The Healing of Suffering

First public explanation by Silo, Aconcagua, Punta de Vacas. Mendoza, Argentina, May 4th 1969

 

If you have come to listen to a man of whom it is supposed transmits wisdom you have mistaken your way, because real wisdom is not transmitted through books or harangues. Real wisdom is in the depth of your consciousness as true love is in the depth of your heart.

 If you have come, pushed by the slanderers and the hypocrites, to listen to this man so that what you hear may later serve you as an argument against him, you have mistaken your way, because this man is not here to ask anything of you, nor to use you, because he does not need you.

 You listen to a man who does not know the laws that rule the Universe, who does not know the laws of History, who is ignorant of the relationships which govern people. This man addresses himself to your consciousness, as do those who meditate in the snowy heights of distant mountains, remote from cities and their ill ambitions. There in the cities, where each day is an anxiety maimed by death, where love is followed by hate, where forgiveness is followed by revenge; there in the cities of the rich and the poor, there in the immense fields of men, a mantle of suffering and sorrow has settled.

 You suffer when pain bites your body. You suffer when hunger takes possession of your body. But you not only suffer for the immediate pain of your body, for the hunger of your body. You suffer also for the consequences of the illnesses that fall upon your body.

You must distinguish two types of suffering. There is that suffering which is produced in you through illness (and that suffering can recede thanks to the advance of science. Hunger as with sickness, can also recede, but thanks to the empire of justice.) There is another type of suffering that does not depend upon the illness of your body but rather derives from it. If you are crippled, if you cannot see, or if you do not hear, you suffer. But even though this suffering derives from your body, such suffering belongs to your mind.

 There is another type of suffering which cannot recede with the advance of science neither with the advance of justice. This kind of suffering that is strictly of your mind recedes in front of faith, in front of the joy of living, in front of love. You must know that this suffering is always based on the violence that there is in your own consciousness. You suffer because you fear losing what you have, or because of what you have already lost, or because of what you are desperately trying to reach. You suffer because you do not have or because you fear in general... There you have the great enemies of man; fear of illness, fear of poverty, fear of death, fear of loneliness. All these are sufferings that belong to your mind. All of them reveal the internal violence, the violence that there is in your mind. Notice that violence always derives from desire. The more violent that man is, the more gross are his desires.

 I would like to tell you a story about something that happened a long time ago.

There was once a traveler who had to make a long journey. For that purpose, he tied his animal to a cart and undertook the long trip toward a distant destiny and with a fixed limit of time. He called the animal Necessity, the cart Desire, he named one wheel Pleasure and the other one Pain. In this manner, the traveler carried his cart right and left but always toward his destiny. The faster the cart moved, the faster the wheels of pleasure and pain moved, connected as they were by the same axle, and transporting as they went the cart of desire.

 As the journey was very long, our traveler became bored. He then decided to decorate the cart, adorning it with things of beauty. And so he went on. But the more he embellished the cart of desire, the heavier it became for Necessity. In such a way, that on the bends and steeper slopes, the poor animal called by him Necessity grew weak, not being able to drag the cart of desire. On the sandy roads the wheels of pleasure and suffering became embedded in the ground.

 One day our traveler became desperate, for the road was very long and he was very far from his destiny. He then decided to meditate that night and while doing so, he heard the neighing of his old friend. Comprehending the message, the following morning he tore off the ornaments from the cart, relieving it of all that weight, and very early that morning he started out trotting joyfully, advancing toward his destiny. Nevertheless, he had lost time which was already irreclaimable.

 The following night he meditated once again and understood thanks to a new warning from his friend that he now had to undertake a task that was twice as difficult, because it now meant his dispossessing. At daybreak he sacrificed the cart of desire. It is certain that upon doing so he lost the wheel of pleasure, but with it he also lost the wheel of suffering. He mounted the animal Necessity on its back, and started galloping through the green fields until he reached his destiny. 

Notice how desire can trap you. But there are desires of different weight. There are more gross desires and there are more elevated desires. Elevate desire! Surpass desire! Purify desire! But in so doing, surely you will have to sacrifice the wheel of pleasure, but also the wheel of suffering.

 Violence in man, moved by his desires, not only remains as sickness in his consciousness, but it acts in the world of other men and is exercised with the rest of the  people. Do not think that I speak of violence referring only to the armed act of war, where some men destroy other men. That is a form of physical violence.

 There is an economic violence. Economic violence is that which makes you exploit another. Economic violence occurs when you steal from another, when you are no longer the brother of another, but rather a bird of prey for your brother.

 There is also racial violence. Do you believe you are not exercising violence when you persecute one who is of a different race than your own? Do you believe you are not exercising violence when you defame him because he is of a different race than your own?

 There is religious violence. Do you believe you are not exercising violence when you do not give work or when you close the doors or when you fire someone for not being of your own religion. Do you believe it is not religious violence when by means of defamation you fence in he who does not commune with your principles? Fence him in within his family? Fence him in among his beloved ones because he does not commune with your religion?

 There are other forms of violence that are the forms imposed by the Philistine morality. You want to impose a way of life upon others. You must impose a vocation upon another..  But who has told you that you can impose a way of life because it pleases you? Where is the mould and where is the model for you to impose it...? Here then is another form of violence.

 You can only put an end to the violence in yourself and in others and in the world that surrounds you by internal faith and by internal meditation. There are no false doors in order to end the violence. The world in on the verge of exploding and there is no way to end the violence! Do not search for false doors!

 There are no politics that can solve this mad urge for violence. There is no party nor movement in the planet that can end the violence. There are no false exits for the violence in the world.... They tell me that young people from the different latitudes are searching for false doors in order to escape from violence and internal suffering. They search in drugs for a solution. Do not search for false doors in order to end the violence.

 My brother and sister, fulfill simple commandments, as are simple these stones, and this snow and this sun that blesses us. Carry peace within you and carry it to others.

 My brother and sister, there in history the human being is showing the face of suffering, look at that face of suffering... but remember that it is necessary to continue forward, and that it is necessary to learn to laugh and that it is necessary to learn to love.

 To you my brother and sister I throw this hope, this hope of joy, this hope of love, for you to elevate your heart and elevate your spirit, and so that you do not forget to elevate your body.