What is and What Should Be (1991)

0:01 I want to welcome you to Hammurati and this opportunity this afternoon to think or contemplate, ponder, consider, reflect. In other words, trying to develop this particular ability we have in order to say... Report an error in the passage at 0:01 Highlight the passage at 0:01

0:37 Bring attention to the dharma, the way things are, because even though we think we understand life or we feel we know a lot because we have maybe quite a lot of knowledge, our Report an error in the passage at 0:37 Highlight the passage at 0:37

0:53 society is not really encouraged or even trained us in any way to really use that ability to ponder and consider, contemplate. Reflect the pod to develop our intuitive faculty. Report an error in the passage at 0:53 Highlight the passage at 0:53

1:20 Now when I talk about intuition, what I mean by that, because people might have different definitions of that, but what I mean when I use the word intuition is the pure sensitivity, receptivity of the human mind before it... It's kind of clouded over with biases or prejudices or opinions and views. It's the true sensitivity of a moment where you're feeling when something is coming through to you into consciousness, not through any kind of determination to make it happen, but just because we are born in this sensitive state. Report an error in the passage at 1:20 Highlight the passage at 1:20

2:11 mind from biases, Report an error in the passage at 2:11 Highlight the passage at 2:11

2:16 its true nature is intuitive. will pick up, it will feel what is happening way it is now. to interpret intuitive experience is important because sometimes we have no way of translating our intuition into Any sensible form or communicate it to someone else. So therefore, intuitive experience oftentimes is dismissed as erratic, untrustworthy, just very subjective. Report an error in the passage at 2:16 Highlight the passage at 2:16

2:56 I often say women's intuition, which of course means that it's not as trustworthy as man's rational intelligence because we very much have exalted rational thought about everything else in, say, modern society and the modern science, empirical science, is based on rational thinking, on logic and reason, ability to discriminate, and Report an error in the passage at 2:56 Highlight the passage at 2:56

3:33 not to dismiss that function or to knock it down in any way, but we need to put it in its proper context. And not exalted, because the intuitive abilities are where we tend to be lacking, we don't trust, we don't have confidence in our own intelligence and sensitivity. So human beings will easily believe somebody else, or somebody who's even convincing Maya, they're quite willing to believe. Report an error in the passage at 3:33 Highlight the passage at 3:33

4:12 Just because maybe the person is charismatic or seems very confident, and even though he's obviously, you know, he might not be obviously, but, you know, giving wrong information, just we're impressed by somebody who seems confident and can tell us what is right, what is wrong, what we should do with our lives. Report an error in the passage at 4:12 Highlight the passage at 4:12

4:38 And yet intuitively we might... We might not feel right about it at all. We might have a feeling that this isn't, don't follow this or don't trust this and yet we could dismiss this as just being a kind of neurotic hang-up or just being overly sensitive or it's easy to put it down rather than to really consider what that is, to really bring into conscious awareness. Report an error in the passage at 4:38 Highlight the passage at 4:38

5:08 What the value of intuition is. Because it is, say, when the mind is free, when you're not coming from a position, then the mind is just what it is. It's a sensitive instrument that will be able to pick up what's happening and to interpret it with wisdom rather than from or from just inadequate ways of expressing it. Like I've noticed some people are intuitive, but the way they express it sometimes doesn't sound sensible or doesn't make sense, so it's easy to dismiss it. Report an error in the passage at 5:08 Highlight the passage at 5:08

6:00 It sounds too subjective or too funny, too strange, and so one can easily just say, oh, that person is a bit odd. Strange, because what they're saying sounds that way. Report an error in the passage at 6:00 Highlight the passage at 6:00

6:18 And this is probably, you know, some of these people I meet, it's not that what they're experiencing is wrong or misguided, it's just they don't know how to express what they're feeling or what's actually happening. They don't know how to communicate it. So in the teachings of the Buddha, these teachings help us too. It's a kind of an agreed... Report an error in the passage at 6:18 Highlight the passage at 6:18

6:43 vocabulary and expression and a measure we can use for communication. So when we have dharma language or we agree on how to use concepts and words and ideas and raise an expression that we agree upon in which are if understood properly are very direct and skillful means. means communication with least amount of possibility for misunderstanding. Report an error in the passage at 6:43 Highlight the passage at 6:43

7:21 What is and what should be is the subject of today's talk, and I think most of us very much have been educated and conditioned to think in terms of how life should be. Report an error in the passage at 7:21 Highlight the passage at 7:21

7:47 And this, speaking from, say, an American position, being born and bred and grown up and educated in the United States, then I realized very much, having been a Buddhist monk for 25 years, how much my mind would always be thinking of how life or how... or how the world or the United States or Britain should be. Report an error in the passage at 7:47 Highlight the passage at 7:47

8:24 When Report an error in the passage at 8:24 Highlight the passage at 8:24

8:29 we reflect on the United States as a manifestation in this modern world of nations, we recognize that it is a country that was founded on ideals, very high-minded ideas. Report an error in the passage at 8:29 Highlight the passage at 8:29

8:49 And it was a reaction to the old kind of aristocratic orders and monarchies of Europe. So it was based on the ideals of democracy, freedom, equality, egalitarianism. So those are ideas. We might say those are how life should be, isn't it? It should be fair and there should be freedom and equality. It's the ideal. Report an error in the passage at 8:49 Highlight the passage at 8:49

9:21 Expression of what we would like life to be as an ideal. Then how life actually is, we can say, if we don't contemplate and consider and reflect upon life as we're experiencing it, then we're always put in this position of comparing it to the ideal that we have for it. And of course it's not going to ever fit into that ideal. I've never, you know, I think in moments I've felt that somehow America has lived up to its ideal, but only in moments, not as a kind of continuous success story. Report an error in the passage at 9:21 Highlight the passage at 9:21

10:10 And usually those moments were when I was an innocent child and didn't know really much of what was going on anyway. For Report an error in the passage at 10:10 Highlight the passage at 10:10

10:21 oneself also we have the ideal of what... What a man should be, a woman should be, what husband and wife, and the ideals of, say, what do you expect here in Britain? What do British people expect that they should be as an ideal if you're going to be considered proper and right and worthy of respect? What should you be like as a man or woman, as a citizen? Report an error in the passage at 10:21 Highlight the passage at 10:21

10:55 And then in daily life, isn't it, then we have to deal with the kind of ordinary functions of our bodies and the vicissitudes and the way life actually flows, hits us, traumatizes us, irritates us, frustrates us, and generally ordinary daily life experience before it becomes extreme in any way. In just the routine, monotonous routine of getting up and going out of bed and getting dressed and preparing breakfast and doing the dishes and on and on through a day of, say, very ordinary mundane activities. Report an error in the passage at 10:55 Highlight the passage at 10:55

11:45 And I remember as a child back in the 40s thinking of this ideal home where everything's push button. You had these kind of of kind of Report an error in the passage at 11:45 Highlight the passage at 11:45

11:59 this ideal home would be set forth in a comic book where the housewife, the woman at home, didn't have to do anything but just sit around pushing buttons and everything Report an error in the passage at 11:59 Highlight the passage at 11:59

12:14 become clean and the dishes would be washed and windows would be cleaned and everything would be done and all you have to do is sit there and push buttons and the least amount of physically... physical exertion demanded. Report an error in the passage at 12:14 Highlight the passage at 12:14

12:30 that seemed like how life should be, where you weren't wasting your time doing the dishes. Report an error in the passage at 12:30 Highlight the passage at 12:30

12:39 the carpets, because ideally we should devote ourselves to maybe more important tasks. One of those were, I'm not quite sure, that was that if we weren't kind of Report an error in the passage at 12:39 Highlight the passage at 12:39

12:56 things of house cleaning and daily life, then we would have time to maybe an artist or a poet or do something really worthwhile rather than just somebody washing the windows. Report an error in the passage at 12:56 Highlight the passage at 12:56

13:15 you can see, say, 50 years later, that it's not, you know, when we have the computers and all the machining and technology. Report an error in the passage at 13:15 Highlight the passage at 13:15

13:29 people seem to have less time than they had before. remember reading a story about my great-great-grandmother who a pioneer in the of the United States in what was called the Oregon Territory. Report an error in the passage at 13:29 Highlight the passage at 13:29

13:50 she kept her diaries. Report an error in the passage at 13:50 Highlight the passage at 13:50

13:58 And her life was just, you know, a very busy person who even had to make her own soap and had to do everything. There was no kind of supermarkets or even grocery stores or anything very available. One just had to kind of produce the things you needed and make everything yourself. Report an error in the passage at 13:58 Highlight the passage at 13:58

14:24 In this biography, there always seemed to be enough time for her to, say, do her writing and the things that she valued, in spite of having to do all these other things. Report an error in the passage at 14:24 Highlight the passage at 14:24

14:40 But now, sitting here at Amaravati, even the monks, the nuns themselves, we have computers in the office and we have all kinds of Report an error in the passage at 14:40 Highlight the passage at 14:40

14:56 Electric machinery and gadgetry, but it always seems that there's even more to do than there was before you even had it. So, trying to make life what it should be, you know, the idea of being freed from the slavery of routines and dull and boring activities, Might sound good as an ideal, but as an actual experience, is that where it's at? Is washing the dishes, making the bed, cooking the dinner, are these things that we really should get away from because they're destroying our life? Report an error in the passage at 14:56 Highlight the passage at 14:56

15:37 Or maybe it's a matter of seeing it in the right way, of understanding how life really is, rather than thinking that somehow it should be... Something it is not. Report an error in the passage at 15:37 Highlight the passage at 15:37

15:55 So, in contemplation and reflection on dharma, we're actually looking at the way life is, in which we can see it as compared to an ideal of how we would like it. For example, to say here in Amavati, I have an ideal of what I would like this community to be. How I would like the monks and the nuns and the anagarikas and lay people and how the site should be developed. Report an error in the passage at 15:55 Highlight the passage at 15:55

16:24 And all of this, I can certainly think up ideals that would be very nice if they were achievable, if they were possible. An ideal community, harmony, people really practicing the dharma, really developing wisdom, and getting enlightened, and being able to get out of their suffering. And so forth, this would be ideal. But life as it is in a monastery isn't going to be that way, isn't going to be ideal. Report an error in the passage at 16:24 Highlight the passage at 16:24

17:06 You find that community life has a lot of other things that you don't have when you're living life more, say, on your own terms. Community life you have to put up with Living with people maybe you wouldn't bother to live with if it wasn't a community. There's a lot of people in this community that I wouldn't have chosen to live with, Report an error in the passage at 17:06 Highlight the passage at 17:06

17:35 but I found myself living with them, which is good because that means that I have to kind of accommodate, learn to open up more, how to... How to accept, how to relate to people that sometimes I don't understand all that well or who react very differently or see life in a very different way than I do. Report an error in the passage at 17:35 Highlight the passage at 17:35

18:06 And so if I think of the ideal community, I tend to think of monks and nuns more like myself that would agree with me and where we live in this state where there's very little conflict and where agrees with what I think, of course then there isn't going to be a lot of problems there the ideal community, but in life as it actually happens, then there are. Report an error in the passage at 18:06 Highlight the passage at 18:06

18:35 People are going to not agree, or not the way you do things, or be critical, or people aren't going to maybe develop the way that you think they should, or or the the way way you have wanted them to. Or things aren't necessarily going to, every day, be just one kind of inspiring moment after another. Monasteries, like anything else, go through ups and downs, cycles of kind of expansion and contraction and elation and depression. Report an error in the passage at 18:35 Highlight the passage at 18:35

19:11 So reflection on dharma allows us to see these as natural cycles. The way things are as change and movement, what arises ceases, the pattern of all conditioned phenomena, the beginning and what begins ends. This basic pattern of all conditioned phenomena is taken and applied to every possible situation, mental, physical, internal, external. Report an error in the passage at 19:11 Highlight the passage at 19:11

19:46 That is, that you have in your daily life. Report an error in the passage at 19:46 Highlight the passage at 19:46

19:55 Now this, when we contemplate, say, externally, just the changing of the seasons, or the day into night, that's quite obvious, and we accept that even without thinking about it. But if we contemplate that, what do we do? Then we begin to really notice the way the light is, and the way, And the subtleties of change that before it becomes obviously winter or autumn or spring or whatever, we're aware of this continuous changing. Report an error in the passage at 19:55 Highlight the passage at 19:55

20:38 Where before we might have seen change only in more of an abstract way, yes, everything changes, but have not really contemplated, held our minds. Open our minds to the way it's changing now and to really notice what the leaves on the trees and the flowers and the way they are at this time and just be able to ponder and be with that as it is without comparing it with something else. Report an error in the passage at 20:38 Highlight the passage at 20:38

21:18 So concentrating the mind, they... Letting the mind, say, sustain itself on the way it is means being receptive and open to whatever you're feeling or experiencing and that includes even your reactions to it. Report an error in the passage at 21:18 Highlight the passage at 21:18

21:40 Now we're used to reacting to life so that things stimulate us or impinge on us or touch us in some way, eventual objects, then we tend to react to them. And that reaction, of course, will bring some kind of associations. So I remember, you know, when I loved to kind of go sightseeing and touring around and looking at things, I used to always find myself comparing one place with another. Report an error in the passage at 21:40 Highlight the passage at 21:40

22:12 Oh, this reminds me of what it's like in Northern California, or if I was in Southern England, or if I... I was in Switzerland. I said, oh, this reminds me of the Rocky Mountains, or if I was in Thailand or whatever, there would always be some kind of tendency to compare what I'm seeing with some other place. Report an error in the passage at 22:12 Highlight the passage at 22:12

22:42 And then sometimes that comparison would be in a critical way, like, oh, we have much more majestic mountains in ...in California than they do in Europe, or in these terms of always saying that somehow the place you're not in is somehow better than the place you are. Report an error in the passage at 22:42 Highlight the passage at 22:42

23:07 Or it could go the other way, putting down where you were by exalting where you are, saying this is much better than the way it was in the United States. Report an error in the passage at 23:07 Highlight the passage at 23:07

23:19 But this is the critical mind at work, isn't it? We're comparing, we're saying... One place with another, one person with another person, one country with another country, ourselves with somebody else, one religion with another religion, and on and on in this way. We point out, say, how they're similar and their differences, and then we have various preferences, like we prefer this to that, or that way to this way. Report an error in the passage at 23:19 Highlight the passage at 23:19

23:52 So that's the The discriminative faculty at work, comparing, discriminating, knowing which is bigger and which is fatter and which is older and which is better and which is worse, Report an error in the passage at 23:52 Highlight the passage at 23:52

24:10 but that function of mind as an attachment, as something that we hold to, then takes us always to a kind of negativity that overrides our conscious experience. At least this is what I've found. Then I began to be aware that so much of my life was kind of swimming in a kind of realm of negativity, where it seemed to be, you know, like a kind of joyless realm, where things didn't seem quite right, and there was something, maybe something wrong. Report an error in the passage at 24:10 Highlight the passage at 24:10

24:46 It wasn't always that it was obviously wrong, and there was something definitely wrong, but there was this way. Suspicion or kind of anxiety hanging around your mind. They're thinking there's something not right. It should be some other way than the way it is. And this level of negativity was of course the result of being so identified and so attached to the discerning faculty of the mind. Report an error in the passage at 24:46 Highlight the passage at 24:46

25:20 Because it leaves you in a state of ...of disquietude and dis-ease and lack of contentment. Report an error in the passage at 25:20 Highlight the passage at 25:20

25:32 We'll say the... This wasn't a choice I made, it was just very much the conditioning of the mind, what happens to, say, somebody of my age going through the compulsory school systems and the universities and then the result with that emphasis on discrimination. ...leaves you in this state where your mind is not content with anything because it can always imagine it could be better than what it is. Report an error in the passage at 25:32 Highlight the passage at 25:32

26:06 Now in Thailand where I lived for 10 years, 11 years, it was a very good experience because I lived in a part of Thailand that at first I didn't like very much. Report an error in the passage at 26:06 Highlight the passage at 26:06

26:20 I liked the coastal parts of Thailand very much. you very much. Report an error in the passage at 26:20 Highlight the passage at 26:20

26:25 And I'd always thought it would be nice to live, I'd always lived on coasts and from the west coast, and I liked port cities, and I never wanted to live inland in any, like living in Chicago or Des Moines, Iowa or something was always like being exiled to Siberia. It was always Seattle or San Francisco or some place on the coast that I... Report an error in the passage at 26:25 Highlight the passage at 26:25

26:53 would gravitate to. So Ubud, Rajatthani, in northeast Thailand, was not the place that I would have chosen to preference, I went to live there mainly because of Ajahn Chah, because he was there and he wasn't living on the coast, so I had to choose between living on the coast or living with him. Report an error in the passage at 26:53 Highlight the passage at 26:53

27:15 obviously there was many choices in the matter, because Report an error in the passage at 27:15 Highlight the passage at 27:15

27:22 with him. But there still is... Living in a place which I at first wasn't attracted to and which would bring up a lot of negative mental state. It was too flat, for one thing. The forests there were scrubby. They weren't majestic like redwood forests or even lush jungles. They were just kind of scrubby, nondescript forests. Report an error in the passage at 27:22 Highlight the passage at 27:22

27:54 There is no beautiful scenery in Ubon Rajatani. It wasn't like there was beautiful waterfalls and lakes and so forth. It seemed to be pretty dreary and then during a good part of the year it was downright bleak. So the negative... Report an error in the passage at 27:54 Highlight the passage at 27:54

28:19 ...mind would easily rise up when looking at this place comparing it to say coastal Thailand or to west coast of America. Report an error in the passage at 28:19 Highlight the passage at 28:19

28:31 But the meditation that Ajahn Chah taught was on contemplating where you are and what's happening. I began to be very much aware of what was going on in my mind like complaining about... the weather or about the flatness or the uninteresting landscape or the food. I began to just notice this level of negativity that would kind of hang around me. I could see that it would easily go out into looking at the people around me. Report an error in the passage at 28:31 Highlight the passage at 28:31

29:10 I could easily kind of be critical of the other monks. Sometimes, you know, Ajahn Chah was in many ways a very charismatic and inspiring person, but he had certain habits that I, you know, that didn't fit my ideal of what an enlightened teacher should do. So, I mean, like he chewed this betel nut and smoked cigarettes. And I found that, you know, I wished he wouldn't do that. Report an error in the passage at 29:10 Highlight the passage at 29:10

29:47 It didn't fit my ideal. And so I began to notice this in myself, the way it is and the way I thought it should be. And so sometimes when I first went to Wat Phra Pong, the monastery where Ajahn Chah lived, I was quite inspired by it. So it seemed like it was the way it should be at first. It seemed like this is what a monastery should be, was the general impression. Report an error in the passage at 29:47 Highlight the passage at 29:47

30:20 Then actually living there, when I started living there on a permanent basis, then I began to see that there were things that didn't quite fit into the ideal of how it should be. And my critical factors would start taking over, that if only he'd change this, or if they wouldn't do it that way, or if they didn't spend so much time doing things like that, and spent more time doing these other things. Report an error in the passage at 30:20 Highlight the passage at 30:20

30:46 And my mind kept... Going, kind of making comments and critical comments about the life there. Then Report an error in the passage at 30:46 Highlight the passage at 30:46

31:14 the way Ajahn Chah would help you was to encourage you to look at this. So when you would kind of go to him and say, Ajahn Chah, you know, I feel that we could make this monastery much better if we changed, you know, this thing. This isn't very good. If we change it to something else, To doing something more what I think should be done, I think it would be a much better monastery. And then, of course, he would just be kind of smiling and laughing at you and you'd think he's making fun of me. Report an error in the passage at 31:14 Highlight the passage at 31:14

31:48 And here I'd present him with a really good idea. He'd probably never thought of it before. And here I am, you know, American from abroad, great gift to this monastery, and he's not kind of impressed with my suggestions. But then, I began to see that what he was pointing to was this negativity in me, that one way of getting me to look at myself was not by going along with me, even though my suggestions might be quite good, but getting me to look at that in me which was disgruntled or didn't like the way it is. Report an error in the passage at 31:48 Highlight the passage at 31:48

32:30 Because he didn't ever try to defend, like saying, well, this is the best monastery, this is the... This is the right way to do everything. He would merely point out, this is the way we do it here. And therefore, if you look at the way it is, then you can... And there's nothing wrong with the way it is. It wasn't like there's anything basically wrong or evil or bad. Report an error in the passage at 32:30 Highlight the passage at 32:30

33:03 It just didn't particularly... I didn't particularly agree with everything. But then the important lesson was to see the negativity rather than to try to create a monastery from your ideals and according to the way you felt it should be. Report an error in the passage at 33:03 Highlight the passage at 33:03

33:26 And I began to appreciate that. I began to appreciate the fact that one didn't have to spend one's whole life trying to make things perfect. Or trying to kind of prop up everything and try to force everything into these ideal patterns because actually I found that quite an exasperating prospect to think of having to force life always, to try to hang on and hold it and keep it together and make it into something better all the time seemed to me to be a A rather exhausting task and when I really contemplated it that honestly I would feel I can't do it and want to kind of just hide away in a little corner and hope to escape the whole process. Report an error in the passage at 33:26 Highlight the passage at 33:26

34:22 I became a coward because life just seemed too much to cope with if I had to spend my life trying to make it live up to how it should be. Or myself, if I had to spend my whole life trying to kind of make myself into some ideal monk, or to try to force myself into these ideals as a kind of permanent position, that would be beyond my ability, and so one could only feel a sense of despair. Report an error in the passage at 34:22 Highlight the passage at 34:22

35:00 And inadequacy and inferiority as a result. Because in monastic life, because it is based on high principles and it's a very noble kind of life, if that's all you ever see in it, then of course you're always feeling worthless and inadequate because even though some people, you might, You can look good oftentimes in front of others, but mentally you have to put up with a lot of negativity and anger and jealousy and fears and lustful thoughts and all kinds of mental states that you think a monk shouldn't have. Report an error in the passage at 35:00 Highlight the passage at 35:00

35:46 An ideal monk wouldn't have these thoughts. Keep thinking of someone like Saint Francis of Assisi. I thought it would be nice if... Report an error in the passage at 35:46 Highlight the passage at 35:46

35:56 If animals were attracted to me because I'm so kind. I felt like I was basically a kind person. So I thought, you know, it would be nice just to have the company of these animals. They don't kind of like, you know, in Walt Disney films or whatever. They kind of come around and you have these jolly times together. Report an error in the passage at 35:56 Highlight the passage at 35:56

36:18 So one time I remember there was this gibbon ape in the monastery. Somebody let loose this gibbon. And it was a very amusing creature because it would do all kinds of tricks. While you're doing the evening chanting, it would jump on the Buddha whoop and swing from the top of it onto Sāriputta and Moggallama and then onto the rafters above and then would urinate down on the lay people. Report an error in the passage at 36:18 Highlight the passage at 36:18

36:52 It was all very kind of amusing to see. So one time I thought it would be nice to make friends with this gibbon. They're quite attractive creatures. So one day we were asked to go and help over in the nun's quarters doing some kind of thing. So I went over there and the gibbon was there. So I started, and it was being quite, you know, it was right there in a tree and I just started looking at it and trying to befriend it. Report an error in the passage at 36:52 Highlight the passage at 36:52

37:25 Well, after that day, I was constantly pursued by this ape that would swing up in the trees and suddenly land on top of my shoulders and bite me on top of my head. And it seemed to take great delight in persecuting me. And that wasn't what I was after. I was longing for this more kind of St. Francis' relationship. Report an error in the passage at 37:25 Highlight the passage at 37:25

37:52 Sitting together, we were looking with great love into each other's eyes. And I became actually terrified of going out of the hut. Report an error in the passage at 37:52 Highlight the passage at 37:52

38:03 That's so bad that finally Ajahn Chah had the ape taken off to another place because I was getting pretty neurotic by that moment. It was really frightening. Because it could move very stealthily and just suddenly appear out of nowhere and leap right on and take a bite out of your head and then rush off. Report an error in the passage at 38:03 Highlight the passage at 38:03

38:25 For you could even hit it. It was so much for St. Francis. I had to deal with fear and anger and wanting to smash the little beast. Report an error in the passage at 38:25 Highlight the passage at 38:25

38:40 These were not the way I thought it should be. This is the way it was. This is what was actually taking place. Report an error in the passage at 38:40 Highlight the passage at 38:40

38:51 So the way it is, is not a justification. It's not fatalistic. Like fatalism is always a negative thing. Well, that's the way it is. That's the world, so nothing you can do about it, so you just have to live with it. You know, stiff up a little bit and do the best you can. The world is rotten and that's it. That's not what I call a skillful reflection on the way it is. Report an error in the passage at 38:51 Highlight the passage at 38:51

39:24 When I use the word the way it is, it has no... It has no sense of judgment or approval or discipline. It's a mere recognition that it's this way. And using the way it is as a reflection brings attention to the way it is. Report an error in the passage at 39:24 Highlight the passage at 39:24

40:03 So that you can then pay attention to the way it is rather than reacting to what's happening. Report an error in the passage at 40:03 Highlight the passage at 40:03

40:14 In the past year we've had several people disrobe and this is always upsetting for a community of serious minded mendicants when people disrobe, especially People who've been in the order quite a while, you know, it triggers off various thoughts in your mind. And just noticing the way it is in the mind. When somebody asks to leave the order, then you can see a certain kind of resentment. Report an error in the passage at 40:14 Highlight the passage at 40:14

40:58 You can see... Certain kind of understanding. Sometimes you think, well, yes, maybe. Then resentment. Then you can think of ways of kind of putting them down. They haven't really understood the practice. Or then you can think of, maybe I haven't, maybe I have somehow not given them enough attention. Maybe it's my fault. Maybe I should have done more for them. And then there is a fear of maybe... Report an error in the passage at 40:58 Highlight the passage at 40:58

41:30 It was my fault that they didn't, you know, lack of real, really good teaching. Or then you can dismiss it. It doesn't really matter. Come and go. And so these are, say, emotional reactions I've found in myself, wanting to understand and then taking it personally or feeling annoyed. Or blaming them. But what I'm pointing to is not that there's any way you should react, but to notice reactions, emotional reactions, as the way it is. Report an error in the passage at 41:30 Highlight the passage at 41:30

42:16 If I say I should have, a monk of my years in the monastic life, shouldn't have felt certain feelings when these people asked to leave. That's how it should be, this perfect monk. But how it is, is this way. And so therefore you can actually become aware of what's actually going on in your mind and reflecting on it without judging it, without making any critical comments about it or feeling that you shouldn't feel the way you do or you should feel a certain way and not another way. Report an error in the passage at 42:16 Highlight the passage at 42:16

42:59 And then you can actually witness that as the reactions are impermanent. They arise, they cease. And through that, knowing the way it is, then you can release these tensions in your mind that oftentimes come from always assuming life should be some other way. Report an error in the passage at 42:59 Highlight the passage at 42:59

43:29 Or comparing. What's happening now or the way you're feeling now or the way the community is now or the way the world is now with this ideal world of the should, how it should be or how it shouldn't be. Report an error in the passage at 43:29 Highlight the passage at 43:29

43:50 This I call developing your intuition because intuition is ability to be with the flow of life as it is. And you have to accept within this moment Your own emotional reactions as part of the flow of life for you. And the emotional reactions are conditioned reactions so that they're on the level of personality, of me as a person, me as a man, as a woman, me as an American, me as a monk, me as this or that, me as an abbot. Report an error in the passage at 43:50 Highlight the passage at 43:50

44:30 These are conditions of the mind. which are, and conventions, that have their place at moments, at a certain time and place. These are valid ways of thinking and appropriate responses to a situation, but as underlying assumptions about what one is, and then comparing, say, the flow of life with these perceptions, You only get confused. You only feel confused by it. Report an error in the passage at 44:30 Highlight the passage at 44:30

45:09 Well, say, with the intuitive mind, then the sense you're letting go of fixed perceptions by just seeing the nature of perception, by recognizing that the reactions you do have as being the way they are. They're like this. Report an error in the passage at 45:09 Highlight the passage at 45:09

45:36 Another example of this is when my mother died two years ago. She died. I'd seen her the night before in her home, and I'd flown from San Diego to San Francisco the next morning, and then... Report an error in the passage at 45:36 Highlight the passage at 45:36

46:06 Then I found that she died in the night. So I had to teach a retreat, a ten-day retreat in California, and the first day of that retreat was the day that I got the news of her death, you see. So this was when I heard that. The last thing I felt like doing was teaching a meditation retreat. How am I going to do this? Report an error in the passage at 46:06 Highlight the passage at 46:06

46:35 And yet, I was the only one that could teach this retreat. I didn't bring anyone with me. I didn't bring any other monks or nuns. And people had been waiting to go on this retreat. And there was a waiting list, and I was expected, and they'd already signed up and paid their fees and so forth. So you didn't want to back out. And yet, the last thing I felt like was teaching. Report an error in the passage at 46:35 Highlight the passage at 46:35

47:03 Go through a ten day retreat and being the teacher of it. So then I reflected on the way it is. This is the way it is rather than the way it should be. And in that reflection I could accept that I could accept the conditions affecting me both the news of my mother's death the actual retreat that was going to take place and the feelings I was having. Report an error in the passage at 47:03 Highlight the passage at 47:03

47:31 There was an acceptance of all of those Feelings and perceptions and the reactions of not wanting to, not feeling, you know, this is about the last thing I want to do at this time. I accepted that. I recognized that as a feeling that comes and goes in the mind. And then I just went ahead and did what was, because there was no need. Report an error in the passage at 47:31 Highlight the passage at 47:31

47:56 Obviously my mother didn't, was dead and my sister was arranging for the funeral. So I wasn't particularly needed for any other reason. Report an error in the passage at 47:56 Highlight the passage at 47:56

48:11 Then you only have one mother. So, I mean, mothers are always special. They're not like any other person in your life. So you can't very well just, you know, you can say, well, in Nietzsche, you know, everything's impermanent and what is born must die. That's easy to say when somebody else's mother dies. Report an error in the passage at 48:11 Highlight the passage at 48:11

48:36 When your own mother dies, then there's other feelings that arise, isn't there? And strong memories arise, and a various sense of loss, and a sadness. And these one could accept as conscious experience. Now, the idea of a monk, say, when I was in Thailand, The idea that I got from the way everyone talked in Thailand was that if you're mindful you don't feel anything. So if you feel grief or sadness at the death of your mother, it's because you're not mindful. Report an error in the passage at 48:36 Highlight the passage at 48:36

49:22 That's how I tended to interpret what I learned in Thailand, you see. But by this time I was not going to try to pretend I wasn't feeling anything, but to really observe. And accept what I was feeling, the way it is. This is the way it is. And in that, then I could allow the feeling of grief, or whatever that feeling is, when somebody you love dies, and your mother dies, I could allow that feeling to, I could allow myself to feel that, but yet I would not say I was suffering. Report an error in the passage at 49:22 Highlight the passage at 49:22

50:01 I wouldn't say that I was suffering. I was aware of that feeling and therefore the sense of suffering wasn't there. The suffering would come if I started thinking I shouldn't be feeling this. But when I accepted the actual feeling of loss and the perception of death of my mother and so forth, then that is the way it is. Report an error in the passage at 50:01 Highlight the passage at 50:01

50:30 That I accepted. That I could totally embrace. And when I reflected on that, I wasn't suffering from any of that. Report an error in the passage at 50:30 Highlight the passage at 50:30

50:47 The suffering would come when I'd become self-conscious or doubting or getting caught up with making critical comments or wanting things to be other than the way they are. Report an error in the passage at 50:47 Highlight the passage at 50:47

51:05 So this was a very kind of... useful way of looking at the dharma. Because then you can accept what you're feeling, the sensitivity, all that you're going to experience in life, you can accept all of it, whatever it is, success and failure, happiness, suffering, good fortune, misfortune, good health, bad health, being loved and adored or being... Report an error in the passage at 51:05 Highlight the passage at 51:05

51:39 Accused and blamed and criticized. The whole range of worldly dhammas we can accept and see them as they are. This is the way it is. And in that response to life, there's no suffering. There's still pain. You can still feel the sense of being offended or hurt. Report an error in the passage at 51:39 Highlight the passage at 51:39

52:10 You can criticize you unfairly, blame you for something, or you can feel the reaction of the feeling of being hurt or being offended, but underlying that is an awareness of it that Report an error in the passage at 52:10 Highlight the passage at 52:10

52:27 is seeing it as dharma rather than merely as a merely emotional reaction and all the complicated, confusing reactions we have to something. Report an error in the passage at 52:27 Highlight the passage at 52:27

52:44 For example, the ones about somebody disrobing in the community. If you get caught in the reactions, well, we understand, or maybe it's my fault, or it's her fault, or it's his fault, or it's this or that, then you're trying to choose out of all these different reactions what is the honest one or the right one. Report an error in the passage at 52:44 Highlight the passage at 52:44

53:14 Rather than really observing that these reactions are just that and that the conditioned mind reacts in that way. Another example is I began to be aware in this life as a monk. I began to contemplate. I could see in myself the tendency to blame other people. So I decided to really investigate blaming. What is this blaming? Report an error in the passage at 53:14 Highlight the passage at 53:14

53:49 So I noticed that when something would go wrong, whether it was due to me or somebody else, they'd say, who's to blame? Okay, who did it? Who's to blame for this? And I noticed how sometimes this was just such an immediate reaction to an experience of life, that there always had to be somebody to blame, or your mind was always... Report an error in the passage at 53:49 Highlight the passage at 53:49

54:17 Really looking, they would just react like the Pavlovian dog, you know, just, who's to blame? And then I began to notice that most people do this, this sense of who's to blame? And then one can blame oneself. Sometimes if you're trying to be kind of nice about it all, it was probably my fault because, you know, I probably didn't give proper directions. Report an error in the passage at 54:17 Highlight the passage at 54:17

54:46 If I could just, you know, express myself better, then it wouldn't have happened. So I must be, that's being the good guy, isn't it? Taking all the blame yourself. Then there's the, you know, oh, that person, you know, you can't trust them, always making a mess of everything. And there's, in a community, oftentimes there's somebody who people tend to blame, the scapegoat or the, or the sad sack or whatever that seems to be the victim. So blaming is a common human reaction. Report an error in the passage at 54:46 Highlight the passage at 54:46

55:32 We see it all the time in ourselves and just in the world news. Blaming of the Middle East, the Israelis and the Arabs and the... Iranians are blaming of the communists. They're kind of not so much now. You can blame the Americans. They're good ones to blame. It's always good to blame superpower. Blame the aristocrats. Blame the rich people. Report an error in the passage at 55:32 Highlight the passage at 55:32

56:03 Blame the privileged. You can blame the various minorities. You can blame yourself. You can blame the British government. You can blame the Tory party, whatever. And there's always reasons, good reasons, to blame, isn't it? One usually finds very rational things to say and proofs of why this person or that thing is to blame. But what I'm interested in is not really trying to get the statistics right and the facts right, but in... Report an error in the passage at 56:03 Highlight the passage at 56:03

56:41 I'm witnessing this desire to blame somebody because I see it as a strong kind of reaction to life. So I would pay attention. So when I feel this in me that wanted to blame somebody, I'd really say, this is the way, what does this feel like? This emotion that I'm feeling now, this kind of energy that wants to blame somebody or wants to know who's to blame for this. Report an error in the passage at 56:41 Highlight the passage at 56:41

57:11 And I could begin to just be aware of it as some kind of movement inside me, some kind of compulsive thing. It wasn't even intentional, like I was choosing to blame. It was just some kind of compulsive reaction to a situation. And of course we learn it as children, isn't it? We used to blame my sister, the other boys and girls in the neighborhood you could blame. Report an error in the passage at 57:11 Highlight the passage at 57:11

57:40 You got older, you started blaming your parents. This is a very common human reaction to life. But in reflecting on the way it is, then you're looking, you're not really, it doesn't matter if anyone's to blame or not, but you're becoming aware of, picking up on that kind of energy. They're seeking to point the finger at somebody. Then you can, when you identify that, then you can You really can let go of it. You can actually not be caught up in that kind of reaction, an adequate reaction. Report an error in the passage at 57:40 Highlight the passage at 57:40

58:22 And then your mind is much more open to being truly sensitive and receptive to where you can get a perspective on what's happened rather than rushing around blaming somebody. Well, you oftentimes get it wrong. Isn't it? I mean, so many cases in the, you know, the kind of tragedies of life where somebody's been blamed for something and then find out that they didn't do it. Report an error in the passage at 58:22 Highlight the passage at 58:22

58:52 There's so many stories in the daily newspapers about people in prison who were convicted for something they didn't do. Report an error in the passage at 58:52 Highlight the passage at 58:52

59:08 Now the way life should be, what should be, is also a very important ...function of our mind, to have ideals and models of perfection. This is a kind of miraculous gift we have. Report an error in the passage at 59:08 Highlight the passage at 59:08

59:33 So it's not something to condemn or to fear or to deny, but learn how to use it, what its proper place is in our life. I like to compare my ideals with like the guiding stars. If you're traveling and you need to have your direction clear, you fix on the stars, don't you? Now you can't ever reach the stars. You don't have any intention of trying to hold on to the star, do you? You know it's obviously so high up and so far away that you... Report an error in the passage at 59:33 Highlight the passage at 59:33

1:00:19 There's not any suggestion in your mind that you're going to try to become the star. But it is a beautiful object in the night sky that you can look to to keep your direction from getting lost on the path so you can keep going in the right direction. So the ideals that we have of life Say the perfect models of perfection that we do have are not to be despised, but they are the goals, that which we can keep fixed on as a point for direction, but not as something to compare the way life is. Report an error in the passage at 1:00:19 Highlight the passage at 1:00:19

1:01:08 We don't compare, do we, the planet Earth with the star, star the particular things we find on a journey and compare because they're not as beautiful as the star that Report an error in the passage at 1:01:08 Highlight the passage at 1:01:08

1:01:27 them. recognize that this is the way it is. Our journey on this planet, going from one place to another, is like this. have to bear with the various obstacles and trials that come to you because this is the way it is. It's going to be very difficult. Various wild animals and various bandits and difficult padgers and bogs and swamps and piranha fish and crocodiles and gibbon apes and things like this. Report an error in the passage at 1:01:27 Highlight the passage at 1:01:27

1:02:03 You're not saying that the earth or life shouldn't present us with any of these. Because the ideal is that there aren't any prāṇa fish in the ideal utopian system. But we learn how to keep the direction in spite of having to maybe get through various difficulties and bad patches and difficult trials and tribulations in our life within this form. Report an error in the passage at 1:02:03 Highlight the passage at 1:02:03

1:02:37 So that doesn't... mean the ideal or the direction isn't one means that we just keep going in the right direction Report an error in the passage at 1:02:37 Highlight the passage at 1:02:37