Shortcut to Nibbana

0:00 Satsang with Mooji Satsang with Mooji Report an error in the passage at 0:00 Highlight the passage at 0:00

0:09 [chanting]

0:26 APARU TADE SANGAMATASATAURA YESODOVANTA BAMUNCHANTOSATA So Report an error in the passage at 0:26 Highlight the passage at 0:26

0:39 this is the full moon night of January, first full moon of the new year, 2007. Report an error in the passage at 0:39 Highlight the passage at 0:39

0:53 And the Saṅgha has reflected on their training rules, the patimokas and so forth, that part of the monastic... ...convention, the moral, ethical foundation that we established, and then the bhavana, the development or cultivation of the path. Report an error in the passage at 0:53 Highlight the passage at 0:53

1:28 And so on Sunday evening we enter the three-month winter retreat, the annual three-month retreat, three months during the English winter. ...of total silence and Report an error in the passage at 1:28 Highlight the passage at 1:28

1:53 meditation. But how does that affect your mind? Some people say, oh, wonderful, you know. Other people say, oh, I don't know if I'll be able to get through one month. The point of it is to be aware of whatever, you know, we're not interested in kind of marathon meditations or endurance contests. But it's not to test you out and see who can stay quiet the longest, sit the longest and bear with three months of English winter in total silence. Report an error in the passage at 1:53 Highlight the passage at 1:53

2:36 That's the hard line. The point is awake and attention. So if you think you're just going to grin and bear it and really... You know, try to get enlightened during the next three months or solve all your problems or fear that you might just crack up, fall apart. Report an error in the passage at 2:36 Highlight the passage at 2:36

3:03 Be aware of that. Be aware of your own, the way we grasp just perceptions. Because right now, what is it? It's a retreat, three-month winter retreat. What is the reality of that in the here and now? Words, isn't it? Concepts. Report an error in the passage at 3:03 Highlight the passage at 3:03

3:24 And then you have, most of you have memories of being on retreats and so that the word retreat and then three months, three months seems like a long time to many people and so forth. So this is a way of reflecting on just how the power of concepts and words, how they affect us. Or tones of voice, you know, if I take a really stern tone, Report an error in the passage at 3:24 Highlight the passage at 3:24

3:56 Dead serious kind of attitude, you know, hard master, meditation master approach, you know, whip you someone else into enlightenment. Report an error in the passage at 3:56 Highlight the passage at 3:56

4:11 And if any of you drop dead, we just push your body outside and we Report an error in the passage at 4:11 Highlight the passage at 4:11

4:19 won't even have to take time to chant Kusla Dhamma for you. Report an error in the passage at 4:19 Highlight the passage at 4:19

4:26 Now I'm making you laugh, but what if I said that in all seriousness? Then just notice how, you know, then we want to... Another three months of conviviality, because conviviality is a pleasant word, isn't it? Convivial means friendly and kind of, you know, it doesn't have that austere, hard line to it. Report an error in the passage at 4:26 Highlight the passage at 4:26

4:52 Three months of friendliness and mettā and love and bliss. And so these words, you know, positive words, and if I say them in the right inspiring way, then... You feel inspired. And this is just to observe how the human mind, you know, what being human is. You know, we have this language, we have language, we have concepts, and positive, negatives, positives and negatives, and then, you know, they affect us like this. Report an error in the passage at 4:52 Highlight the passage at 4:52

5:32 You know, negative concept, or a negative innuendo, or a tone of voice, or whatever is like this. A positive, inspiring, happy, beautiful, refined is you feel like this. We can be vulgar and coarse or terribly refined or very proper samanas only using Pāli terms to express our deepest feelings. Report an error in the passage at 5:32 Highlight the passage at 5:32

6:05 So there are ideals, you know, we have ideals of This is a very idealistic, you know, most of us enter monasticism out of idealism, so we expect a lot from it, you know, whether we want that, we want some supportive convention, something that we can trust, something that will never disappoint us or never let us down. Report an error in the passage at 6:05 Highlight the passage at 6:05

6:35 And of course, this is where the emphasis The Buddha made on mindfulness, because it's only a convention. Now, convention, when I use this word, it means it's like, it's a conditioned state, like what we call the scriptural Dhamma, Vinaya, is all convention. Buddhism is a convention. Theravāda Buddhism, Mahāyāna Buddhism, Tibetan Buddhism, it's all conventions. Report an error in the passage at 6:35 Highlight the passage at 6:35

7:10 They have forms, they have qualities. The religious conventions, you know, whether they're Buddhist or Christian or Muslim or whatever, just to point out what a convention is so that you begin to see it in terms of what it is rather than just let the convention kind of lead you into a state of Glee or elation or doubt or aversion or anger. Now this is very important because our emotional worlds, we're in these sensitive forms, living in this sense realm. Report an error in the passage at 7:10 Highlight the passage at 7:10

7:50 So the human experience, being human, as you've heard me say many times, is the experience of sensitivity. And sensitivity is like this, you feel everything. It's about... Continuous, unrelenting feeling. The only way you can get away from it sometimes is falling into sleep. And yesterday I took a nap and had this strange dream that you were all adoring some false monk who was pouring furniture polish all over you. Report an error in the passage at 7:50 Highlight the passage at 7:50

8:35 And I was trying to know Report an error in the passage at 8:35 Highlight the passage at 8:35

8:41 what the meaning of that is. But sensitivity is, you know, this is why. In Saripatthana, you know, Vedanana, Pasana, Saripatthana, Vedanana, looking into sensitivity. What is sensitivity? Ayatana, six senses and things like this. It's so obviously stated in the Saripatthana Sutta. And then to observe sensitivity, not just try to suppress it or... Report an error in the passage at 8:41 Highlight the passage at 8:41

9:17 Or only have, you know, try to seek situations where you only have pleasant sensory impingement. Because the world that we live in, you know, it's this planet Earth that we live on. You know, it is a beautiful planet. And it has much beauty to it. Report an error in the passage at 9:17 Highlight the passage at 9:17

9:41 Sensitivity implies the very positive, the refined. The bliss, the beautiful, but also it means its opposite, hell and misery and despair and ugliness, brutality, torture, cruelty, on the other end, coarse cruelty, brutality, and then all the various shades of feeling in between. Now, this is just reflecting on the way it is. It's not a judgment. Report an error in the passage at 9:41 Highlight the passage at 9:41

10:21 So in knowing the world as it is, the Buddha's inviting us to look at the world as we experience it, not in terms of ideas of it, of what the world is as a perception or some kind of viewpoint, but recognize when we talk about the world, it's this, here and now, this. This is the world that I experience. You know, whatever part of the world I'm in, I'm experiencing it from this, from this sensitive state, from the limitations of this form. Report an error in the passage at 10:21 Highlight the passage at 10:21

11:04 And so this is called reflection and observing the way it is. So it's like waking up, investigating, looking into. So because... Recognizing what sensitivity is, we're not trying to avoid it or become insensitive, or think that we've got to live only in the positive sides of sensitivity. We've got to seek special, refined, concentrated states where we can stay in yogic bliss for hours or days or months. Report an error in the passage at 11:04 Highlight the passage at 11:04

11:53 Because then, you know, we develop a longing for special, for that which is refined, that which is rare. Report an error in the passage at 11:53 Highlight the passage at 11:53

12:05 But in mindfulness meditation, you know, mindfulness is the path to the deathless, is the way to liberation, not through attachment to refined positive states or creations in consciousness, but to let go. Of any control, of any preference, of any condition, and be the knower of the way it is. And then we get into vipassanā. All conditions are impermanent. All dharma is not self. So in terms of a clear statement, clear teaching, I don't think you can do better than that. Report an error in the passage at 12:05 Highlight the passage at 12:05

12:48 It's pretty direct. You don't need special equipment or high technology. In fact, Buddhist monasticism was based on low technology. Report an error in the passage at 12:48 Highlight the passage at 12:48

13:04 They give you an alms bowl, shave your head, wear rags. You don't get any. Even though nowadays you get laptops. Report an error in the passage at 13:04 Highlight the passage at 13:04

13:20 But these are the problems we face in modern affluent situations. Report an error in the passage at 13:20 Highlight the passage at 13:20

13:29 But these needn't be problems either, because the point is not to attach to any view, but to whatever view that you are attached to, to recognize it is a view, an attachment is like this, an opinion, a preference, a prejudice, a concept, whatever it is, an attachment to it. What happens? And knowing for myself, and examining my own experience through consciousness, is whatever I attach to, I become like that. Report an error in the passage at 13:29 Highlight the passage at 13:29

14:15 So this sense of becoming. If I start thinking negatively, I don't like this, I don't like that, I don't want this, I become negative. Report an error in the passage at 14:15 Highlight the passage at 14:15

14:31 My personality always kind of stays on that level of grumpy complaining. And so then I'd watch myself, you know, because when you're very idealistic like I was, there's a lot to complain about wherever you go. Because you want life to be always more than what it is, you know, and everywhere you go, you never quite, you know, you can always see something you don't like about it. Report an error in the passage at 14:31 Highlight the passage at 14:31

15:01 I was in the Navy for four years. Four years in the American Navy. I came out completely addicted to what is vulgarly referred to in naval jargon in the United States, bitching. Report an error in the passage at 15:01 Highlight the passage at 15:01

15:30 This is the way we talked in the Navy. Bitching about everything. I remember, you know, we'd go to San Francisco and they'd start complaining about San Francisco. We'd go over to Sasebo and they'd complain about that. Hong Kong, they'd complain about Hong Kong. Complain about this, complain about that. Complain about the food, complain about the ship, the navy, the government, the captain. Report an error in the passage at 15:30 Highlight the passage at 15:30

15:59 And you'd get together and complain. And so by four years of... I wasn't... That way before, but after four years of sitting on rusting old warships complaining, I was addicted. Report an error in the passage at 15:59 Highlight the passage at 15:59

16:19 It's taken me a long time to get out of the habit, because those kind of habits are, once you become an addict, it's hard to get out of it. But then... The thing that got me out of it was observing it, not just trying to shut up, not complain about anything and be awfully nice and understanding and sweet and try to put on a nice mask of a good boy. Report an error in the passage at 16:19 Highlight the passage at 16:19

16:51 I love everybody feeling. But in terms of recognizing the result with complaining, this continual grumpy complaining is It made me feel depressed. Report an error in the passage at 16:51 Highlight the passage at 16:51

17:08 You know, so you get kind of stuck. You get locked into gloomy states. And this is where the first noble truth comes in. Suffering. Why do I suffer so much? So I start reflecting. You know, start observing. Rather than just complaining because life, myself, the society I'm in. The world I live in, the people I live with, are not what I think they should be. But I suddenly recognize that this is the way the world is. Report an error in the passage at 17:08 Highlight the passage at 17:08

17:52 There's beauty, there's ugly, there's good-bad, there's fairness, there's unfairness, there's happiness, there's misery, and on and on like this. Report an error in the passage at 17:52 Highlight the passage at 17:52

18:06 If you've got one, you've got the other. You've got happiness, you're going to have unhappiness. So trying to be happy or attain happiness through controlling, through trying to control everything to make you feel happy, will lead to unhappiness because you'll inevitably fail. You can kind of delude yourself for a while and then it'll fall apart, disappoint you. Notice how when you... Report an error in the passage at 18:06 Highlight the passage at 18:06

18:50 be wise and compassionate for us, then we inevitably let you down. Report an error in the passage at 18:50 Highlight the passage at 18:50

18:59 a of weeks ago at tea time, one of the lay people was asking me about Report an error in the passage at 18:59 Highlight the passage at 18:59

19:11 She wanted to know if she could trust me. And so I said, no way can you trust me. I'm not asking anybody to trust me. Because I'm not pointing at myself. You know, I don't want you to trust me, in other words. But, you know, if you're going to trust, trust in awareness of the moment. This is refuge, when we take refuge. An awakened consciousness. Report an error in the passage at 19:11 Highlight the passage at 19:11

19:47 In yourself, not in Ajahn Sumedho will always be there for me and never let me down. I've always let you down in so many ways. I'm never quite what you've always wanted your teacher to be, have I? And when you do expect, you're set up for disillusionment. Report an error in the passage at 19:47 Highlight the passage at 19:47

20:13 So in this world of changing conditions, recognize that conditions... You can trust the fact that they'll change. That's what. You know, whatever you think, whatever you feel, whatever place you're in, people you're living with, the thing you can know is, will they always be there for me? Will I always feel safe and secure here? Will life, will you promise to make me feel This safety all my whole life and nobody can promise that and keep it because conditioned phenomena is changing. Report an error in the passage at 20:13 Highlight the passage at 20:13

21:04 So you know in changing from the ignorant state of self-view we see change in terms of dhamma, the refuge in dhamma. All conditions are impermanent. Well, Report an error in the passage at 21:04 Highlight the passage at 21:04

21:26 that's not something to grasp. You can easily quote, all conditions are impermanent. And that can be just another opinion we grasp. And that's not what is recommended. Not grasping Buddhist views, but taking those teachings and proving them. Report an error in the passage at 21:26 Highlight the passage at 21:26

21:47 And to prove, to see, to recognize impermanence, And whatever, you don't need to go over it. You just look at yourself, the way, you know, how things affect you, how a sunny day, sunny warm day, or a cold rainy day, that has an effect. We feel it, don't we? You can't help but feel the weather. And it has a different effect. You know, it's easier to be happy, feel happy, on a warm sunny day, isn't it? Report an error in the passage at 21:47 Highlight the passage at 21:47

22:23 Because the conditions for happiness are there. Sunshine, warmth, blue sky, spring flowers, green grass. It's all pretty, beautiful. And the conditions for, and these are what bring happiness. Beauty, warmth. And then suddenly it'll turn cold and it'll be winter time and harsh winds blowing and And damp and cloudy grey skies. And how do you feel? Report an error in the passage at 22:23 Highlight the passage at 22:23

23:04 You can observe. It's different than on a sunny day. Now we can complain, you know, English weather, like we do. Good at complaining about the weather. But the weather is just the way it is. You know, wanting English weather to be like Hawaii is a waste of time, isn't it? It's just never going to be that way, no matter how much you want it to be. So, you know, the obvious thing is to learn from the way it is. Report an error in the passage at 23:04 Highlight the passage at 23:04

23:40 You don't have to go to Hawaii, because then you'll find something there you won't like. It's too damp there. Things get moldy and they stink when you're in Hawaii. I lived in Hawaii. It's full of foul odors, rotting fruit and things like that. And things mold, get very moldy. So sensitivity then is the state we're in, where we have to bear with sensitivity till the body dies. Report an error in the passage at 23:40 Highlight the passage at 23:40

24:19 And that, you know, then as you get older too, you know, you don't have the youthful vigor. You know, like now I'm feeling stiffer. Report an error in the passage at 24:19 Highlight the passage at 24:19

24:32 Lack of energy, things like this, due to old age. I don't have that kind of zip I used to have when we were in Egypt last month, climbing Mount Sinai. Oh, God. I used to love climbing mountains like that. I've climbed Mount Kinabalu, Mauna Loa, I've climbed Cro-Patrick, Pyrenees, all kinds of mountains. Report an error in the passage at 24:32 Highlight the passage at 24:32

25:08 The Alps, the Italian Alps, Swiss Alps, and all like that. I've climbed Glastonbury Tor, Adams Peak, and then Mount Sinai, and Mount Kailash in Tibet. I suddenly realized I'm too old. I don't have the... I don't have that thing that gets you up mountains anymore. Report an error in the passage at 25:08 Highlight the passage at 25:08

25:46 They don't admit old age, Sumedho, you know, you're still young, you know, people trying to cheer me up. But they don't have to feel what 73 years old is like, you know, a 73-year-old body is not the same as a 40 or 50, not to mention a 20 or a 30, like this. Report an error in the passage at 25:46 Highlight the passage at 25:46

26:16 at least this body is like this. Well, one could complain about it, or just recognize it's like this. Report an error in the passage at 26:16 Highlight the passage at 26:16

26:46 Then awareness of it is like this. And what I'm pointing to is this awareness that embraces, that allows things to be what they are, without saying how it should be. Now we're so conditioned to want to put something onto it, to add, to make some comment, or give it some value, a value judgment of some sort. Report an error in the passage at 26:46 Highlight the passage at 26:46

27:15 During this winter's retreat, I encourage you to train yourselves. Don't judge anything, you know, accept the flow in whatever way you're experiencing it, both physically, emotionally, mentally. And this is an attitude then of awareness, sati sampatanya, in which you're not trying to get anything or get rid of anything or become anything, but if you are, if you are determined to get something or become something, Or get rid of things. Be the knower of that. What's it like to be someone trying to become or somebody trying to get rid of something you don't like and that you're experiencing. Report an error in the passage at 27:15 Highlight the passage at 27:15

28:01 You know, so you become, you're noticing the way it is. You're awakening to dhamma. And you're awakening to the truth of the way it is. So the word dhamma You know, translated as best we can into English, the truth of the way it is. Then this word dhamma is, you know, we have kusla dhamma, kusla dhamma, all kinds of dhammas, and amata dhamma. Report an error in the passage at 28:01 Highlight the passage at 28:01

28:37 So, and in awareness is the way that we, from this amata dhamma, or the deathless, the unconditioned, unconditioned reality. Pure conscious awareness. Then we have perspective on kusala dhamma, akusala dhamma, apaya, kata, dhamma, the different dhammas. Good, bad, right, wrong, so forth. So this is why when we say the path to the deathless, mindfulness, path to the deathless, apamado matapadam. Report an error in the passage at 28:37 Highlight the passage at 28:37

29:15 Apamado is... Paying attention, being aware, being awake is the path to the death. It's as simple as that. It's not that I become somebody who won't die. Because those are words again. I'm somebody, if I'm mindful, I will become somebody that won't die. It's rubbish. Report an error in the passage at 29:15 Highlight the passage at 29:15

29:48 That's another delusion if I touch it. I don't want to die. I want to reach the deathless. It's still the conventional form of language and thought. Report an error in the passage at 29:48 Highlight the passage at 29:48

30:05 So instead of identity or grasping or thinking, you're letting go of all that. Letting go of grasping, of thinking, letting go of feeling, which is not suppressing, but allowing feeling to be what it is. Whatever... Report an error in the passage at 30:05 Highlight the passage at 30:05

30:24 Feeling it might be. So it's this attitude of patient attention, relaxed attention, a sense of listening, open, allowing, receiving. Report an error in the passage at 30:24 Highlight the passage at 30:24

30:44 Now when we aren't that way, then we are in the state of becoming because we're trying to, you know, we go back into our conditioned habits. Report an error in the passage at 30:44 Highlight the passage at 30:44

30:54 Now my conditioned habits? Report an error in the passage at 30:54 Highlight the passage at 30:54

30:59 from my experience... that's what i know you know maybe you're different i'm not saying you have to experience things like me but these are more examples you know when i become a person i have to attach to being being i have to name name? Report an error in the passage at 30:59 Highlight the passage at 30:59

31:22 I can become Lungpho's tomato for you. Report an error in the passage at 31:22 Highlight the passage at 31:22

31:32 I'm a teacher. I'm a teacher. Or I'm a chow kun in Thailand. That means something. I'm a high-ranking monk. Report an error in the passage at 31:32 Highlight the passage at 31:32

31:47 I'm just an ordinary guy. I'm just like any of you. I'm nothing special. Still a person, isn't it? An identity of some sort. Whether you want to make yourself the best or the worst or ordinary or... Report an error in the passage at 31:47 Highlight the passage at 31:47

32:06 That's all concept again. You have to think to do that. To create yourself, you have to think, I am a Buddhist monk, I am Ajahn Sumedho. But if I stop thinking, and just awareness, attentiveness, then I have perspective. If the thought, I am Ajahn Sumedho, comes up, I see it for what it is. It's a thought, a mind. It begins and ends. Report an error in the passage at 32:06 Highlight the passage at 32:06

32:36 It's a saṅkhāra arising, ceasing. So then there's nothing to think about that other than reflect. You know, all sankharas are impermanent. So then we don't have to define or find ourselves in any form or any quality or any condition because we are this pure amatadhamma, deathless reality. Report an error in the passage at 32:36 Highlight the passage at 32:36

33:03 You know, this is when we... When we recognize this and rest in it and trust it, that's why I say it's the only thing you can trust. That which is trustworthy is this refuge in awareness. So I warn you not to trust anything, any condition, any system, any convention, any teacher. But don't distrust them either. That's the opposite. But examine them. How do you use... Report an error in the passage at 33:03 Highlight the passage at 33:03

33:37 This Buddhist convention, you know, how to use it skillfully. So its purpose, the purpose of the Buddhist convention is for realizing truth, for liberation from death, from delusion, from ignorance. And so grasping the convention won't, you know, isn't going to do it. You know, it'll still be, you know, it still will, when the time comes, be, you know, It will fail you. The convention will fail you. Because it's not meant to be a refuge. It's not meant to be what you rely on is the convention. Report an error in the passage at 33:37 Highlight the passage at 33:37

34:20 But the convention is here in order to help us see pointing to this here and now reality of consciousness that we're all experiencing. So nothing special about it. I don't have to Practice in a cave for 25 years to know this, or do anything special, but just suddenly wake up, pay attention, in the terms of awareness, not in terms of theory, ideas, philosophical systems, religious systems, grasping any of those. Report an error in the passage at 34:20 Highlight the passage at 34:20

35:06 Even though how profound they might be intellectually, the grasping of any convention will inevitably fail you, disappoint you, because you're grasping something that is changing, that can't be a refuge. So just to reflect on what I'm saying, it's like to... I encourage you to awaken this, to recognition of it, and to cultivating it. Like this is a lifetime path, you know, from now till death of the body. Report an error in the passage at 35:06 Highlight the passage at 35:06

35:49 You know, because our karma ripens in the present. So, you know, you can't, you know, things change. People come and go. People love you and hate you. Everything is wonderful. Everything is horrible. Fair and unfair and so forth. It's like the weather. Everything is changing. And then karma, whether we're happy or sad or threatened or frightened or joyful or glad or feel secure or insecure, whatever we're feeling, our relationship to the feeling is knowing it is like this. Report an error in the passage at 35:49 Highlight the passage at 35:49

36:30 It is what it is. And when I say it is what it is, it's just receiving it, because as soon as you say, this is a bad thought, then it becomes more than that, isn't it? You're putting a value judgment onto it, even if it is a bad thought. But if a bad thought comes into your mind, consciousness, it's like this. Report an error in the passage at 36:30 Highlight the passage at 36:30

36:57 Bad thoughts are like this. Anger is like this. Despair. And in this way, you know, you can actually let go. You know, I found through this, this is why mindfulness now is becoming increasingly appreciated in the Western world. You know, they're finding, you know, in psychotherapy, they're finding how important mindfulness is. Because if we can't, if we, you know, just trying to change the mask or... Report an error in the passage at 36:57 Highlight the passage at 36:57

37:31 or trying to think positively or endlessly think about ourselves of how we need to become like this or get rid of that or resolve this trauma or work out of relationships with our families and on and on like that. There's no end to it. No matter what your relationships are or your emotional problems Or your character or personality. Don't make a problem about it. But see it in terms of what it is in the present. Report an error in the passage at 37:31 Highlight the passage at 37:31

38:10 It's like this. So this is the shortcut, actually. Shortcut to nibbāna. Somebody asked me once, you know, because they were coming to meditation workshops here and they were finding it a bit difficult. Ajahn Sumedho, isn't there any shortcuts? I said, yeah. Report an error in the passage at 38:10 Highlight the passage at 38:10

38:32 What is it? I said, I'm doing it. This is a shortcut. Report an error in the passage at 38:32 Highlight the passage at 38:32

38:42 And he said, I was afraid you'd say that. Report an error in the passage at 38:42 Highlight the passage at 38:42

38:47 But notice, like what I'm saying right now, observe what your mind's doing. It brings up, well, what about the scriptures say this, and this teacher says this, and you've got to purify this, and you've got to get your sīla right, and you've got to... can't. Report an error in the passage at 38:47 Highlight the passage at 38:47

38:44 know what I'm Report an error in the passage at 38:44 Highlight the passage at 38:44

39:03 Get your jhānas and your samādhi and then you've got to do all these things. It's just not like waking up and being here. It sounds, I can't do it. I've got all these things to develop and cultivate and get and achieve and the scriptures say this and the teacher says that. Report an error in the passage at 39:03 Highlight the passage at 39:03

39:27 Now listen, that's all thinking again, isn't it? Those are views and opinions. Those are ideas you get. You've heard this. Famous masters have said this or told you this. You've read all the holy books of every religion. And they fill you with ideas. Fair enough. But now, during this winter, there's a chance not to get rid of it. Report an error in the passage at 39:27 Highlight the passage at 39:27

39:59 to disparage it, but to recognize in the present, you know, your own doubt this, or about what's going on here at Amar Bhatti, or about your own ability, or your own views about what you need for practice are like this. know, they are what they are. I'm not asking you to kind of, you shouldn't have any views or opinions or, you know, trying to kind of Convert you to my philosophy. But it's meant to be an encouragement to begin to very directly recognize, see the way it is. Report an error in the passage at 39:59 Highlight the passage at 39:59

40:45 And to learn from yourself the way you are. You know, your own kind of obsessions or views and opinions, biases, attachments. Report an error in the passage at 40:45 Highlight the passage at 40:45

40:59 We learn from that. We learn from our attachments, from our opinions, from our fears and desires. This is learning the nature of all conditions are impermanent. All dharma is not self. So the world is like this right now. You know, whatever you're feeling, thinking, the world's like this. Now then, when I do this, When I reflect and I say the world is like this, what I'm doing is I'm just kind of accepting it in terms of the way I'm experiencing it now. Report an error in the passage at 40:59 Highlight the passage at 40:59

41:42 It's like this. It's not a kind of resignation, a kind of fatalism, saying it's permanently like this. But it is. Right now, the way I feel, the emotional state and so forth is like this. Report an error in the passage at 41:42 Highlight the passage at 41:42

42:06 And as I am willing to kind of receive the world the way it is right now, I'm aware that it changes. That's starting from the here and now, being aware. I can't keep the feeling I have about, you know, it's some kind of permanent state. Report an error in the passage at 42:06 Highlight the passage at 42:06

42:32 You're aware that that which is aware of change, that is the path to the deathless. That is, you know, so, and the path to the deathless and awareness aren't two things. So it's a, you know, it gets down to this ultimate simplicity of awareness is the deathless itself. So they say, apamado amatapadam, awareness, path to the deathless, pamado matunopadam, heedlessness, not being aware, is like always dying. Report an error in the passage at 42:32 Highlight the passage at 42:32

43:18 Being heedless and unaware and inattentive is like, you know, that's why we're frightened because we're always dying. We're always a part of us dying and we feel this loss and sense of change that we can't control and dread about the future because, you know, you don't know what's going to happen. Report an error in the passage at 43:18 Highlight the passage at 43:18

43:43 And as long as we get lost in that, then it's pamadho heedlessness, not being aware, is the path to death. And then the third verse is apamadho namiyanti. Apamadho namiyanti is never dying. It's like never dying. It's deathless. Niyinti. Apamana, Apamana. Report an error in the passage at 43:43 Highlight the passage at 43:43

44:13 But heedlessness is like dying every moment. You know, that's why in affluent societies like we live in, you know, people suffer a lot because, you know, it's something about our lives no matter how comfortable or secure they might be. Report an error in the passage at 44:13 Highlight the passage at 44:13

44:32 There's something totally unsatisfying about it. You know, there's something missing because we're always caught in the death, in this death, this realm of death. We're attached to death. We bound ourselves to the death realm, to the sankharas, to the changingness, without knowing what we're doing. We're helpless victims, lost in the death realm, the saṃsāra. So it's not getting rid of saṃsāra, but awakening. Report an error in the passage at 44:32 Highlight the passage at 44:32

45:09 So it's as simple as that. It's recognizing what... What that is, awareness, attentiveness to the present, and then trusting it. Report an error in the passage at 45:09 Highlight the passage at 45:09

45:29 Now, you know, I totally trust this, completely trustworthy, but don't take my word for it. Because you have to find out yourself. As Ajahn Sumedho told me, that's all right, but it won't, how much good is it going to do you unless you do it? So I offer this as a reflection. reflection and Report an error in the passage at 45:29 Highlight the passage at 45:29