Everything Changes

The Buddha teaches us all our stress and suffering comes from three things (the Buddha calls these things poisons): delusion, greed, and hatred (anger). We delude ourselves into thinking we are going to last forever. We delude ourselves ourselves into thinking our experiences are a permanent state of affairs. We think our relationships will also last. We ignore the fact of impermanence. As a result, we crave the things we want and cling tenaciously to them once we get them.

We're often jealous of those who have what we want and don't or can't have. Often our anger boils up when we are unable to get what we want or when we lose what we have.

Yet, if we can directly experience that none of the things we want or desire, none of the things we experience, not even our very selves, are anything other than momentary, then what is there to crave, to become greedy for, or to become anger over?

This is the understanding of impermanence. When you come to experience the world from this perspective, your view of things changes. When your world view encompasses the fleeting nature of things, you approach life with less stress, anxiety, and suffering.

D.T. Suzuki, a Japanese monk who brought Zen to the United States, was once asked, "What is the essential teaching of Buddhism?" Suzuki answered, "Everything changes."