1. What is life like?
According to Buddhism, to truly understand the nature of life, we need to look at the Four Noble Truths and The Wheel of Life together. This will give us ‘the whole picture’.

2. This is the doctrine or teaching on Impermanence.
This is the doctrine or teaching on no permanent self.
This is the doctrine or teaching on Suffering or Unsatisfactoriness

3. Buddhists say that life is characterised by Three Marks of Existence.
What is life like for a Buddhist?
Buddhists describe life as impermanent and full of change. This is a crucial Buddhist teaching and one that we must understand. It has implications for our understanding of the rest of the Buddha's teachings.
Buddhists say that life is characterised by Three Marks of Existence.
The Three Marks of Existence
Anicca
Anatta
Dukkha

4. 1st Mark: Anicca (Impermanence)
‘Anicca’literally means ‘impermanence’
It is the First Mark of Existence / Universal Truth
This means that everything is constantly changing
Nothing stays the same (nothing is permanent)

5. Anicca and Understanding
This concept is at the root of all Buddhist belief – if you accept and understand anicca, you are on the road to enlightenment!
Dhammapada 20
“All created things perish”

6. Anicca and the Buddha We can see Anicca in the life of the Buddha:
The Four Sights
The Great Renunciation
Search for the correct path
His travelling and teaching
His death.
So is it real?

7. YOU??
This slide could be used to stimulate discussion about the physical and psychological self. What makes a person who they are? What physical things are now ‘you’ which were once something else? (and will become something else again). This could also stimulate discussion of the idea of a ‘spiritual’ self. Is there such a thing?

8. Why is Anicca important?
Buddhists believe life is full of suffering. This suffering is mainly caused by people’s unrealistic EXPECTATIONS of things – wanting more money / wanting to be happy forever / not wanting to get old / etc.
We resist change and are upset by it, we get upset when we don’t get what we want, etc.
If we understand that everything is impermanent and will always change, we shouldn’t have these unreasonable expectations. We will always realise that good things come to an end, and also that bad things will also pass.
This gives a realistic and truthful outlook on the world, and allows Buddhists to properly understand other Buddhist teachings.
Why is Anicca important?

9. This literally means “no soul”
2nd Mark of Existence
This literally means “no soul”
This is Anicca applied to people.
Some further discussion here about the existence of the concept of the soul/spirit.
Image credit: Wikimedia - Impermanence in incense: a Chinese ideogram was drawn with incense, and then set on fire to burn slowly. Kunming, Yunnan province, China. Shared under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic licence.
Anatta

10. All Life is Suffering The First Noble Truth
By looking at the centre of the Wheel of Life we can understand more about what causes us to suffer and what we can then do to stop it.

11. The Wheel of life is a symbol of what life is really like.
Just like a real wheel that turns, our life continually turns round and round until it is stopped.
Just like a real wheel the Wheel of life turn at its centre or the axis.
Image credit: Tibetan chakra by P. Roelli or CC-BY-SA-3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
As human beings, it is how we are at the very centre of our being, that determines how our life will turn.

12. The Cause of Suffering is Craving/Greed
If we want to stop a
Wheel turning we
have to find the
Cause, then stop
it.
Remember the analogy of the Doctor and the Cure!!!
The Cause of Suffering is Craving/Greed
(Tanha)
The doctor and the cure analogy refers to the idea that the Buddha’s teaching is like prescribing a cure for illness – the illness being a mistaken view of the way things are, and the prescription being that the Buddha’s teaching provides the remedy to the ailment.
The Second Noble Truth

13. Hatred / Aggression
Greed / Craving
Tanha
Ignorance

14. This image shows that greed, hatred and ignorance are inextricably linked – each feeds off the other. If these things are at the centre of what makes us tick then our lives will continue with suffering.

15. The animals at the centre of the wheel represent the three poisons or the three fires. These fuel the wheel and help it turn.
The animals are shown biting each other because they feed off each other and so cause each other.
In order to stop the Wheel turning we need to stop feeding these fires and so stop suffering and recognise the true nature of life. We will then have achieved enlightenment and attained Nirvana/Nibbana.

16. Greed / Craving
In Pali this is called Tanha. This is the Second Noble Truth.
ANATTA
We attach ourselves to things and expect things to provide us with pleasure and satisfaction – when it does not we suffer.
The Buddha identifies three types of craving:
Craving for objects of sense pleasure
Craving for Existence
Craving for Non Existence
Give examples of the three types of craving!!
ANICCA

17. Craving Objects of Sense Desire
BODILY PLEASURES
SWEETS AND ALCOHOL
LUXURY GOODS
We place high expectations on these items as we assume that they will give us lasting pleasure. When they don’t we get upset and we then suffer.
We get attached to the experience of pleasure and as we know this never lasts (Anicca). We will always want more and we are never satisfied. Our desire for an object may also increase the more we use it. This may cause us more suffering.

18. Craving Existence
This is the desire to be someone. We crave recognition and acceptance of who we are. We want people to recognise us a certain person.
When they don’t recognise us as that person we suffer. We become upset and this may lead us to anger because we are ignorant of the truth.
Even if we become that person it will not last forever – WHY…? …because of Anicca!

19. Craving Non Existence
Also remember that there is no permanent self so these times will not last forever.
There are often times in life that we want to be a nobody and want to run away from the various situations that life has thrown at us.
This again could lead us to do harmful or anger-fuelled actions because we have been ignorant of the fact that this will not last forever. (ANICCA)
It is these actions that we have committed as a result of craving non existence that may cause us further suffering.

20. If a man watches not for NIRVANA, his cravings grow like a creeper
DHAMMAPADA 334 – 342
If a man watches not for NIRVANA, his cravings grow like a creeper
and he jumps from death to death like a monkey in the forest from one
tree without fruit to another.
And when his cravings overcome him, his sorrows increase more and
more, like the entangling creeper called birana.
But whoever in this world overcomes his selfish cravings, his sorrows
fall away from him, like drops of water from a lotus flower.
Therefore in love I tell you, to you all who have come here: Cut off
the bonds of desires, as the surface grass creeper called birana is cut
for its fragrant root called usira. Be not like a reed in a stream which MARA,
the devil of temptation, crushes again and again.

21. wholly uprooted sorrows will come again.
DHAMMAPADA 334 – 342
Just a s a tree, though cut down, can grow again and again if its roots
are undamaged and strong, in the same way if the roots of craving are not
wholly uprooted sorrows will come again.
When the thirty six stream of desire that run towards pleasures are
strong, their powerful waves carry away that man without vision whose
imaginings are lustful desires.
Everywhere flow the streams. The creeper of craving grown everywhere.
If you see the creeper grow, cut off its roots by the power of wisdom.
The sensuous pleasures of men flow everywhere. Bound for pleasures
and seeking pleasures men suffer life and old age.

22. Men who are pursued by lust run around like hunted hares.
DHAMMAPADA 334 – 342
Men who are pursued by lust run around like hunted hares.
Held in fetters and in bonds they suffer and suffer again.
In groups of no more than four – highlight the places in
the source that describe the Buddhist teachings we
have learned about i.e Tanha, Anicca, Anatta, Dukkha.
Then rewrite the passage summarising
the meaning or message
the Buddha was trying to convey.

23. If a man watches not for NIRVANA, his cravings grow like a creeper
DHAMMAPADA 334 – 342
If a man watches not for NIRVANA, his cravings grow like a creeper
and he jumps from death to death like a monkey in the forest from one
tree without fruit to another.
And when his cravings overcome him, his sorrows increase more and
more, like the entangling creeper called birana.
But whoever in this world overcomes his selfish cravings, his sorrows
fall away from him, like drops of water from a lotus flower.
Therefore in love I tell you, to you all who have come here: Cut off
the bonds of desires, as the surface grass creeper called birana is cut
for its fragrant root called usira. Be not like a reed in a stream which MARA,
the devil of temptation, crushes again and again.

24. wholly uprooted sorrows will come again.
DHAMMAPADA 334 – 342
Just a s a tree, though cut down, can grow again and again if its roots
are undamaged and strong, in the same way if the roots of craving are not
wholly uprooted sorrows will come again.
When the thirty six stream of desire that run towards pleasures are
strong, their powerful waves carry away that man without vision whose
imaginings are lustful desires.
Everywhere flow the streams. The creeper of craving grown everywhere.
If you see the creeper grow, cut of its roots by the power of wisdom.
The sensuous pleasures of men flow everywhere. Bound for pleasures
and seeking pleasures men suffer life and old age.

25. Men who are pursued by lust run around like hunted hares.
DHAMMAPADA 334 – 342
Men who are pursued by lust run around like hunted hares.
Held in fetters and in bonds they suffer and suffer again.
The Buddha is teaching us about the roots or cause of craving.
He compares craving to a creeper called birana. A
creeper is supported by another structure but eventually overcomes it.
It overcomes this structure until it starts to damage it – just like
craving will start to damage us – it will cause us to suffer.
Only by overcoming craving, or cutting out the roots, can we stop
the cycle of rebirth and achieve enlightenment and Nibbana.

26. Hatred, Aggression HOT COLD
Acts that are a result of hatred or aggressive
acts will ultimately cause suffering. Harmful acts
will result in you building up bad kamma and this
will cause the wheel to continue turning. Medical
research shows that anger can cause bad
effects on our health.
Anger includes putting
The blame for something on
someone else.
These are acts like assault or physical abuse or active acts.
These are acts like ignoring someone or more passive acts
HOT
COLD

27. IGNORANCE What does it mean to be ignorant of something?
It means that you didn’t know any better
or that you did not know the truth about
something and didn’t bother to find out.

28. IGNORANCE
According to Buddhism, if we are ignorant then we do not know how things really are. As humans we are ignorant of the true nature of things,. We are ignorant of the Three Marks of existence. For Buddhists it is this ignorance that is the root of the other two poisons or fires.
So how do they
cause each other?

29. A cycle of poisons that cause each other.
CRAVING
We crave and Attach
Ourselves to objects
and ideas. When they
don’t meet our
expectations we get angry
and suffer.
IGNORANCE
We do not know what
true happiness is so we
want what we think
will make us happy.
ANGER TO IGNORANCE
We are angry so we are
further deluded by the true
nature of things.
A cycle of poisons that cause each other.
ANGER
We are aggressive to
others because we have
suffered and
we do not understand
the true nature of
suffering.

30. We are the result of our own actions.
The Three Poisons work together and cause selfish action to take place. This keeps the Wheel turning and we are caught in the Samsaric Cycle.
They cause even more suffering if we don’t stop them and because the wheel keeps on turning we still have to go through the suffering of life.
We are the result of our own actions.
The only way that we can stop it is if we realise the truth, and build up good kamma to move on…

31. The Wheel turning is called Samsara
The Wheel turning is called Samsara. We are caught in this continual turning cycle of birth, life, death and rebirth. We want to stop this and achieve enlightenment.
This type of existence is
Samsara.
The type of existence we
are aiming for is Nibbana

32. Samsara "wandering on" Birth Life Death Rebirth It is a long process
It happens over time.
There have been numerous rebirths.
Innumerable past lives.
We wander aimlessly from life to life.
Death
Rebirth

34. The Wheel shows us . . . The Six Realms of Rebirth and how a
being moves through
them.
There are three good existences on the right and three bad existences on the left.

35. What is life like? So what is life like for a Buddhist?
It is characterised by the three Marks of Existence and also by the fact
that we are caught in the Wheel of Samsara.
You will need to know about each of these things in detail. You
should also be able to talk about these with references to sources.