I have often thrown away the word Sukha. While hearing and reading the word, I immediately jump to the word Dukha and its dissatisfaction or uneasiness, as the teaching of Buddha. In preparing these Dharma notes I’ve stepped out of this shackle.
As I scurry about in my research it seems the insightful options follow me waiting for me to loosen my grip on finding the right answer(s). This is like searching for a four leaf clover through censoring other shapes. This I believe is a demonstration of Dukha! So how to allow Dukha Dharma? I trudged the road of Shayamuni Buddha – Yoga:
Yoga Sutra 2.15
Parinama tapa samskara duhkhaih
gunavrtti virodhaccha duhkham
evam sarvam vivekinah~ The cause of suffering is change, longing, habits, and the ever-fluctuating activity of the gunas. Even the wise suffer, for suffering is everywhere.
Dukham (Sanskrit) or Dukkha (Pali) is referred to in Hinduism and Buddhism as suffering. Sukham (Sanskrit) or Sukha (Pali) means the opposite: comfort, sweetness or ‘quiet joy’. As a yoga anatomist I really enjoy the more literal breakdown of these words, as they describe good or bad space (in the body and/or the mind):
Du: Bad
Su: Good
Kha: Hole (early Aryan translation referring to the axle of a wheel), sky, ether, or space (later translation)
Dukkha: Stale, stuck, stagnant, uneasy ‘bad’ space
Sukha: Fresh, clear, sweet, easeful ‘good’ spaceSthira Sukham Asanam
Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra 2.46: Sthira Sukham Asanam, is usually translated as ‘a steady and comfortable seat’ for the purpose of seated concentration, meditation and absorption. In Hatha yoga this Sutra is used to describe the ideal equanimous experience in every asana (physical yoga posture). This experience, with practice, can be accomplished with a calm and focused attention to breath, bandhas, bone alignment, muscle activation and joint stabilization.
A more literal translation of Sthira Sukham Asanam is ‘to firmly sit/establish oneself / dwell in good space.’ I love this translation because in order to firmly establish oneself in good space one has to actively cultivate said good space (Sukha). Eliminating physical, emotional and psychological Dukkha – the ‘bad’ space – is necessary for this process of cultivation. Yoga.https://www.yogaeasy.com/artikel/less-dukkha-more-sukha
Wow.
This opening of a Dharma Gate has led to an insight.
Enter the “Gunas.” https://www.pureflow.yoga/day-13-tips-living-sattvic-life/
The one page from the article above sends us back to the lotus flower and its life of three bodies or fields. These three gunas are tamas (darkness), rajas (activity), and sattva (beingness). I take these to be the personification of awakening.
That is, being born in one phase becoming awakened and being enlightened in the second and third, but do not take these as three, rather they are five. The fourth is aging and the fifth is dying but here too do not take this as five.
Just as one provides us with the capability to experience two-five, it is awakening to the fullness of experience one and two that opens us to the potential of dropping away Dukha and allowing Sukha.
No Dukha no Sukha…
Dare I call this “DukhaSukha?”
-Sangaku