How Can I Make Myself Feel Awful Today?

We are not the way we appear to ourselves to be. It is our delusion that causes the problem, not the outside environment, nor other people. We tend to put the blame outside of ourselves. However there is no need to put the blame anywhere, not even on ourselves. Rather we should feel compassion for our own delusion. When we understand the extent of our own confusion then we can see so clearly the extent of others’ delusion. Everyone wants to be happy, we expend so much time, so much effort, so much money into making ourselves happy, so how is it that most people we meet are so sad? And we make others miserable. Nobody gets up in the morning and say, “How can I make myself feel really, really awful today?”

It is due to our confusion as to where real happiness lies. We are deceived but that delusion isn’t a matter of blame; it’s a cause for compassion. We are deluded. Our families are deluded. Our neighbours are deluded. Our countries are deluded; our government is deluded, who is not deluded? That is not the cause for anger, that is the cause for compassion and for skilfully working to transform that delusion into understanding. That’s why we are meditating: to transform the confusion of the mind into wisdom and compassion.