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"Embracing and Transforming Suffering with Compassion and Wisdom"
We often project our suffering onto the heavens when we do not understand the causes of illness, disability, or sudden accidents, as in the saying, “the Buddhas of the ten directions, the gods of the nine heavens have not yet heard of the injustices in this world,” and as Lady Vuong blamed heaven and earth when Thuy Kieu was sold. In the Bible, Job lost both his wealth and his children, then suffered from painful illness, yet did not blame God, demonstrating that suffering is a test for practicing patience, learning acceptance, and letting go.
The method to transform suffering is based on the teachings of non-self and karma as follows:
- Patience with beings: being patient and compassionate with all beings—parents, children, social classes—not abandoning them out of resentment, but still firmly preventing injustice because we love them as ourselves.
- Patience with phenomena: deeply contemplating the mental formations (anger, jealousy, fear) and physical phenomena to realize their emptiness, their unborn nature, and to resolve grievances in our hearts.
Through the example of the young boat person who was raped and the meditation session in which we see ourselves as both victim and pirate, we see that only when we open our hearts with insight and mindfulness does the perfection of patience become a source of transformation, embracing both our own injustice and that of those who cause suffering.