Attachment to desire: the path to dissatisfaction

I believe that human beings are in a constant search for freedom, peace and inner happiness, whether we are aware of it or not. However, it is not a secret that we usually look outside for the fulfillment of these wishes.

A) Yes, we embark on the incessant search for pleasure and away from painBut all this does is cause us more suffering. We are obsessed with success, beauty, money, power, consumption, pleasant experiences, approval and prestige, among many others, that we blind ourselves to the reality that they are not lasting things, nor that they cannot make us truly happy.

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Holding on to desires results in dissatisfaction

Clinging to these things leaves us, as the Buddhist meditation teacher Sogyal Rinpoche says, “like people crawling through an endless desert, dying of thirst” because what our Modern society offers us to drink, by which it teaches us that it is important to pursue, and what we also choose to drink, is a glass of salty water that makes our thirst even more intense. We want more and more of those objects, situations, experiences or people to whom we attribute the power to make ourselves happy and along the way we not only become thirsty and lost, but we can also seriously harm those who surround.

Just think of excessive ambition of some public figures and political leaders and how this ambition takes the resources that are destined to generate well-being in the people who have the mission to serve, leaving, in their place, great poverty, hunger, violence and pain. Attachment to desires makes us selfish, it only makes us think about our well-being. However, it is not a wise way to achieve this, because clinging to desire is never satisfied nor is it the way to feel fullness.

Another example is unhealthy attachment to a partner. The desire for connection, to love and to feel loved, becomes with grasping, a desire to possess and control the other, as if it were possible to make them never leave or never change their feelings. Since this is not the case, re-deposit happiness in a person leaves whoever does it constantly unsatisfied, because the expectations you place on the other are not realistic.

It is likely that on several occasions we have said or thought that we will be happy when we finally travel, we have the house, the car, the achievement or the desired person, and then discover that, although these things do bring us joy for a time, they do not give us the lasting peace and happiness that we seek and that, as is to be expected, new ones arise again wishes.

Does this mean that we would be better off removing desire from our lives?

The two types of wishes

Jack Kornfield, clinical psychologist and meditation teacher explains from the perspective of Buddhist philosophy that there are healthy and unhealthy desires. These arise from a neutral state of mind called the will to do. When the will to do is directed in a healthy way, it provokes healthy desires. When directed in an unhealthy way, it provokes unhealthy desires.

We may want something for different reasons. People may want to help others out of genuine compassion and generosity or out of admiration. They may wish to create some technology to destroy or to contribute to development and health. Attachment operates in subtle waysEven in things that seem harmless or good and often in desires there are mixed motivations. We may want to travel out of the desire to know and broaden the vision about the world and diversity, or not to be left behind, to show every detail on social networks, or to escape the problems.

Kornfield explains that healthy desire creates happiness, it is based on wisdom, kindness and compassion and derives in interest, responsible management, generosity, flexibility, integrity and growth spiritual. Unhealthy desire creates suffering, is based on greed and ignorance, and leads to possession, self-centeredness, fear, greed, compulsion, and dissatisfaction. Inner freedom arises from the ability not to cling to desire. This is different from getting rid of it.

It's about learning to relate wisely to desire. Not obsessing over the fulfillment of what we want or to stop enjoying life without these things being present. This implies an open and relaxed attitude towards desires. We can let go and calmly reflect on them and see what drives them or if we really need to carry them out. If we decide to do them, we do it with awareness.

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Towards a form of addiction

Buddhist philosophy describes this state as a hungry spirit whose desire is insatiable and therefore suffers greatly, because nothing can satisfy him.

As Mason-John & Groves put it, “In a sense, we can all identify with hungry ghosts, because we live in a culture where nothing it is enough… We want to live in a bigger place, we want to have a better job, more vacations, the latest technological innovation, the latest in everything. Even if we do not define ourselves as addicts, many of us use acceptable drugs, such as food, social toast, medications, sex, shopping, friendships, etc., to cope with the emptiness of our lives ”.

Work with desire and pain

Thus, it is necessary to transform the relationship we have with desire and also with pain, since the inability to be with the inevitable pain of life leads us to take refuge in unhealthy desires that paradoxically end up producing greater suffering. It is important to foster healthy desires and rid ourselves of those that enslave us. For this, we can use mindfulness to our mental states when desire arises and kindly observe how we feel when present and how we feel when we cling to the. In this way we begin to discern healthy desires from those that are not. Likewise, we can begin to recognize how we use desires to escape from the uncomfortable and if it's our usual way of reacting.

Kornfield says that we must investigate desire and be willing to work with it to regain our innate freedom and balance. Working with desires will depend on whether we tend to suppress it or wish excessively. It's about not resisting or holding on to desires when they arise, but rather accepting them graciously and observing their natural course without necessarily acting on them.

This practice helps us to relate in a more compassionate and kind way with our inner experience, which in turn helps us to better regulate our emotions and to act with greater awareness. We are realizing that thoughts, as well as desire and painful emotions come and go, are not permanent as we believe in those moments in which they arise. We disempower unhealthy desires when we don't act on them, despite their intensity. Then they stop ruling us.

Instead of running away from pain, we face it with compassion and without judgment, allowing it to be and dissolve itself. We stop identifying with what happens to us and with our internal experiences. We recognize that crucial moment, in which, by pausing, we can realize that we have a choice and we can respond more consciously to the situations that life presents us, without causing us suffering secondary.

Finally, Tara Brach, clinical psychologist and meditation teacher mentions that we yearn to discover our true nature, and that behind our countless desires there is a spiritual longing, but because our desires tend to cling and fixate on things that are transitory, we feel cut off from about us. When we feel distanced from our own reality, we identify with our desires and the ways to satisfy them, which sets us apart even more. It is when we cultivate a calm mind that we can be aware of our deepest longings, listen to them, and respond to them. As they say, “Invest in what a shipwreck cannot take away from you”.

Bibliographic references:

• Kornfield, J. (2010). The Wisdom of the Heart. A Guide to the Universal Teachings of Buddhist Psychology. Barcelona, ​​Spain: The March Hare.
• Mason-John, V. & Groves P. (2015). Mindfulness and Addictions. Recovery in eight steps. Spain: Editorial Siglantana.
• Rinpoche S. (2015). The Tibetan Book of Life and Death. 20th Anniversary Commemorative Edition. Barcelona, ​​Spain: Urano Editions.
• Brach, T. (2003). Radical Acceptance. Madrid, Spain: Gaia Ediciones.