Desire -- wanting something I don't have -- has been a major driving force in my life. Desire to advance and improve my standard of living is perhaps one of the main reasons behind the choices I have made. The choice of education, career, friends, and activities are all driven by a deep desire to get something better than what I currently have. Are desires bad? Can there be progress without desire? Can there be an end to desire? I believe many people before me asked similar questions and many of them, including the Buddha, Krishna, and other saints and philosophers have given their answers to these questions.
There is a beautiful verse in Hindu Upanishada about desire, which I quote below.
You are what your deep, driving desire is.
As your desire is, so is your will.
As your will is, so is your deed.
As your deed is, so is your destiny.
Based on some of the experiences in my life, I do believe every word of the above verse to be true. I have realized that driven by my deep desire for something, I make a tremendous effort to achieve that thing, and sometimes succeed in the effort. Once the thing has been achieved, I get dissatisfied, and a new desire pops up, and the cycle continues on and on to no end! I have a few issues with this approach to life or what I may say the way of the universe. Firstly, ceaseless desire exhausts my energy. Secondly, I lose the balance of my mind in my blind quest at achieving something. This is perhaps one of the worst things I feel about life driven by desire. I feel angry, anxious, fearful, sad, hateful when my desire is not fulfilled immediately or is never fulfilled. And, after experiencing all those negative emotions and taking them out on my loved ones -- mother, father, sister, friends -- I feel so small.
I do think I need desire to progress in my life. However, I hope I can work to not get too attached to my desire -- to the outcome -- and enjoy the process of fulfilling a desire. I hope I can learn to accept whatever the outcome of my effort is -- success or failure -- and not get too elated or too sad by either one. This is where the Buddha's teaching of Vipassana comes in. The Buddha and Krishna and others did show the path. Why is it so difficult for me to follow the path? Perhaps, my desire to follow that path is not strong!
There is a beautiful verse in Hindu Upanishada about desire, which I quote below.
You are what your deep, driving desire is.
As your desire is, so is your will.
As your will is, so is your deed.
As your deed is, so is your destiny.
Based on some of the experiences in my life, I do believe every word of the above verse to be true. I have realized that driven by my deep desire for something, I make a tremendous effort to achieve that thing, and sometimes succeed in the effort. Once the thing has been achieved, I get dissatisfied, and a new desire pops up, and the cycle continues on and on to no end! I have a few issues with this approach to life or what I may say the way of the universe. Firstly, ceaseless desire exhausts my energy. Secondly, I lose the balance of my mind in my blind quest at achieving something. This is perhaps one of the worst things I feel about life driven by desire. I feel angry, anxious, fearful, sad, hateful when my desire is not fulfilled immediately or is never fulfilled. And, after experiencing all those negative emotions and taking them out on my loved ones -- mother, father, sister, friends -- I feel so small.
I do think I need desire to progress in my life. However, I hope I can work to not get too attached to my desire -- to the outcome -- and enjoy the process of fulfilling a desire. I hope I can learn to accept whatever the outcome of my effort is -- success or failure -- and not get too elated or too sad by either one. This is where the Buddha's teaching of Vipassana comes in. The Buddha and Krishna and others did show the path. Why is it so difficult for me to follow the path? Perhaps, my desire to follow that path is not strong!
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