A flower has no intention of making us happy

Photo by Tanalee Youngblood on Unsplash

“WHEN WE SEE A FLOWER, we think, ‘How pretty.  I like looking at this.’ The feeling is one of acceptance.  Seeing a cockroach, however, may cause revulsion and rejection.  We may experience feelings like ‘I don’t want to see that.  It’s disgusting.  I wish it would go away.’

“So, who is doing all this accepting and rejecting?  The answer, of course, is your own mind.  We make these decisions as we see the world around us with our eyes, hear it with our ears, and feel it with our bodies.  Acceptance of something gives rise to attachment, rejection to anger.  Therefore, we can see that the true source of anger lies in the individual, not in the object.  Objects are neutral.  A flower has no intention of making us happy; neither does a cockroach intend to cause repulsion.  Every individual’s perception is fixed by his or her attitude.

“Let us say that all of us are wearing colored glasses.  These glasses are the difference between whether one lives in the light of contentment or in the darkness of dissatisfaction.  The Buddha provides instructions to remove the glasses and correct our vision, but the responsibility of actually taking the glasses off falls entirely upon the individual.  Please do not wait until a mystical being intervenes.  That will never happen.”

~ Venerable Sumanasara
from “Freedom From Anger, Understand It, Overcoming It, and Finding Joy,” p. 12

This entry was posted in Mindfulness, Quotes, Readings and tagged , . Bookmark the permalink.

1 Response to A flower has no intention of making us happy

Comments are closed.