Why Overcome Cyclic Rebirths?
Soh

A reader’s question (paraphrased)

A reader writes that much non-dual literature explains māyā with the familiar ocean-and-waves image: each individual life is like a wave or bubble that briefly rises from the ocean of consciousness and then subsides. From that perspective, liberation is often pictured as the bursting of the bubble—the dissolution of the illusion of separateness back into the vast sea.

But, the reader continues, if we truly are the sea, then another wave inevitably forms. The ocean’s nature is to move, surge, and dance; the play of waves is not an error to fix but an expression of what the sea is. Likewise, consciousness naturally manifests as forms and experiences—it plays. This spontaneous līlā (divine play) is not opposed to truth; it is truth in motion.

Both Buddhist and Hindu traditions often motivate practice with the wish to be free from the cycle of birth and death—to stop returning, to stop taking up form, since existence is bound up with suffering. Yet, viewed through non-duality, a question arises: if there is no real separation from the “ocean of being,” how could we ever truly avoid “becoming a wave” again?

If it is the very nature of the sea to move and the nature of consciousness to express itself, then what we call reincarnation or manifestation might be the spontaneous rhythm of the infinite rather than a mistake to escape. From this angle, the reader finds it hard to feel motivated for arduous spiritual practice aimed at liberation—because if the ocean-and-wave metaphor holds, we will simply become a wave again (perhaps not here, but in other realms). So: why practice at all? The reader asks for my view when I have time, and ends with thanks for the resources on Awakening to Reality, which they found immensely helpful.


Soh's Reply:


Thank you for your thoughtful note. From a Buddhist perspective it is critical to give rise to a deep urgency to practice. Below I respond in detail, expanding key points and keeping your references intact.
1) Why overcome cyclic existence?
In the Buddha’s early discourses, saṃsāra is beginningless and saturated with dukkha (unsatisfactoriness/suffering) from top to bottom. Here is what the Buddha taught:
**“Linked Discourses 15.13
Chapter Two
Thirty Mendicants
Near Rājagaha, in the Bamboo Grove. Then thirty mendicants from Pāvā went to the Buddha. All of them lived in the wilderness, ate only almsfood, wore rag robes, and owned just three robes; yet they all still had fetters. They bowed to the Buddha and sat down to one side. The same thirty monks from Pāvā visited the Buddha on another occasion when he was at Sāvatthī, occasioning the allowance for the robe-making ceremony after the rains residence (Kd 7:1.1.1). | Pāvā, a town of the Mallas, was where Mahāvīra died, plunging the Jains into chaos. (The Jains, however, say this was another Pāvā east of Nāḷandā.) Perhaps because of this, Pāvā became associated with especially ascetic monks such as those in this discourse: Mahākassapa heard the news of the Buddha’s passing at Pāvā; and sixty monks from Pāvā allied with monks of “Avanti and the south” arguing for strict Vinaya in the Second Council (Kd 22:1.7.11.1).
Then it occurred to the Buddha, “These thirty mendicants from Pāvā live in the wilderness, eat only almsfood, wear rag robes, and own just three robes; yet they all still have fetters. See SN 16.5:2.1 for explanations of these strict observances.Why don’t I teach them the Dhamma in such a way that their minds are freed from defilements by not grasping while sitting in this very seat?”
Then the Buddha said to the mendicants, “Mendicants!”
“Venerable sir,” they replied. The Buddha said this:
“Mendicants, this transmigration has no known beginning. No first point is found of sentient beings roaming and transmigrating, shrouded by ignorance and fettered by craving.
What do you think? Which is more: the flow of blood you’ve shed when your head was chopped off while roaming and transmigrating for such a very long time, or the water in the four oceans?”
“As we understand the Buddha’s teaching, the flow of blood we’ve shed when our head was chopped off while roaming and transmigrating is more than the water in the four oceans.”
“Good, good, mendicants! It’s good that you understand my teaching like this. The flow of blood you’ve shed when your head was chopped off while roaming and transmigrating is indeed more than the water in the four oceans. For a long time you’ve been cows, and the flow of blood you’ve shed when your head was chopped off as a cow is more than the water in the four oceans. For a long time you’ve been buffalo … sheep … goats … deer … chickens … pigs … For a long time you’ve been bandits, arrested for raiding villages, highway robbery, or adultery. And the flow of blood you’ve shed when your head was chopped off as a bandit is more than the water in the four oceans.
Why is that? This transmigration has no known beginning. … This is quite enough for you to become disillusioned, dispassionate, and freed regarding all conditions.”
That is what the Buddha said. Satisfied, the mendicants approved what the Buddha said. And while this discourse was being spoken, the minds of the thirty mendicants from Pāvā were freed from defilements by not grasping.”** (SN 15.13). (SuttaCentral)
This sober framing is meant to stir saṁvega—urgency to end the causes of suffering (craving, aversion, and delusion), not to despair.
John Tan, 2006:
“Life is like a passing cloud, when it comes to an end, a hundred years is like yesterday, like a snap of a finger. If it is only about one life, it really doesn’t matter whether we are enlightened. The insight that the Blessed One has is not just about one life; countless lives we suffered, life after life, unending…Such is suffering.
It is not about logic or science and there is really no point arguing in this scientific age. Take steps in practice and experience the truth of Buddha’s words. Of the 3 dharma seals, the truth of ‘suffering’ to me is most difficult to experience in depth.
May all take Buddha’s words seriously.”
(Also See: On "Supernatural Powers" or Siddhis, and Past Lives https://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2018/07/on-supernatural-powers-or-siddhis.html )
Another friend told me after a bout of severe illness, “It was a great experience to develop renunciation.. I’d rather die than get a body which can experience that sort of pain again.” So do not let our present relative comforts or fortunate circumstances (which are impermanent) blind us to the pains of saṃsāra that we have undergone for countless lifetimes and shall undergo again prior to liberation, and the importance for liberation from cyclic rebirth.
The Buddha also compared the rarity of a human rebirth and meeting the true Dharma to a blind turtle surfacing once every hundred years and by chance placing its neck through the hole of a drifting yoke—vanishingly rare and precious, so don’t waste it (SN 56.48). (SuttaCentral)
He urged us to strive as if one’s head or turban were on fire, and taught the Fire Sermon: our six sense fields are “burning” with greed, hate and delusion—another reason to cool the fires now (SN 35.28). (SuttaCentral)
2) A Mahāyāna difference: freedom from compelled rebirth vs. compassionate manifestation
Buddhism does not posit a single eternal “ocean of consciousness” that must keep waving. What appears does so through dependent arising; when its causes (especially ignorance) cease, the effects cease. Nāgārjuna crystallizes this: “Whatever is dependently arisen, that is explained to be emptiness … and is itself the middle way.” (MMK 24:18). 
Thus, liberation (nirvāṇa) is not annihilation but the ending of afflictive processes—especially “I-making” and “mine-making.” In Mahāyāna, full Buddhahood is described as non-abiding nirvāṇa (apratiṣṭhita-nirvāṇa): no longer compelled by karma to cycle in birth and death, yet able to freely manifest out of compassion to guide beings. This coheres with the trikāya teaching—especially the nirmāṇakāya, the Buddha’s compassionate emanation body. (Encyclopedia of Buddhism)
From the bodhisattva path perspective, by the eighth bhūmi (the “Immovable”), afflictive obscurations are exhausted; conduct becomes spontaneous, unshakable, and naturally for others’ benefit. Appearance among beings at that level is skillful means—without suffering as ordinary beings do. (lotsawahouse.org)
Prior to the eighth bhūmi, bodhisattvas may “forget” and re-recognize their realization after their next birth (often at a young age); post-eighth, emanations are fully conscious (knowledge of true nature unforgotten) even at conception, when they freely choose to appear. In Mahāyāna and Vajrayana Buddhism, Śākyamuni’s Indian appearance is taken as an emanation of a long-awakened Buddha—consistent with non-abiding nirvāṇa and trikāya. (lotsawahouse.org)
3) Non-duality and anattā (no-self): not annihilationism nor nihilism
As you intuited, “waves” (appearances) keep playing. In Buddhism, the crucial point is how they appear: when there is appropriation (“I as seer, hearer, controller”), dukkha arises; when there is just the seen, just the heard, without a seer/hearer imagined behind it, there is peace. This is the Buddha’s instruction to Bāhiya: “In the seen, just the seen; in the heard, just the heard … just this is the end of suffering” (Ud 1.10). (SuttaCentral)
Years ago I summarized the same point in my own words: nirvāṇa is the cessation of craving, aggression, and delusion—especially the delusion of a perceiver/controller/self/Self. It is not annihilating a real self (none was ever found); it is ending the clinging process. Without this delusion feeding I-me-mine-making, compelled rebirth ends—precisely the thrust of MN 140’s portrait of the “sage at peace … not reborn” after greed, hatred and delusion are “cut off at the root, like a palm stump.” (SuttaCentral)

Excerpt: “In their ignorance, they used to acquire attachments. Those have been cut off at the root, made like a palm stump, obliterated so they are unable to arise in the future. Therefore a mendicant thus endowed is endowed with the ultimate foundation of generosity. For this is the ultimate noble generosity, namely, letting go of all attachments.
In their ignorance, they used to be covetous, full of desire and lust. That has been cut off at the root, made like a palm stump, obliterated so it’s unable to arise in the future. In their ignorance, they used to be contemptuous, full of ill will and malevolence. That has been cut off at the root, made like a palm stump, obliterated so it’s unable to arise in the future. In their ignorance, they used to be ignorant, full of delusion. That has been cut off at the root, made like a palm stump, obliterated so it’s unable to arise in the future. Therefore a mendicant thus endowed is endowed with the ultimate foundation of peace. For this is the ultimate noble peace, namely, the pacification of greed, hate, and delusion.
‘Do not neglect wisdom; preserve truth; foster generosity; and train only for peace.’ That’s what I said, and this is why I said it. This concludes the discussion of the four foundations.
‘Where they stand, the streams of conceiving do not flow. And where the streams of conceiving do not flow, they are called a sage at peace.’ “Streams of conceiving” (maññassavā) is a unique image, allied to the notion that defilements may “stream on to” a person (āsavā assaveyyuṁ, AN 4.195:2.2). That’s what I said, but why did I say it?
These are all forms of conceiving: ‘I am’, ‘I am this’, ‘I will be’, ‘I will not be’, ‘I will have form’, ‘I will be formless’, ‘I will be percipient’, ‘I will be non-percipient’, ‘I will be neither percipient nor non-percipient.’ Conceiving is a disease, a boil, a dart. Having gone beyond all conceiving, one is called a sage at peace. The sage at peace is not reborn, does not grow old, and does not die. They are not shaken, and do not yearn. For they have nothing which would cause them to be reborn. Not being reborn, how could they grow old? Not growing old, how could they die? Not dying, how could they be shaken? Not shaking, for what could they yearn?”
 
Important nuance: In Buddhism, clarity/presence/luminosity is not denied—but it is also not reified as a metaphysical Self or singular substratum. Dependent origination itself is taught as emptiness/the middle way, which undercuts both annihilationism and an eternalistic “Presence” as ultimate substance. 
4) Addressing the Līlā / play concern directly
From a Mahāyāna lens, it’s not that “the ocean must wave again” by compulsion. Rather:
  • Compelled cycling continues so long as ignorance and karma persist; ending their causes ends compelled rebirth (dependent origination).
  • Compassionate play is the Buddha’s free, effortless manifestation—non-abiding in either saṃsāra or static cessation—appearing as needed for beings via nirmāṇakāya. (Encyclopedia of Buddhism)
So motivation for practice is stronger, not weaker: we practice to end suffering and to gain the capacity to truly help others.
5) What to cultivate concretely
  • Prajñā (wisdom) that sees through both “self” and “things” as inherently existent, purifying the two obscurations—(i) afflictive and (ii) cognitive (subtle grasping at inherent existence)—the twin veils preventing Buddhahood. (Encyclopedia of Buddhism)
  • Bodhicitta and the pāramitās (generosity, ethics, patience, vigor, concentration, wisdom), walking the ten bhūmis toward effortless, compassionate activity (to and beyond the eighth “Immovable”). (lotsawahouse.org)
6) Mahāyāna view vs. Advaita/“Brahman–Līlā” (plus explicit refutations of “universal consciousness”)
The Hindu/Advaita teaching of Brahman and Līlā differs from the Buddhist insight based on dependent origination and emptiness. In Buddhism, clarity/presence/luminosity is not denied, but we do not posit an ultimate Self, a universal Witness, or an all-embracing single consciousness-substance. Nāgārjuna’s dictum—dependent origination is emptiness; emptiness is the middle way—precludes that reification. (See: https://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2025/08/the-unfindable-fullness-how-drum.html )
For readers who tend to extrapolate a “Universal Mind,” the following pieces explicitly refute that view and explain why it is a subtle reification that deviates from Buddhadharma:
To echo John Tan’s comments back in year 2004~2006:
  • “Though non-duality is experienced, it is not thorough. He sank back to a source and ding dong in between. Is there Witness without conditions? Are there moments of manifestation without conditions where Witness is experienced? If there is, then it is a game. If not, then know the truth of Dependent Origination. There is a stage 6. The nature of Presence is empty.”
  • “Buddhism is nothing but replacing the ‘Self’ in Hinduism with Condition Arising. Keep the clarity, the presence, the luminosity and eliminate the ultimate ‘Self’, the controller, the supreme. Still you must taste, sense, eat, hear and see Pure Awareness in every authentication. And every authentication is Bliss.” (2004)
  • “The part of stage 5 must be led forward by DO [dependent origination], otherwise one will sink back to a source. Very often, this is the case. So don't underestimate the simple sentence of ‘manifestation is the source’. It is the key to non-duality then lead to DO. It must be DO that lead one out of the source. Then all broken pieces will slowly fall into place. Otherwise, we will have all those funny theories like reality is lila, a game plot of God. That is because causes and conditions is not understood, and how awareness becomes causes and conditions. When luminosity-emptiness is experienced in its total state, then it is dharmakaya. Experiencing the luminosity aspect itself is not enough. It is best not to talk about transcendental body.” (2006)
Read more context here: https://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2022/10/buddha-nature-vs-brahman.html . (This piece unpacks the difference between Buddha-nature and Brahman from a dependent-origination/emptiness perspective.)
7) Why practice with great urgency—now
  • Overcoming cyclic existence matters because the Buddha teaches that saṃsāra is only suffering; its beginning is untraceable and its ledger of pain exceeds the waters of the oceans (SN 15.13). Let this stir urgency, not apathy. (SuttaCentral)
  • A conscious emanation of an eighth-bhūmi bodhisattva or a Buddha does not suffer as we do; they freely manifest to guide and liberate—this is non-abiding nirvāṇa and trikāya in action. (Encyclopedia of Buddhism)
  • Our human birth is precious and rare (the blind turtle simile). We must practice as if our hair were on fire, mindful of death and impermanence, because conditions change swiftly and opportunities vanish. (SuttaCentral)
8) A crisp, one-breath summary (kept for convenience alongside the full exposition above)
Because saṃsāra is suffering, we practice to end its causes—ignorance and clinging. When those cease, compelled rebirth ceases. In Mahāyāna, the fully awakened do not dissolve into a static cessation; from non-abiding nirvāṇa they freely emanate (nirmāṇakāya) to help beings. This is why practice is urgent: our human life is exceedingly rare, the Dharma is available now, and we should train as if our hair were on fire, cultivating prajñā and compassion for the sake of all. (SuttaCentral)
Warmly,
Soh
Notes
  • SN 15.13 (oceans of blood), blind turtle (SN 56.48), Bāhiya (Ud 1.10), and Fire Sermon (SN 35.28) are all explicitly referenced with canonical sources. (SuttaCentral)
  • Non-abiding nirvāṇa and trikāya are grounded with accessible references; the eighth-bhūmi point is anchored in a traditional stages-and-paths resource. (Encyclopedia of Buddhism)
  • The refutations of “universal consciousness” are included with three specific links (ATR 2018/2021/2022). (awakeningtoreality.com) 
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