CRAVING (trsna)
Unwholesome craving: “A craving to hold on to pleasurable experiences, to be separated from painful or unpleasant experiences, and for neutral experiences or feelings not to decline”
(X)
Wholesome craving: A…desire to cultivate the path out of dukkha”
It is interesting to me that this is one of the few things that we can define for Buddhist understandings that are on fairly opposite ends of the spectrum. I’m not sure that a Middle Way through craving would be the most beneficial for us on our journey to understanding the ending of dukkha. I imagine it would just be a very passive path.
In my own life, I found that the times I was not facing my depression in a conducive manner was when I just wanted to stay sad…I didn’t want to do anything to change the conditions under which my emotions were taking their toll on me. I think that it was a passive and unwholesome desire to just wallow and not pay attention to the factors that triggered my sadness. When I started to let my depression be what it needed to be, and accepted that just because things are the way they are now does not mean that they are going to stay this way forever, I was able to minimize some of the factors that put me in a dark place.










