Desire

"Desire nothing." This is a recurring sentence in translations of the Buddha's words. Its simplicity strikes many hedonistic moderns as patently absurd. They will never get it as long as they subscribe to identifying themselves with their possessions. So there is no sense speaking to them about it.

 

The person who has discovered the joy of liberation from desire understands the words instantly. The person who has learned that his body and all things around it are simply empty husks made up of whirling and transitory energy will embrace the happy emptiness of freedom from desire. The person who knows and accepts his own inevtable death has gone beyond a life of desire.