true suffering
"I just smashed my finger," a man said to me playfully in the elevator as we were leaving the Shambhala center, the topic of the evening having been true suffering, "Which kind of suffering is that?"
"Oh, the first one," I quipped back.
"You know," he said, looking thoughtful, "I think it might be more the second one."
"Smashing your finger causes you pain, not suffering," I replied with a such a level of decisiveness that I surprised myself, "The suffering is in your reaction to it." Answer as if you know the answer had been my recent instruction and without even thinking about it, there I was employing it.
"Well, then, that must be a testament to my practice," he responded, "because I wasn't upset by it at all."