when the instructed noble disciple experiences a painful feeling, he does not sorrow, grieve, or lament; he does not weep beating his breast and become distraught. He feels one feeling-a bodily one, not a mental one. Suppose they were to strike a man with a dart, buy they would not strike him immediately afterward with a second dart, so that the man would feel a feeling caused by one dart only. So too, when the instructed noble disciple experiences a painful feeling, he feels one feeling-a bodily one, and not a mental one."

            While experiencing that same painful feeling, he harbors no aversion toward it. Since he harbors no aversion toward painful feeling, the underlying tendency to aversion does not lie behind this. While experiencing painful feeling, he does not seek delight in sensual pleasure. For what reason? Because the noble instructed disciple knows of an escape from painful feeling other than sensual pleasure, the underlying tendency to lust for pleasant feeling, does not lie behind this. He understands as it really is the origin and the passing away, the gratification, the danger, and the escape in the case of these feelings. Since he understands these things, the underlying tendency to ignorance in regard to neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling does not lie behind this.

            If he feels a pleasant feeling, he feels it detached. If he feels a painful feeling, he feels it detached. If he feels a neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling, he feels it detached. This monks is called a noble disciple who is detached from birth, aging, and death; who is detached from sorrow, lamentation, pain, dejection, and despair; who is detached from suffering I say."

            This monks, is the distinction, the disparity, the difference between the instructed noble disciple and the uninstructed worldling."

    -- In the Buddha's Words: An Anthology of Discourses from the Pali Canon.