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from Rediscovering Life by Anthony De Mello . . .

The world is full of sorrow? Agreed. The root of sorrow is desire. Well— all right. Now, what are you going to conclude, that the uprooting of sorrow is desirelessness? So you are going to be a vegetable? I mean, how do you live without desires?

Let me give you a better translation. I don’t think Buddha would be so foolish and stupid as to say that we ought to have no desires. For heaven’s sake. I wouldn’t be writing this if I didn’t have the desire to communicate an idea. You wouldn’t be reading this if you didn’t have the desire to hear my message. So let’s give it a better translation.

The world is full of sorrow. The root of sorrow is attachment. The uprooting of sorrow means the uprooting, the dropping of attachments. You know, there are desires on whose fulfillment my happi- ness does not depend. In fact, you’ve got lots of de- sires on whose fulfillment your happiness does not depend. Or else you’d be climbing walls; you’d be nervous wrecks. We, all of us, have two types of desires. We’ve got some desires—we desire all kinds of things, and of course, we’re happy to get them, and when we don’t get them, it’s okay. Too bad, but we’re not unhappy.

However, we’ve got other desires—good Lord, if we don’t get them, we’re going to be miserable. That’s what I mean by an attachment. Where do you think all conflicts come from? Attachments. Where do you think greed comes from? Attachments. Where do you think loneliness comes from? Attachments. Where do you think emptiness comes from? You got it, same cause. Where do you think fears come from? Attachments. No attachment, no fear. Ever thought of that?

No attachment, no fear.

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