It would perhaps be better if life did not bring change—if it could be relied upon to provide lasting happiness. But since this is not true, a calm and clear understanding of what is true—that no conditions are permanent or reliable—would weaken the grip in which craving holds us. Craving can vanish in awakening to the absurdity of the assumptions that underlie it. Without stamping it out or denying it, craving may be renounced the way a child renounces sandcastles: not by repressing the desire to make them but by turning aside from an endeavor that no longer holds any interest.
