The Four Immeasurables.

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Abstract

s answer was that all these conflicts, hatred, dangers and suffering are because of envy and miserliness.</p></blockquote><blockquote id="cd14"><p>One who is envious is one who wants to be happier than another but cannot. People like that also cannot stand others who are happier than themselves. Miserliness also does not want another to have a share in one’s happiness and does not want another to be as happy as oneself. The result is a lot of fighting and quarrelling. These have their roots in anger and anger stems from greed and ignorance.</p></blockquote><blockquote id="4a6b"><p>The Four Divine Abidings are the immediate answer to ease such conflicts.</p></blockquote><blockquote id="a7e4"><p>The Dhammapada says – Hatred is not overcome by hatred It is overcome by Love This is the eternal Law. Dhpd. 5</p></blockquote><p id="651e">Extract taken from: <a href="http://www.buddhanet.net/mettab5.htm">http://www.buddhanet.net/mettab5.htm</a></p><p id="8c4e">May this teaching lead you to happiness; may it help you grow in truth. May you be freed from the suffering of birth and death.</p><figure id="9f15"><img src="https://cdn-images-1.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:800/0*lbqmSQUOu-YCPrnQ.png"><figcaption></figcaption></figure><p id="f11c">You may also like these Dhamma articles:</p><div id="34a5" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/stillness-a4b6e9b5f478"> <div> <div> <h2>Stillness.</h2> <div><h3>#WednesdayWisdom</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/1*PWLE4MFD3D9QKVUrk6Qbmw.png)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><div id="d37b" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/avijja-ignorance-6faf41d3ef8b"> <div> <div> <h2>Avijja — Ignorance.</h2> <div><h3>#WednesdayWisdom</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/1*y8XFbxb_lrU3h_3nU0FmSg.png)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><div id="10f2" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/how-to-actualise-bodhicitta-awakening-mind-every-day-60172a0e1dbc"> <div> <div> <h2>How To Actualise Bodhicitta (Awakening Mind) Every Day.</h2> <div><h3>and why we should want to put others’ happiness above our own…</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/1*bS17-fvb1lBzD304GhwCRg.jpeg)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><div id="b968" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/the-way-out-of-suffering-5b43d545910d"> <div> <div> <h2>The Way Out of Suffering.</h2>

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The Four Immeasurables.

sublime attitudes for living in harmony with others

Lord Buddha wanted us all to live in harmony with each other and to realise the enormous capacity we have, as human beings, to train our mind and really take control of how we use our speech and actions during this lifetime.

A beneficial and easy to remember starting point for how we conduct ourselves and interact with others is to learn and practice The Four Immeasurables:

Metta — loving kindness

Karuna — compassion

Mudita — sympathetic joy

Upekkha — equanimity

When we check ourselves, to make sure we are acting and speaking with these things in mind, we prevent ourselves from causing harm to others and experiencing feelings of guilt and regret.

They also serve, respectively, as antidotes to anger, cruelty, envy and discrimination. When we find these negative states of mind arising, instead of allowing the mind to proliferate and create all kinds of extra suffering, we instead set the intention to counter those thoughts and resulting feelings by applying the corresponding noble attitude:

We counter our anger at another person by sending them loving kindness and by remembering that we are all the same in our human predicament.

Similarly, if we arrive in a position where we may cause harm to a living creature, we focus with compassion on their plight, and consider that we may have been such a creature in a previous existence and may well be so again in the near future.

If we can perfect our practice of sympathetic joy, then we will feel happy for our friend’s joy and good fortune and rejoice with them, not react with a mind lost in jealousy or with poison in our hearts. (This is by far the hardest noble attitude to genuinely achieve).

When we practice equanimity, we are able to remain unmoved by both the good and the bad because we regard them as having the same property, which is suffering. We do not run mindlessly to either extreme but remain comfortable in the middle, thereby not adding to our suffering. It is sometimes, mistakenly, interpreted negatively as indifference since we are taught to say: “I don’t care” but, when we say this without any sense of aversion, it simply means that we’re not affected one way or the other.

“Once the Deva king Sakka asked the Buddha,

“Why do beings who wish to be free from anger and ill-will, who do not want to quarrel and be ill-treated, who pray for happiness, peace and freedom, are yet not free from danger and suffering?”

The Buddha’s answer was that all these conflicts, hatred, dangers and suffering are because of envy and miserliness.

One who is envious is one who wants to be happier than another but cannot. People like that also cannot stand others who are happier than themselves. Miserliness also does not want another to have a share in one’s happiness and does not want another to be as happy as oneself. The result is a lot of fighting and quarrelling. These have their roots in anger and anger stems from greed and ignorance.

The Four Divine Abidings are the immediate answer to ease such conflicts.

The Dhammapada says – Hatred is not overcome by hatred It is overcome by Love This is the eternal Law. Dhpd. 5

May this teaching lead you to happiness; may it help you grow in truth. May you be freed from the suffering of birth and death.

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