After contemplating death and impermanence, it’s then helpful to think about things from another point of view.

What will happen if we ignore our opportunity and carry on as we always have, by clinging to this small self as if it’s the only thing in the universe that matters?

To answer that question, we must examine our own mind and how it habitually suffers.

This is the third subject to contemplate when training in the preliminaries, “the defects of samsara.”

The Sanskrit word samsara refers to the perpetual cycle of suffering that we sentient beings go through as a result of our innocent but ignorant self-importance.

This cycle will never come to an end unless the rascal in our heart is recognized for what it is and. banished forever.

We human beings are very resilient.

However much we suffer, when the pain is over we tend to move on and forget.

In a way, that is admirable.

But if there’s something we can actually do about our suffering, if we can eliminate its causes and thus become free, if peace and happiness are realistic possibilities, then does it make sense just to keep suffering?

When we have some understanding of the causes of suffering but insist on bearing it over and over again, never learning our lesson, would you say that such resilience is intelligent?

— Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, The Intelligent Heart

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