/lit/ - Literature

>>11149291
I hope you are still around anon.

>it's impossible to find satisfaction or avoid suffering in this state with a normal human mindset. Not as in a Western sense specifically, but any that depends on a constant release of pleasure. When you consider life in the long term this way, the justifications become very weak, and often simply come down to increasing the odds of pleasure and minimizing the pain
That's completely correct. But you should also see that it's impossible to find true satisfaction or avoid suffering in *any* -not just your current- state even if you have a *normal* (what is normal anyway?) human mindset. This is the basic knowledge and feeling that enables you to understand the first Noble Truth of dukkha.

>Someday comes more tragedy. It is not awful, but it seems quite empty. Like running in place for centuries.
There are similes where the Buddha explains samsara as without discoverable beginning or end. It's indeed as if you were a dog chasing for its own tail without realizing it's in fact your own tail. Now, don't get caught up in the negativity of the impossibility of avoiding suffering, just like a dog would get caught up chasing its own tail only generating more and more suffering. This is where the other three Noble Truths come into play. There is actually a way out of this never ending cycle.

>To be honest though, I am still divided on whether coming to Buddhism to avoid pain is sensible or not. It shouldn't matter what you're feeling, right? The conclusion holds true at any time.
You won't avoid the pain that comes, for example, if you get hit by a dart. You will avoid the pain that comes with identifying yourself with that pain you feel. The dart simile touches exactly this point (see https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn36/sn36.006.than.html))
I'm not sure what you mean by "It shouldn't matter what you're feeling". Can you explain better? I'd be inclined to say that it does matter what feeling you are experiencing. Feeling hate is not the same as feeling sadness, even if the underlying process through which they come about are the same.