According to Tibetan Buddhism, a Gakja is a self existent thing which could never exist, but because you believe in it you suffer. When people stop and think about it, it seems logical that things will change. Yet, in a moment of dis-ease it is not often that we stop to consider this very thing. We take for granted that people will always be there. This is the exact reason that our friendships slowly turn into estrangements. When we fall in love we expect that feeling to always last. When we are full of anxiety, worried about money, or suffering beyond words we cannot see in that moment that it will not always be that way.A produced thing does not last. If something is produced it must die. It is the same with karmic seeds. The moment anything comes into existence; be it a seed in the ground- a child being born-, or a feeling like anxiety, jealousy, anger, fear, or pleasure it is one step closer to ending.
The problem with our mental afflictions is that we strongly identify with them. The longer we identify with it the more it becomes a habit. Habits become who we are. We need to learn how to rewire to become the person we are destined to be. The law of karma functions by saying that we have zero control over what is happening to us in the present moment. The present moment is a previous result of a cause from the past. If we want to change and rewire our future, we must change our reaction to those things in the present. All we have in our present moment is our discipline. Go to it for refuge. As Lama Marut says, "Begin to redirect your energy that used to run amock in your mental afflictions." The way you have previously associated with these energies has been unhelpful.
The purpose of yoga is to create a perfectly happy being. You know what to give up and what to take up when you achieve yoga. When we can sit and watch our feelings, we can see how true impermanence is. When we believe that things will last forever; like our relationships, jobs, or financial situation we are ultimately disappointed. When we can connect to the feeling of impermanence we understand that the feeling must change. It will change in an instant, it is short lived. This is great to think about when things are not going right. Relax into reality. Things are going to change. "This too will pass." Things are empty of being permanent.
So the question is "Are we ever unhappy because we are mistaking changing things for unchanging things?" Because we mistake changing things for unchanging things we suffer. So what can we do? Relax into the present and garden for the future.
From Lama Maruts' Mahamudra Reading:
Example of a Meditation on Impermanence:
"I think this feeling of unhappiness will last for a while. But really, the rise and fall of a moment of emotion is just like the rising and fading sounds of a plane passing overhead- it comes and goes quickly, and even in the space of its short existence it is constantly changing by degrees, from softer to louder to softer, etc."
