Many people seek happiness by chasing after objects of their senses. True happiness, however, is found only in the mind, not outside. Buddhas above and sentient beings below see the same things, but Buddhas see them without dualistic grasping, like they are illusions or dreams. We ordinary beings grasp them as truly existent, never doubting that they are real. Toward those things which appear pleasant to us we develop attachment, toward those things which appear unpleasant to us we develop aversion, and towards things which appear neither pleasant nor unpleasant to us, we are indifferent. We grasp these objects which ultimately do not exist from their own side. It is like in the darkness of dusk, mistakenly thinking that a striped rope is really a snake.
In his Commentary on Bodhicitta, Nagarjuna said:
Those supreme on two legs
Teach the Bodhisattvas about the aggregates like this:
Forms are like bursting bubbles
Feelings are like bubbles of water
Perceptions are similar to mirages
Karmic formations are like plantain trees
and Consciousness is like illusion.
Written by Khenpo Karten Rinpoche in the book Precious Teachings, the chapter entitled “Happiness and Suffering Are Only Appearances, They Are Not Real” page 104 in the paper version and 111 of the PDF version.
