Ties That Bind

I am a novice on the dharma path. One of the concepts I am having trouble understanding is the seeming prohibition of attachment to other people. Is it "wrong" to have special friends or a monogamous love relationship? Please explain what is meant by "learning to be free of attachments" with respect to human relationships.

First of all, it's important to look at what the Buddha was talking about when he used the terms we have translated as "attachment." In Pali, the language of the original Buddhist texts, there's a term,

which is the word to describe thirst, craving, desire. It has also been translated as "attachment."

Thanha carries with it the sense of craving or grasping after something in a way that's always out of harmony with the way things are, a sense of trying to keep something or someone from changing, or to control them. From a Buddhist perspective, thanha is a morally unwholesome or unskillful state of mind. It can only cause suffering, because it is out of balance with the truth.

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Another term the Buddha used is

which means a strong desire to do something. Chandha is morally neutral and takes on the characteristic of qualities arising alongside it. You can have a strong desire to do something out of love or compassion, or out of greed or hatred. So a powerful intention to carrying out something can be skillful or unskillful, depending on what motivates it.

I observed the "thanha" aspect of my mind when I first began to meditate. I found it very hard to be with just one breath. In the midst of being with

breath I was wanting to know what the next one would feel like; I wanted it to be right. I was already leaning into the future, trying to make something happen in a particular way. In order to bring my practice into balance, I had to be with the breath that was. My first lesson in practice was about letting go of the desire to control the next breath.

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