07 Right Understanding

60 The Buddha says that everything that exists exhibits three characteristics: impermanence (anicca), unsatisfactoriness (dukkha) and absence of self-nature (anatta). The first of these characteristics is apparent to any observant or thoughtful person. Failure can change into success, love can change into indifference or hatred, civilizations decline while others rise, youth changes into middle age from there into old age and death. Everything that exists is in the process of changing into something else.

61 The second characteristic, unsatisfactoriness or suffering, means that nothing is capable of giving us complete and lasting satisfaction, both because of impermanence and because of the nature of the conditioned mind. Even during the most pleasant experience there is always at the back of the mind the anxiety that it might not last, or the though `if only this, that or the other were the case, how much more prefect the experience would be'.

62 The third characteristic that all things exhibits is the absence of self-nature. It is often assumed that things have a self-nature, an essence, or in the case of human beings, a soul, which never changes and which is the true self of the thing or person.

In fact, everything is compounded (sankhara), that is, made up of parts which in turn are made up of other parts, and a thing only comes into existence when all the parts come together. A house, for example, is a collection of bricks, walls, windows, doors and a roof, and does not have a separate existence apart from these components.

Human beings are the same. We, are, the Buddha said, made of Five Aggregates (panca khanda) : body (rupa), feelings (vedana), perception (sanna), mental constructs (sankhara‚) and consciousness (vinnana), and because we are a collection of parts, each of which is in a constant state of change, we too have no self-nature, no permanent, independently existing self.

63 Not understanding these three characteristics has a profound effect upon every aspect of our life - how we see ourselves and our world. When we do not understand or cannot accept our own impermanence, old age and death are seen as fearful and terrifying. When we believe that things are capable of giving us lasting happiness, we strive to accumulate more and more, we invest our possessions with a value they do not have, and we take steps to prevent others from taking them.

For as long as we assume that we possess a self, the attitude `I', `me', `mine' dominates our life with all the problems such as attitude brings in its wake.

64 We have said before that the aim of life is to free ourselves from samsara and to attain the happiness of Nirvana (25). We cling to samsaric existence because despite all the problems it involves us in, ignorance prevents up from seeing it as it really is impermanent, suffering and without self-nature. When though the development of Right Understanding (samma ditthi) wisdom (panna) replace ignorance, we come to see things as they really are (yathabhutananadassana), we lose interest (nibbida) in samsaric existence and our passions fade away (viraga), leaving us content, unshakably calm and free (vimutti).

All compounded things are impermanent.
When one sees this with wisdom,
One turns away from suffering.
This is the path to utter purity.

All compounded things are unsatisfactory.
When one sees this with wisdom,
One turns away from suffering.
This is the path to utter purity.

All things are without self-nature.
When one sees this wisdom,
One turns away from suffering.
This is the path to purity.

65 Developing Perfect Understanding is, the Buddha says, like a blind man who has eyesight restored, and whose attitude toward things he used to like changes because he can now see them accurately.

It is like a man born blind who cannot see either colour or shape, the even or the uneven, the stars, the sun or the moon. He might hear someone speaking of the pleasure of lovely, unstained, pure white cloth, and start searching to get some.

But someone might deceive him by giving him a greasy, grimy, coarse robe, and by saying : " My good man, this is a lovely, unstained, pure white cloth." He might take it and put it on. Then his friends and relations might get a physician and surgeon to make medicine for him - potions, purgatives, ointments and treatment for his eyes.

Because of this, he might regain his sight and clarify his vision. Then the desire and attachment he had for that greasy robe would go, he would no longer consider the man who gave it to him a friend. He might even consider him an enemy, thinking:

"For a long time, I have been defrauded, deceived and cheated by this man."

Even so, if I were to teach you Dhamma, saying: "This is that health, this is that Nirvana," you might come to know health, you might see Nirvana. With the arising of that vision, the desire and attachment you had for the five clinging aggregates might go.

You might even think:

"For a long time, I have been defrauded, deceived and cheated by the mind, by clinging to body, feeling, perception, mental constructs and consciousness.

Conditioned by this clinging there was becoming; conditioned by becoming there was birth; conditioned by birth old age, dying, grief, sorrow, suffering, lamentation and despair came into being. This is the origin of whole mass of suffering.

66 There are three ways to develop the wisdom needed to have clear understanding of reality. We can develop wisdom through thinking (cintamaya panna), through learning and study (sutamaya panna) and through the practice of meditation (bhavanamaya panna).

Careful thought and reflection will tell us that the Buddha's teachings about the three characteristics are sound. However, this understanding, being only intellectual and on the surface of the mind as it were, may not necessarily change us.

Many people know that smoking endangers their health but they do not stop smoking. Likewise, intellectually we may accept the truth of impermanence but continue to act as if we were going to live forever.

To be transformational, this understanding will have to go deeper. Study of the Buddha's teachings and perhaps of sciences like physics, physiology and psychology might give us a deeper and more direct insight into the truths of impermanence, unsatisfactory and absence of self-nature.

But ultimately, it is only with a mind calmed and purified by meditation that these truths are fully comprehended and understood. We will describe what this involves in the chapter on Right Mindfulness and Right Concentration.