1 There is suffering.
“Birth is suffering; Decay is suffering; Death is suffering; Sorrow, Lamentation, Pain, Grief, and Despair, are suffering; not to get what one desires, is suffering…”
The Buddha Shakyamuni had everything; born a prince; born wealthy; had absolutely everything: beauty, strength, a kingdom, wealth beyond imagining. But his parents prevented him from seeing the truth. He was always kept cloistered; protected. And because of his natural interest in understanding things, he snuck out of the palace grounds and for the first time saw old people; sick people; dead people. He was astonished because as a prince he never saw those things. He was greatly disturbed. Subsequently, he decided that this problem of old age, sickness, death, and all the problems of pain and suffering, must have a solution. So he abandoned all of his material goods and status and went to live in the wilderness with absolutely nothing, and devoted himself to religion, to yoga, and spent years in meditation; in complete abstinence. He only ate a single grain of rice a day. After seven years he was nothing more than a skeleton with skin on it; completely emaciated. And in that time, meditating in the forest, he heard nearby someone trying to play an instrument that is called a veena; it has strings. But the string did not sound right; it was not in tune. And suddenly it struck him; he is like that. If the string is not in exactly the right tension it does not produce a beautiful note. And he realized he is exactly like that. He went from one extreme, of materialism, wealth, status, beauty and everything else, and abandoned that and went all the way to another extreme of renouncing everything and being completely alone; and both extremes were wrong. He realized he needed to be in the middle; tuned.
Subsequently, he came to understand these truths: Yes, there is suffering.
2 Suffering has a cause.
“It is that craving which gives rise to fresh rebirth, and, bound up with pleasure and lust…”
When we are craving something it always sets in motion this cycle called “Pratityasamutpada,” which is very difficult to translate into English. Usually it is translated as “dependent-origination.” It simply says: because of this, that happens, and because of that, this happens. It is a cycle of cause and effect. Craving is what gives rise to that wheel of movement that causes suffering. So it says it is that craving which gives rise to fresh rebirth, bound up with pleasure and lust. The cause of suffering is craving; desire.
Since suffering has a cause, which is craving, then the Third Noble Truth says:
3 There is extinction for suffering.
“It is the complete fading away and extinction of this craving, its forsaking and giving up, the liberation and detachment from it…”
If we can conquer that unnatural craving for pleasure and the unnatural avoidance of pain, and instead learn to be in the middle, neither craving or avoiding, simply being, not chasing pleasure and always avoiding uncomfortable things, but being present and aware, awake, then we undo the chain that binds us to suffering.
4 The extinction of suffering is the result of the eightfold path.
“It is the Noble Eightfold Path, the way that leads to the extinction of suffering… This is the Middle Path which the Perfect One has found out, which makes one both to see and to know, which leads to peace, to discernment, to enlightenment, to Nirvana.”
This is the first teaching that the Buddha gave. It is most profound. It is something that is maybe somewhat easy to grasp with your intellect, but extraordinarily deep because it penetrates into every atom of our existence. To think you understand it with your mind is not enough. True understanding of the Four Noble Truths is revealed in your actions when you are no longer acting upon your craving and aversion.