Everything that Man has made began as an idea in someone’s mind. The world is made up of ideas, many of them wrong and silly, and it is from such ideas that most of our suffering flows.

     If we treat only the symptoms but leave untouched the underlying causes of suffering, our efforts will, at most, have palliative effects. The causes must be discovered and dealt with, so that the symptoms can no longer arise.

     Our problems originate mainly in the mind, through wrong or incomplete understanding. It is not because we are sinful or evil that we perform bad or antisocial deeds, but more because we are blind and stupid and do not see our place in life, do not understand how much we depend upon others in so many ways.

     Not long ago, on a bus, I heard two mindless twits talking loudly and denigratingly about Japanese people, and I wondered if they had ever stopped to think about who had made their watches, TV’s, cars, videos, cassette-players, and so on. We cannot do without other people, and could not count how many people work for us every day so that we can live as we do. If we understood this, it would certainly modify and improve the way we think about others.

     Just as darkness can be overcome only by light, so Ignorance can only be overcome by Knowledge. If we know the causes of suffering, it is possible to do something about it.