The Subject of Impermanence

Aloha Everyone,

We are familiar with the concept the nothing is permanent that everything is constantly changing.

In Chapter 14 of Comfortable with Uncertainty, Pema Chodron writes, “The Facts of Life: Impermanence.   That nothing is static or fixed, that all is fleeting and changing, is the first mark of existence. We don’t have to be mystics or physicists to know this.  Yet at the level of personal experience, we resist this basic fact.  It means that life isn’t always going to go our way.  It means there are loss as well as gain.  And we don’t like that. 

We know that all is impermanent; we know that everything wears out.  Although we can buy this truth intellectually, emotionally we have a deep-rooted aversion to it.  We want permanence; we expect permanence.  Our natural tendency is to seek security; we believe we can find it.  We experience impermanence at the everyday level as frustration.  We use our daily activity as a shield against the fundamental ambiguity of our situation, expending tremendous energy trying to ward off impermanence and death.  We don’t like it that our bodies change shape.  We don’t like it that we age.  We are afraid of wrinkles and sagging skin.  We use health products as if we actually believe that our skin, our hair, our eyes and our teeth, might somehow miraculously escape the truth of impermanence.

Below are other quotations on the subject of Impermanence.

Namaste — Cathi

“No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.” -  Heraclitus, Greek Philosopher

“From the Absolute to the Relative-from the Infinite to the Finite-from the Undifferentiated to the Differentiated-from the Unconditioned to the Conditioned and again from the Relative to the Absolute. That is the whole truth of the inexistence to the existentialist, formless to the form, Creator to the Creature, one to the every being, absolute to the in absolute and vis-à-vis, so forth every single thing is temporary, non-existed, so do I, the dream that I dreamed off is simply a ‘lie and impermanent too’ same as in the mortal world whatever I do experience.” – Upanishad, a collection of philosophical texts which form the theoretical basis for the Hindu religion.

“It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him the words, “And this too, shall pass away.” How much it expresses! How chastening in the hour of pride! How consoling in the depths of affliction!” - Abraham Lincoln