Avoiding the Second Arrow with Pablo Das

Buddhism doesn’t promise a peaceful life. But it does offer a path to greater ease.

We often imagine spiritual teachers have somehow escaped the messiness of being human. Or they’ve at least reached a place where life no longer rattles them.

Buddhist teacher Pablo Das laughed at that idea.

“If you think you have your shit together” he told us, “it probably means you’re standing in it.”

Apparently no one has it all figured out. And honestly, what a relief.

He went on to share a powerful Buddhist teaching known as The Second Arrow. The metaphor goes like this: The first arrow is the pain that inevitably finds us. Loss. Rejection. Illness. Grief. Heartbreak. None of us escape those things. The second arrow is the one we fire ourselves. (And sometimes we even fire a third or fourth or fifth. Fun!)

We do this with the stories we tell, our resistance, our shame. It can even happen more subtly, by putting energy into wishing reality were different. Yet here’s the terrible irony: in trying to outrun pain, we create more suffering for ourselves — often more suffering than the original wound.

So how do we stop this almost-instinctual human reflex?

Pablo challenged us to consider that there are parts of ourselves we only meet in grief. Heartbreak, uncertainty, and loss don’t just break us open. They introduce us to capacities that may have otherwise remained hidden. In our darkest moments, we find resilience, tenderness, courage, and (maybe most importantly) compassion for others.

You do not have to enjoy suffering, but it might be good to stop believing that joy is the only worthwhile human emotion.

We’re supposed to experience both beauty and loss. Joy and grief. Love and heartbreak. This is what it means to be human. And when we stop fighting the truth that life contains all of it — and we are made better for it — we usually find a little more ease.

There’s no such thing as a life free from suffering. What Buddhism invites us to do is develop a heart spacious enough to receive it all.

It sounds so easy.