Where did the annoyance come from? How to solve annoyances?

　

    Except for saints, all sentient beings have annoyances, and there is just the difference between having more annoyances or less annoyances. What annoyances do sentient beings have? I think the most common annoyance is: birth, aging, sickness and death. Although it is said that this is a process that every living being must go through, we are still deeply troubled by "birth, aging, sickness and death"; no one likes aging, illness and death, so how to avoid aging, avoid sickness and avoid death has become an issue that we should concern during our life. We also have other annoyances, such as: we have to live with people and things we hate, we hate meeting and talking with someone in daily life, we hate living in a certain environment, we hate encountering certain things...etc., but often people and things we hate can't be avoided, the situations won’t follow our own intentions and they keep appearing in our daily life, and then, it become a kind of annoyance. The opposite of this kind of annoyance is: the people and things we like often leave us and cannot stay for a long time; our relatives and people we like cannot always stay with us; and the things we like are sometimes unaffordable and sometimes not available; we sometimes envy others living in a certain country or environment, and our wishes can’t be fulfilled… etc. There are so many annoyances like these; the practical situation is always unsatisfactory, and what we want in our mind often cannot be achieved completely. This is the current situation of sentient beings’ annoyances.

　

    If we want to solve these annoyances, they can't be solved by "temporarily getting the things we can't get", because, if we don't remove the source of these annoyances, other annoyances will still keep popping up, the things we can't get will just be replaced by other objects, and the annoyances are still not resolved completely. So, what is the source of annoyance? According to Buddhism, it is "liking and craving" and "the clinging of self". Annoyance arises because we like and dislike certain things. The stronger these likes and dislikes are, the more serious our annoyances will be. The essence of likes and dislikes is our "liking and craving (desire)", and the existence of “liking and craving” is for satisfying “the clinging of self”, so the root of all annoyances is "liking and craving" and "the clinging of self".

　

    The first step to "relieving" annoyances is to reduce our likes and dislikes; if we have "likes", we want to get and have certain things, and if we have "dislike", we want to avoid and stay away from certain things. When these "wishes (desire)" cannot be realized, our annoyances will arise, and when these "wishes" are realized, we always wish to get more and better, and annoyances will still arise; so, to reduce the “desires” that are generated from likes and dislikes will also reduce our annoyances. As the saying goes: “a contented man will always be happy”; because there are few desires in our mind, therefore we are easily satisfied, and annoyances naturally become less.

　

    Reducing desires can only "reduce" annoyances. Wishing to achieve “no annoyances” at all, one must achieve “no desires” at all. How do ordinary people achieve such a state? There are several methods in Buddhist Dharma that can lead us to gradually remove all annoyances, that is, to gradually remove “liking and craving” and “the clinging of self”:

　

    The first is: to contemplate that our body is impure (Note 1); the principle of this method is: by observing and contemplating the impurity of our body, we can cut off our attachment to "the existence of self" (the clinging of self) , as long as we are no longer attached to our own existence, of course, those desires to satisfy ourselves will no longer arise; for ordinary people, as long as they can reduce "the clinging of self", although the annoyances cannot be completely eliminated, it can still decrease a part of the annoyances.

　

    Another way is to observe the "impermanence" of the world; when we find that "everything in the world is always changing, and we cannot find something that never changes", we will realize that the existence of "I" is actually a kind of Suffering (Note 2); through such observation, coupled with our strong affirmation that "all things are illusory", we can eliminate our liking and disliking of self, and achieve the state of "non-self", which is the elimination of “the clinging of self” and also destroys all desires.

　

    It may be difficult if we want to reach the state of "non-self" all at once, and want to then eliminate all annoyances, but we can start to try to reduce our desires and the attachment of self to reduce our annoyances, and gradually move towards the goal. When the time is right, we can naturally go to the path of eliminating all annoyances.

　

*Note 1: "Contemplating that one's own body is impure" is "contemplation of impurity", also known as "contemplating the impurity of the body": observe the muscles, fat, blood and various organs under our skin, imagine pork , beef will rot and stink if kept at room temperature for too long, so is our body; in addition, the food we eat accumulates in the body, and finally turns into excrement... By observing and contemplating the impurity of the body, it can gradually reduce our greed for self.

　

*Note 2: Impermanence, suffering, emptiness, and non-self: one of the important teachings of Buddhism, by observing the impermanence of all things in the world, we realize that life is a gathering of suffering, and finally reach the state of "non-self".