"Tanha" is usually translated as desire but this is misleading. It's more like "grasping" onto something reflexively. Like rubbernecking when you see an accident. Seeing a sexy opposite gender. Tasty candy. etc...
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Anatta means to understand that In the Beginning, there were no names. Meaning that there's no such thing as True Naming something.
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It's like playing with a fake steering wheel and thinking we're driving. Either we self delude and match our movements to the outside world, or we angrily try to steer away from what we don't like ineffectively.
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Believing we can True Name ourselves and that "I" am suffering is a way of amassing suffering into a container. The container feels a victim. This is b/c we 'obviously' have ownership over ourselves and 'should' be in control of ourselves.
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Another form of this mistake is believing that you've penetrated to the real essence of something, creating for yourself a prior that is non-updateable by sense data.
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Nibbana or nirvana is often interpreted as a state of perpetual bliss but is better translated as "Cooling Down." The opposite of a tense, effortful, clenching up. It is the opposite of Tanha.
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The happiness that results from nibbana is due to relinquishing the need to control and arrange reality to match up to our mental projections.
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It's like the comfortable silence with a good friend, a good meal eaten to perfect satiation, post-orgasm, etc...
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Upadana is literally translated as "fuel" or "seeds". It is a mental event that follows the clenching of Tanha. It can be thought of as the opposite of Equanimity. Instead of keeping your eyes on the road you just HAVE to see the traffic accident.
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It's also like fiddling or micro-managing things that are better left alone. We just "have" to make some adjustments so that things are "perfect."
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Sankhara is like a "construct". If Upadana is a seed, then Sankharas are the warped houses built out of the twisted lumber that grows. It is a collection of mental events built into a story about how the world works.
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E.g. thinking about the world through the lens of Victims and Oppressors. This specific sankhara is called the "Hell Realm" is buddhism b/c it reinterprets signs of how to get out as tricks and attacks.
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"It is said that the most tragic aspect of the hell realm is that none of the gates are barred."
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So put everything together and you get: The mind has ideals which creates nihilism the more we realize our ideals can never be. We come up w/ complex schemes to manifest our ideals but they don't work so we try even harder.
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If we do the opposite and push less hard, we realize that we've been stuck in a vicious cycle of confusion. Instead of trying to buy and decorate the perfect house we start tearing it down. We realize the idea that we needed a perfect house was just one of the confusions.
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These activities used to suck up a lot of energy and attention which can now be used to enjoy things. Bc everyone else still sees things as related to houses they see you as living in a happy spiritual house and want to know how to get their own so that they can be spiritual too
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End of conversation
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