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Knowing the World1 |
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Talking about taking a break or getting some rest, we find rest in the practice itself. Once we've practiced to get to the goal, know the goal, and be the goal, then when we are active, there's no way to incur loss or be harmed. When we are sitting still, there is no way we can be harmed. In all situations, nothing can affect us. Practice has matured to fulfillment and we have reached the destination. Maybe today we don't have a chance to sit and practise samādhi, but we are OK. Samādhi doesn't mean only sitting. There can be samādhi in all postures. If we are really practising in all postures, we will enjoy samādhi thus. There won't be anything that can interfere. Such words as ''I'm not in a clear state of mind now, so I can't practise'' will not be heard. We won't have such ideas; we will never feel that way. Our practice is well developed and complete - this is how it should be. Free of doubt and perplexity, we stop at this point and contemplate. You can look into this: self-view, skeptical doubt, superstitious attachment to rites and rituals. The first step is to get free of these. Whatever sort of knowledge you gain, these are the things the mind needs to get free of. What are they like now? To what extent do we still have them? We are the only ones who can know this; we have to know for ourselves. Who else can know better than we? Self-view, doubt, superstition: if we are stuck in attachment here, have doubt here, are still groping here, then there is the conception of self here. But now we can only think, if there is no self, then who is it that takes interest and practises? All these things go together. If we come to know them through practice and make an end of them, then we live in an ordinary way. Just like the Buddha and the ariyas. They lived just like worldly beings (puthujjana). They used the same language as worldly beings. Their everyday existence wasn't really different. They used many of the same conventions. Where they differed was that they didn't create suffering for themselves with their minds. They had no suffering. This is the crucial point, going beyond suffering, extinguishing suffering. Nibbāna means ''extinguishing.'' Extinguishing suffering, extinguishing heat and torment, extinguishing doubt and anxiety. There's no need to be in doubt about the practice. Whenever there is doubt about something, don't have doubt about the doubt - look directly at it and crush it like that. In the beginning, we train to pacify the mind. This can be difficult to do. You have to find a meditation that suits your own temperament. That will make it easier to gain tranquility. But in truth, the Buddha wanted us to return to ourselves, to take responsibility and look at ourselves. Hot is anger. Too cool is pleasure, the extreme of indulgence. If it's hot it's the extreme of self-torment. We want neither hot nor cold. Know hot and cold. Know all things that appear. Do they cause us to suffer? Do we form attachment to them? Such as the teaching that birth is suffering: it doesn't only mean dying from this life and taking rebirth in the next life. That's so far away. The suffering of birth happens right now. It's said that becoming is the cause of birth. What is this ''becoming''? Anything that we attach to and put meaning on is becoming. Whenever we see anything as self or other or belonging to ourselves, without wise discernment to know that such is only a convention, that is all becoming. Whenever we hold on to something as us or ours and it then undergoes change, the mind is shaken by that. It is shaken with a positive or negative reaction. That sense of self experiencing happiness or unhappiness is birth. When there is birth, it brings suffering along with it. Aging is suffering, illness is suffering, death is suffering. Right now, do we have becoming? Are we aware of this becoming? For example, take the trees in the monastery. The abbot of the monastery can take birth as a worm in every tree in the monastery if he isn't aware of himself, if he feels that it is really his monastery. This grasping at ''my'' monastery with ''my'' orchard and ''my'' trees is the worm that latches on there. If there are thousands of trees, he will become a worm thousands of times. This is becoming. When the trees are cut or meet with any harm, the worms are affected; the mind is shaken and takes birth with all this anxiety. Then there is the suffering of birth, the suffering of aging, and so forth. Are you aware of the way this happens? Well, those objects in our homes or our orchards are still a little far away. Let's look right at ourselves sitting here. We are composed of the five aggregates and the four elements. These sankhāras are designated as a self. Do you see these sankhāras and these suppositions as they really are? If you don't see the truth of them, there is becoming, being gladdened or depressed over the five khandhas, and we take birth, with all the resultant sufferings. This rebirth happens right now, in the present. This glass breaks right now, and we are upset right now. This glass isn't broken now, and we are happy about it now. This is how it happens, being upset or being happy without any wisdom in control. One only meets with ruination. You don't need to look far away to understand this. When you focus your attention here, you can know whether or not there is becoming. Then, when it is happening, are you aware of it? Are you aware of convention and supposition? Do you understand them? It's the grasping attachment that is the vital point, whether or not we are really believing in the designations of me and mine. This grasping is the worm, and it is what causes birth. Where is this attachment? Grasping onto form, feeling, perception, thoughts, and consciousness, we attach to happiness and unhappiness, and we become obscured and take birth. It happens when we have contact through the senses. The eyes see forms, and it happens in the present. This is what the Buddha wanted us to look at, to recognize becoming and birth as they occur through our senses. If we know them, we can let go, internally and externally, the inner senses and the external objects. This can be seen in the present. It's not something that happens when we die from this life. It's the eye seeing forms right now, the ear hearing sounds right now, the nose smelling aromas right now, the tongue tasting flavours right now. Are you taking birth with them? Be aware and recognize birth right as it happens. This way is better. |
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Footnotes
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