One of the most basic and helpful contemplations in Buddhism are the three marks known as annata, anicca, and dukkha. Here, I will define the three marks and explore why they remain as relevant today as when the Buddha taught on them several thousand years ago.

Annatta means ‘no self.’ This sounds a little ambiguous. What it really means is that our self is constantly changing. The person we consider to be “me” is slowly being transformed into a new “me” everyday by our emotions, relationships, thoughts, choices, and environment. In fact, every choice we makes leads us farther away from the person who made that choice. How tragic! Thus, the suffering we experience through self-clinging is simply our belief in and our desire to have a fixed self and hold onto it. Sadly, it’s impossible. Meditating on annatta slowly deconditions our minds from self-attachment and creates a tremendous sense of openness and freedom. This is what many meditators call sky mind, which is really what rather than who we are. 🙂

Anicca is impermanence. For those familiar with Buddhism, we often describe existence as conditioned. Like the self, nothing in our world is permanent. If we take a step back and contemplate our existence, we see that everything we’ve loved, do love, and will love cannot last. The people we love will die. That favorite new object of our affection will become tarnished and no longer new. Try as we might, we can’t even protect ourselves from change. Most of the time we try ignore this tragic state of affairs, but that person in the mirror keeps changing, and we remember. Impermanence is tragic, but contemplations on impermanence can be a powerful motivating force. When we realize our time is finite, we choose to act with greater wisdom and grace.

Dukkha is discontent or suffering. Dukkha is the thing we spend our lives trying to avoid. The sources of suffering are well described by the Buddha as old age, sickness, and death. Dukkha is also the thing that drives us for good or bad on our journey through this life. It is this basic and fundamental discontent with existence that leads us on the spiritual journey. Contemplations on Dukkha like Anicca can be motivating. The path of Buddhism begins with a wish to be free of dukkha, and all of the meditations, sutras, tantras, and visualizations are meant to teach us how to do that. Put simply, to be free of Dukkha is enlightenment.

Care to take a journey outside the self?