Before the Movie starts – AM Reflection

0:09 Reflecting on the here and now, dhamma, timeless, santidiko, akaliko, dhamma. So it's not finding anything, it's recognizing. When you're looking for akalika, dhamma, timeless, then you've grasped the idea of timelessness, the concept, and then you're looking for something. Report an error in the passage at 0:09 Highlight the passage at 0:09

0:46 ...influenced by grasping a concept. Report an error in the passage at 0:46 Highlight the passage at 0:46

0:54 And so this is how we trick ourselves into endlessly seeking and searching, trying to find something, the truth or reality or God or Nibbāna or whatever. We get the idea, we grasp the words, the perceptions, and then we try to look for something that we think is... ...fits that perception. Report an error in the passage at 0:54 Highlight the passage at 0:54

1:28 So like the question now in modern society, the Anglican Church dealing with lack of faith and then, you know, the question of existence of God or that these are, you know, we grasp these ideas of God. Report an error in the passage at 1:28 Highlight the passage at 1:28

1:54 Christians generally say, do you believe in God? And then... He said, yes or no. But do you know that? Do you know God? Are you aware of what you think God is? Report an error in the passage at 1:54 Highlight the passage at 1:54

2:14 Or that you don't believe in God? Believing or not believing in God is the same thing. The problem still exists. Report an error in the passage at 2:14 Highlight the passage at 2:14

2:24 Because if you don't believe in God, then it means you don't believe in what the church... Report an error in the passage at 2:24 Highlight the passage at 2:24

2:58 then you try to find that or You haven't really observed the grasping of the concept, but you come from the concept itself, from the grasping process, without awareness of what you're doing. Report an error in the passage at 2:58 Highlight the passage at 2:58

3:17 So, like awareness then, the Buddha, instead of pointing to believing or disbelieving in God, the Buddha used The noble truth rather than metaphysical dogma. So this is why for people of theistic religions find Buddhism such an anomaly, such a strange thing. You know, doubt its even validity as a religion. But the Buddha is going to take something that's quite banal, ordinary to every human being. Report an error in the passage at 3:17 Highlight the passage at 3:17

4:02 Dukkha or suffering and then exploring suffering, investigating it. So it's not something you believe in, it's something you recognize. Right now I feel unhappy or discontented or depressed or lost or anxious or worried or ill at ease or whatever mild or severe forms it might take. It's not esoteric or mystical or subtle. It's ordinary. Report an error in the passage at 4:02 Highlight the passage at 4:02

4:47 It's not something I believe in because I can see it. I know when I'm suffering, when I'm unhappy, when I'm angry, upset, confused, anxious, worried, self-conscious, frightened, and all like that. I know there's a knowing of it. It's not a kind of... that I have to have special conditions in order to see. Report an error in the passage at 4:47 Highlight the passage at 4:47

5:26 But when you're using terms like God, then that tends to, that word itself in English is an English word. Report an error in the passage at 5:26 Highlight the passage at 5:26

5:39 It brings up all kinds of associations. A child's vision of God, old man, white beard up in the sky to, you know, a more kind of, mystical form of love or whatever. And in Christianity, of course, it's personified. Report an error in the passage at 5:39 Highlight the passage at 5:39

6:03 So you get this sense of being somebody or a person. God loves me. And this is a sense of I'm separate. I'm the inferior one. God is the superior one. And I need God's love. This is... Report an error in the passage at 6:03 Highlight the passage at 6:03

6:24 You know, it's called humility. But it still can be a form of sakya ditti, isn't it? Report an error in the passage at 6:24 Highlight the passage at 6:24

6:35 Because it's based on a sense of I am this person with these faults, these problems, and I need God's help and God's love to guide me and help me, to love me and make me feel safe. Report an error in the passage at 6:35 Highlight the passage at 6:35

6:57 These are all words. And they can, you know, they have a different effect on some people. It can be comforting or irritating, depends on the individual. Report an error in the passage at 6:57 Highlight the passage at 6:57

7:12 I know when born again, Christians come up to me and say, with great intensity looking into my eyes saying, God loves you, you know. I feel irritated by it. It doesn't inspire me. But some people might find that very comforting. You know, as I... This is where, you know, where I'm not saying that I shouldn't feel this way or that somebody that feels comforted by such a statement shouldn't feel that way, but I'm just noting the way it is. Report an error in the passage at 7:12 Highlight the passage at 7:12

7:54 There is the unborn, uncreated, unformed, unconditioned. There is Report an error in the passage at 7:54 Highlight the passage at 7:54

8:10 a statement, but it's... It has no personal quality. You can't make a person out of the unborn, uncreated, formed, unconditioned. There's no way you can create anything out of that. Report an error in the passage at 8:10 Highlight the passage at 8:10

8:25 But it does affect, you know, we tend to just see it in terms of abstract thinking, the unborn. But, you know, what is that? You know, it leaves them, you know, I can't imagine. I can't create images of the unborn. I can create celestial images of God and angels and Brahma deities and Devadas and Bodhisattvas, saints. Report an error in the passage at 8:25 Highlight the passage at 8:25

9:05 I can create, you know, I've got quite good ability to create fantasies or images in my mind. And even coming from Christian I can easily form views about God, create images of God in my mind, or Report an error in the passage at 9:05 Highlight the passage at 9:05

9:31 even see it, you know, reflect on it more with abstract language, philosophically or metaphysically, you know, so it's more, it isn't so coarse as an old man, white beard up in the sky kind of God or Santa Claus or anything like that. It's more sophisticated. Report an error in the passage at 9:31 Highlight the passage at 9:31

9:53 More abstract than that. But when it comes to the unborn, uncreated, just observing, reflecting, the negation of everything that begins and ends, isn't it? Report an error in the passage at 9:53 Highlight the passage at 9:53

10:13 Unborn, uncreated, unformed, unconditioned. Well, that doesn't leave any space for imagination. You can't imagine it. Report an error in the passage at 10:13 Highlight the passage at 10:13

10:31 So this is knowing, isn't it? I'm just encouraging you to explore consciousness right now. This is what I've found out, sharing this knowledge with you. Report an error in the passage at 10:31 Highlight the passage at 10:31

10:48 Then the Buddha used terms like nibbāna, anattā. So they're negations too. They leave nothing left. There's nothing left you can imagine. You know, we tend, it's easy to imagine nibbāna as kind of... Happiness forever or something. But it's a better place than heaven. We can even create absurdities like better than best. Report an error in the passage at 10:48 Highlight the passage at 10:48

11:18 Things like this. Total grammatical absurdities. Nibbāna is better than Christian heaven. Report an error in the passage at 11:18 Highlight the passage at 11:18

11:30 I've heard Buddhists say this. Christians only take you to the day of our realms. But Buddhism takes you to... The true heaven, the highest, we're better than they are, kind of. And then the Christians can say, well, like the Pope, the present Pope Benedict, when he was Cardinal Ratzinger, his views about Buddhism was it's kind of auto-erotic. Report an error in the passage at 11:30 Highlight the passage at 11:30

12:05 It's an interesting take on it, isn't it? You kind of get the idea of, Something, you know, transcendent, but it's not real like Christianity. So it's like a one-upmanship, you know, ours is better than yours. Well that's the thinking process, isn't it? Thought does that. Thinking is best, good, better, best, bad, worse, worst. Report an error in the passage at 12:05 Highlight the passage at 12:05

12:35 It's the hierarchical structures. Because it's linear. You can't transcend. There's no transcendence in clinging to thoughts. You can create an idea of transcendence. But the reality of transcendence is intuitive. It's not about transcendence being higher than what you're transcending. Report an error in the passage at 12:35 Highlight the passage at 12:35

13:07 So this is where Sati Sampachanya... Satipanya, these words, Pāli words, quite useful concepts to use for investigation. Report an error in the passage at 13:07 Highlight the passage at 13:07

13:28 So investigating language and thinking, you know, it depends on memory. It's sannyasankara. So sannyasankara is memories and then the thinking process, emotion, emotional habits. And so... The sense of I am, just this simple grammatical statement, I am, is a concept. Report an error in the passage at 13:28 Highlight the passage at 13:28

14:03 And it can be stated as just an assertion of presence. I am, you know, I'm here, I am. It's not personal yet, is it? Report an error in the passage at 14:03 Highlight the passage at 14:03

14:19 Just a statement of presence, which is true. And I am Ajahn Sumedho, then it's defining. This I am is this being here. Report an error in the passage at 14:19 Highlight the passage at 14:19

14:36 Now when you're recognizing, begin to realize pure consciousness before you create anything into it. Pure presence. As long as you try to figure it out and think about it, you can fool yourself, delude yourself, or deny it's a possibility, or try to... Find all kinds of scriptural proofs or definitions. Report an error in the passage at 14:36 Highlight the passage at 14:36

15:13 But this is why I'm encouraging you to trust your own ability to reflect rather than always see yourself as somebody who has to depend on what others say, what others tell you, or what scriptural authority says. Report an error in the passage at 15:13 Highlight the passage at 15:13

15:30 And so this is like an empowerment when you take the refuges of Buddha's Dhammasanga. Report an error in the passage at 15:30 Highlight the passage at 15:30

15:40 Because on a personal level, I could get it all wrong, couldn't I? I have personal tendencies, preferences, different cultural influences, generation gap, masculinity, age, character tendency. All these could influence my thinking process and how I interpret and experience life. Report an error in the passage at 15:40 Highlight the passage at 15:40

16:14 Being American. Being a cultural background, being brought up in Christian family, all these, you know, the cultural conditioning that I've received from birth has been very much influenced by Christianity and Western civilization, modern science, psychology, Christianity and Judaism, Greek and Roman culture. Report an error in the passage at 16:14 Highlight the passage at 16:14

16:54 Idealism, American idealism. This is how the conditioning of the mind has all these different habit tendencies, ways of looking, perceiving. Report an error in the passage at 16:54 Highlight the passage at 16:54

17:10 I'm older than most of you, or all of you probably. So a different generation. Report an error in the passage at 17:10 Highlight the passage at 17:10

17:22 That has its influence on how I perceive or interpret experience. But outside of that, before any of that come and go and change, but that which is constant, unchanging, continuous, is a consciousness. Through all the personal views and opinions, fears and desires and so forth, they all arise and cease in consciousness. Report an error in the passage at 17:22 Highlight the passage at 17:22

17:52 Consciousness is like the screen. On a movie, isn't it, the images change, but the screen is always there. The light allows the images to be seen on the screen. This is getting back to the reality of the here and now before the movie starts, before the drama, before the I am and me and mine arise and cease on the screen. Report an error in the passage at 17:52 Highlight the passage at 17:52

18:33 In contemplation, there's five khandhat teachings, Rūpa, Vedanā, Sannyasa and Karavinyana. This is an expedient way the Buddha used to investigate reality here and now. Self, the sense of yourself, sakya-ditti, sīla-bhata-bhara-masa, vichy-kecha. These are how you create your sense of individuality, of separateness. Report an error in the passage at 18:33 Highlight the passage at 18:33

19:02 Sense of yourself as a separate... This body is me. I'm a separate body from you. And this is sannyasankara, isn't it? I'm identifying with my body. And it is separate from your body. So, you know, it's not telling a lie. It's not a delusion. But the ignorance is that I identify with it. My body is separate from yours. The sense of me, I'm the body. Report an error in the passage at 19:02 Highlight the passage at 19:02

19:35 And you're somebody else. Now, on a conventional level, this is all right. But it tends to bind us to this illusion of separateness. The separateness is our experience of life. You and me. Of something opposed. Something threatening me. Something separate. And even in forming relationships with other individuals. Report an error in the passage at 19:35 Highlight the passage at 19:35

20:06 The sense of our self depends on the presence of the other person, of feeling safe or loved by the presence of somebody else. Report an error in the passage at 20:06 Highlight the passage at 20:06

20:22 Because we've not explored or investigated dharma. We merely operate from the conventional realities, the emotional world that we create. Report an error in the passage at 20:22 Highlight the passage at 20:22

20:38 So our emotions are very real to us. How I feel is my reality. Report an error in the passage at 20:38 Highlight the passage at 20:38

20:51 Like in monastic life, there is a sense of loneliness because you can't form, say, intimate relationships in the way you can when you're as a layperson. Report an error in the passage at 20:51 Highlight the passage at 20:51

21:11 Physically intimate or emotionally intimate relationships with somebody else. And this is not conducive. form for that kind of relationship. Report an error in the passage at 21:11 Highlight the passage at 21:11

21:31 So, you know, you do feel lonely. You blame it on a monastic life, or you can blame it on yourself, just saying you're not, you just can't find anybody you can trust or really give yourself to. You know, there's all kinds of melodramas around this, great tragedies. Dramas are created around the love relationship between human beings, individuals. Report an error in the passage at 21:31 Highlight the passage at 21:31

22:13 So all this is, repeat, is not a criticism. I was pointing it out. The point of brahmacharya then, of celibacy, is not some kind of sense of we're superior to people who aren't celibate or we're pure. I mean, we can become conceited and arrogant. Sakya Ditti. He can create celibate life, brahmacharya life, as something makes me feel better than people who aren't. Report an error in the passage at 22:13 Highlight the passage at 22:13

22:50 Or it can make me feel frustrated and lonely because, you know, I'm celibate but lonely. Now, in reflecting on this, this ability to observe doubt about celibacy, Or attachment to it. The way the ego can become, you know, increase your sense of self-importance and being better because you're chaste, you're celibate. Report an error in the passage at 22:50 Highlight the passage at 22:50

23:25 You don't indulge in vulgar sexual activities with others. And one can become quite unpleasantly arrogant about being holier than thou. This is one of the problems in religious... Report an error in the passage at 23:25 Highlight the passage at 23:25

23:53 best, this is the best, this is purer, vulgar, worse, disgusting, that's inspiring. And so we go on and on into the perceptual realms that we create, which which is the best and which is the worst. Notice, With awareness that it's not about best and worst or higher than. It's so ordinary, so simple that it doesn't have anything you can grasp. Report an error in the passage at 23:53 Highlight the passage at 23:53

24:27 There's nothing to grasp. That's why we miss it. Because we're used to grasping. Our nature is to grasp. We're conditioned to grasp things. Trying to get, trying to get rid of, control, resist. Report an error in the passage at 24:27 Highlight the passage at 24:27

24:53 It's nothing. Mindfulness, sati sambhajanya. It's not a state you create. It's the simple reality of paying attention here and now, of recognizing, realizing, rather than trying to find anything. Report an error in the passage at 24:53 Highlight the passage at 24:53

25:19 And so the thinking mind can't grasp this. It doesn't make sense on the conceptual level. The unborn, uncreated... Report an error in the passage at 25:19 Highlight the passage at 25:19

25:31 Unformed, unconditioned. So if we don't recognize this, then we tend to just manipulate the conditions, rearrange the furniture in the room. That's what we do with life, is just try to spend our time rearranging the furniture, changing the conditions. Or, the Buddha teaching is pointing to, not to the furniture or the conditions, but to the space. Report an error in the passage at 25:31 Highlight the passage at 25:31

26:04 To consciousness. Report an error in the passage at 26:04 Highlight the passage at 26:04

26:08 Now consciousness then is, you don't create that. Whether you feel fulfilled or lonely, separate or one, or you feel like you're the best or the worst, or whatever, consciousness is the same, isn't it? Consciousness is not wonderful and fantastic. Report an error in the passage at 26:08 Highlight the passage at 26:08

26:35 It's ordinary. It's now. It's not... Absolutely fantastic. It's just not noticed because it doesn't have any quality that grabs our attention. Where emotionally, you know, you might be feeling absolutely fantastic and then that's a wonderful feeling and it's better than feeling depressed and worried about life. Report an error in the passage at 26:35 Highlight the passage at 26:35

27:02 To feel absolutely fantastic is better, isn't it, than feeling depressed and worried. Report an error in the passage at 27:02 Highlight the passage at 27:02

27:14 To feel a purpose and meaning to your life is better than feeling that there's no meaning. Life is a joke and it's just got to put up with it. It's better feeling than the other. These are qualities that we can see in ourselves. Sometimes we can feel blissed out, absolutely fantastic or depressed. Anxious, worried. And we can compare. One is better than the other. That's fair enough. These are forms, conditions, depending on other conditions. Report an error in the passage at 27:14 Highlight the passage at 27:14

27:55 To feel absolutely fantastic, you have to have the conditions for that. You know, where everything is just wonderful and everything's going your way and so forth. The conditions support that beautiful feeling. Report an error in the passage at 27:55 Highlight the passage at 27:55

28:17 And then we can talk about better and worse and the best and the worst. And this is the created, the born, the created, the form, the condition. Report an error in the passage at 28:17 Highlight the passage at 28:17

28:37 But the unborn, uncreated, unformed, unconditioned, now this is what I call intuitive awareness. You recognize it. And to recognize this, You know, you're not trying to annihilate the conditions, but just let go of them. Release this obsessive attachment and identity with the condition, with feelings, with the body, with the sense of self, with views and opinions. Report an error in the passage at 28:37 Highlight the passage at 28:37

29:14 It's not getting rid of it. It's not suicide. It's just releasing this obsessive grasping around the conditions. Like relaxing. Releasing is not a destructive act. It's not because I hate the conditioned realm and I'm going to destroy the world. Report an error in the passage at 29:14 Highlight the passage at 29:14

29:33 Because that's still the self, isn't it? I think the unconditioned is my refuge and I'm going to destroy all the conditions. Report an error in the passage at 29:33 Highlight the passage at 29:33

29:44 It's idiocy. The conditions are the way they are. Some are absolutely fantastic and others are absolutely horrible. They can go from one extreme to the next. Praise and blame, happiness and suffering, success and failure, true and false, good and bad, right and wrong, high and low, heaven and hell. All these are words that describe qualities, forms, conditions, the born, the created, the formed, the conditioned. Report an error in the passage at 29:44 Highlight the passage at 29:44

30:29 But the unconditioned, The sound of silence is noticing it. Report an error in the passage at 30:29 Highlight the passage at 30:29

30:49 Now I use that as synonymous to pure consciousness. Not because I have some kind of doctrinal position to take, but because it works for me. Report an error in the passage at 30:49 Highlight the passage at 30:49

31:01 I'm not trying to make some pronouncement about it, but merely it's purely practical and functional. I Report an error in the passage at 31:01 Highlight the passage at 31:01

31:10 Noticing this sound of silence, because now it's so obvious, so easy for me. Report an error in the passage at 31:10 Highlight the passage at 31:10

31:24 You know, the sense of loneliness drops away, or the habit tendencies. Sakya didi fila bhattabharamasa. Report an error in the passage at 31:24 Highlight the passage at 31:24

31:40 But I'm still conscious. There's still an alert. There's an alertness, a presence here and now. It's real presence. It's not a kind of blissed-out state where I'm no longer functional. I'm so high that I can't even put on my own socks anymore. Report an error in the passage at 31:40 Highlight the passage at 31:40

32:05 In fact, it allows me perspective on practical things, on putting on the robes or eating the food or whatever. It's not a high state where I'm beyond the vulgar activities of daily life. Report an error in the passage at 32:05 Highlight the passage at 32:05

32:24 I'm too good for... Eating food or gross activities. I'm living in a higher realm than the rest of you. This includes everything. The vulgar, the gross, the refined. And it's very discerning. It's possible. Discernment or panya comes from this. And brahmaviharas come from this. Report an error in the passage at 32:24 Highlight the passage at 32:24

32:55 And you try to develop brahmaviharas from the ego level. You know, it's certainly better than trying to develop bad qualities on the ego level. Report an error in the passage at 32:55 Highlight the passage at 32:55

33:07 You know, I encourage people to practice mettā and compassion, even if it's coming from sakya-diti, because at least it's better than developing destructive, mean, nasty, selfish, violent. Report an error in the passage at 33:07 Highlight the passage at 33:07

33:32 hatred towards others and that. It's better than that. But in terms of the reality of Brahmavihara, these are non-personals. I'm somebody with a lot of mettā or a lot of karuṇā. But these are called divine abodes or states of purity that when there is mindfulness, then our relationship to the condition is through Mettā Karuṇā Muditā Upekas, rather than through liking, disliking, and approving, disapproving, on the conditioned level. Report an error in the passage at 33:32 Highlight the passage at 33:32

34:20 Proving of good behavior, obeying the rules, keeping the laws, performing your duties, being a good sport, being on time, keeping yourself clean, brushing your teeth. This is all praiseworthy and how we should be rather than lazy, dirty, sloppy, unclean, and things like this. This is not praiseworthy. And society, you create problems in the society where people don't want to be around you if you smell bad and are sloppy and vulgar and unpleasant. Report an error in the passage at 34:20 Highlight the passage at 34:20

35:18 So discerning, you know, knowing the world as the world, and discerning the unconditioned reality of here and now, once there's a confidence from this kind of knowing, then your relationship to the vipakakama of your life, the body that you have, the emotional habits that you've developed, your thoughts, Views, opinions, memories, tendencies, inclinations, good, bad, right, wrong, whatever. We see them now not in terms of value judgments and from the self-view of very hierarchical structure of the best to the worst. Report an error in the passage at 35:18 Highlight the passage at 35:18

36:10 We see them for what they are. Sape Sankarani Cha. Sape Tama Anattā. Report an error in the passage at 36:10 Highlight the passage at 36:10

36:22 So in this way, it is a kind of mettā practice, because mettā just is not judgmental, is it? Loving kindness, as we interpret it, is not something of, you know, when we do the formalities of loving kindness, it's not about spreading love and that to all the good things, good people, good beings, or spreading more to them than to the evil ones. Report an error in the passage at 36:22 Highlight the passage at 36:22

36:53 It's not about quantity or percentages. Who deserves my mettā? You know, who is it? What group of people deserve my mettā? And, you know, percentage-wise, how much should I spread to Buddhists and how much to Muslims? Report an error in the passage at 36:53 Highlight the passage at 36:53

37:16 Because I, you know, I'm a Buddhist, I should spread more, 90 % of the mettā to the Buddhists and only... 5 % to the Muslims? Report an error in the passage at 37:16 Highlight the passage at 37:16

37:31 Or the angels or the devils or whatever, you know. This is ridiculous. This is a joke, isn't it? Mettā Pauna isn't about approving, liking or disliking or judging who deserves and who doesn't. But it's recognizing. You know, it's a kind of uncritical... Acceptance of conditioned phenomena, regardless of its quality, good or bad, Report an error in the passage at 37:31 Highlight the passage at 37:31

38:07 its non-criticalness, non-preference, mettā-pawana. Report an error in the passage at 38:07 Highlight the passage at 38:07

38:20 On a personal level, ideally we can like the idea of unconditioned love, but on a personal level it's impossible. We like conditionally. When you confuse love with like, like is a condition. And when things aren't likable, you can't like them. Report an error in the passage at 38:20 Highlight the passage at 38:20

38:46 When things are unpleasant, mean, nasty, you can't like that. You can't approve of something that is not worthy of approval. Report an error in the passage at 38:46 Highlight the passage at 38:46

39:04 This is exploring the dualistic nature of language and thought. But then when you take the English word love and align it with mettā, then it isn't about liking or approving of anything. It's knowing. It's non-critical. It's not dividing and punishing and judgmental toward the devil or the criminals. Report an error in the passage at 39:04 Highlight the passage at 39:04

39:45 But it doesn't mean we like them either, personally. It doesn't mean we approve. But it's going to a different way of looking. It's not judging or criticizing. And to judge and criticize, you have to think. You have to give qualities, structures of the best to the worst. Report an error in the passage at 39:45 Highlight the passage at 39:45

40:10 This is not about best to the worst. Awareness includes. The gamut from the best to the worst. It's not excluding anything. Report an error in the passage at 40:10 Highlight the passage at 40:10

40:27 So that's only possible through awareness, through sustained awareness, through mindfulness, satisampacanya, satipanya. Because satipanya allows this individual being here, Ajahn Sumedho, to accept everything for what it is, acknowledging it's the way it is. Report an error in the passage at 40:27 Highlight the passage at 40:27

41:01 The conditions that I am experiencing through my emotional habit tendencies or memories or whatever my peculiarities are, my idiosyncrasies, my habits, my inclinations, good or bad, right or wrong, faults, virtues, because Report an error in the passage at 41:01 Highlight the passage at 41:01

41:29 this awareness is not personal, it's not Ajahn Sumedho. It's not... But it includes Ajahn Sumedho and everything else. So it's not kind of just dismissing Ajahn Sumedho as something, you know, some illusion that I can't be bothered with anymore. It includes all the illusions, fantasies, good, bad, indifferent qualities, conditions, whatever I'm experiencing, whatever happens to be arising and ceasing in consciousness. Report an error in the passage at 41:29 Highlight the passage at 41:29

42:07 But the acknowledgement, recognition of consciousness rather than being caught in my preferences for the conditions that I'm experiencing. Report an error in the passage at 42:07 Highlight the passage at 42:07

42:27 Now consciousness is not personal. So it is, in terms of the reality of this moment, it's universal because it includes everything. Report an error in the passage at 42:27 Highlight the passage at 42:27

42:41 Everything I can think of and all possibilities. Report an error in the passage at 42:41 Highlight the passage at 42:41

42:49 of everything I haven't thought of yet. And it's not something I have more of than you do or anything like that. If I start claiming it, personifying it, personalizing it, then I've lost it again. I'm back into the saṃsāra of self, sakya-diti. Report an error in the passage at 42:49 Highlight the passage at 42:49

43:19 So just notice, it's just this. It's nothing special. It's ordinary. Tamada. When Report an error in the passage at 43:19 Highlight the passage at 43:19

43:33 human beings don't know this, we create endless complicated problems. We become neurotic individuals, neurotic societies full of hatred, prejudice, violence, wars, exploitations, taking sides. Report an error in the passage at 43:33 Highlight the passage at 43:33

43:55 Developing weapons is what we do now, in that we use our intelligence to develop most of the money that's being spent on hideous weapons that destroy things, destroy other beings, other human beings, environmental conditions. Report an error in the passage at 43:55 Highlight the passage at 43:55

44:20 When we're caught in the condition realm, then we're in the realm of fear, because conditions are... They're so subject to different possibilities. And so there's fear. When you're aligned with the conditioned realm, then fear is the main problem with life. Report an error in the passage at 44:20 Highlight the passage at 44:20

44:43 Because even, you know, any kind of personal security or safety, there's always threat to it of some sort. And there's always something possible that can, you know, you can be a Devadana, a beautiful home, and then suddenly realize you've got cancer. Report an error in the passage at 44:43 Highlight the passage at 44:43

45:03 And then on a personal level, isn't it? You have thoroughbred horses, pedigree dogs, swimming pool, everything like a dharma realm. You don't have to go into the ugly parts of the country and see the poverty and ugliness. You can live in an ivory tower and still you can get cancer. Report an error in the passage at 45:03 Highlight the passage at 45:03

45:30 And if you don't get cancer, you still get old. And even if you're so wealthy, you could have formed the best cosmetic surgery. You know, you can only do so much of it, inevitably. It can create illusions that make you feel... But when we live in these illusions, there's always a fear of them being disillusioned, because that's always possible. Report an error in the passage at 45:30 Highlight the passage at 45:30

45:58 There's always a threat on the conditioned plane. That's its nature. Because it's changing and it's beyond control. So the only way out of that, there is an escape. Report an error in the passage at 45:58 Highlight the passage at 45:58

46:17 bika we ajak dang apu tang akatang asangkadang jay tang bika we apawisa ajak dang apu tang akatang asangkadang I don't know. Report an error in the passage at 46:17 Highlight the passage at 46:17

46:30 yi tang ja dasa buddhasa kadasa sangkadasa ni tsa nang panya yi tak. There is the unborn, uncreated, unformed, unconditioned. And because there is the unborn, uncreated, unformed, unconditioned, there is the escape from the born, the created, the formed, the conditioned. Report an error in the passage at 46:30 Highlight the passage at 46:30

47:03 We're not just helpless victims of the conditions we find ourselves with. So then this is the... This is where we get out of the fear-conditioned realm of change that we have no control over to the deathless, Amaravati, deathless realm, or Ajadang, Apudang, Akadang, Asangadang. There is the unborn, uncreated, unformed, unconditioned. And it's merely this. It's here and now. Report an error in the passage at 47:03 Highlight the passage at 47:03

47:46 Ajadang. To be experienced individually by the wise, you have to know it yourself. My words even can be obstructions if you just grasp words that I'm using. It's not for you to use my words, but what I'm saying is like pointing in a direction, to look in that direction, not look at my finger pointing. Report an error in the passage at 47:46 Highlight the passage at 47:46

48:19 Concentrated on me, but on the direction. So that direction is clearly stated in the morning chanting, apparent here and now, timeless, leading onwards, to be experienced individually by the wise, to be recognized. So again, this encouragement to... Use this time, this community retreat time, just for this kind of exploration. Keep at it. If you keep going, if you keep using it, keep reflecting, keep reminding yourself. Report an error in the passage at 48:19 Highlight the passage at 48:19

49:09 I've found over the years, now it's so strong, it's so stable in me. It's not like I'm... That's why I can talk like this, because it's something that's been tested. Report an error in the passage at 49:09 Highlight the passage at 49:09

49:24 Put to test, investigation, for a long time, as continuous as I can make it, through the vicissitudes of life, through the changing conditions of Saṅgha life, of living in Thailand, living in England, wherever, it doesn't matter. Report an error in the passage at 49:24 Highlight the passage at 49:24

49:49 It's who comes and goes, who ordains and who disrobes, and how conditions change. The developing or degeneration of conditioned phenomena, it doesn't matter really. Don't let any of that be the things that you attach to. Report an error in the passage at 49:49 Highlight the passage at 49:49

50:13 I remember years ago here in Amaravati, there was a woman who used to come here and she was saying that the saṅgha was going to fall apart and everybody was going to disrobe. Told me that. Report an error in the passage at 50:13 Highlight the passage at 50:13

50:37 And then, of course, Zanando ran away, and we had all kinds of unpleasant experiences from that time. Report an error in the passage at 50:37 Highlight the passage at 50:37

50:50 Now, what does that do? You know, say, to me, anyway, as someone who felt responsible for all this, that got it going, and was strongly, in many ways, identified with it all. Report an error in the passage at 50:50 Highlight the passage at 50:50

51:09 So it was an opportunity to reflect on that, on my own. Identity with this, with what I've been doing here, Amaravati Chiturst and Saṅgha life and monks and nuns that I ordained and the development and so forth and then it's kind of seemingly fall apart. Report an error in the passage at 51:09 Highlight the passage at 51:09

51:36 Seemed to go on, you know, like developing magnificently and then started falling apart. This determination to be aware of this rather than to be a tendency to be emotionally attached to the emotions of disappointment or blame. You know, something in me wanting to blame others for the degeneration or blame myself. Some lack in me, you know, something missing in me that couldn't kind of sustain this. Report an error in the passage at 51:36 Highlight the passage at 51:36

52:10 This progress and development, so people became disillusioned and left because of me, it was my fault, or somebody else's. Report an error in the passage at 52:10 Highlight the passage at 52:10

52:22 But through all this period, it was to observe this, because the ego, the Sakya Ditti, did come up very strongly through this period. But the relationship to Sakya Ditti was seeing it, observing it, receiving it. Report an error in the passage at 52:22 Highlight the passage at 52:22

52:41 And I had to really determine to do it because it was so believable, so emotionally fraught. Now how I could do that was through resting in this sound of silence because in this sound of silence I can, gives me a perspective on my own feelings, on my personal emotional feelings in the present that I can't have when I'm just merely trying to control emotions. Report an error in the passage at 52:41 Highlight the passage at 52:41

53:13 Or just follow them. Report an error in the passage at 53:13 Highlight the passage at 53:13

53:19 So, you know, this is where encouragement to use life here, your love of it, your disillusionment with it, your faith, confidence, when faith and confidence falls away, your trust and inspiration, your disillusionment, distrust, disappointment, all of it is conditioned phenomena that I encourage you to accept. Report an error in the passage at 53:19 Highlight the passage at 53:19

53:49 To see it in terms of dharma rather than letting even the strongest kind of emotional you're having in the present time to let it completely take you over and follow it. Report an error in the passage at 53:49 Highlight the passage at 53:49

54:03 It's not controlling the emotion. It's having perspective on emotional feelings in the present. So it's not a denial or a rejection. Report an error in the passage at 54:03 Highlight the passage at 54:03

54:14 It's being able to see it is what it is. Feeling... Despair and disillusionment is like this. Report an error in the passage at 54:14 Highlight the passage at 54:14

54:28 Feeling inspired is like this. Feeling worried about the saṅgha, about what's going to happen, what the future is like this. Report an error in the passage at 54:28 Highlight the passage at 54:28

54:44 So that if you train yourself using what happens in your life, individually or as a group, then this confidence... It comes to you just to become, you know, it's a certainty of knowing this is the dharma, no longer based on faith or inspiration or belief, but in awareness, in discernment, in panya. Report an error in the passage at 54:44 Highlight the passage at 54:44