Harmony 2

There are three kinds of suffering. One kind is immediate suffering or the pain we experience when our body is hurt. Another kind is suffering of change - the pain we feel when something good is lost for us. The third kind is the suffering caused by our way of living. 

The third kind is most difficult to experience and get rid of.

In the western culture, tremendous progress have been made in lessening the first kind of suffering. Factors that used to give this suffering - lack of food, clothes, bad housing, bad health, dangerous homes and work and even war - have been dealt with. The situation of today is like paradise compared to what it was just 200 years ago.

Also, the suffering of change has been lessened. Our pain of losing material things is turned into the consumer world we live in, where new products help us forget the loss of glamor of last years products. But still we suffer from losing other people, and from losing our own health, youth and life.

The third kind of suffering is not yet addressed properly. We have to endure it. We even increase it. But it can be addressed.

The factors in our way of living that result in suffering are very fundamental. They are our ignorance and our way to relate to others.

Suffering as experience is a distinct process in mind. It can be solved in mind. The antidote is love. 

In order to solve the external causes which give rise to ever new and worsened suffering, the first step is to seek harmony in relations with others. We should acknowledge our total interdependency. And there are good signs. The awareness of our interdependency in environment, climate and global economy is increasing.