Right Practice - Steady Practice¹

All of you ask yourselves now, is this right? To practice when you feel like it, not when you don't: is that in accordance with the Dhamma? Is it straight? Is it in line with the teaching? This is what makes practice inconsistent.

Whether you feel like it or not you should practice just the same: this is how the Buddha taught. Most people wait till they're in the mood before practicing, when they don't feel like it they don't bother. This is as far as they go. This is called ''disaster,'' it's not practice. In the true practice, whether you are happy or depressed you practice; whether it's easy or difficult you practice; whether it's hot or cold you practice. It's straight like this. In the real practice, whether standing, walking, sitting or reclining you must have the intention to continue the practice steadily, making your sati consistent in all postures.

At first thought it seems as if you should stand for as long as you walk, walk for as long as you sit, sit for as long as you lie down... I've tried it but I couldn't do it. If a meditator were to make his standing, walking, sitting and lying down all equal, how many days could he keep it up for? Stand for five minutes, sit for five minutes, lie down for five minutes... I couldn't do it for very long. So I sat down and thought about it some more. ''What does it all mean? People in this world can't practice like this!''

Then I realized... ''Oh, that's not right, it can't be right because it's impossible to do. Standing, walking, sitting, reclining... make them all consistent. To make the postures consistent the way they explain it in the books is impossible.''

But it is possible to do this: the mind... just consider the mind. To have sati, recollection, sampajañña, self-awareness, and paññā, all-round wisdom... this you can do. This is something that's really worth practicing. This means that while standing we have sati, while walking we have sati, while sitting we have sati, and while reclining we have sati - consistently. This is possible. We put awareness into our standing, walking, sitting, lying down - into all postures.

When the mind has been trained like this it will constantly recollect Buddho, Buddho, Buddho... which is knowing. Knowing what? Knowing what is right and what is wrong at all times. Yes, this is possible. This is getting down to the real practice. That is, whether standing, walking, sitting or lying down there is continuous sati.

Then you should understand those conditions which should be given up and those which should be cultivated. You know happiness, you know unhappiness. When you know happiness and unhappiness your mind will settle at the point which is free of happiness and unhappiness. Happiness is the loose path, kāmasukallikānuyogo. Unhappiness is the tight path, attakilamathānuyogo⁶. If we know these two extremes, we pull it back. We know when the mind is inclining towards happiness or unhappiness and we pull it back, we don't allow it to lean over. We have this sort of awareness, we adhere to the One Path, the single Dhamma. We adhere to the awareness, not allowing the mind to follow its inclinations.

But in your practice it doesn't tend to be like that, does it? You follow your inclinations. If you follow your inclinations it's easy, isn't it? But this is the ease which causes suffering, like someone who can't be bothered working. He takes it easy, but when the time comes to eat he hasn't got anything. This is how it goes.

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.