"If we're willing to give up hope that insecurity and pain can be exterminated, then we can have the courage to relax with the groundlessness of our situation. This is the first step on the path."
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Pema Chodron
Why do you suppose Pema Chodron identifies giving up hope that insecurity and pain can be exterminated as the "first step on the path"? Does this have any relationship to the Buddha's "Four Noble Truths"? Is J. Krishnamurti correct that one cannot obtain enlightenment if one is trying to escape suffering? Do you agree or disagree with Chodron?
Well Sir, the link to the web page is missing. But, the concept that is being presented is pretty universal relative to achieving some of the more advanced mystical experiences. And it should be understood that what he is presenting here, at least relative to a lot of people, would require years of psychoanalysis or self introspection to achieve it. And generally speaking the whole process would be painful. "Why?" Because you are dealing with the concept of total "hopelessness" and total "vulnerability" as a mind state. Which of course
will kill you. This is because when a person or an animal feels "powerless" and "vunerable" and all is "hopeless", the autonomic nervious system begins shutting down the body and the mind. From there you get sick and die. Sometime fast, sometimes slower. Which is why achieving permission to feel power or maintaining permission to feel power in one's life, even if it is not real
, is very important to physical and mental health. The problem is that "hope" gives you permission to feel "power" and the possiblity of feeling "safe" and you can not achieve true union with the "unknown", which should be the ultimate goal of all mystics, if permission to feel "power" is involved in any way shape or form.
"The dark night of the soul." Is what a lot of mystics call the experience of, "giving up hope that insecurity and pain can be exterminated." The fellow that you are quoting is correct. The problem is what one has to work through to achieve it. And for most people it is not easy, at all. And maybe even dangerous if not done right. I spent twenty years working through that one and I had to use yogi meditations that consciously stimulated my life centers and immune system to counter balance my subconscious mind shutting down my nervious system because I was in a state of "powerlessness" and "hopelessness". What is funny is that if I had known about this back in the beginning it wouldn't have been as bad of an experience because I would have known what was going on.
"Is it the first step on the path?" Not so much
. But, I will say one thing, it is one of those major steps on the path.