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- 10:01
Commitment, then, is a willingness, as I like to use this word, a determination in one's life. In Pāli, in the Ten Virtues, or Baramitas, one of them is called Adhitana, Adhitana Baramita, which can be translated as commitment. Or resolution, to make a resolution, to resolve, to commit oneself to an ideal or to a way.
- 22:23
So I found some and then I'd go out to one of the public parks in San Francisco and I'd read for the day and I'd get so high. This reading, D.T. Suzuki or Alan Watts, I get absolutely thrilled and high, inspired. And then years later, when I made a commitment to the holy life, and I tried to read those same books, I just felt critical, negative, and I couldn't get inspired by them.
- 33:02
Restless and I worry and feel anxious about everything. So these are what we call the five hindrances. These are the last three hindrances. The first two hindrances are greed and hatred. The last three are dullness and sleepiness, restlessness and agitation and doubt.
- 41:35
So when you let things go, when you allow things to go their natural course, Then you have the insight, the full insight into the dhamma, the way things are, that whatever is subject to arising is subject to ceasing and is not self, is anattā. As long as you depend on inspiration on arising with things and attach to that arising, that increases the sense of the self.
- 50:01
But to see that tendency, to see that the loyalty or love that one might have for a particular month is all right, there's nothing wrong with it, but to know it for what it is rather than to blindly grasp that and bind yourself to your perception. Because then you can see how to free yourself from just being a disciple. For the rest of your life, just following a teacher, where you actually learn how to grow up and be a liberated, enlightened human being, is what the Buddha's teachings are about.
Transcript
0:00 This afternoon I want to welcome you here to Amaravati. And today's subject, commitment, I was wondering how many people would attend such a talk. I Report an error in the passage at 0:00
0:19 mean, it's a good sign, isn't it, that there are people that are interested in the subject. Report an error in the passage at 0:19
0:38 Exploration of the human mind, and we will need to consider what do we mean by this word commitment. Report an error in the passage at 0:38
0:49 Many of the words we have, we can use habitually, thoroughly, so that they're just something that go off through the mouth without fully understanding what they mean and what that really implies. Report an error in the passage at 0:49
1:16 These talks are aimed at trying to awaken or stimulate, encourage People to think and contemplate themselves, their lives, the language they use, the conventions of Buddhism, or conventions of religion in general. Because this is most important in the development of humanity, of the human mind, is to develop this awakeness to where what we do, how we live. Report an error in the passage at 1:16
1:59 Our lifetime from birth to death is something that we learn from and that we perfect rather than just go through the motions of breathing and surviving in a human body in a society without being any the wiser for it by the time we die. Report an error in the passage at 1:59
2:20 And this, of course, we have the example of Gautama the Buddha who was to me The source of inspiration and the encouragement to humanity, saying that this is a possibility, that human beings can be enlightened beings, can realize the truth, Report an error in the passage at 2:20
2:48 where sometimes if you're caught in your own views, self-views, ideas, or pessimistic attitudes of the present time, one can just... Feel that there's really no meaning to life, no purpose, nothing that you can do. You just have to get by somehow, which is a very uninspired, negative, and depressing view of life. Report an error in the passage at 2:48
3:18 The Report an error in the passage at 3:18
3:22 fact that many human beings have risen up to do things that were very good, very noble, self-sacrificing, virtuous. Being willing to commit themselves to, say, a religious path or some ideal in which they had to, say, let go of a lot of their own selfish interests or Report an error in the passage at 3:22
3:53 comfort or convenience or privileges or whatever in order to realize that ideal or that path. Report an error in the passage at 3:53
4:05 Now, all religious... All religions point at an ideal and also at a reality, an ultimate reality. And yet to look and to realize the ultimate reality, we have to use ideas. And if we don't use ideas at all, if we don't have ideals, then our lives tend to get preoccupied with just the daily life. Routines and habits, emotional habits, physical habits. One can just putter one's life away, just puttering around from morning to night for a lifetime. Report an error in the passage at 4:05
5:00 In fact, sometimes I think that's what many people do, just putter through their lives. And the word puttering is a kind of just aimless... Movement of going from this to that, from one thing to the next, without any direction, isn't it? It's just going around without any commitment, without any direction, any ideal, nothing to aim at, or just for pleasure. Report an error in the passage at 5:00
5:31 We can experience a lot of pleasure through the sensory consciousness. So then one's life can just be preoccupied with seeking of pleasure, just having a good time or pleasant sensory experiences. Report an error in the passage at 5:31
5:53 But the religious ideal and the realization of that ideal, this the Buddha made very clear in his teaching. It's where the ideal and the real meet is in the dhamma. Report an error in the passage at 5:53
6:12 If religion just is aiming at an ideal that has no reality, that also leads to cynicism and disappointment, doesn't it? If we're aiming at an ideal that has no ultimate truth to it, but just some pleasant ideal we have, then we have no way of realizing that within this lifetime. Report an error in the passage at 6:12
6:45 That can lead to great disappointment or to just blindness, to a kind of blind loyalty and a blind faith that doesn't awaken the mind but tends to just condition it and maybe give it some form of strength to keep going. But it doesn't allow the human being to see clearly the way things are. It's just you have to more or less put blinkers on. Report an error in the passage at 6:45
7:14 And just filter out everything that doesn't agree and aim and try to just keep this ideal as a kind of continuous affirmation. So commitment can be done with loyalty and devotion, but maybe not with any wisdom. Report an error in the passage at 7:14
7:40 And I noticed a tendency in a character here in England, English character. It seems to have a lot of loyalty. There's a tremendous kind of feeling of obligation and loyalty. But sometimes it's a loyalty not combined with wisdom. It becomes a kind of blind attachment, a fixation without real reflection and understanding of what's happening. Report an error in the passage at 7:40
8:20 So there's loyalty, which is a good quality and a virtue, but without wisdom, then it also can, if we're loyal to something that isn't ultimately, that can't be realized, ultimately realized, then we can get really far off, far out. Report an error in the passage at 8:20
8:42 Then there's the other attitude, say the opposite, of just not any commitment whatsoever. Just do what you want. Follow any impulse. Eat, drink, and be merry. Have a good time. And just do what your heart says. Report an error in the passage at 8:42
9:05 I remember years ago when I lived in Berkeley, California as a student, one of the most widely read poets of the university student life at that time was He offered this ethereal poetry about follow your heart wherever it takes you. And I kept thinking that that sounds marvelous. And I kept watching people quote that particular line and their hearts were taking them all over the place. Report an error in the passage at 9:05
9:42 I seriously began to wonder if that's what he really meant or if that was just a Californian way of interpreting it. Report an error in the passage at 9:42
10:01 Commitment, then, is a willingness, as I like to use this word, a determination in one's life. In Pāli, in the Ten Virtues, or Baramitas, one of them is called Adhitana, Adhitana Baramita, which can be translated as commitment. Or resolution, to make a resolution, to resolve, to commit oneself to an ideal or to a way. Report an error in the passage at 10:01
10:45 And this is done, say, not as a blindness, but as a way of reflection. If we stay with something long enough, then we can actually begin to see the result of what we've been doing. And this is most important in the development of wisdom is that we're not just thinking I'm going to do this because sometime in the future I will become wise or in the next life I will go to a better place. Report an error in the passage at 10:45
11:18 Just on hope alone or blind faith or belief. But we're actually watching and observing the result of what we're doing. Like you can, just in meditation practice, Buddhist meditation practice, from the very beginning you need to reflect on the result of what you're doing. Is your meditation taking you towards calm, towards clarity, or is it taking you to confusion? Report an error in the passage at 11:18
11:50 Does it help you to relax and to open up and to be sensitive? sensitive or does it shut you down, close you off, you more frightened and rigid? Report an error in the passage at 11:50
12:09 this you have to look realize this for yourself. Report an error in the passage at 12:09
12:19 the development of wisdom, it means that you need to know yourself and what the results are. Now the commitment to the path or to a method or a teacher or a school. Whatever, this kind of commitment should never be a blind one where you just believe Report an error in the passage at 12:19
12:48 that the teacher knows more than you do and that you are just someone who has to follow and do not have any ability to contemplate the results of what you're doing. They have a kind of blind loyalty to teachers or to methods of meditation, to systems of meditation. And people will commit themselves to these methods or teachers and go on for years, years and years, trusting Report an error in the passage at 12:48
13:25 only that sometime in the future the method will suddenly enlighten them or that they'll suddenly realize something, have some great insight or great experience. Report an error in the passage at 13:25
13:40 And one man, I remember, came to me one time, he said, I've been practicing this certain type of method of meditation for 20 years, he said. I've been doing it every day for 20 years, a very kind of strict method of meditation, Vipassanā meditation, he said, and I've got nowhere. 20 years I've been doing this, every day, and I'm nowhere. Report an error in the passage at 13:40
14:10 That's rather depressing, isn't it? And he's an old man, too. He can't live very much longer. Report an error in the passage at 14:10
14:19 So I said, well, what have you been doing for 20 years? He said, well, a teacher said you do this and do that, and I've been doing this and that for 20 years. Report an error in the passage at 14:19
14:30 But I thought, nowhere. And obviously he hadn't, because he still was very much thinking that by doing this method every day, that somehow... Some dramatic change would take place. And he didn't get the dramatic changes he was expecting. In fact, in the way life happens, sometimes life brings us all kinds of ordeals, challenges, and difficult situations to bear with, which are affecting our minds. Report an error in the passage at 14:30
15:10 And if we're just attached to a method of meditation alone, Then we tend to suppress our feelings a lot. And with that suppression, then of course we tend to not come to terms with the experiences that life brings to us. And we have to pay the price for that by it all kind of coming back on us, the backlash of suppression. And we find ourselves, say, after 20 years, feeling odd. Report an error in the passage at 15:10
15:45 I haven't got anything out of it. When we go through one of life's patches, difficult patches, and we don't have the wisdom to reflect and see what life is and why life is the way it is, then we just feel that I shouldn't be suffering at this time. If I'd been meditating in the right way, this wouldn't bother me, this wouldn't affect me. But it does, though obviously I haven't got anything. Report an error in the passage at 15:45
16:16 From this meditation. So that's a blind loyalty to a method, but without reflecting on the results of it. Except just assuming that the results are, that you haven't gotten anywhere. Well, actually, I don't believe that was actually the case with that man. I think he probably had a lot of results, good results, that he wasn't aware of at the time. Report an error in the passage at 16:16
16:46 Because even some kind of regular... Mental exercise certainly is good for you, you know, if you're doing it in a regular way, not for any kind of ambitious goal of becoming, say, aiming at something impossible or some vain or egotistical idea, but just some form of self-discipline and commitment to something or other does help. Report an error in the passage at 16:46
17:19 Give us some kind of strength in our lives that we wouldn't have if we just followed impulses or desires of the moment. Report an error in the passage at 17:19
17:35 Commitment to the holy life, say for a monk, a bhikkhu, this is for me a very strong commitment because I realize that if I didn't commit myself to the life, then I would just come and go. And wouldn't really stay through the difficult patches of it, the disillusionment with it. Because everything works on that principle, doesn't it? The arising and then the ceasing. Where you're inspired at first, you're going to feel disillusioned. Report an error in the passage at 17:35
18:18 And the more inspired you tend to be, the more disillusioned you'll be. And that applies to everything. The more you, if you're having, if you fall in love with somebody, the more you fall in love head over heels without any wisdom, but just getting caught up in that lovely feeling, the more depressing it will be later. Report an error in the passage at 18:18
18:50 Because one extreme takes you very high, and then of course that means you're going to have to drop down very low because of that. You go up high, you have to get very high, then to get back to where you were, say when you started, is considered very low, because being very high is very pleasant, ecstatic, wonderful to get high. Report an error in the passage at 18:50
19:20 So inspiration is a mental condition, just like romance, or these kind of inspiring... Experiences, human experiences, they get us very high. They lift us up. And Report an error in the passage at 19:20
19:40 then if we have no wisdom, then when we go down again, when what goes up must come down, all we can do is feel disappointed, disillusioned with it, with the person we're in love with, or with ourselves, or with the meditation, or the religious life, whatever. That was inspiring you. Then you just feel disappointed and embittered by it. Report an error in the passage at 19:40
20:11 Now, when you commit yourself to something, then you begin to, you already say, I'm going to stick with this through the cycle. Report an error in the passage at 20:11
20:24 It's easy to commit yourself to a relationship when it's romantic and it's going up and it's very inspiring, very high. But it's very difficult to commit yourself to it when it's going down, isn't it? One just wants to get out of it, get away from it as quickly as possible. Report an error in the passage at 20:24
20:49 With a religious life, it's the same way. One, say, is inspired. I want to be a monk for the rest of my life, devote myself to the Buddha Dhamma, give myself totally. All these worldly things are foolish. Report an error in the passage at 20:49
21:05 These worldly goals are empty and one gets caught in this lovely kind of aspiration and inspiration of the mind. But then religious life also involves a lot of dreariness. I think in the Old Testament they described it as 40 years in the desert for the Israelites. Report an error in the passage at 21:05
21:34 It seems like sometimes longer than 40 years. The dreary plains, the plateaus, where the initial inspiration, the uplifting feelings are no longer, you cannot get them anymore. You can't make them happen. Even reading your old favorite poems and inspiring scriptures, suddenly all you feel is negative. Report an error in the passage at 21:34
22:03 When I was in the Navy, this was when I was about 21 or 22, I became aware of Buddhism while I was in the American Navy. So I'd haunt the bookshops in San Francisco to find any books I could find on Buddhism. So I found some and then I'd go out to one of the public parks in San Francisco and I'd read for the day and I'd get so high. Report an error in the passage at 22:03
22:32 This reading, D.T. Suzuki or Alan Watts, I get absolutely thrilled and high, inspired. And then years later, when I made a commitment to the holy life, and I tried to read those same books, I just felt critical, negative, and I couldn't get inspired by them. Report an error in the passage at 22:32
23:05 The times had changed. It was a different experience of life. Report an error in the passage at 23:05
23:14 One thing with commitment, then, is that it takes you through the commitment to, say, a teacher or a way of meditation or a school. Report an error in the passage at 23:14
23:29 Commitment to the practice of the dharma. Or, say, on the worldly plane, commitment to a relationship, to a marriage. Then this... Allows us to learn from the other side of it. We're no longer requesting that it just be romantic and happy and inspiring. But we are willing to learn from the other side of it when it becomes dreary and boring. Not to mention if it's just downright hopeless and a total disappointment. Report an error in the passage at 23:29
24:10 One thing with the holy life I've found with monasticism is But it coming from a very moral tradition, it being in itself a moral form, something that is based on moral commitment, then no matter how boring and dreary one might feel in the life, you can't really fault it. You can't really say it's bad or it's wrong because you... Report an error in the passage at 24:10
24:42 You respect that its form, its whole presence is good, whether you particularly like it in the moment or not, it's something else. Report an error in the passage at 24:42
24:54 So that gives you the confidence to stay with it through the 40 years in the desert or through the time of one's experience of the holy life where one is not feeling any inspiration or one would like to maybe get out of it. Or leave it. Go somewhere else. Do something new. Report an error in the passage at 24:54
25:31 From my experience as a monk, I remember that this was very much what our teacher Ajahn Chah was very good at pointing to. That he was very skillful at getting us to look at the kind of Restlessness of our mind or the way that we would get caught in negativity and boredom, doubt and uncertainty. The Report an error in the passage at 25:31
26:13 Buddhist path is quite a path of wisdom because it uses everything that we can experience for our practice. And so it's not a path where you exclude anything. You're not trying to just... Choose the best and hold on to the good and the best. But even the worst, the unpleasant, the painful is to be reflected on. Report an error in the passage at 26:13
26:45 So it allows you to say, come to terms with fear, anxiety, doubt, not to mention the more passionate qualities of anger, hatred, greed, and lust. Report an error in the passage at 26:45
27:04 But actually in the religious life, lust and greed, anger and hatred are quite exciting human emotions. And so when you have something interesting to work with, you feel like you're really getting somewhere. If you get angry very quickly or you have a very lustful nature, these are very energizing, very stimulating. Report an error in the passage at 27:04
27:33 Defilements. To feel anger and hatred stimulates the mind. But then when those more passionate, extreme passions fall away, then one is stuck on this dreary plateau. And the dreary plateau of defilements are what we call the dullness and sleepiness. And you get agitated and worried. Report an error in the passage at 27:33
28:10 Restlessness, and then you have doubt, endless doubt, kind of grinding uncertainty, insecurity in your mind. Now, I'm trying to present these three defilements as they're nothing dramatic, are they, when you're dull and sleepy, torporous. Report an error in the passage at 28:10
28:32 It's not like being passionately put in a passion of anger, hatred, or greed, or lust, is it? As soon as you feel lust or anger, there's no torpor, is there? Report an error in the passage at 28:32
28:50 You're quite wide awake, stimulated. And I think a lot of life of people just find that this is how they keep feeling alive. If your life doesn't have a lot of anger and hatred and greed and lust in it, then one tends to feel dull and weary. Report an error in the passage at 28:50
29:14 Mediocre and depressed. So the modern materialist tendencies are to provide all kinds of things to arouse this greed in us, to make us want things, to feel that we've got to get and have and desire these wonderful stimulating objects. Or we can feel, I know this oftentimes in, This was very common in university life. An idealistic, educated Western people is to abide in the state of indignation over the injustices of the society and the world. Report an error in the passage at 29:14
30:01 Because you can get tremendous energy out of feeling indignant. And I've done that, I know. I used to depend very much on being awake to feeling indignant. Report an error in the passage at 30:01
30:16 Because if I wasn't indignant, I'd fall asleep. And Report an error in the passage at 30:16
30:29 there's a lot to get indignant about when you look around. You know, in the world there's a lot of unfairness and injustice and all kinds of things that shouldn't happen and are bad and wrong. And that we can just create this very powerful emotion. Report an error in the passage at 30:29
30:55 Jealousy, another one. There's a kind of greed, isn't it? To really want something that somebody else has or to feel, to be jealous of someone else because they are better or better looking or have more or have higher status than what you have. That's another powerful, very passionate feeling. And fear. Fear is very strong kind of personal experience, isn't it? Report an error in the passage at 30:55
31:30 To be frightened. People... We'll go to these horror films, won't they, to be frightened. Because when you're frightened, you feel alive. When you're full of greed and lust and anger and indignation, you feel alive. And when these passions have subsided, what's left, if you're not mindful and awake through meditation, all you do is feel dull and torporous or just anxious and restless and agitated. Report an error in the passage at 31:30
32:03 Or just depressed and doubtful and uncertain and despairing. And this is a kind of plateau of where, say, in reflecting on the results of your practice, when you're actually watching how your mind, what is actually happening in you, in your mind, you can pinpoint these very feelings. Report an error in the passage at 32:03
32:36 You can observe. You can say, there is this feeling. I feel dull. I don't have any interest anymore. I'm bored with everything. When I sit in meditation, I just fall asleep. I'm just going through the motions. I can't feel inspired by anything. I get depressed and dull and bored. I just feel anxious. Restless and I worry and feel anxious about everything. So these are what we call the five hindrances. Report an error in the passage at 32:36
33:13 These are the last three hindrances. The first two hindrances are greed and hatred. The last three are dullness and sleepiness, restlessness and agitation and doubt. Report an error in the passage at 33:13
33:33 Now, the last three, even if they're boring and uninteresting defilements, but they are subtle. Because in order to understand them, you have to accept them and study them, investigate them as they are, rather than just trying to get inspired or getting angry or just following an impulse for some kind of distraction. Report an error in the passage at 33:33
34:06 You have to, with the commitment to the holy life, to the practice of the dharma, then you will have that reminder, that encouragement, that direct pointing at this kind of dreary plane, this plateau. Report an error in the passage at 34:06
34:28 And on that plateau it takes great skill to really be mindful of it and to understand it and see it for what it is. Because You're dealing very much with the subtlety of feeling and mood that you're easily caught into, easily caught up into it, or reacting to it. Report an error in the passage at 34:28
35:00 Now to get excited, to get excited is one way out of it. To feel indignant, romance is a way out of it. Have an interesting relationship, what they call romance these days, to be indignant. Report an error in the passage at 35:00
35:22 Or to just take drugs and drink to go out and have a good time, to stimulate yourself, your body, so that you're just experiencing pleasure and excitement. Report an error in the passage at 35:22
35:39 But for meditation... We don't recommend that. In fact, the idea of the eight precepts alone, when people take the eight precepts, they say, I will refrain from dancing, singing, going to shows, playing sports, all kinds of exciting competitive games, dressing up to be attractive and to stimulate desires in others. Report an error in the passage at 35:39
36:11 To go out and just indulge in food and all the pleasures of the senses. We say in the eight precepts that that is renounced. Report an error in the passage at 36:11
36:25 So when I give those eight precepts to people I say this particular precept means that you can't have any more fun. Fun is not allowed in the holy life. I'm just being facetious actually. We're using that word because Report an error in the passage at 36:25
36:43 What we're saying is that we are encouraging you not to distract yourself when the going gets boring. When you find yourself on the plateau and you're just feeling negative and bored and dull by that, by being on that plateau, it's very natural to want to have a good time, have some fun. Report an error in the passage at 36:43
37:19 But when we're committed to the holy life, then we say, I will refrain from that. Doesn't mean we always want to refrain from it. Much of the time we don't want to refrain from it, but we have made that commitment. And when we make a commitment like that, then that sticks in the mind, so that even though we might... Report an error in the passage at 37:19
37:45 We find ourselves inclining to do the things that would distract us. We're determined not to follow that so that we will look more closely, more directly at the way it is now, the way we're feeling now, the mood that we're in now, the feeling of dullness itself or sleepiness. We'll look at just the feeling of restlessness and agitation, physical or mental. Report an error in the passage at 37:45
38:16 We'll look at the doubt and uncertainty that we might be experiencing. Am I doing the right thing? Is this life really meant for me? Is this the right teacher? Is this the right path? Am I capable of being enlightened? Am I... There's a doubt about yourself, doubt about the religion, doubt about the Buddha, Dhammasanga, doubt. Report an error in the passage at 38:16
38:41 Whatever the doubt is, you begin to investigate that very... That feeling, that mood, that experience of uncertainty and doubt. And to be able to do that means that you have to commit yourself to it because it's something that in its subtlety we can dismiss and overlook by distracting ourselves into something that is exciting or inspiring or entertaining. Report an error in the passage at 38:41
39:13 The Report an error in the passage at 39:13
39:22 commitment then carries us through that valley. I Report an error in the passage at 39:22
39:31 thought that was a very accurate description of a religious experience, where you get very high on inspiration. And interesting companions and all dedicated to the noblest goals that human beings can possibly think of. And then all that falls away. In the book, Journey to the East, H.H. is so caught up with the most fascinating pilgrims on this religious journey. And they're all terribly gifted, dedicated. Report an error in the passage at 39:31
40:26 dedicated and Types of people, from Mozart to even famous people from the past. And then, of course, they all disappear, leaving him in this valley of morbidio inferiori, which he doesn't handle very well, actually, in the book. He botches it up. He Report an error in the passage at 40:26
40:56 doesn't stay. He doesn't go through the valley. He gets out of it as quickly as possible. What Report an error in the passage at 40:56
41:06 I recommend is staying in the valley. Report an error in the passage at 41:06
41:11 Because then one can contemplate that, that very, that negativity, the subtlety of it, until you realize that it is impermanent, it's anicca dukhanata, it is not self, it's merely an appearance, an illusion of the mind, and it falls away. So when you let things go, when you allow things to go their natural course, Then you have the insight, the full insight into the dhamma, the way things are, that whatever is subject to arising is subject to ceasing and is not self, is anattā. Report an error in the passage at 41:11
41:58 As long as you depend on inspiration on arising with things and attach to that arising, that increases the sense of the self. Me, I'm on this journey, I am... A religious seeker. I am going to get enlightened. I am, and so this is all very beautiful in a way, but just the attachment to the arising side of the religious life, the inspiring, inspiration of religion, actually increases the sense of me and mine. Report an error in the passage at 41:58
42:39 And therefore, when it goes down, the valley of morbidia inferiori then you then you start thinking I am I've been wasting my time. I am not getting anywhere. I am incapable and so forth. Because before you're going to be the first Ajahn, first enlightened being in UK, then by the time you're in the valley of Morbidio Inferior you feel that you'll be the last. Report an error in the passage at 42:39
43:17 British enlightened being. Probably even behind the last blade of grass. Because when you're depressed, it even seems like the grass has a better chance than you. To Report an error in the passage at 43:17
43:48 know yourself also means that you have to know the kind of how you tend to do things. Because commitment can mean a kind of... It can be an ideal that you're very fond of, but it also can be done very stupidly, so that you commit yourself to things that are not, say, based on truth, or even if they are, you're committed to the ideal more than to the actual realization of truth. Report an error in the passage at 43:48
44:26 It may be a loyalty or devotion. That is lacking in wisdom. Report an error in the passage at 44:26
44:36 In Britain, for example, I've seen Buddhists do this, where they get very committed to a technique of meditation or to a teacher. Report an error in the passage at 44:36
44:49 And the teacher tells them everything, what to do, where they can go, who they can see. Tells them, is always kind of... Very, very strict and telling them exactly what is right and wrong. And people get committed to that way of practice. And because of that, they don't see how their mind works. They tend to form a cult or a sect, a religious sect. Report an error in the passage at 44:49
45:27 This happens in Buddhism also. It happens here in Britain. I remember when we first came to Britain, there was a group. Meditators who practice Vipassanā, they were so dedicated to their method and their teacher that they regarded any other method or any other teacher as something that they should have nothing to do with. Report an error in the passage at 45:27
45:54 So that in regards to the monks, they felt that they should have nothing to do with the monks because we didn't practice their method or didn't look to their teacher. Report an error in the passage at 45:54
46:06 So that they were very loyal. To their teacher and to their method. But they didn't see the attachment to the teacher and the method either. They just grasped hold of this. And therefore they depended very much on the teacher telling them what's right and wrong, what they can do, what they can't do. Report an error in the passage at 46:06
46:40 Now in awakening the human mind, I mean, that's one level of practice to keep you as a child where I'm the father or the mother and you're the children. Then I tell you what you should do, what you shouldn't do. And then I tell you where you are, whether you're a good girl or a bad boy, whatever. Report an error in the passage at 46:40
47:09 And then you look to me always in that relationship of, say, a father figure. A child to a father. But in developing the Buddha Dharma, you see, it's a growing up beyond that relationship. Even though there's a convention and a way of relating that is to respect from junior to senior, from lay person to monk or nun and so forth. Report an error in the passage at 47:09
47:47 These are... Encourage, the forms of respect, conventional respect are encouraged. They're not to be fixations or convey any form of grasping. Report an error in the passage at 47:47
48:02 They can be reflection. Report an error in the passage at 48:02
48:07 For example, here in Anamavati, what I try to get the monks and the nuns to do is to reflect on why they regard me being the head monk, being the abbot, rather than just a kind of blind adherent. or loyalty I would rather they actually look at any doubts or attachments or reactions to an authority figure or to someone in my position or to someone with my character or personality. Report an error in the passage at 48:07
48:46 Because this isn't the only place. And then they have to go to Chitur. They've got Ajahn and Ando. It's a very different kind of character. Report an error in the passage at 48:46
48:59 And then they go to Harnam, up to Northumberland, where Ajahn Prabhakar, very different kind of character. And then to Devon, Kittisar, different type of character. So if you're just reacting to character or personality, or whether you feel inspired or like or dislike the particular senior monk, and then you're just going to compare, say, if you're attached to me as your ideal, then... Report an error in the passage at 48:59
49:29 If you go to Chiturst or Harnam or Devon, then you'll compare the head monks with me, usually to their disadvantage, if you're attached to me. Report an error in the passage at 49:29
49:45 And so, I mean, this is a human failing, isn't it? We don't see this in ourselves. We think this is the right way, and then we compare every other teacher with that. But that's not what I'm encouraging at all. But to see that tendency, to see that the loyalty or love that one might have for a particular month is all right, there's nothing wrong with it, but to know it for what it is rather than to blindly grasp that and bind yourself to your perception. Report an error in the passage at 49:45
50:21 Because then you can see how to free yourself from just being a disciple. For the rest of your life, just following a teacher, where you actually learn how to grow up and be a liberated, enlightened human being, is what the Buddha's teachings are about. It's for maturing, it's for developing the human being into a mature and wise, enlightened being, rather than just a loyal but very dependent. Report an error in the passage at 50:21
51:23 you don't go anywhere else. You don't have anything to do with the Tibetans or Zen or the Mohammedans or the Christians or anything else other forms of Theravāda. You don't have anything to do with the Report an error in the passage at 51:23
51:39 Burmese Mahathir Sayadaw, or you don't do anything to do with the Sri Lankans, or whatever, these teachers and that. That is because they say they're all good, they're all just as good, we're not disparaging any of them, but if you're going to develop, you have to stay with this one. Report an error in the passage at 51:39
52:03 Well, I can see the point of that in some ways, that you have to stay with something, yes. Report an error in the passage at 52:03
52:12 But you also need to understand the grasping that goes on with staying. So I don't particularly worry about it. I don't make a problem here about other teachers or traditions or things like this because I mainly would rather, I mean I see that the real problem with human, that human ignorance comes from grasping. Report an error in the passage at 52:12
52:40 And so grasping even the idea that you have to stay here, All the time they have nothing to do with the rest of them. That makes you a very rigid sectarian kind of person. And that's not liberation, is it? One becomes very fixed and narrow and blinkered by one's attachment. Report an error in the passage at 52:40
53:11 To say you should do everything. You should go and practice Tibetan pujas. You should go sit with the Zen. You should do the... I don't recommend that either. But it's just a matter of really... Determining what particularly form do you find something where you feel attracted, you feel where faith arises, something where you feel an interest and a respect, and trust in that then, to follow that, but Report an error in the passage at 53:11
54:19 not to make a problem about other ways. One can learn. In my own life, I started out with Zen. When I was in the Navy, I became interested in reading Zen books on Zen. Report an error in the passage at 54:19
54:41 And the Zen books all said that Theravāda was an inferior form of meditation, an inferior form of Buddhism. And I used to love to read Aldous Huxley. And in his book, Perennial Philosophy, he really put down Theravāda Buddhism as absolutely hopeless form of Buddhism that hadn't produced any enlightened beings since the Buddha. Report an error in the passage at 54:41
55:10 So I had a prejudice against Theravāda Buddhism from that. But then I found myself in Southeast Asia in 1964 where there wasn't anything but Theravāda Buddhism. Report an error in the passage at 55:10
55:29 And so I started... I met a Chinese, I was in Malaysia, so I was a Chinese teacher. I was a school teacher, and this Chinese friend was a school teacher, and he was a Buddhist from Penang. And so he and I used to talk dharma, have dharma discussions. And so he aroused my interest in Theravāda. So he said, why don't you write to the World Publication Society in Sri Lanka? Report an error in the passage at 55:29
56:00 I wrote to them. They sent me packages of little leaflets, books on Theravāda. And from there, and then going to Thailand, I decided, well, Thailand is certainly a nice country. And I used to think, I was planning to go to Japan, and I thought, well, I remember Japan being a very, very cold country. Report an error in the passage at 56:00
56:27 The winters in Japan were horrendous. So I thought, maybe you can, practice in this nice, warm... Report an error in the passage at 56:27
56:36 And then through actually pursuing it, committing myself to it, of finding, beginning to really appreciate it. Report an error in the passage at 56:36
57:06 To feel tremendous respect and love for the tradition, which doesn't, which doesn't, this love and respect for the Theravāda form is not a put-down of any other Buddhist tradition. It doesn't mean that I have, I regard any other form as less. But like something, like an old friend, like something you know well, you feel comfortable with it. Report an error in the passage at 57:06
57:36 With the Theravāda form, I feel comfortable with it. It's what I know, what I have used. So this is what I teach through the Theravāda school, because it's like a musical instrument. If you learn to play the piano, then you teach somebody else how to do it. You can't very well teach them how to play the violin. Report an error in the passage at 57:36
57:59 It Report an error in the passage at 57:59
58:03 doesn't mean pianos are better than violins, does it? It just means that... This is the one you know how to play. So this is the music of the Theravāda instrument. Report an error in the passage at 58:03
58:19 So I'll end my talk now, the formal part. If you'll take a short break, a five-minute break, then come back, then I'll open the remaining time up for questions. Report an error in the passage at 58:19
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Talk by Ajahn Sumedho. Original at Amaravati Buddhist Monastery via Internet Archive: https://archive.org/details/ajahn-sumedho-dhamma-talks. Licensed CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Transcript generated automatically and may contain errors; the audio is the authoritative version.
Talks of Ajahn Sumedho, archived on Internet Archive. More from Amaravati