Notes on ‘What’s Dukkha’ by Glenn Wallis | May 2008 Shambhala Sun
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… even a “happy” moment is tinged by dukkha. That is because neither the moment nor the experience is stable. Since the quality of happiness arises in dependence on external factors, it fades away as those factors disassemble. And in that gap is felt the trace, however subtle, of underlying dukkha. Since, furthermore, our lives are successions of such moments, dukkha is said to be “pervasive”…
… Our English term would have to have the following colorings (on an increasing scale of intensity):
faint unsettledness, irritation, impatience, annoyance, frustration, disappointment, dissatisfaction, aggravation, tension, stress, anxiety, vexation, pain, desperation, sorrow, sadness, suffering, misery, agony, anguish
… It is obvious that each of these qualities involves some degree of unease, so “unease” is how I translate the term for general usage.