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- 0:38
On a conventional level, we are the body. But what I'm pointing at is the body is a condition like a tree or a squirrel or a rat or a fish or whatever. And the consciousness, it's a conscious form. But consciousness is not... When we're born, when the body's born, it's conscious. So like a baby, a newborn baby is conscious and it's in a form.
- 3:24
So you learn, like they say in Buddhist terminology, we have our karma. I am the owner of my karma, heir to my karma, born of my karma, related to my karma, and so forth. What does that mean? It's a way of explaining our individual tendencies that we have to deal with in our lives.
- 8:54
So then like mindfulness... Mindfulness is the way that, now the Buddha pointed to mindfulness as the gate or the door to that oneness or dhamma or reality. To amatadhamma, to the deathless. There you go, the deathless. Amatapadam, the way to the deathless is through mindfulness.
- 9:51
And it's before you create yourself into it, before I am a meditation master arises into it. Before I am a male, I am American, I am this, that. Before any of that arises, before there's any thoughts, or even the emotions I might be feeling, you know, beyond that emotional feeling or energetic emotional experience, there's consciousness. So then I begin to say, well, this consciousness then
- 22:18
anything Or Mettā, the Brahma Bihara's work in that way. Mettā Karuṇā Muditā Upekkhā. So when you get to pure consciousness, it's not a cold kind of nothingness. It might sound like it on a conceptual level. Like just being mindful means you don't feel any emotions. You're just, you know, people praise you.
Transcript
0:00 Do you have any questions? Anything you want me to discuss? You Report an error in the passage at 0:00
0:12 said earlier that we are not the body. I find that very difficult to understand, especially in the context of your saying, it's from this point that we have consciousness. So if it is from this point that we have consciousness, then surely in some sense we are the body. Report an error in the passage at 0:12
0:34 ha. Report an error in the passage at 0:34
0:38 On a conventional level, we are the body. But what I'm pointing at is the body is a condition like a tree or a squirrel or a rat or a fish or whatever. And the consciousness, it's a conscious form. But consciousness is not... Report an error in the passage at 0:38
1:06 When we're born, when the body's born, it's conscious. So like a baby, a newborn baby is conscious and it's in a form. So it's experiencing consciousness through the limitation of its form. And then after a baby's born, then it's conditioned into identifying cultural, ethnic identities, ego, language, and so forth. Report an error in the passage at 1:06
1:37 It's programmed and conditioned after birth. So this is a reflection on consciousness. It's not culturally conditioned. It's functional. And that we're experiencing consciousness, but we tend to project into consciousness our identity. So like from the ego level, I say I am Ajahn Sumedho. I am a meditation master. Report an error in the passage at 1:37
2:04 Or whatever then this this these are words that I've acquired Satsang with Mooji Satsang with Mooji Report an error in the passage at 2:04
2:23 uh but i mean it is uh it is it is a uh you know a series of words i am A meditation master, that's maybe a positive identity or maybe it's an ego identity. You know, I need to feel I'm a special person. That's conditioned after birth. And so language, the language that we think in is conditioned. The cultural assumptions that I'm American, that's a condition that I acquired after birth. Report an error in the passage at 2:23
3:01 That I'm a male is a condition. The body is a male. It's like all phenomena. It is what it is. But my relationship to the body then changes from identifying with it and assuming that it's mine to recognizing it and learning through it. So you learn, like they say in Buddhist terminology, we have our karma. Report an error in the passage at 3:01
3:31 I am the owner of my karma, heir to my karma, born of my karma, related to my karma, and so forth. What does that mean? It's a way of explaining our individual tendencies that we have to deal with in our lives. So we're all human beings. We have that in common, common karma of being human. Report an error in the passage at 3:31
3:57 And then the human birth is one where we... We are experiencing consciousness and we can be highly conditioned. We have a retentive memory. We remember things of our past. That's why we can learn languages and think and analyze and compare and make value judgments because of our thinking and ability to remember. Report an error in the passage at 3:57
4:30 And so that is programmed into, you know, that becomes our karmic tendency as we grow up. We become identified and limited by our identities. So, I mean, if you know, you meet people who are very attached to an identity of some sort, like I'm working class or lower middle class or whatever. Here in Britain, they've got strong class identities. Report an error in the passage at 4:30
4:58 You know, in America we don't have very strong class identities. They say middle class probably includes everybody, except a few cotton pickers or something. Report an error in the passage at 4:58
5:14 But I mean, it's not highly structured. It's not a strong identity. But it is a cultural thing. People have different cultural emphasis that say the difference between being I wasn't born with them. Then I have my own peculiar individual tendencies, idiosyncratic tendencies, you know, that my sister doesn't have. Report an error in the passage at 5:14
5:59 And then we were both... Report an error in the passage at 5:59
6:14 also individual tendencies, karmic tendencies, or inherited tendencies. we inherit, you know, from our parents, various that acquire through heredity. Report an error in the passage at 6:14
6:32 Outside of all that, there's this consciousness. And what I'm pointing to is consciousness then is a unifier. We're one in consciousness. This is not a doctrine. I'm not asking you to believe this. Just contemplate it. My consciousness is not... We're one even with everything in the universe. It's universal. Report an error in the passage at 6:32
6:58 So with the squirrels and the trees and the rats and the mosquitoes and then all the human beings and whatever. So this consciousness then, but we're, say, in terms of the way we think and the way we're conditioned is we're human beings. We call ourselves human beings. So that's another karmic condition that we can all identify with. We're all human. Report an error in the passage at 6:58
7:28 Then we divide it into male and female. So women have a common karma of having female identity and men with the male identity. The problems between the genders is because we share a common human karma but we have to deal with the gender. Report an error in the passage at 7:28
8:24 this you know I mean it's And then maybe I have peculiar or strange or idiosyncratic tendencies that nobody else seems to have. Where do they come from? But outside of all those differences of conditioned phenomena and karmic conditioning is consciousness. So then like mindfulness... Mindfulness is the way that, now the Buddha pointed to mindfulness as the gate or the door to that oneness or dhamma or reality. Report an error in the passage at 8:24
9:09 To amatadhamma, to the deathless. There you go, the deathless. Amatapadam, the way to the deathless is through mindfulness. Well that's, those are words but they're meant to, they're not, Doctrinal statements, they're suggestions, ways of investigating. What does that mean here and now? So more and more as you investigate like this, then you begin to recognize consciousness, pure consciousness. Report an error in the passage at 9:09
9:51 And it's before you create yourself into it, before I am a meditation master arises into it. Before I am a male, I am American, I am this, that. Before any of that arises, before there's any thoughts, or even the emotions I might be feeling, you know, beyond that emotional feeling or energetic emotional experience, there's consciousness. Report an error in the passage at 9:51
10:21 So then I begin to say, well, this consciousness then If I really trust in pure consciousness, then I can bear with the idiosyncratic tendencies or the emotional habits I have or the world that I tend to create. I begin to let go of it because I'm no longer caught in trying to control or create myself or defend myself or promote myself or destroy myself. Report an error in the passage at 10:21
11:19 reality rather than the other, where you were merely caught in a programming. A program that was looking for happiness and security, safety, in things that were very dependent. When things go right, when things are all right, then I feel happy. When things don't go right, then I'm depressed. On a personal level, that's how my personality is. Report an error in the passage at 11:19
11:47 It's happy when people praise and when I'm blamed, then I'm personally unhappy. But outside that, happiness and unhappiness, those are conditions that arise and cease in consciousness. So then you investigate. Report an error in the passage at 11:47
12:20 So you begin to explore, investigate that attachment to wanting something that you don't have or not wanting something that you have. These are common, you know, the desire that we tend to be blindly committed to, reactive to. We begin to observe. And as we do that, then more and more the desires cease. Report an error in the passage at 12:20
12:48 And we, you know, we have more and more sense of this is it. This is the refuge, this pure consciousness. Report an error in the passage at 12:48
12:59 And that's where, you know, I talk about sound of silence. That's how I experience it. You know, it's still resonating vibration. It's pure. I see it. I mean, I use it for consciousness. So I'm resting in it. Report an error in the passage at 12:59
13:23 You know, abiding in it and then I have perspective on my own feelings or when people praise me or blame me or I feel healthy and vigorous or I feel sick and weak or things are going well in the community or things are falling apart or whatever. It works on all levels because, you know, no longer do I expect the world to conform to my desires. Report an error in the passage at 13:23
13:53 desires, am I disappointed, nor am I going to follow and indulge in disappointment and blame when the world changes in ways I don't like. So you begin to, you know, like through your own kind of investigation, you can prove this to yourself. Now the body, is what it is. It's like a leaf or a tree or anything. It's seeing it, not dismissing it, denying it, nor attaching to it. Report an error in the passage at 13:53
14:38 But we, you know, the reality of this moment is consciousness is experienced through, from this point, this human form. And then consciousness is like this. Then my body, I'm 74-year-old. Buddhist monk. And then I become the body. I become somebody who's 74 years old. But if I recognize this consciousness as my refuge, it's not aging. Report an error in the passage at 14:38
15:17 It doesn't get old. It's not male or female. It has no idiosyncratic tendencies. It's not Asian or European or anything. Report an error in the passage at 15:17
15:31 It's pure. It's intelligent. I don't become stupid or a zombie or, you know, become unconscious when I'm mindful. I'm alert. There's alertness. There's attention. And then this is where the wisdom, the panya operates from this level, from this awareness. Report an error in the passage at 15:31
16:02 So the body is, you know, on a conventional level, I say I am... Ajahn Sumedho, I'm a Buddhist monk and I'm a male and so forth. There's nothing wrong with any of this. There's not a denial. But it is merely a conventional form that we use for worldly purposes. And when the world becomes our priority, then we're forced into always feeling threatened by, you know, if you don't agree with me or if... Report an error in the passage at 16:02
17:01 you were expecting and so that that is uh Because of, you know, it's based on the sense of I'm going to change something. I'm going to, I want to fix what's wrong with the world. It's still the ego, the sense of me and the limitations that that implies. Report an error in the passage at 17:01
17:27 Or it can go the opposite way. I'm, you know, it doesn't matter what I do or how I live. It's not, you know, my existence on this planet doesn't count. I'm just like an ant in an anthill. a and a beehive. I'm nobody. It's just, you know, if I live or die, it's not going to affect the movement or change of the universe whatsoever. Report an error in the passage at 17:27
17:49 And so you can just, that's still the ego, whether you think, you know, I'm going to change the world and make it right, or, you know, the megalomania, or the total, I'm just of no use, and my life has no meaning. Report an error in the passage at 17:49
18:05 those are, that's sakayaditti, or the But this is, you notice, it's awakened to that. So however you conceive yourself as being, you know, God's gift to the world or being totally useless, you begin to see that as a creation you make. That's not the way it is. That's what you might have believed in or how you experience, you've limited, you've bound yourself into that form and experience life through that limitation. Report an error in the passage at 18:05
18:40 And you can't get outside it. So even within the limitation of the human form, we have this Buddha view of life. You see, this is like refuge in Buddha, which is non-self. Buddha, I can't claim that I am Buddha. That doesn't make any sense. In Theravāda terms, Pāli terms, you say I take refuge in the Buddha. What does that mean in a practical way? Report an error in the passage at 18:40
19:08 It means mindfulness. Taking refuge in awareness, wisdom. So then you begin to affirm, notice this. Trust yourself more. Not what your ego, your emotions can say, I love you one minute and I hate you the next. So the emotions are changed according to so many other conditions affecting them. But this stillness, this silence, This awareness, this consciousness, it's self-sustaining. I don't create it. It's not cultural, not personal. Report an error in the passage at 19:08
19:52 And I'm sure it must be the same for everything. Consciousness isn't like, I can't claim it as my consciousness. Report an error in the passage at 19:52
20:03 I'm experiencing consciousness through the limitation of a form. So then my relationship to the form, is being mindful of it rather than attaching to it and binding myself to the form that I have, to the body or to the cultural conditions, views and opinions, religious biases, and all the rest. Report an error in the passage at 20:03
20:34 I'm no longer creating myself with conditioned phenomena. So then there is... Underlying this, then, is what we call unconditioned love. And so you take the word love, which is, you know, I like to explore that word because it's used for so many things. It's another word, like happiness, or it can mean all kinds of different things. But in Christian terms, unconditioned love. Report an error in the passage at 20:34
21:11 Because sometimes we love conditionally. You know, I love you. When you do what I like, but if you don't do what I like, I don't love you anymore. It's like blackmail. I used to love you because you used to do what I said. Now, I don't love you. Report an error in the passage at 21:11
21:35 It's not love in this sense, is it? It's more like, you know, I like you when you do what I want you to do. Because the conditions for liking are there. You know, if I'm a very selfish, authoritarian, egocentric person and you want to get along with me, then you have to say the right things, be politically correct, flatter me, tell me I look only 35 years old, tell Report an error in the passage at 21:35
22:11 me that the emperor has the most beautiful robes in the world when I'm... Not wearing anything? Report an error in the passage at 22:11
22:22 You have to say things that appease. And that kind of thing then is that I like you. I'll allow you to be around and I want you. But then if you start telling the truth, then I don't like you anymore. That's like and dislike are dependent. But in this sense of unconditional love, what do we mean by that? Report an error in the passage at 22:22
22:18 anything Report an error in the passage at 22:18
22:46 Or Mettā, the Brahma Bihara's work in that way. Mettā Karuṇā Muditā Upekkhā. So when you get to pure consciousness, it's not a cold kind of nothingness. It might sound like it on a conceptual level. Like just being mindful means you don't feel any emotions. You're just, you know, people praise you. Different people condemn you. Don't care. Report an error in the passage at 22:46
23:16 care just Totally indifferent to life. It's not a kind of passive indifference. It's a vibrant state of awareness that is beyond description. You have to be recognized. Report an error in the passage at 23:16
23:42 And so then our responses to the world are through compassion rather than through my plan to save the world. Now compassion is from wisdom rather than from Ajahn Sumedho's ideas of how the world should be. Report an error in the passage at 23:42
24:07 So then compassion is more practical. It's not based on making everybody do what I, you know, forcing you to take the precepts and give dharma every day. Report an error in the passage at 24:07
24:22 And holding a gun to your head making you sit down and meditate for an hour every evening. Report an error in the passage at 24:22
24:33 It's like compassion comes out of wisdom and so it's spontaneity. And of course it's kindness, it's understanding the suffering, the realm of suffering through having investigated it, through having learned from it. So you understand the suffering of... other beings. Not through a kind of patronizing authoritarian view, but because, you know, compassion means you know because of your own, you've learned from suffering yourself. Report an error in the passage at 24:33
25:13 Muditā, joy, sympathetic joy at the beauty of life, because the happiness of others, the goodness, the beauty that we experience through this form. As a human individual. And then upekkhā equanimity. So equanimity is like abiding in this conscious awareness. It's not feeling compassion every moment, every conscious moment. But when the conditions for compassion arise and one feels, then compassion is a spontaneous response. Report an error in the passage at 25:13
25:52 Or joy is a spontaneous response. It's not about me trying to be a compassionate monk. Report an error in the passage at 25:52
26:02 So you begin to, you know, and the more you investigate this, the more you realize you don't know anything. It's don't know. So the self, the sakya ditti, the ego, wants to know everything. Wants to have the answers to the questions, solution to the problems, and all that, but This sense of not knowing. It's not about having to know anything. It's about faith and trust in awareness. Report an error in the passage at 26:02
26:41 And it's humbling because all your little favorite hang-ups and things that you're very attached to, you begin to see through them. You even see the attachment even to goodness. is suffering. So it's more like just letting go and that liberation that comes through non-attachment and then you begin to recognize the true nature of dharma or reality. Report an error in the passage at 26:41
27:21 This is real. This is not a fantasy world. It's not about refined states of consciousness, about specially cultivated Refined states of consciousness that I have because I've been a monk for so long and you can't possibly hope to get. This is about being human and awake, and so the birth, death, and enlightenment. Report an error in the passage at 27:21
27:49 You begin to recognize the gift of the human birth. Report an error in the passage at 27:49
27:59 Even though I have seen being human as a kind of curse in my youth, I thought, what a curse this is. You know, to be human, you know, I used to envy the dog or the cat. You know, they didn't have to have all these memories and self-consciousness and worrying about what others think and all the, you know, when you're in teenage years, all the misery that you create in your mind around how you look and what others think of you. Report an error in the passage at 27:59
28:34 If I were a dog, it wouldn't matter so much, would it? Report an error in the passage at 28:34
28:39 don't Or a cat, that would be nice. Like a poodle or something to a beautiful movie star would be quite nice. Report an error in the passage at 28:39
28:56 But being me, you know, so sensitive and not understanding, not understanding myself or the world, you know, just being kind of in it without understanding it is very frightening. Report an error in the passage at 28:56
29:14 Any more questions? ha, ha. Report an error in the passage at 29:14
· · · silence, 1 minute
29:46 Yeah? actually, they also said, let's go back to the cat. Those little cats were quite nice. would you say to yourself now if you could go back in time now and talk to yourself again? Report an error in the passage at 29:46
30:03 I wish I knew then what I know now. Great difference. Report an error in the passage at 30:03
30:13 you know, that's... Report an error in the passage at 30:13
30:17 You know, I remember I went, I've just been in the States recently. And I left the States, actually, I haven't lived there since 1963. And of course, things have changed enormously since then. And I've been back, you know, to visit relatives, and we have a branch monastery, but I haven't lived there. Report an error in the passage at 30:17
30:41 And then my parents, they died about 20 years ago in San Diego. So I went to visit their grave. Report an error in the passage at 30:41
30:51 in a Catholic cemetery in San Diego. it all the gravestone my sister she's she moved from Southern California back to Washington State so my parents grave doesn't get much attention and so some friends and I Ajahn Panyasar, we cleaned off the gravestone and I kept thinking about my parents and Report an error in the passage at 30:51
31:50 condominiums and things like that. Report an error in the passage at 31:50
32:20 So the memories come back. Memories come back to you. And, you know, you just keep learning from life. Report an error in the passage at 32:20
32:32 And it was in the Navy that I became very much aware of Buddhism. So even though I've had plenty of unhappy memories about being in the military, I also have a kind of gratitude. I learn from that. From the military. And it was where I first became aware of Buddhism, was in Japan. So I mean, just seeing in the life, you know, my parents were very devout Episcopalians, Anglicans. Report an error in the passage at 32:32
33:08 So we were brought up in that style, you know, in the States. And it was the west coast of America, it was very liberal, you know, quite a nice... I was over 30 by then. Report an error in the passage at 33:08
33:47 Life has not treated me particularly badly, and I've not been abused or, you know, unnecessarily mistreated in life, or unfortunate, you know, but somehow it was never, you know, I still suffered a lot because of this ignorance, this self-consciousness, the way you're brought up in that reward and punishment style. Report an error in the passage at 33:47
34:17 And the whole cultural attitude of, you know, you're rewarded for being good, punished for being bad, and that you're trying to conform to fit in to where you'll not be punished. And you can see it in the military, you know, learning how to look good when you're on the drilling field. Report an error in the passage at 34:17
34:42 And yet you could go out afterward and... Report an error in the passage at 34:42
34:49 know, and how your life was this kind of schizophrenic thing of trying to please and look good and pass the exams and then the other, you know, just feeling rebellious and life was meaningless. And yet there was, through all that, there was an awakening to... This is like in the legend of Prince Siddhartha. Report an error in the passage at 34:49
35:17 You know, this legendary story of the Buddha's, when he was this prince. You know, it's a legendary story of somebody who's brought up in privileged society. You know, you read it in the scriptures, he had all the best that you could have at that time. You know, he had all the best conditions for worldly power, success, wealth, prestige. Report an error in the passage at 35:17
35:47 Praise and he was gifted and intelligent and good looking and all the best. And yet, the point in his life when he saw old age, sickness, death, you know, what is that? Suddenly these are things, the warning signs. They warn us that don't take this for granted, you know, that life isn't going to be You know, a candy store. Life is like this. Report an error in the passage at 35:47
36:26 It's going to have its misery. It's a part of human karma, really, this realm. And you look at the world around you, look at the tsunami, or the cyclone in Burma, or the Chinese earthquake. You know... Report an error in the passage at 36:26
36:48 These are natural conditions. You can't blame this on the Islamic terrorists. We can't blame it on anybody. Then people say, how could God allow this to happen? How could God allow that terrible earthquake to happen and kill all those innocent people in China? You know, because we wonder, you know, if God is good and loves us, why would he allow such horrible things to happen to us? Report an error in the passage at 36:48
37:26 Now, in a Buddhist sense, we know that this is the way things are, that this planet is basically insecure place. It's dangerous. Report an error in the passage at 37:26
37:40 Tsunamis, cyclones, hurricanes, floods. Dangerous. You know, it's not. Report an error in the passage at 37:40
37:41 hurricanes, floods. Meteors from outer space. Who knows what's going to happen? But yet we want to live with this illusion that if we make all the right gestures, say the right prayers, perform the right ceremonies, do everything right, we'll be rewarded by not ever getting sick, having good health and success and wealth and prosperity as a reward for all our good works. Report an error in the passage at 37:41
38:13 And this inevitably leads to disappointment because that's not the way it is. So then the Buddha, this awakened consciousness within a human individual. Report an error in the passage at 38:13
38:30 So the word Buddha means awake. It's consciousness and awakened. So it's not like something special. It's just not recognized. Report an error in the passage at 38:30
38:45 So when you begin to recognize this in yourself, this awakened consciousness is like this, then you can deal with the conditions that inevitably happen to you, tsunamis or earthquakes or success, winning the lottery, losing everything, health and wealth or sickness and pain. These are bearable. These are... Report an error in the passage at 38:45
39:16 ...are conditions that are part of the karma of being born on this planet in this form. So then we're no longer frightened of it. We're no longer dreading it because we know that whatever happens we feel confident in learning from it. Because our refuge is in the deathless, non-compounded reality rather than in... Report an error in the passage at 39:16
39:47 In the illusions of everything's okay, everything's going to be all right. Report an error in the passage at 39:47
39:55 So your children, you know, they're being aware of the pain of life at an early age, which is a good thing. You aren't mistreating them are you? Report an error in the passage at 39:55
40:11 Embarrassing question. Report an error in the passage at 40:11
40:18 Yes? Well, that's the ultimate question. Report an error in the passage at 40:18
40:27 Well, let's put it like this. The self is a creation. To discern the difference between pure awareness and the ego, experiencing life through this created self. Report an error in the passage at 40:27
40:44 When I experience life through my personality is one thing, or when I experience through pure consciousness. Pure consciousness I can't claim as some kind of personal thing. Because the personal, even the word personal, implies a limitation to the body and the sense of me as a personality. Report an error in the passage at 40:44
41:11 So that's why consciousness is recognizable and realizable. But it's like you're conscious right now. now you know this natural state that you're in at this moment but you may not recognize conscious pure consciousness because the the tendency is always to experience through the condition I am this person. I feel like this. These are my feelings. These are my desires. And we experience, we project, we create ourselves and experience life through these distortions of condition. Report an error in the passage at 41:11
41:56 And that's why it is suffering, because the conditions are never perfect. They are so changing and interdependent that you can't just create one perfect condition and stay with it. It's not possible. So that's why with mindfulness we're aware of conditions changing rather than trying to create perfect conditions. Report an error in the passage at 41:56
42:29 You can see, like, this past century, you know, it's an interesting time now because, like, political idealism that was so rampant when I was young doesn't exist, as far as I can tell. Like, communism and socialism and these words no longer mean very much. And yet, back in the... Report an error in the passage at 42:29
43:03 great, know, expectations. Revolution, democratic revolutions. You can see it in the present American administration to bring democracy to the Middle East is, you know, whether, you know, their motives are all that pure and all something else. But the idea... Ideal of democracy, a political system that's totally fair, doesn't exist, except as an ideal. Report an error in the passage at 43:03
43:35 You know, so it's easy to become cynical because we recognize, like communism, as an ideal is quite beautiful. You know, everything's equal and there's no classes. Everybody, you know, it's a... Taking an ideal to its most fair sense of equality and justice, at least that's how I would perceive the communist ideal. Report an error in the passage at 43:35
44:06 But then the reality of it, it became a tyranny. It didn't end up with the ideal communism. It ended up as a form of tyranny, fear-based. and Report an error in the passage at 44:06
44:21 You know, conform through fear, having to conform through fear of being punished or persecuted. So this is, that's a tyranny. So then we do this to ourselves, you know, we can tyrannize ourselves and our ideals of how we would like to be or want somebody else to be. How many of you idealize somebody else? Report an error in the passage at 44:21
44:52 My teacher is the wisest, kindest person I've ever met. And then you get to know me better and you realize... Report an error in the passage at 44:52
45:06 Disappointing, isn't it? Because the ideal of Ajahn Sumedho might not live up, might not be the reality of the changing conditions. So we become easily disillusioned with... With husbands, wives, friends, partners, systems, teachers, gurus, sages, because we're still, you know, projecting outward. And that's where this, you know, this is why I see this in, you know, in my life as a, past 50 years I've been a Buddhist. Report an error in the passage at 45:06
45:51 So I've watched, you know, I've been able to observe. Up close, the interest, the growing interest in Buddhist meditation, in the Western world especially. So this is, you know, I see this is because we haven't developed wisdom in the West. Report an error in the passage at 45:51
46:11 We're not wise, we're clever. And of course it's turning against us. You know, the environmental problems and where do the social problems ever end? And, you know, it's just... You know, poverty and we're going to get rid of poverty and we're going to, you know, still these great kind of altruistic goals. Report an error in the passage at 46:11
46:39 But the real problem is not poverty or corruption or Islamic fundamentalism or American misuse of power. It's ignorance from us all, isn't it? It's human ignorance. And this is where, you know, you begin to see, well, I can't, what can I do about somebody else if I'm still ignorant? Report an error in the passage at 46:39
47:10 You know, am I going to complain about you because you're not wise when I'm not? So then I think, no, I've got to, you know, take the bull by the horns. Is that the right? I've got to do it myself, you know. This is what I can do. I can't make anyone else do it. And so this has been the motivation for living this life. Report an error in the passage at 47:10
47:41 This is something that I can actually do. And then through doing it this way, increasingly more confident in the result of it. Because it's always this Buddhist style is to... You know, it gives you the prescription. It tells you what's wrong and what you need to do about it. And then having done that, taken the medicine, then the result is like this. Report an error in the passage at 47:41
48:10 Then you begin to, and that's insight. You know the result of mindfulness is this, is non-suffering. And then it becomes more and more clear. Non-suffering is the reality. And suffering is the illusion I create out of my blind habit tendencies. And so the self as this pure awareness knows the ego. The ego can't know pure awareness. So more and more your true nature is this pure consciousness that you know. Report an error in the passage at 48:10
48:52 But it's not really yours. It's reality. But you're experiencing it through the limitation of the form. But the form's not the problem. It's what you create out of ignorance that distorts the consciousness. Report an error in the passage at 48:52
49:14 Does that help? Report an error in the passage at 49:14
49:18 Well, this is where you have... It's not about thinking anymore. It's discerning. And it's wisdom. This is where words... ...fail. You can't describe it. Because any words are kind of misleading, actually. That's why it's more pointing and encouraging. What I'm trying to do now is encourage you, not to tell you anything. Report an error in the passage at 49:18
49:51 So that you begin to... Because you can't figure it out, but you begin to intuit. It's more intuitive. And that... And then your relationship to the world around you changes from self-consciousness and love and hate and all that kind of condition phenomenon more towards compassion and respect for life. Report an error in the passage at 49:51
50:21 And you feel this sense of a universal reality. That you might call unconditioned love or whatever. It's not a blank kind of void of a black hole. But it's beyond description. But it is real. It's recognizable. Report an error in the passage at 50:21
50:48 So that's where, you know, the Buddha didn't try to describe it or say much about it except point to it. Report an error in the passage at 50:48
51:00 But, you know, like not having an ego is... is such, is a relief. I mean, the ego still operates, but I no longer, you know, I know better than to attach to it or believe in it. Through having investigated and seeing the results of attaching to my own likes and dislikes and feelings and that, I can see, you know, the suffering that my life becomes, you know, quite... Report an error in the passage at 51:00
51:37 just unsatisfying if I do that. I've explored that through these years, monastic life, because you have certain parts of it that are exciting, inspiring, and everything goes well, and then it gets boring. boring, and you come... Feel aversion to it and critical of it. And you go through the usual emotional reactions to conditions. Report an error in the passage at 51:37
52:09 But your relationship to them changes from attachment to non-attachment. Report an error in the passage at 52:09
· · · silence, 1 minute
52:53 Well, just trust your awareness more and see what happens. And I mean, sometimes you can be kind of, it can sound too passive the way I teach. Report an error in the passage at 52:53
53:14 they can But it's quite spontaneous. I mean, the way I talk, sometimes it can sound like a kind of passive, just impermanent way it is, kind of feeling. But the way it is isn't a passive kind of resignation to suffering. But rather than wishing it were otherwise, you see, there's no point in wishing. This mess to be otherwise, but if you're willing, there's a mess in front of you and you kind of, you begin to see how to clear it up better than if you're just, oh God, I've got to clean up that mess. Report an error in the passage at 53:14
53:57 Whose fault is it? Who made this mess here? Oh God, just leave it. Just leave somebody else. I have no energy left. That's like passive resignation. But then more and more you can begin to see how to, you know, if there is a way of cleaning up the mess or maybe there's no way to do it. But it's more intuitive rather than coming from some idea that you've got to clean up the mess or that you should, you know, or trying to figure out who to blame. Report an error in the passage at 53:57
54:37 So you become more confident in knowing how to deal with conflicting situations, both internally and externally. Because you're discerning, panya, wisdom faculty starts growing, starts operating more. That's universal. You're coming more from a universal intelligence rather than just this sense of... Report an error in the passage at 54:37
55:04 This mess, whose fault is it, is it mine? You see, that always will limit you to, you know, I've cleaned up so many, I'm fed up with it, to believing all these emotional reactions you might have in regard to it. Report an error in the passage at 55:04
55:25 So, you know, if somebody makes a mess, there's a certain, you know, I don't just say, we just contemplate it. But, you know, I can still feel maybe annoyance or wanting to blame somebody like this. But more and more as I see through that and not get attached to it, then I can, you know, respond to it better. Report an error in the passage at 55:25
55:54 Or maybe not respond. It depends. You know, it's more intuitive than prescriptive. Report an error in the passage at 55:54
56:08 So I think I will retire. Report an error in the passage at 56:08
56:22 So next. Sunday, I will be in Italy. Somebody else will be giving the talk. But the following Sunday, I'll be here. Report an error in the passage at 56:22
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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