How Aspiration Can Free Us From Suffering

Dhamma Talk + Guided Meditation
Session 043: Oct 28th, 2020, by Sophia Ojha Ensslin and Cristof Ensslin

Banner Photo by Saad Chaudhry - Thank you!

Handout

This week we have prepared a multi-page handout for you. It is posted below as blog content. Plus, you can download it as PDF by clicking on the following button:

Introduction

You may have heard that Buddhism teaches us about letting go of our desires. But not all desires are created equal. Bhante Vimalaramsi recently told us about wholesome desires. Wanting to make good karma or wanting to reach spiritual enlightenment are examples of wholesome desire. That’s anything that leads to more peace, love and harmony internally and externally.

One Little Caveat

For meditation, that means to develop one’s mind to become still and tranquil. For everyday life, it means doing wholesome actions. Now there is one little caveat. When we have those desires, we are prone to also get attached to them and attached to what results will transpire. If we get attached to what we want to achieve, it then becomes a cause for suffering. Because if we don’t get what we aimed for, we fall into disappointment or sadness or anger or get a sense of failure. And we are then trapped by our desires, even if they are wholesome desires, instead of feeling light, liberated and happy.

So how do we navigate this in our daily life? Shall we not have any desires, even wholesome desires? Shall we not take action because we are attached to the results? Shall we not work to get things the way we want it? Shall we then all sit in a cave and deprive ourselves of all things?

Clearly, not. Buddhism is pragmatic not dogmatic. It’s about how we can lead a happy life and free ourselves of suffering in our practical day to day life in an intelligent way. So let’s look at this a bit closely. To begin, what is helpful is to make a distinction between aspiration and expectation, between efforts and results, between wholesome desire and unwholesome desires.

Wholesome desire is anything that leads to peace, harmony, and love, internally and externally. Unwholesome desire is anything that leads us away from peace, harmony and love. Simple enough.

Let’s Look Now At Aspiration And Expectation

We know that they are two different words although we may at times use them interchangeably. But they are very distinct from each other.

Aspiration as defined by Merriam Webster: is a strong desire to achieve something high or great. One may have aspirations to have a great relationship with their kids. One may aspire to make a contribution in their community. A 6 year old child may aspire to be a fireman or a zoologist. Those are all aspirations - a strong desire to achieve something high or great. One may aspire to be a good human being. One may have the aspiration for spiritual enlightenment. All aspirations.

Expectation is clearly different.

Expectation as defined by Merriam Webster dictionary is ‘the act or state of expecting’.

And expecting is defined as ‘to consider probable or certain’; ‘to consider reasonable, due, or necessary’; ‘to consider bound in duty or obligated’.

You can see the line of thinking is different with each of those words. Aspiration is implying efforts one takes oneself towards a certain end result. The emphasis is on one’s desires - whether you make the efforts or not will be connected to many factors.

Whereas expectation is connected to a state of being - the state of expecting. There’s no action there. It’s a state of being that seems more dependent on the external world rather than an internal springboard that informs our next steps.

Now one can have an aspiration to become a zoologist and also have the expectation of becoming a zoologist. An aspiration will drive you to take the actions that will lead you to become a zoologist and the expectation will keep you in a state of expecting until you become one.

In other words, expectation is what kills you, aspiration is what drives you.

I also feel expectation is very much connected with what the outside situation should deliver you, what others should deliver to you, what everyone else ought to do, what the weather should do, what your computer should do and so on. And we also put it on us - it’s the expectation of what our efforts should bring us, it’s the expectation of us feeling a certain way or not feeling a certain way. And when that expectation is not fulfilled, what happens? We are inundated with a variety of emotions depending on what the expectation was all about and how strongly we are attached to that expectation. When someone doesn’t fulfill our expectations or something doesn’t fulfill our expectations, or we don’t fulfill those said expectations, we drop into a state of suffering or dukkha - an umbrella term for any kind of dissatisfaction we may experience.

Suffering, in Buddha’s teachings, has many aspects and is what happens when:

• We get what we don’t want

• We don’t get what we want

• We are with those we don’t want to be with

• We are not with those that we do want to be with

• Not liking what we do have

• Wanting what we don’t have

So expectation is inevitably intertwined with suffering. Let me say that again. Expectation is inevitably intertwined with suffering. And that’s the practice, right? To practice letting go of expectations - expectation of how the world should be, instead of how the world actually is.

Let Go Of Expectations, Keep Aspirations

However, letting go of expectations doesn’t mean that we let go of our aspirations. We can still aspire to make a difference in our community, we can still aspire to change our lives, we can aspire to be a fireman or a zoologist, we can aspire to have good relationships. And these aspirations will inform our thought, speech and action. And when divorced from expectations, these aspirations will fulfill us - where we are gaining fulfillment and contentment from the actions we take and not postponing our sense of happiness to the future and making it dependent on the results that we expect.

It is the actions that we focus on, derived from our aspirations, not on the expectation of a particular end result. And then there is no dukkha, there is no suffering, because we have developed equanimity and acceptance of reality as it is, even while we take conscious actions towards a higher purpose or aspirational end goal.