According to His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Verse 22 of the Thirty-Seven Practices of the Bodhisattva says:

All that appears comes from an illusion of the mind and the mind itself is from beginningless time without inherent existence, free from the two extremes of manifestation (eternalism [unchanging] and nihilism [life is without meaning or purpose]) and beyond all elaboration to understand this nature (Tathata) and to not conceive of subjects and objects as really existing is a practice of the bodhisattva.

Two basic Buddhist teachings are being expressed in this verse: 1) Shunyata, beings and things have no intrinsic existence in themselves; all phenomena come into being because of conditions created by other phenomena, and 2) Ta.tha’ta – a Sanskrit word that means suchness or the true nature of reality at any given moment.

Tathata or suchness is often best revealed in those seemingly mundane or meaningless experiences, such as noticing the way the wind blows through trees, a sky full of rainbows or watching someone’s face light up as they smile.

We find freedom in Tathata, in the experience of life itself; life just as it is. We develop the capacity to experience thoughts, sensations and feelings completely. Then we do not struggle with what we experience. When we are completely engaged in an activity, we naturally have no sense of self. Our aim in practice is to engage and experience life so completely that we become empty, open, and aware in whatever arises. Quite naturally, without any effort, we become nothing but an ongoing response to the experience of life, including the suffering and struggles of others. That is freedom.

Pema Chodron wrote in her book When Things Fall Apart, “Life is glorious, but life is also wretched. It is both. Appreciating the gloriousness inspires us, encourages us, cheers us up, gives us a bigger perspective, energizes us. We feel connected. But if that’s all that’s happening, we get arrogant and start to look down on others, and there is a sense of making ourselves a big deal and being really serious about it, wanting it to be like that forever. The gloriousness becomes tinged by craving and addiction. On the other hand, wretchedness–life’s painful aspect–softens us up considerably. Knowing pain is a very important ingredient of being there for another person. When you are feeling a lot of grief, you can look right into somebody’s eyes because you feel you haven’t got anything to lose–you’re just there. The wretchedness humbles us and softens us, but if we were only wretched, we would all just go down the tubes. We’d be so depressed, discouraged, and hopeless that we wouldn’t have enough energy to eat an apple. Gloriousness and wretchedness need each other. One inspires us, the other softens us. They go together.”

The point is that both of these emotions can be present  — sometimes at the very same moment — and we can still be okay. They’re just feelings and if we can know that both of them will pass and pass relatively quickly, then it can be somewhat easier to experience them. Getting hooked is what’s painful. Thinking that either gloriousness or wretchedness will last forever — that those feelings will never change — is what creates our suffering. Everything passes. When we notice this, we can feel more stable, not so tossed about by the seas of life.

Photo by Diego Madrigal 

Sogyal Rinpoche wrote in The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, “Self-grasping creates self-cherishing, which in turn creates an ingrained aversion to harm and suffering. However, harm and suffering have no objective existence, what gives them their existence and their power is only our aversion to them. When you understand this, you understand then that it is our aversion, in fact, that attracts to us every negativity and obstacle that can possibly happen to us, and fills our lives with nervous anxiety, expectation, and fear. Wear down that aversion by wearing down the self-grasping mind and its attachment to a nonexistent self, and you will wear down any hold on you that any obstacle or negativity can have.”

Joseph Goldstein once told Sylvia Boorstein in an interview, “Your attention is good. Use it to pay closer attention.You have a lot of Energy available to you. Don’t squander it!” She says of this, “The urgency of the task–it’s painful to suffer, and there is so little time to undo a lifetime, maybe more, of habits of suffering!–is a compelling call to pay attention all the time, not letting the mind be seduced into daydreams. Here are questions you could ask yourself during the day, on a bus, at work, at home looking out the window: “What’s going on here that I don’t see?” “What am I missing?” “What could I be seeing that would open my heart or lift it up?” You could think of it as contemplation practice, reflecting on the present moment, expecting to learn something new. The expectation energizes attention.”