The Four Noble Truths and Dependent Origination

And what, Monks, is the Noble Truth of discontentedness?

Birth is discontentedness, aging, sickness, death, sorrow, grief, pain, displeasure, and despair are discontentedness. Not to get what one desires is discontentedness. In short, The Five Aggregates based on clinging are discontentedness.

And what, Monks, is the Noble Truth of the arising of discontentedness

Conditioned by ignorance (unknowing of true reality) the volitional formations (choices/decisions) come to be;

Conditioned by the volitional activities, consciousness;

Conditioned by consciousness, name-and-form;

Conditioned by name-and-form, the six sense bases;

Conditioned by the six sense bases, contact;

Conditioned by contact, feeling;

Conditioned by feeling, craving:

Conditioned by craving, clinging;

Conditioned by clinging, existence:

Conditioned by existence, birth;

Conditioned by birth, aging-and-death, sorrow, grief, pain, displeasure and despair come to pass.

This is the arising of the whole mass of discontentedness.

This, Monks, is called the Noble Truth of the arising of discontentedness.

And what, Monks, is the Noble Truth of the elimination of discontentedness?

From the complete fading out and ending of ignorance (unknowing of true reality) comes the ending of the volitional formations (choices/decisions);

From the ending of the volitional formations (choices/decisions), the ending of consciousness;

From the ending of consciousness, the ending of name-and-form;

From the ending of name-and-form, the ending of the six sense bases;

From the ending of the six sense bases, the ending of contact;

From the ending of contact, the ending of feeling;

From the ending of feeling, the ending of craving;

From the ending of craving, the ending of clinging;

From the ending of clinging, the ending of existence;

From the ending of existence, the ending of birth;

From the ending of birth, aging-and-death, sorrow, grief, pain, displeasure and despair comes the ending of this whole mass of discontentedness.

This, Monks, is called the elimination of discontentedness.

And what, Monks, is the Noble Truth of the practice that leads to the elimination of discontentedness?

It is just this Noble Eight Fold Path: Right View, Right Intention, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, Right Concentration. This is called the Noble Truth of the practice that leads to the elimination of discontentedness.

(Reference: AN 3.61)

In this Teaching from Gotama Buddha, he combines The Four Noble Truths with Dependent Origination providing a full picture of what is discontentedness, the cause of discontentedness, the elimination of discontentedness, and the path to the complete elimination of discontentedness.

The Four Noble Truths is a detailed and concise Teaching that explains discontentedness, the cause of discontentedness, the elimination of discontentedness, and the path to the complete elimination of discontentedness.

Dependent Origination is a detailed and concise Teaching that explains the arising of discontentedness and the cause of rebirth.

These two (2) Teachings combined provide a more detailed and concise way of understanding the cause of discontentedness and how to eliminate it from the mind.

Detailed explanation of The Four Noble Truths is available in this same book series found in Chapter 4 of the book “Developing a Life Practice: The Path That Leads to Enlightenment” (Volume 1).

Detailed explanation of Dependent Origination is available in this same book series found in Chapter 14 of the book “The First Stage of Enlightenment (Stream-Enterer” (Volume 5).