The 3 Poisons: Greed, Hatred, and Confusion

Buddhism has a long tradition of rigorousness of study and dedication of generations of practitioners studying the mind.

Abhidhamma may be the Buddhist science from the mind1 – a way of seeing and comprehending the self, suffering, and the causes and removal of suffering. As practitioners, we're also concerned with suffering – its causes and it is alleviation. In Buddhism, the 3 poisons of greed, hatred, and delusion are thought to be unskillful and also the real cause of unnecessary human suffering.2,3 Likewise, we have seen in our offices how poorly-informed decisions and unwholesome mental habits affect people's mental and physical well-being. We are able to find out about greed, hatred, and delusion from many sources, but from my own teachers I learned to acknowledge them in myself yet others. The objective of this information is to pay for these 3 root poisons as “personalities,” or types, and discuss remediation. Because Buddhism features its own specific language, I'll begin with some fundamental Buddhist terminology.

Terminology

• Mind – Also known as consciousness, your brain is the factor that knows, perceives, experiences. According to Buddhist philosophy, the true nature of the mind is clear and pristine, pure experience.1
• Object – Something that is perceived through the mind. An object can be something tangible, like a sight, sound, touch, taste, or other physical experience, or it may be mental. Mental objects can be things like ideas, imaginings, feelings, memories, and other thoughts.4
• Greed – Attachment of the mind onto an object of desire, which gets to be clinging. It is a state of wanting and believing that lasting happiness will be obtained by acquiring the object of desire.
• Hatred /aversion – Attempting to be removed or separated in the object. There is potential to deal with the item, and this resistance takes the type of the need to eliminate the object or run from it . Hatred ranges from slight aversion to destructive rage.4
• Delusion/ignorance – False beliefs and wrong views. A persistent and insidious false view is the belief inside a lasting, separate, unchanging self – the idea of “I,” “me” or “mine” being separate and independent from others. Although this view abounds, it is considered false and unskillful.

The Personalities

The Greed Type

This may be the person or frame of mind that wishes things. They say yes to things simply because they imagine how well it'll fulfill their desires. They have a tendency to exaggerate the advantages of obtaining their object of desire. Greed personalities want to have a great time. If they are having fun, they'll consider steps to make their experience better still. Clearly, they will be inclined towards excesses. The greed-dominated mind tends to glaze over details, thinking only of the advantages of securing the item, and neglecting the potential pitfalls, obstacles, and negative consequences. They can do very well in business because they imagine all of the advantages of their plans and considerations, and they also proceed, expecting good results.

There are endless items to want, so it is simple to move from need to desire with temporary satisfactions and disappointments among. This problem is not easily remedied, since there is an enjoyment – albeit temporary – in obtaining the object of desire. In the more obvious and developed forms, however, greed will incite distrust, discomfort, and possibly disgust from others, which clarifies the reality that their state is not wholesome. If a greed type is thwarted from acquiring the object of their desire, anger can easily ensue.

The Hate Type

Hatred, or aversion, may be the other side of greed; while the greed type tries to pull things in, the hate type is always trying to keep things out. The individual whose first response is “No” to any request or suggestion, is a hate type. Hate types are averse to change, to being disturbed, plus they expect the worst. The main focus, if this poison dominates, is commonly narrow and precise. People tend to know exactly what it is that disturbs them or what they hate, and can concentrate with intense concentration. Because they foresee and expect negative outcomes, hate types tend towards pessimism and cynicism.

They are realists, however, because things actually have a tendency to not go the way they are planned; every silver lining has its cloud, and there are negative consequences to just about every action. In group-planning situations, a hate type will begin to explain all the problems, all of the potential difficulties, and all the ways a plan might not work. If left solely up to and including hate type, new projects would likely not be started, but there would be something wrong with the way situations are.

The Confused Type

The confused type doesn't know what course of action to consider; they are perpetually in a condition of indecision. They may appear lost or spacey, and they're often unsure of what they really want. The confusion is really a defense against being truly committed or present, and also against self-responsibility and the uncertainty borne of following through based on ignorance. They don't know which stand to take, and therefore won't take one. In group situations, the confused type will wait for others to offer suggestions and opinions before offering their very own. This is because their remarks are in fact according to what other people think and say. Clearly, the confused personality is definitely swayed by popular opinion. There are confused-hate types who watch for advice or opinions from those around after which proceed in the opposite direction. There's also confused-greed types, who wait for a same, but go along with the group. At the center of this state may be the “I” concept – “I don't know,” “I have no idea what to think,” “I have no idea what to do”- but it is still by pointing out “I.”

Never Fulfilling

In reality, these poisons are modes of reacting around the world, in an attempt to secure happiness. The main reason these methods cannot secure happiness is they are rooted in ignorance. Nobody is totally or solely a greed type, hate type, or confused type.

All people can understand these 3 poisons, because being human, we experience all of them, often together as well as on a regular basis. The majority of us have a dominant mode, the poison we prefer when we are from options or feel threatened, and we'll try out the other poisons to determine how well they fulfill our needs. Because these states will never fulfill us, only keep us locked in suffering, it is important that we have seen these roots in ourselves, understand them, and know how to take corrective measures.

The Remedies

These 3 poisons are somewhat not the same as each other, but at their root is ignorance – ignorance from the true nature of reality. When ignorance is dispelled, so too would be the 3 poisons. Dispelling ignorance means dispelling belief in a self and the item . Instead of ignorance, there is only experience, without any individual “self” owning the experience. Seeing the true nature of reality and dispelling ignorance may take years of mental training and discipline, and we cannot expect everyone to be able to commit to this path. Thankfully, there are more methods to correcting these unproductive mind states.

Treating As with Like

In this method, we are able to go ahead and take mind state and amplify it or the effects. For example, if a person thought that having sex can make her or him happy , an exercise in dispelling the greed state may include having sex for twenty-four or perhaps Two days straight, without breaks. Sooner or later, there is an excessive amount of the best thing, and also the reality from the unsatisfactoriness of the object becomes clear and can have to be acknowledged.

Hate types would embrace the hate, really amp up, hate the item more, obsess about this, and then, once the hate cannot become more intense, hate the truth that they're hating the item, as well as hate the hating of the object. Sooner or later, there's only the experience with hatred and hopefully some clarity about its nature. Clearly, caution is recommended when suggesting these exercises, especially if there is mental instability present or a tendency to destructive behavior.

Treating Like with the Opposite

A popular and digestible choice for treating the poisons would be to cultivate the opposing, more wholesome mind state.

The wholesome quality opposing greed is generosity. Generosity could be practiced in lots of ways: we are able to hand out our time, our money, or our well-wishes. To ensure that generosity to become perfected, there might be no clinging to anything, no ownership. Another way of viewing generosity, although it seems contrary, is to take into account that ownership is finished – you have everything and therefore can provide anything away. No quantity of things or acquisition is ever going to be sufficient for any greed state; however, once the sense of satisfaction and completeness exists, nothing more is required. It can be difficult at first to begin giving, and that's why this is a practice; starting small , increase once we progress. Giving can be to charities we feel in, strangers, or institutions, but ideally is not accomplished for credit or something like that in return. The straightforward practice of giving can improve a feeling of happiness and well-being, and loosen the choke-hold we've on our possessions and our desires.

The wholesome quality opposing hatred is loving kindness, that is generally an internally-generated state. Imagination can help tremendously with this practice. We are able to imagine a pinky-orange glow coming from our heart that extends to other beings. We are able to also think thoughts like, “May I be and happy, may the folks within this room be well and happy, may the people within this city be and happy” while visualizing an expanding orb of the loving kindness. The goal is to generate a sense of the loving kindness that we extend to others, eventually to those we dislike. To create things simple, we start with loving kindness to ourselves; whenever we have this established, we extend it to our loved ones and friends, then to those we're neutral about ; when we are ready, we extend the feeling to those with whom we've conflict. When loving kindness exists, hatred can't be present, making this simple substitution.

The quality opposing confusion is assuredness. Practicing assuredness would, again, start with smaller decisions and progress from there, however the individual should be willing to commit fully to people decisions without revisiting or questioning. Here, the person should be able to decisively employ cutting off doubts and uncertainty once the confusion or questioning arises. Here, again, imagination is really a useful tool. The look of the sword that reduces an unwholesome mental trail supplies a feeling of empowerment and finality. With time, the person might take on bigger and more important decisions, but decisions like what to cook for dinner, what to order in a restaurant, or what to wear might be appropriate starting points.

Start Small

I find, with exercises like these, that it's useful to suggest frequent, small doses, such as practicing a loving-kindness meditation for One or two minutes, 6 times each day. The regularity helps imprint the pattern on the mind, and giving the customer a precise number of visualizations to complete per day keeps your brain attempting to track the number. It is a wise decision to ask the client to be prepared to report on their experience during the follow-up visit.