To train mindfulness and discernment
to become progressively stronger and not to deteriorate, please train them in
the method already mentioned. Don't let yourself be careless in any useful activity
of any sort, no matter how small. Otherwise the carelessness that's already
the lord of the heart will become a chronic disease taking deep root in the
heart, ruining every aspect of your practice. Try to train yourself in the habit
of being dependable and intent in your proper activities, within and without,
at all times. Don't let carelessness or negligence incubate in your character
at all, because people who have trained themselves in the habit of being true
to their every duty are sure to be able to succeed in every sort of activity,
whether inner or outer, without any obstacle to thwart them. Even when they
train their hearts, which is the important job within, they are sure to succeed
with circumspection in such a way that they will find nothing with which they
can fault themselves -- because outer activities and inner activities both point
to the same heart in charge of them. If the heart is habitually careless, then
when it takes charge of any inner task, it's bound to ruin the task, without
leaving even a scrap for itself to take as its refuge.
So for a bright future in the tasks that form your livelihood and source of
happiness, you should train yourself in the habit of being dependable and true
in your duties. Perform each task to the utmost of your ability. Then when you
turn inward to perform your inner work for the sake of stillness or for the
sake of discernment and discovery, you will be able to perform both sorts of
work with precision and circumspection because of the habits you have developed
in training yourself to be true and circumspect all along. To follow the practice
from the beginning to the highest level depends mainly on your basic habits.
The 'beginning' of the practice and the 'end' both refer to the one heart whose
condition of awareness will develop when it's modified by the Dhamma, both in
terms of causes -- the striving of the practice -- and in terms of the results,
or happiness, just as a child gradually develops from infancy to adulthood when
nourished by food and all sorts of other factors. The beginning of the practice
thus refers to the training of the mind in the beginning stages so as to change
its habits and sensibilities, making them reasonable and right, until it is
knowledgeable and can maintain itself without any deviations from the reasonability
and rightness appropriate to it. But when we come right down to it, the beginning
and end of the practice are like a piece of fruit: We can't say exactly where
it begins and where it ends. When we look at it, it's simply a piece of fruit.
The same sort of thing holds true with the mind. We talk about the beginning
or the end of the practice in the sense that the mind has its various preoccupations,
coarse and refined, mixed in with it. In modifying them, we have to keep coming
up with new techniques, changing those preoccupations from their original state
to more and more refined levels that should be called, where suitable, the beginning
or the end of the path. Those of you listening should make yourselves reach
this sort of understanding of the defilements and evil qualities in the heart
that are given such a variety of names that they can go beyond the bounds of
what the suppositions of a single mind can keep track of and resolve. Otherwise
you won't have any techniques for curing yourselves of the condition just mentioned.
Let me stress once more the principle that guarantees sure results: Train yourself
in the habit of being solid and true in your work and duties at all times. Don't
be unsteady, uncertain, or undependable. If you say you'll go, go. If you say
you'll stay, stay. If you say you'll do something, do it. Once you've settled
on a time or a task, keep to it. Be the sort of person who writes with his hand
and erases with his hand. Don't be the sort who writes with his hand and erases
with his foot. In other words, once we've made a vow, no one else can come in
and destroy that vow, and yet we ourselves are the ones who destroy it: This
is what is meant by writing with the hand and erasing with the foot, which is
something very unseemly. We have to be true to our plans and always decisive.
Once we've determined that a particular task is worthwhile and right, we should
give our life to that task and to our determination. This way we'll become dependable
and self-reliant. The virtues we are maintaining will become dependable virtues
and won't turn into virtues floating in the wind. Our practice of concentration
will become dependable concentration on every level and won't turn into concentration
floating in the wind, i.e., concentration only in name but without the actuality
of concentration in the heart. And when we develop each level of discernment,
it will be dependable discernment, in keeping with the truthfulness of our character,
and won't turn into discernment floating in the wind, i.e., discernment only
in name but without any ingenuity in freeing ourselves. What I've said so far
is so that you will see the drawbacks of being undependable and desultory, without
any inner truthfulness, and so that if you hope for genuine progress in terms
of the world and the Dhamma, you'll look for a way to give these things a wide
berth.
Now I'd like to say more about mindfulness and discernment, the factors that
can make your character more stable and circumspect. You should always be aware
that discernment isn't something that you can cook up like food. It comes from
considering things carefully. A person without discernment is unable to complete
his tasks with any sort of finesse and unable to protect his valuables -- in
the sense of the world or of the Dhamma -- from danger. For this reason, the
important factors in maintaining and practicing the teachings of the religion
are mindfulness and discernment. Whenever an event, whether good or bad, makes
contact with the mind, mindfulness and discernment should take it up immediately.
This way you can be alert to good and bad events in time and can prevent the
heart from straying after things that will harm it.
For the most part, whenever an issue arises, whether it's sudden or not, the
heart can be swayed or harmed in line with that issue because it lacks the mindfulness
and discernment to observe and inspect things carefully beforehand. It then
sees everything as worth pursuing, and so you let the mind follow along with
things without your being aware of it. By the time you realize what has happened,
time has been wasted, and it's too late to put a stop to the mind, so you let
things follow their own course until they all turn to ashes, without any way
of being remedied. Don't think that this comes from anything other than a lack
of the mindfulness and discernment that can lead out to freedom. If not for
this, who would be willing to sacrifice his or her own worth -- with a value
above that of anything else in the world -- for the sake of this sort of failure?
Yet it's unavoidable and we have to give in -- all of us -- for when the chips
are down, it's normal that mindfulness will lapse, and we won't be able to latch
onto anything in time. We'll then let things follow their own course in line
with the force of events too strong for the mind to withstand.
Thus it is only right that we should prepare ourselves from this moment onward
to be ready for the events that lie in wait around us, within and without, and
are ready to strike at any time or place. Even though it's still morning (even
though you're still alive), don't let yourself delay. To be prepared is to strive
to have a firm basis, both within and without, for your living and dying. Whether
you live here or there, whether death will happen here or there, whether you
live in this world or the next, or whether you're coming to this world or going
to the next, you should prepare yourself, beginning now, in the immediate present.
Otherwise, when life is up, you won't be able to prepare anything in time. I've
never seen any Teacher's Dhamma that says to prepare yourself tomorrow or next
month or next year or in the next life, which would simply encourage people
to be complacent. I've seen the Dhamma say only that you should make yourself
a refuge both within and without right now while you're alive. Even though days,
nights, months, and years, this world and the next, are always present in the
cosmos, they're not for worthless people who are born and die in vain without
doing anything of any benefit to the world or the Dhamma at all.
In particular, now that we are monks and meditators -- which is a peaceful way
of life, a way of life that the world trusts and respects, a way of life that
more than any other in the world gives us the opportunity to do good for ourselves
and others -- we should be fully prepared in our affairs as monks and shouldn't
let ourselves be lacking. For our behavior as monks to be gracious in a way
pleasing and inspiring to others, we must use mindfulness and discernment as
our guardians, looking after our every movement. A person with mindfulness and
discernment looking after his behavior is gracious within and without, and maintains
that graciousness in a way that never loses its appeal at any time. When we
use mindfulness and discernment to straighten out things within us -- namely,
the mind and its mess of preoccupations -- the mind immediately becomes clean,
clear, and a thing of value.
Remember the Dhamma you have studied and heard, and bring it inward to blend
with your practice and to support it. Keep your mindfulness and discernment
right with the heart and with your every movement. Wherever the eye looks or
the ear listens, mindfulness and discernment should follow them there. Whatever
the tongue, nose, and body come into contact with -- no matter how good or bad,
coarse or refined -- mindfulness and discernment should keep track of those
things and pry intelligently into their causes every time there's a contact.
Even when ideas occur in the mind itself, mindfulness and discernment must keep
track and investigate them without break -- because those who have gained release
from the world of entanglements in the heart have all acted in this way. They
have never acted like logs thrown away on the ground where children can climb
up to urinate and defecate on them day and night. If anyone acts like a log,
defilements and cravings from the various directions -- namely, from sights,
sounds, smells, tastes, and tactile sensations -- will come in through the openings
of the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and body to urinate and defecate on the heart
that is making itself into a log because it doesn't have any intelligence or
circumspection with regard to its inner and outer preoccupations. It simply
lets cravings and defilements urinate and defecate on it day and night. This
isn't at all fitting for those who aim at freedom from the cycle -- i.e., who
aim at nibbana -- because the nibbana of the Buddha and his disciples is not
a lazy nibbana or a log's nibbana. Those who want the Buddha's nibbana in their
hearts must try to conform to the tracks left by the practice of the Buddha
and his disciples. In other words, they must make an effort to develop mindfulness,
discernment, conviction, and persistence to keep abreast of the events occurring
within and without at all times. Don't act like a log, simply going through
the motions of walking, sitting, meditating, sitting like a stump in the middle
of a field without any sense of circumspection in the heart. This sort of going
through the motions isn't any different from the way people in general normally
act.
To be a disciple of the Tathagata, whose fame has spread throughout the three
levels of the cosmos, you should try to revive the mindfulness and discernment
lying dormant in the heart so that they can support your efforts in extracting
all the various defilements and cravings coming from the heart that at the moment
is like a log. Greed, anger, delusion, laziness, discontent, jealousy, possessiveness:
All of these things are excrement piled on the heart. Once mindfulness and discernment
have been trained as we have mentioned, they will become stronger day by day,
more and more accustomed to working, in the same way that we get accustomed
to other forms of work. When we bring them to bear on the effort of the practice
within the heart, they will be able to understand the affairs of the heart in
due time, without taking long.
In order to be principled and methodical in your training, keep your awareness
constantly with the body. Keep mindfulness focused there and use discernment
to investigate within the sphere of the body. To do this is to follow the principles
of the frames of reference (satipatthana) and the Noble Truths (ariya-sacca),
which form the path of all the Noble Ones.
There are four frames of reference: the body, feelings, the mind, and phenomena.
'The body' refers to every part of the body. This is termed kayanupassana satipatthana.
'Feelings' refers to pleasure, pain, and indifference. This is termed vedananupassana
satipatthana. 'The mind' refers to the mental states that are fashioned by the
mind and color it. This is termed cittanupassana satipatthana. 'Phenomena' refers
to anything, material or mental, that is the object or focal point of the mind's
investigation. This is termed dhammanupassana satipatthana.
In investigating the four frames of reference, be sure to come to a right understanding
from the outset that body, feelings, mind, and phenomena as frames of reference
are a class separate from the mind that possesses them as frames of reference.
Otherwise you'll get discouraged or upset when they exhibit change as part of
their normal nature or as a result of the investigation, which is something
that may happen in the course of the practice. In other words, these four factors
normally undergo change that can give rise to pleasure or displeasure. When
we are investigating them, they continue to undergo change, which can make the
meditator pleased or displeased or sometimes even discouraged and fed up with
the investigation. I mention this so that you'll be forewarned when it happens
and will make yourself understand with circumspection that the mind in charge
of the frames of reference hasn't changed along with its frame of reference
in any way. Once you have come to a right understanding, you can become confident
in your investigation of the frames of reference. No matter which frame of reference
-- body, feelings, mind, or phenomena -- exhibits change or disappears, the
heart -- a phenomenon that doesn't change or die -- will be able to investigate
to the full extent of its strength and come to a clear comprehension of these
four factors step by step without being affected by the pleasures and pains
in the body and mind, which are the conditions exhibited by the frames of reference.
In investigating the body, you can deal either with the internal body or with
external bodies, depending on the situation and what comes easiest to the heart.
'The internal body' refers to every part of your own body. 'External bodies'
refers to the bodies of other people and animals. 'The body within the body'
refers to any one part of the body. All of these things will show themselves
to be disgusting and dismaying to the person who uses discernment to investigate
them and know them as they actually are. Inside and out, both the internal body
and external bodies, all share in the same characteristics. They always have
to be washed and cleaned -- and thus the care of the body is a constant duty
for everyone in the world. The things that are used to care for the body, to
keep it alive and presentable, are thus the best-selling merchandise all over
the world. The investigation of the body so as to see clearly with discernment
into its origins, needs, and behavior, is thus a means of cutting off a well-spring
of worries and stress in the heart -- because even a huge mountain of solid
rock reaching to the clouds would never weigh on the heart causing it any stress,
but the khandhas -- such as the physical khandha, or body -- oppress and weigh
on the heart at all times to the point where we can find no chance to put them
down. The affairs of stress that are related to the khandhas thus converge on
the heart responsible for them. For this reason, the mind in charge of the khandhas
should gain an all-around understanding of the khandhas, both in their good
and their bad aspects, so as to manage them smoothly and comfortably, and not
always be abused by them.
Normally, the khandhas take advantage of us all day long. Every move we make
is for their sake. If the mind can find a way out by becoming wise to its khandhas
-- even while it is still responsible for them -- it can then be in a position
to contend with them and won't have to take on all their stresses and pains.
At the same time, the stresses and pains in the khandhas won't set up shop to
sell us all their suffering. Thus those who investigate the khandhas so as to
see their benefits and drawbacks with discernment aren't destined to take on
pain and nothing but pain from the khandhas. They are sure to find a way to
reduce and relieve the tensions and strains in their hearts.
In investigating the body, you have to investigate it repeatedly, time and again
-- as required for your understanding, and not as determined by your laziness
-- until you really see clearly that the body is nothing but a body, and is
in no way a being, a person, one's self, or another. This is called the contemplation
of the body as a frame of reference.
As for feelings, the mind, and phenomena, you should realize that they are all
present in this same body, but their characteristics are somewhat different,
which is why they are given different names. Make sure that you understand this
point well. Otherwise the four frames of reference and the four Noble Truths
will turn into a cause of stress -- a source of worries and doubts -- while
you are practicing, because of your confusion about where these phenomena begin
and end.
As for feelings, there are three: pleasure, pain, and indifference -- neither
pleasure nor pain. Feelings coming from the body and those coming from the mind
have these same three sorts. To investigate them, you should ferret them out
and examine them in line with their characteristics, but don't take the body
to be a feeling. Let the body be the body. Let the feeling be a feeling -- in
the same way as seeing a tiger as a tiger, and an elephant as an elephant. Don't
take the tiger to be an elephant, or else your evidence won't be in line with
the truth, and the issue will spread until it can never be resolved. In other
words, ferret out and investigate the feeling displaying itself in the present
moment so as to see how it arises, how it takes a stance, and how it disbands.
The bases for the arising of all three kinds of feeling are the body and mind,
but the feelings themselves aren't the body, nor are they the mind. They keep
on being feelings both in their arising and in their disbanding. Don't understand
them as being anything else or you'll be understanding them wrongly. The cause
of stress will arise in that moment, and you won't be able to find any way to
remedy or escape from it. Your investigation, instead of leading to the discernment
that will release you from stress and its cause, will turn into a factory producing
stress and its cause at that moment without your realizing it.