“The Never-Ending Play”

The world is similar to a grand theatre, called Samsara (the cycle of rebirth). The play opens with birth, followed by different scenes filled with different emotions, and in different stages of life. We are both actors and audience. Every play has the same ending, that of death.

In these plays, the true ending never comes, no matter how much we want to quit the role or just walk out. We are too emotionally involved with our roles, and too blind to understand that it is our own karma that determines the story of our lives.

According to Buddha, it is hard to find the beginning and the end of one’s cycle of birth and death. “Those feeling satisfied with birth return to rebirth often, but I say this, birth is suffering because what follows are old age, illness, and death. The separation from loved ones, frustration from unpleasantness, lamentation, and all those physical and emotional pains and anguish, are like a mushroom that springs from the earth, but still stained with dirty soil. They are like cattle that carry the cart with them wherever they go.”

The Buddha’s teachings on refraining from committing a sin, doing good deeds, and purifying the mind through Vipassana meditation, is actually the guideline that helps us abandon worldly attachments. If you want to walk out of this theatre, adopt the his teachings in your daily life. The final scene is waiting for you.

Translation: Napassakorn Oveerawong
Source: “Top Ideas in Buddhism”, 5000s Magazine Vol.37 “Reincarnation”