Arrogance and Despair

   What does suffering do for people? Now an interesting point is that from a Buddhist perspective, suffering is the First Noble Truth, and the word is out on whether or not it's meant to be noble or not. After all, we think of suffering as something to be 'overcome', not as something to be quietly endured. But Santideva, on the other hand, will go so far as to say that there is a benefit to suffering, and that is, it reduces what he refers to as "arrogance":

21. Suffering has another quality since arrogance diminishes because of despair, and one feels compassion for beings in the cycle of existence, fear of sin, and a yearning for the Jina. (p.64).

The interesting thing about this line is that is almost feels like a reversal of the Four Noble Truths, at least insofar as it switches the classic notion of trying to overcome suffering through the Eightfold Path. What this passage suggests, instead, is that even suffering itself can become a kind of leveler of the ego. By seeing suffering as it is, one stops attaching to the view that there is a self who is in charge. When I stop trying to think I am in 'charge' of my life (whatever that might mean), some real connection might potentially form between myself and my world. I start to experience compassion as well as "fear of sin", perhaps here referring to the fear of wrongdoing. After all, with suffering, actions have a lot of weighted consequences, and life starts to look more and more fragile and interdependent. Finally, "yearning for the Jina" perhaps refers to a kind of yearning to live a moral life, or at least a spiritual teaching.
   A question I have here is that, is there a specific kind of suffering that Santideva is referring to in this passage, or is it any kind of suffering? The word "despair" perhaps gives it away, because all suffering eventually leads to a point where one no longer really feels in control of their life. Even a suffering like the desire for a cup of coffee seems innocuous, but it also reminds a person of their dependence on something external for their sense of happiness. (Think about what happens when a coffee-lover doesn't have their cup in the morning!) It's interesting how some of the worst addictions seem to lead people to a similar epiphany, where they understand that suffering of craving takes them to the very end of self. It's precisely when I realize how little "I" am in control of craving that I stop believing in my own lies about who I am and how much influence I have over my everyday life. That is also when, paradoxically, my mind can become more open to a fundamental reality of interconnection.



Santideva, The Way of the Bodhisattva (selected chapters only). Translated by V. Wallace and A. Wallace. Snow Lion, 1997.  .