As we have already seen, the function of this exercise is to nourish us with joy and happiness and to heal the wounds within us. But we have no doubts about letting go of this joy in order to embark on the work of observation. Joy and happiness come about because of physical and psychological conditions, and are as impermanent as all other physical

All that is subject to arising is subject to

As a path toward liberation, intellectual acknowledgment of impermanence must become integrated with embodied experience; then we can gain more support for giving up grasping at those things we cannot hold, whether that means our own bodies or those of people we love, or our roles, or our prestige.