Understanding "The Arrow"
There’s a Buddhist teaching found in the Sallatha Sutta translated as “The Arrow.” Sutras can be difficult to interpret, not only due to translation issues, but they’re usually very big concepts hidden within stories and imagery. In “The Arrow,” it says if an arrow is shot at you and makes contact, you will feel pain in the part of your body where the arrow has hit. Now, if a second arrow comes and strikes exactly in the same spot as the first arrow, the pain will not only be double, but it will be at least ten times more intense.
The first arrow represents the unexpected and unwelcome challenges of life, such as doing poorly on a test, losing an important object, being rejected, or being injured in an accident. These unpleasant things sometimes happen in life, and this causes us some pain. The second arrow, an arrow fired from within ourselves, is our reaction, our narrative, our interpretation of the first arrow. This can be our anxiety, our anger, our guilt, our frustration to the pain of the first arrow’s strike. All these things magnify our suffering. Often, we will imagine an ultimate disaster that hasn’t happened yet, or we will ruminate on something from the past that isn’t actually an issue we’re facing today. For example, when we do poor on an exam or project, we may worry we have done irreparable damage to our reputation or grade. If we get injured, we may worry about missing out on something important to us in the future. When we discover a body pain or anomaly, our mind might jump straight to fear of disease or greater suffering in the future. Being rejected may make our mind spin with doubt about our appeal or ability to find the right person. We may be unable to stop worrying about a mistake we've made in the past, fretting about consequences that haven't manifested. We don’t know any of these concerns to be certain, yet our fear of the unknown causes our stress to grow bigger. More examples of second arrows are any thoughts that amplify the pain of the original arrow. These secondary arrows may manifest in judgment, “How could I be so stupid?”, or in fear, “What if this pain doesn’t go away? What if it only gets worse from here?”, or in anger, “I hate that I have this pain. Why does this have to happen to me, I have other things to do!” It’s almost effortless for us to conjure up hellish negativity in our mind that does nothing to solve our problems, it actually magnifies the pain of the actual event. We can multiply our suffering by ten times, or more, if we react unskillfully.
Suffering is unavoidable, so we must learn how to suffer skillfully. Part of this skill is learning how to observe our suffering without reacting in anger, jealousy, fear, or despair. We need our energy to handle the big challenges of life and so we can enjoy an abundance of happiness, so we practice this skill to see what little sufferings we can let go of. Instead of obsessing, dreading, or regretting whatever lurks around the corner, we practice being present with the real suffering that’s right in front of us, now. We don’t condemn ourselves for our past, and we don’t convince ourselves we know what awful things are about to happen. We practice our mindfulness, recognizing what is here in the present moment without adding more stress to the situation.
The first arrow represents the unexpected and unwelcome challenges of life, such as doing poorly on a test, losing an important object, being rejected, or being injured in an accident. These unpleasant things sometimes happen in life, and this causes us some pain. The second arrow, an arrow fired from within ourselves, is our reaction, our narrative, our interpretation of the first arrow. This can be our anxiety, our anger, our guilt, our frustration to the pain of the first arrow’s strike. All these things magnify our suffering. Often, we will imagine an ultimate disaster that hasn’t happened yet, or we will ruminate on something from the past that isn’t actually an issue we’re facing today. For example, when we do poor on an exam or project, we may worry we have done irreparable damage to our reputation or grade. If we get injured, we may worry about missing out on something important to us in the future. When we discover a body pain or anomaly, our mind might jump straight to fear of disease or greater suffering in the future. Being rejected may make our mind spin with doubt about our appeal or ability to find the right person. We may be unable to stop worrying about a mistake we've made in the past, fretting about consequences that haven't manifested. We don’t know any of these concerns to be certain, yet our fear of the unknown causes our stress to grow bigger. More examples of second arrows are any thoughts that amplify the pain of the original arrow. These secondary arrows may manifest in judgment, “How could I be so stupid?”, or in fear, “What if this pain doesn’t go away? What if it only gets worse from here?”, or in anger, “I hate that I have this pain. Why does this have to happen to me, I have other things to do!” It’s almost effortless for us to conjure up hellish negativity in our mind that does nothing to solve our problems, it actually magnifies the pain of the actual event. We can multiply our suffering by ten times, or more, if we react unskillfully.
Suffering is unavoidable, so we must learn how to suffer skillfully. Part of this skill is learning how to observe our suffering without reacting in anger, jealousy, fear, or despair. We need our energy to handle the big challenges of life and so we can enjoy an abundance of happiness, so we practice this skill to see what little sufferings we can let go of. Instead of obsessing, dreading, or regretting whatever lurks around the corner, we practice being present with the real suffering that’s right in front of us, now. We don’t condemn ourselves for our past, and we don’t convince ourselves we know what awful things are about to happen. We practice our mindfulness, recognizing what is here in the present moment without adding more stress to the situation.