DTR CRSS X 2ND ARROW DISAPPOINTMENT, AVOIDING LOSS OF FACE, UCL BTECH US LINE

Escaping the two arrows

“Bhikkhus, when the uninstructed worldling is being contacted by a painful feeling, he sorrows, grieves, and laments; he weeps beating his breast and becomes distraught. He feels two feelings—a bodily one and a mental one. Suppose they were to strike a man with a dart, and then they would strike him immediately afterwards with a second dart, so that the man would feel a feeling caused by two darts. So too, when the uninstructed worldling is being contacted by a painful feeling ... he feels two feelings—a bodily one and a mental one.

-- The Arrow - Sallattha Sutta (SN 36:6)

The second arrow is cognitive. It is a mental reaction to either mental or physical change - an inevitable feature of Impermanence. This reaction is triggered by attachment and delusion:

“Being contacted by that same painful feeling, he harbours aversion towards it. When he harbours aversion towards painful feeling, the underlying tendency to aversion towards painful feeling lies behind this. Being contacted by painful feeling, he seeks delight in sensual pleasure. For what reason? Because the uninstructed worldling does not know of any escape from painful feeling other than sensual pleasure. When he seeks delight in sensual pleasure, the underlying tendency to lust for pleasant feeling lies behind this. He does not understand as it really is the origin and the passing away, the gratification, the danger, and the escape in the case of these feelings. When he does not understand these things, the underlying tendency to ignorance in regard to neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling lies behind this.

So the uninstructed person reacts with resistance (aversion) to the change that is threatening their attachment. There can also be a futile attempt to escape to sensual delight. This desperate motion is born out of self-deception (delusion, ignorance) that the antidote for sensual suffering is sensual delight. In truth they are merely opposite facets of the same delusion, and such fervent clinging to sensual delights only renders the clinger more attached to sensuality, and thus more vulnerable to all suffering associated with a sensual and material world forever in a state of change.

In fact strong past conditioning of attachment to sensuality is the reason the unskillful person feels the sensual pain so acutely, and seeks escape in sensual pleasures so desperately.

It is rather straightforward for an instructed practitioner to escape the second arrow - just adhere to the instruction of Bahiya Sutta:

In reference to the seen, there will be only the seen. In reference to the heard, only the heard. In reference to the sensed, only the sensed. In reference to the cognized, only the cognized. That is how you should train yourself. When for you there will be only the seen in reference to the seen, only the heard in reference to the heard, only the sensed in reference to the sensed, only the cognized in reference to the cognized, then, Bāhiya, there is no you in connection with that. When there is no you in connection with that, there is no you there. When there is no you there, you are neither here nor yonder nor between the two.

-- Ud 1:10 Bāhiya Sutta

As the end of the paragraph explains, all these cognitive second arrows are byproducts of the self. Once you eliminate the delusion of self, no second arrows can hit you.

Back before I studied Buddhism, whenever something happened in my life that seemed catastrophic, I used this intuitive practice:

I paid attention to my breathing, inhaling deeply. Then I would say to myself:

I am here, and I am breathing. There is nothing wrong in this very moment, and nothing outside of this moment matters much. Anything outside of this experience is essentially fiction. In this moment, itself, I am well. And that is the only thing there is.

Any plans, prospects, safety, risks, chances, or likelihoods - they are all hypothetical. Nothing more than imaginary.

Obviously this can work as long as there is no first arrow. So let's discuss that one now.

The first arrow is a physical sensation of pain. It is the undeniable stubborn root of worldly suffering. If we describe existence as a series of moments, then all pain and suffering that are not in the experience of the moment can be denied with the simple cognitive practices outlined above. However, a sensation of pain which is in the moment, and stalks us moment-to-moment, cannot be denied.

For that we need to create space between ourselves and the pain. An air gap of sorts:

“If [instructed noble disciple] feels a pleasant feeling, he feels it detached. If he feels a painful feeling, he feels it detached. If he feels a neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling, he feels it detached. This, bhikkhus, is called a noble disciple who is detached from birth, aging, and death; who is detached from sorrow, lamentation, pain, displeasure, and despair; who is detached from suffering, I say.

Thus our great shield against the first arrow is mindfulness. As you are contacted by a painful feeling, simply take a step back and calmly observe it.

I imagine this step back as a mental retreat of sorts, like a turtle retreating into its shell. Pulling inwards, such as a person shrinking within their clothes, until there is no contact between the cloth and the person. Except this happens with the aggregates - which are shed like a snake's skin, revealing themselves as conspicuously non-self.

A ghost recoiling from the sheet it wears, until the sheet drops to the floor, and there is no sheet and no ghost.

Entirely unattached, all pain is just a curious feeling to be examined. It is not yourself, it does not affect you anymore than any external phenomena, such as the reflection of an actor in pain projected onto a cinema screen.