Sukha

What is Sukha?

Sukha is a Sanskrit and Pāli word that is often translated as “happiness” or “ease” or “pleasure” or “bliss”.

But what is happiness, ease, pleasure, or bliss? To me, all those feelings are often described in things that I obtain through life. I find happiness in having a car, a house, a love, family, and the list goes on. What would I do if I lost all those things? Would I still be happy or would I look towards other “things” to make me happy? Would I find happiness in work, friends, and more and more things?

It seems that we often find ourselves in a never ending craving to gain these things because they often bring us a short amount of happiness. The truth is, those things become our dukkha because we look at those things not realizing that they will die, or wither away ending our happiness.

Sukha does not die, or wither away. It is the happiness that we find in understanding the nature of things. Its the happiness that we obtain through nothing, it just exists in us. We have the capability of having this happiness at all times through nothing but ourselves. It is that in between of the two extremes.

Dukkha is everything that is not sukha and sukha is never ending…