Note: This is the midterm essay I submitted for Buddhism and Modern Psychology. I got a good grade on it and am quite proud of my work, so I am posting it here. This course is available for free on Coursera. It is offered by Princeton with Robert Wright as the lecturer.
The Four Noble Truths can be summed up as the following: Life is suffering. The cause of suffering is craving for and clinging to that which is impermanent. For one’s suffering to cease, one has to let go of the craving or clinging. For one to let go of the craving or clinging, one must practice the Noble Eightfold Path.
This may sound simplistic to many because evolution has shaped us into creatures that depend on the pursuit of short-lived pleasure for survival of both the individual and the species. Nevertheless, I find this doctrine to be a good guideline on how to stay sane while alive, especially when fulfilling responsibilities and meeting expectations as a fully-grown human being. I personally cannot attest to what practicing the Noble Eightfold Path can do for a practitioner because I have neither deliberately nor consistently practiced it, but the first three Noble Truths are clearly reflected in my own experiences with craving, clinging, and suffering.
Duhkha in My Youth
I have spent most of my life with depression and anxiety. While a significant part of this may be due to genetic predisposition, I can’t deny the contribution that my upbringing had in exacerbating my condition.
I was an achiever when I was in elementary school, not because I was exceptionally studious, but because my parents were the stereotypical Asian parents who valued high grades. With their attachment to academic achievement, almost to the exclusion of everything else, they inadvertently trained me to become attached to high marks and to favor rote memorization over genuine learning. In addition to that, my mother was a helicopter parent who felt the need to do my own homework and school projects for me to ensure that I get good grades.
This strategy worked during my elementary school years, but in high school, I transferred to a school with a rigorous science training whose campus was located an ocean away from home. The combination of being away from my parents, studying in a school with strict standards, and not having a good foundation for independence at a young age resulted in the opposite of what my parents expected from me. Me being attached to getting high grades to get my parents’ approval as a disaster for my mental health.
For the rest of my life as a student, I never recovered my achiever status. My worsening academic performance and self-esteem fed into each other and made the other worse. Everything snowballed. I had to drop out of the university because of my deteriorating mental health. My depression and anxiety lasted a long time and I was never able to finish my degree.
Duhkha in Adulthood
I brought all of my unhealthy patterns with me in every job that I took and every relationship that I had. Many people who are into spirituality believe that what you focus on grows, and that is exactly what happened to me. Unbeknownst to me, my way of coping with my ever worsening life situation was to numb the feelings or to deny what was happening and run away from it if I can. While I was never addicted to substances, I dealt with my misery with food, seeking exciting experiences, and getting into relationships that I shouldn’t have gotten into. I sought exhiliration to distract myself from my unhappiness, desperately clung to the high, and either crashed or scrambled to induce the next high when the previous high wore off.
Anicca to the Rescue
Fortunately for me, change is the only thing that is constant. The very thing that I sought to eradicate from my life became my savior when I finally understood that life is impermanence and even the suffering ends. I became interested in meditation and mindfulness as a way of stabilizing my mind and emotions. With mindfulness, I learned to let go of intense craving by allowing what is in the here and now and embracing impermanence. I followed the common meditation advice of feeling your own feelings instead of trying to suppress them. I have only started doing this almost three months ago to date, but the results have been profound: my rollercoaster moods have stabilized, my tendency to get obsessed with the things I badly want has been tamed, and the more mundane tasks I had to do became more fulfilling for me.
In Summary
Attachment to the impermanent sets us up for disappointment. Attachment makes us cling to short-lived pleasure and then feel bad when it subsides. While pleasure-seeking may seem part and parcel of the natural human evolutionary adaptation, the Buddha taught us that non-attachment is a way to subvert this tendency and help humans live a more peaceful and emotionally balanced existence.