user10950: I need some help understanding how the Buddhist view on 'accepting what is' and noticing how craving for it to be different to how it is causes suffering, is different to learned helplessness where you become conditioned to give up trying because you believe it's futile.  They seem to be very similar to me.  In what ways are they different.  Is the difference that with Buddhism you don't give up trying? For example if I have a string of failed relationships it can cause learned helplessness and I might give up trying to begin a new one but how would I see it through a Buddhist lense?   It's finished because everything is impermanent, now I accept that and I don't give up hope because that's just how it is?  But still there is a part of me that feels it's pointless to try again if I know it's going to end in pain again.

user43: Suchness has a different flavor from helplessness you describe. It's more like you always live afresh, as if you were a new person, a new child - every time. It's not that you accept things as inevitable as victim accepts her pain - as much as you see the world and the situation you are in with no baggage from the past. That's the meaning. See the difference?
So if you don't have a gf, you face the world being as naive, open, and vulnerable as if you never had a gf and never had the pain. You don't know what to expect, so everything is possible.
You don't compare what you see against your memories projected forward as expectations. Nor you compare it against the fantasies you see on TV. Your eyes are truly open to see what's really happening in actuality, hence it's called "suchness", freedom from preconceptions.
It's not that you stop learning or end up living in the present moment like an imbecile who can't reason or plan. It's just that you approach the world with an attitude of freshness, not tiredness. You have no fear holding you down, so you can play and improvise. You have no thoughts veiling your eyes, so you can see.
And despite past pains or failures, you still stay like that - new, open. That's the spirit of suchness or "accepting what is" if you want.

10950: <p>I need some help understanding how the Buddhist view on 'accepting what is' and noticing how craving for it to be different to how it is causes suffering, is different to learned helplessness where you become conditioned to give up trying because you believe it's futile.  They seem to be very similar to me.  In what ways are they different.  Is the difference that with Buddhism you don't give up trying? For example if I have a string of failed relationships it can cause learned helplessness and I might give up trying to begin a new one but how would I see it through a Buddhist lense?   It's finished because everything is impermanent, now I accept that and I don't give up hope because that's just how it is?  But still there is a part of me that feels it's pointless to try again if I know it's going to end in pain again.</p>
 43: <p><em>Suchness</em> has a different flavor from helplessness you describe. It's more like you always live afresh, as if you were a new person, a new child - every time. It's not that you accept things as inevitable as victim accepts her pain - as much as you see the world and the situation you are in with no baggage from the past. That's the meaning. See the difference?</p>

<p>So if you don't have a gf, you face the world being as naive, open, and vulnerable as if you never had a gf and never had the pain. You don't know what to expect, so everything is possible.</p>

<p>You don't compare what you see against your memories projected forward as expectations. Nor you compare it against the fantasies you see on TV. Your eyes are truly open to see what's really happening in actuality, hence it's called "suchness", freedom from preconceptions.</p>

<p>It's not that you stop learning or end up living in the present moment like an imbecile who can't reason or plan. It's just that you approach the world with an attitude of freshness, not tiredness. You have no fear holding you down, so you can play and improvise. You have no thoughts veiling your eyes, so you can see.</p>

<p>And despite past pains or failures, you still stay like that - new, open. That's the spirit of suchness or "accepting what is" if you want.</p>
