Reading guide
The same two-part promise, restated
As in SN 22.7, the Buddha opens by naming both halves of his subject together: how grasping leads to anxiety, and how not grasping leads to freedom from anxiety. The repetition of this exact framing across two consecutive discourses signals that what follows is a deliberate restatement, not a new topic.
"This is mine, I am this, this is my self"
An unlearned ordinary person regards each aggregate with this three-part claim: mama (mine, a claim of possession), eso'ham asmi (I am this, a claim of identity), and eso me attā (this is my self, a claim of essential selfhood). The three phrases are not presented as logically distinct configurations the way SN 22.7's fourfold formula was; they read instead as three ways of voicing the same underlying grip.
A more direct route to the same sorrow
When an aggregate held with this claim decays and perishes, the result named here is simply “sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, and distress” — the discourse skips SN 22.7's intermediate step of consciousness “latching on” to the perishing, moving straight from the claim to its painful consequence. This is a shorter causal account than SN 22.7's, not a contradictory one.
Two formulas, one lesson repeated at two speeds
A learned noble disciple regards each aggregate with the negated version — “this is not mine, I am not this, this is not my self” — and when that aggregate decays, no sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, or distress arises. Placed immediately after SN 22.7, this discourse functions as a compressed, more memorable version of the same lesson, well suited to recitation or to a listener less prepared for SN 22.7's more technical fourfold analysis.
Key terms
The text
§1At Sāvatthī. “Mendicants, I will teach you how grasping leads to anxiety, and how not grasping leads to freedom from anxiety. Listen and apply your mind well, I will speak. And how does grasping lead to anxiety? It’s when an unlearned ordinary person regards form like this: ‘This is mine, I am this, this is my self.’ But that form of theirs decays and perishes, which gives rise to sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, and distress.
§2They regard feeling … perception … choices … consciousness like this: ‘This is mine, I am this, this is my self.’ But that consciousness of theirs decays and perishes, which gives rise to sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, and distress. That’s how grasping leads to anxiety.
§3And how does not grasping lead to freedom from anxiety? It’s when a learned noble disciple regards form like this: ‘This is not mine, I am not this, this is not my self.’ When that form of theirs decays and perishes, it doesn’t give rise to sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, and distress.
§4They regard feeling … perception … choices … consciousness like this: ‘This is not mine, I am not this, this is not my self.’ When that consciousness of theirs decays and perishes, it doesn’t give rise to sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, and distress. That’s how not grasping leads to freedom from anxiety.”
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