The following talk was given at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California.

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Thank you. So in these few minutes we have here, I want to try to bring alive for you the distinction between discomfort and suffering.

Big words.

Discomfort is an expected part of human life.

What the Buddhists call suffering, dukkha, is a particular, the word literally means pain,

but the way it's used in the teachings of the Buddha, and it's a certain

kind of emotional pain that is not emotional discomfort, but rather a certain kind of emotional

pain that comes because of how we have gotten contracted, or we clinging, or resisting to something.

It's kind of like if we get contracted in clinging, then it's kind of like water.

If you try to hit water, you know, it's a karate chop on water,

the water just smiles and just kind of parts its way,

and the water doesn't really care.

And it, you know, and your hand goes through, and the water just feel, you're trying to make

space there, but it just fills in again, you know, smiles and look how silly you are.

But if part of the water has become ice, like the surface has been frozen over,

and then you hit it, you'll break the ice.

And if it's really hard ice, like many inches thick and you hit it hard enough,

the ice is not going to break, it's your hands are going to break.

So when we become solidified around certain things that we're really holding on to a tight,

clinging, desires, aversions, identities, all kinds of beliefs that we have.

We become more fragile.

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