Right Practice - Steady Practice¹

Our practice is like this. The Buddha said, ''Don't act on desire, don't speak from desire, don't eat with desire.'' Standing, walking, sitting or reclining... whatever... don't do it with desire. This means to do it with detachment. It's just like buying the coconuts from the market. We're not going to eat the shells but it's not yet time to throw them away. We keep them first. This is how the practice is. Concept and transcendence³ are co-existent, just like a coconut. The flesh, the husk and the shell are all together. When we buy it we buy the whole lot. If somebody wants to accuse us of eating coconut shells that's their business, we know what we're doing.

Wisdom is something each of us finds for oneself. To see it we must go neither fast nor slow. What should we do? Go to where there is neither fast nor slow. Going fast or going slow are not the way.

But we're all impatient, we're in a hurry. As soon as we begin we want to rush to the end, we don't want to be left behind. We want to succeed. When it comes to fixing their minds for meditation some people go too far.... They light the incense, prostrate and make a vow, ''As long as this incense is not yet completely burnt I will not rise from my sitting, even if I collapse or die, no matter what... I'll die sitting.'' Having made their vow they start their sitting. As soon as they start to sit Māra's⁴ hordes come rushing at them from all sides. They've only sat for an instant and already they think the incense must be finished. They open their eyes for a peek... ''Oh, there's still ages left!''

They grit their teeth and sit some more, feeling hot, flustered, agitated and confused... Reaching the breaking point they think, ''It must be finished by now''.... Have another peek... ''Oh, no! It's not even half-way yet!''

Two or three times and it's still not finished, so they just give up, pack it in and sit there hating themselves. ''I'm so stupid, I'm so hopeless!'' They sit and hate themselves, feeling like a hopeless case. This just gives rise to frustration and hindrances. This is called the hindrance of ill-will. They can't blame others so they blame themselves. And why is this? It's all because of wanting.

Actually it isn't necessary to go through all that. To concentrate means to concentrate with detachment, not to concentrate yourself into knots. But maybe we read the scriptures, about the life of the Buddha, how he sat under the Bodhi tree and determined to himself,

''As long as I have still not attained Supreme Enlightenment I will not rise from this place, even if my blood dries up.''

Reading this in the books you may think of trying it yourself. You'll do it like the Buddha. But you haven't considered that your car is only a small one. The Buddha's car was a really big one, he could take it all in one go. With only your tiny, little car, how can you possibly take it all at once? It's a different story altogether.

Why do we think like that? Because we're too extreme. Sometimes we go too low, sometimes we go too high. The point of balance is so hard to find.

Now I'm only speaking from experience. In the past my practice was like this. Practicing in order to get beyond wanting... if we don't want, can we practice? I was stuck here. But to practice with wanting is suffering. I didn't know what to do, I was baffled. Then I realized that the practice which is steady is the important thing. One must practice consistently. They call this the practice that is ''consistent in all postures.'' Keep refining the practice, don't let it become a disaster. Practice is one thing, disaster is another⁵. Most people usually create disaster. When they feel lazy they don't bother to practice, they only practice when they feel energetic. This is how I tended to be.

Footnotes

...¹

Given at Wat Keuan to a group of university students who had taken temporary ordination, during the hot season of 1978

... Potiyahn²

One of the many branch monasteries of Ajahn Chah's main monastery, Wat Pah Pong.

... transcendence³

Concept (sammuti) refers to supposed or provisional reality, while transcendence (vimutti) refers to the liberation from attachment to or delusion within it.

...'s⁴

Māra: the Buddhist personification of evil, the Tempter, that force which opposes any attempts to develop goodness and virtue.

... another⁵

The play on words here between the Thai ''phadtibut'' (practice) and ''wibut'' (disaster) is lost in the English.

...attakilamathānuyogo⁶

These are the two extremes pointed out as wrong paths by the Buddha in his First Discourse. They are normally rendered as ''indulgence in sense pleasures'' and ''self-mortification.''

...pa-kow⁷

Pa-kow: an eight-precept postulant, who often lives with bhikkhus and, in addition to his own meditation practice, also helps them with certain services which bhikkhus are forbidden by the Vinaya from doing.