Four Applications Of Mindfulness Retreat 2013 with B. Alan Wallace (part 14)

0:05 So, here's entry level into the close application of mindfulness to the body, and that explicitly, and then implicitly, all that we directly perceive by way of the body, by way of our five physical senses. Report an error in the passage at 0:05 Highlight the passage at 0:05

0:20 It's a core element of apashana, a core element of the path to the cessation of suffering and its causes. And it brings us right back to the second noble truth, because if this fourth noble truth is going to work, it has to counteract the second noble truth. The second being the source of suffering. You have to counteract not only the symptoms, but get to the source. And so that's what this Vipassanā is directly doing. Report an error in the passage at 0:20 Highlight the passage at 0:20

0:43 The shamatha practice and the achievement of shamatha is very effective for subduing, almost causing to go into hibernation, some of the most virulent of the mental afflictions and most specifically what are called the five obscurations. That's a direct translation from Tibetan. More commonly translated as the five hindrances from Pāli in Sanskrit. Both are fine, but I do prefer the term obscuration a bit more. Report an error in the passage at 0:43 Highlight the passage at 0:43

1:13 And just to list them very quickly, they're in the notes. But I like the word obscuring because they really do obscure something. If I'm trying to get to the door and something gets in my way, that's a hindrance. But if something is obscuring, that means it's already there but I can't see it. That's what the real connotation is of these five hindrances. Report an error in the passage at 1:13 Highlight the passage at 1:13

1:33 Nīvaraṇa, they're called. And I'll list them first and then tell you what they're obscuring. And that is, in order, that is, there's a sequence here. The first one that is highlighted is our infatuation, craving, clinging, grasping onto sensory pleasures. Report an error in the passage at 1:33 Highlight the passage at 1:33

1:54 Sensual and sensory. Or one can say more broadly, hedonic. Because it's not just pleasant. Visual scenes, nice sounds and so forth. But it covers more than that. It covers the intangibles like fame and wealth and power, prestige and so forth that are very much part of the desire realm. And so that's really what the connotation is here in Tibetan. And that is in Tibetan, it's Döbe Yundan Achakpa. It's attachment to the bounties, the attractions. Report an error in the passage at 1:54 Highlight the passage at 1:54

2:24 There's a good word. It's the kind of clinging of the attraction, the attachment to the attractions of... The desire realm, all the goodies out there, you know, and thinking therein lies my happiness. If I could only be more famous, if more people loved me, appreciated me, if more people would praise me, or I could have more sensual pleasure, a better car, what have you, all the goodies, all the attractions that science and technology have actually unveiled for us a lot. Report an error in the passage at 2:24 Highlight the passage at 2:24

2:53 Well, that's obscuring something. Then, of course, as we're pursuing these, oh, I wish I had a sweater like that one, I wish I could, and then I try to take it from you, and you don't like that, and you punch me in the nose. Then, I don't like that, you punch me in the nose, and so then ill will arises. Report an error in the passage at 2:53 Highlight the passage at 2:53

3:09 Ill will, animosity, enmity, malice. When people get in our way, or just anything gets in our way, prevents us from getting us getting what we want, or I get a nice blue sweatshirt like that, and then somebody wants to take away my blue sweatshirt, I have to punch him in the nose. And so right on the tail of, kind of almost like the shadow of this clinging, craving, grasping attachment to the attractions of the desire realm is when we don't get what we want or somebody is threatening to take away what we have that we want, then anger and then on top of that animosity, ill will arises. Report an error in the passage at 3:09 Highlight the passage at 3:09

3:45 So that's the second one. And then thirdly is laxity and dullness, sometimes called sloth and torpor, but laxity and dullness is more accurate. We all know what that is. So laxity, kind of the loss of clarity, dullness you've really slipped into, kind of a torpor, dullness of mind. That's very clear. That obscures something. Report an error in the passage at 3:45 Highlight the passage at 3:45

4:02 And then the excitation and hand-in-hand with that anxiety. That's the fourth one. And then finally afflictive doubt. So they're all on the notes, those five. Classic, classic set. But the afflictive uncertainty, that wishy-washy, namby-pamby, in and out, can't make up your mind, can't commit. So it happens a lot, but it's afflictive. It's not just healthy skepticism. It's afflictive uncertainty. And so those five very common traits, tendencies of human mind, and why I prefer the translation of obscuration, is because insofar as we're enmeshed in these afflictions of the mind, they obscure the natural purity and clarity, luminosity of our own awareness. That's what they obscure. Report an error in the passage at 4:02 Highlight the passage at 4:02

4:53 And in that very luminosity, that clarity and the natural purity of awareness is to be found bliss. If we give bliss a chance, and don't keep on fixating on things that are not blissful by nature, but we think they are. Oh, if I only had that car, that would make me so happy. Or that woman, or that prestige, or that job, or if I could look better, if I could get a facelift, an extreme makeover, dye my hair, develop a six-pack, then I'd be happy. Report an error in the passage at 4:53 Highlight the passage at 4:53

5:21 Okay, that kind of thing. Well, as long as we're fixated there, we're going to miss the boat. And that is, we're looking where bliss isn't to be found, which means we're not looking where bliss is to be found. And bliss comes from the nature of your awareness. It always does. Even in sex. Sex isn't intrinsically a pleasant experience. Otherwise, rape would be a lot of fun for both parties. Report an error in the passage at 5:21 Highlight the passage at 5:21

5:42 Well, that's an understatement. Absolutely false, obviously. Whether it's fun for anybody, I don't even know. But there it is, it's a sexual act, which can be blissful, and there it's misery, it's torture, it's trauma. And so if sex can be terrible, then why couldn't everything else? I mean, it's a pretty nice act, a lot of pleasure there, but no, not necessarily. And so even if that, well then, everything else, it kind of follows, investigate it, check it out. Report an error in the passage at 5:42 Highlight the passage at 5:42

6:08 And so insofar as the mind is caught up in those, then the natural purity, bliss, luminosity of the mind is obscured. And by just the practice of shamatha, Developing and then achieving shamatha. Those five obscurations, they're not eradicated. You're not free of them forever. But they've gone dormant. Gone dormant. Report an error in the passage at 6:08 Highlight the passage at 6:08

6:29 So they can be aroused. They're more like a bear. Bears apparently don't technically hibernate. They just really go into deep sleep. But if you go to a hibernating bear and poke it with a sharp stick, you might not want to do that. Because the bear will wake up and it will show you how displeased it is with your waking it from a really nice long sleep. Report an error in the passage at 6:29 Highlight the passage at 6:29

6:49 So it's more like that. I think rodents really hibernate. You can poke them, poke them, poke them and they won't wake up when they're deep in hibernation. They're gone until spring. But a bear can be woken up. Well, there's five obscurations. They're like bears sleeping. So they can be aroused. They can come out of there and growl a little bit and then go back in again. Report an error in the passage at 6:49 Highlight the passage at 6:49

7:08 But they're really subdued. And it's a really good thing because you subdue the five obscurations and then you can bring out the strength of Vipassanā and walk right over them and then start... Report an error in the passage at 7:08 Highlight the passage at 7:08

7:19 Knocking them out for the, you know, really eliminating them altogether. So, we move into Vipassanā territory then, with as much as possible having made dormant vibe obscurations. And then we are now going to Vipassanā, we're really looking for the roots of suffering, seeking to identify them and apply skillful means to severing the roots. Report an error in the passage at 7:19 Highlight the passage at 7:19

7:45 And we can pinpoint it right at the beginning, because this is old science. It's time-tested science. And if we ask, why do I suffer? Why do I suffer at all? Why do I suffer physically? How come I'm so vulnerable to suffering? From internal stuff and external sharp things, blunt things, heavy things. Report an error in the passage at 7:45 Highlight the passage at 7:45

8:03 We're just so doggone vulnerable here, physically. And then we know how vulnerable we are mentally. And so it's actually an absolutely fundamental question. I think hardly ever gets even asked in the modern world. Or doesn't. To my mind, it's not probed sufficiently. And the Buddhist answer here is a hypothesis. Boy, if you just believe this, then you have a dead end. But if you believe this is a working hypothesis and check it out, then you open up vast possibilities. Report an error in the passage at 8:03 Highlight the passage at 8:03

8:28 Here's the statement. Why are we vulnerable? And the simple answer is because we're close, literally, nyewaralempa, we're closely holding on to, closely identifying with my body, my mind, my feelings, my personal history, my thoughts, my intentions. My perceptions, my dreams, my, my, my, my, my, my. And so it starts with the body, because the body among all of those things, of the body, the feelings, mental states, intentions, thoughts, memories and all of that, this is the easiest access. Report an error in the passage at 8:28 Highlight the passage at 8:28

9:03 And that is, if I say, where's Rhonda? And she'll say, here. And how did you know that? Because that's where her body is, right? That's what we identify with on the coarsest level, that's what animals strongly identify with, and we do too. And so there it is, as we try to know ourselves, know thyself, know ourselves, identify, okay, well, just for starters, where am I? Report an error in the passage at 9:03 Highlight the passage at 9:03

9:27 I want to know myself, where am I? Well, look where your body is, that's where you'll be found. Here we are as corporeal beings, human beings. And so there it is, and we identify with it very strongly. We do from inside the womb, and certainly ever after, identifying with it. And we have a sense, we look into the mirror and we say, how do I look? Report an error in the passage at 9:27 Highlight the passage at 9:27

9:46 So we actually can think, that's me. And the materialists will say, that is you. So they compound conate ignorance and delusion with acquired delusion. So they're just throwing more mud in the face by just one more delusion after another. That's why it's so tragic. Because we had enough to deal with conately without having to get the acquired embellishments, the dump truck full of delusions coming from the materialists who can't see beyond the body because they've not developed introspection sufficiently. Report an error in the passage at 9:46 Highlight the passage at 9:46

10:12 And so here it is. Here's the body. You go through it and see no part of it is a person. A brain isn't a person. Which part of the brain is a person? The frontal cortex? Or the amygdala? The hippocampus? I mean, frankly, it's silly. The whole notion of the mind, the brain is a person. There was one young woman, a youngish woman, I think adolescent, in Germany. Report an error in the passage at 10:12 Highlight the passage at 10:12

10:33 This was published in a top-notch scientific journal just recently, five years ago maybe. A young woman found in Germany that she was studied scientifically and she had half a brain. Literally, one hemisphere was empty. It was filled with fluid. And the other half was brain. And she had 125 IQ, something like that. Report an error in the passage at 10:33 Highlight the passage at 10:33

10:54 She was cheerful, light-hearted, full personality, quite normal. One half was full of water. So what is she, half a person? Report an error in the passage at 10:54 Highlight the passage at 10:54

11:05 She was born that way, of course. If you're an adult, you have a full brain and somebody takes out half of it, you're dead. Everybody knows that. But no, she was born that way. So what do the neuroscientists say? Oh, neuroplasticity, neuroplasticity. That's nice. Doesn't explain anything at all. But at least you said something. And there are even more outrageous cases. Report an error in the passage at 11:05 Highlight the passage at 11:05

11:23 Not as well documented, but that was slam dunk. That was very, very clear. And it was recent. An older study done in England by a neurologist. He took a large number of people with, now what's it called? I always get it. Water in the brain. Water in the brain, what's it called? Encephalus? Report an error in the passage at 11:23 Highlight the passage at 11:23

11:43 Hydroencephalus. Thank you. That's the technical term. Water in the brain is what ordinary people like me know. But it's a disease where some degree of the cavity inside the skull, instead of being filled with brain matter, is filled with fluid. And this doctor did a fairly large study of people who had anywhere from 10 % to 90 % of their brain cavity filled with fluid. Report an error in the passage at 11:43 Highlight the passage at 11:43

12:10 And they were still alive. Of course, they were born that way. And he found that varying degrees of dimension and so forth and so forth. But he found a remarkable percentage, a significant percentage of people whose brain cavity was 90 % filled with fluid had average intelligence, 100 IQ. They were functional. Now others who were demented, severely impaired, but the fact that you could have 90 % of your brain gone and still be functional. Report an error in the passage at 12:10 Highlight the passage at 12:10

12:38 Really the whole notion that the brain is equivalent to human brain, it just sounds silly. So there it is. You don't want to linger there. But people are not brains. That should really be obvious, but it's not obvious to people who can only think in terms of physical terms. But no other part of the body, certainly not the brain, but not any other part, is a person. Report an error in the passage at 12:38 Highlight the passage at 12:38

12:57 But we grasp onto the body as being I and or mine. And through that grasping, it's involuntary, it's deeply ingrained, profoundly habitual, conate. By that grasping, we suffer. We make ourselves vulnerable to suffering. I heard a very interesting dream in this last retreat in Phuket. It's quite a remarkable group of people. There's one who is quite adept at lucid dreaming. Report an error in the passage at 12:57 Highlight the passage at 12:57

13:27 He told me about a dream in which he was very lucid. And in the dream, where he knows this body in the dream is not him and it's not really a body, it's not really his at all. In the dream, he fell. And when he was then prone and vulnerable, Animals converged in upon him, including ravens, and they devoured his body, including the ravens, pecking out his eyes. Quite grotesque. Report an error in the passage at 13:27 Highlight the passage at 13:27

13:55 It's like the practice for those going into Tibetan Buddhism. He would have involuntary practice taking place. And his body was just being taken apart until it was gone. They took away his bones. And in the whole period that this was taking place, he felt totally relaxed. Totally relaxed. So they're taking, and when they've eaten it, and it's really chur. Chur is a practice where you visualize it's taking place. This wasn't a visualization, it was a dream, it was all happening to him. Report an error in the passage at 13:55 Highlight the passage at 13:55

14:23 And when they'd taken away the last vestiges of his body, he took away all the bone fragments, then he just went, whoosh, and created a new one. Well, we all know in our Mata Namla dreams, if somebody just punches you, it hurts. You don't like it. If somebody beats you, it hurts more. If you cut yourself, you don't like that at all. If a car hits you, it's very painful. Why? Report an error in the passage at 14:23 Highlight the passage at 14:23

14:51 You're identifying with your dream body. That's what makes you vulnerable. It is said that. I don't ask you to simply believe this, but I'll tell you something that's true anyway. When you're an Arya Bodhisattva, a person like Arya Deva, when you have so awakened to the nature of waking reality, They actually know it as it is. Then you're not only identifying with this body and mind as being really mine, but you're not even identifying them as being inherently real, absolutely objectively real. Report an error in the passage at 14:51 Highlight the passage at 14:51

15:24 You're seeing them more in the waking state with clear mind, no delusion involved at all. You're seeing them really as dreamlike phenomena in the waking state. And it's said for an Arya Bodhisattva, so a Bodhisattva has such profound realization of emptiness and dependent origination, that for such a person, He said, you can give away your limbs like other people can give away vegetables. And Arya Devah did, actually. He gave away, let somebody have one of his eyes. Report an error in the passage at 15:24 Highlight the passage at 15:24

15:51 So the story goes. But they said, oh, now you can sacrifice your body at will. Because it's easy. Like a hand, by the kilo, how much would you like? Report an error in the passage at 15:51 Highlight the passage at 15:51

16:01 Because you're really lucid. As this person was very lucid in his dream, he experienced no pain because he wasn't identifying with any, and he just reformed his body when it was finished. He said, have a nice meal. Let all the ravens pluck out his eyes. That was quite dramatic. We can't do that. And why? Not because of nerve endings, but because we are misapprehending the nature of the body. Report an error in the passage at 16:01 Highlight the passage at 16:01

16:23 And then likewise for the mind. We can be tortured mentally. It can be every bit as painful as being tortured physically. We know that, right? We can torture ourselves. We can be tortured by another person mentally. So the brunt of the pain is all psychological. And how is it that the mind, which is so intangible, you can't touch it, you can't poke it, you can't stab it. How is it that anybody, that there is such a thing as psychological torture? Report an error in the passage at 16:23 Highlight the passage at 16:23

16:50 How is that possible when you can't even find it? Well, people who are using their intelligence to inflict pain on others, they come up with very ingenious methods for torturing other people's minds even though they can't see them. How is it though that we are vulnerable to torture? How is it that we can... Report an error in the passage at 16:50 Highlight the passage at 16:50

17:07 We can be insulted. We can be verbally abused with no physical contact at all. And I know somebody where his father, when he was a youth, put him down in a, I think, rather unintentional, nevertheless very cruel fashion. Put down his son. Put him down. Just put him in his place. Just kind of smashed his sense of self-worth. Very sad, sir. I won't tell the story, but there it was. Report an error in the passage at 17:07 Highlight the passage at 17:07

17:30 But I know this person. And it so wounded him, he never really got over it. I mean, like 70 years later, he wasn't over it. And I heard him tell the story a number of times and every single time tears would well up in his eyes when he told the story of something that occurred to him when he was like 13 years old. Report an error in the passage at 17:30 Highlight the passage at 17:30

17:46 So that's major trauma. And it really influences life. And it wasn't, of course, an isolated circumstance. But how is it that we're so vulnerable to mere words? Report an error in the passage at 17:46 Highlight the passage at 17:46

17:57 Well, since we can't change everybody else's behavior, if we want to be free of that kind of suffering, don't hold your breath for everybody else to behave well. It can happen. Not in our lifetime. Change your mind. But what is it? What is it? Grasping onto, identifying with, my mind, me, my memories, who I am, my sense of self-worth, and that grasping onto that which is not I or mine as being I or mine, that makes us vulnerable. Report an error in the passage at 17:57 Highlight the passage at 17:57

18:25 So one might imagine, if one didn't know anything about meditation, saying, okay, don't grasp onto the body as being yours or you, don't grasp onto your mind as being you or yours. It sounds like radical dissociation, like radical... Existential escape mechanism. Total radical existential dissociation. So you don't feel anything. You're totally removed. Report an error in the passage at 18:25 Highlight the passage at 18:25

18:48 You've isolated yourself from reality. And wonderfully, just the opposite is the case. Quite interesting. You're not withdrawn. That's what you do in Samādhi. We go into the form realm and the formless realm. That's what the Gautama tried first. The first thing he did when he stepped out of his home. Report an error in the passage at 18:48 Highlight the passage at 18:48

19:06 He found two Samādhi masters. They were extremely good at withdrawal. Away from the desire realm, from the foreign realm to the desire realm, and off into a space of sheer nothingness. That's profound dissociation. But the problem is, the chickens come home to roost, and that is like a yo-yo. You can linger there for a long time, and then you snap back in again, and there you are, right where you were when you began. Report an error in the passage at 19:06 Highlight the passage at 19:06

19:28 So that's the samādhi approach. Long, tall, maybe dissociation, but you keep on snapping back. And that's why the Buddha quickly saw, that's not the way to liberation. That's a long vacation, but nothing more. So we know that's an option, but it doesn't work. Gautama already knew that 2,500 years ago. Came back and said, okay, but how can we be totally present in the world? Report an error in the passage at 19:28 Highlight the passage at 19:28

19:48 No dissociation. We'll just take away the delusion, thank you very much, and know reality as it is and find therein lies bliss, not just apathy or dissociation or an absence of feeling, but bliss by knowing reality as it is and being totally present, open-heartedly, empathetically, totally present in reality. Report an error in the passage at 19:48 Highlight the passage at 19:48

20:10 But without the grasping, the clinging, the identification. So that's where we've taken our little steps here. I'm going to stop so we have some time of discussion. But we've just stepped into the pool with observing rather than identifying with our own bodies. It's very easy to identify with. I feel hot. My stomach hurts. I feel restless. I feel heavy. I feel light. I feel happy. Report an error in the passage at 20:10 Highlight the passage at 20:10

20:35 I feel good. We just don't make any division at all between somatic sensations and I, and then I am. I'm in pain, etc., etc. It's normal. Let alone mental. I'm so angry I could spit. Total cognitive fusion between your own identity and this mental affliction that's come up. And you've just put your head in its mouth and let it swallow you whole. I am so angry. As if I and angry are one thing. Well, that's what makes it vulnerable. Report an error in the passage at 20:35 Highlight the passage at 20:35

21:06 So we're starting in the easiest. We're starting in the shallow end of the pool. There's a sequence here. And on that note, keep on saying I'm going to stop. You know me. If you didn't, those newcomers, now you're getting to know me. It's hard for me to stop. Because it's so important. It's so amazing. But we start where it's easy access. And that is, we can observe tactile sensations. We don't have to simply identify with them. Report an error in the passage at 21:06 Highlight the passage at 21:06

21:27 And we see that. So in the Buddhist magisterial sequence here, we start with the body. We'll do more this afternoon. And then when we have some foundation there of observing the body, recognizing the body as the body, tactile sensations and tactile sensations, rather than me or mine, they're just tactile sensations. Report an error in the passage at 21:27 Highlight the passage at 21:27

21:48 Get over it. Just like these are just visual impressions. They're not your visual impressions. There's nothing in them that makes them yours. You simply have a private showing of visual reality from your perspective. Not my sounds. They're just sounds arising in an auditory field, which I'll call mine simply because I'm aware of it. Report an error in the passage at 21:48 Highlight the passage at 21:48

22:06 And likewise smells, taste and touch. They're simply arising in their respective spaces. So we start there to start stepping out on the path of liberation. And having located ourselves, I am where my body is, then we recognize ever so swiftly something that we're already aware of and that is that not only am I embodied, but I have feelings and I really care about them an awful lot. Report an error in the passage at 22:06 Highlight the passage at 22:06

22:32 That is physical pleasure and pain, mental pleasure and pain. I can't help it, I'm a sentient being, it's not voluntary. I can't stop. Even people who want to stop, like committing suicide, that's their last ask, last gasp, last act in their mind's eye, in their hopeful vision to terminate suffering. Report an error in the passage at 22:32 Highlight the passage at 22:32

22:55 Unfortunately we have a big surprise coming for them. But it is an act of caring about themselves, that I can't stand it anymore, hopefully this will be better. Annihilation will be better than this, they're hoping. Report an error in the passage at 22:55 Highlight the passage at 22:55

23:08 It's too bad they got that one wrong. But even that is an act of trying to protect ourselves from suffering or avoid or make it stop. So we all care, all sentient beings care about suffering and about happiness. If we can't have happiness, well at least less suffering would be awfully nice. So the Buddha just went right to that, what we already care about. Buddhist, not Buddhist. Religious, not religious. Human, not human. We already care about it. Report an error in the passage at 23:08 Highlight the passage at 23:08

23:34 And we haven't proven ourselves to be all that successful thus far. Otherwise you probably wouldn't come to a meditation retreat. If you're so successful, slam dunk, stay at home. Report an error in the passage at 23:34 Highlight the passage at 23:34

23:45 But if we would like to be more successful than we have in freeing ourselves from suffering, we have to look at the causes and not just the symptoms, which is the marketable way to look at it. And so we go to feelings and try to understand them rather than simply identifying with them. And then as we tend to feelings arising in the body, feelings arising in the mind, we say, aha! Report an error in the passage at 23:45 Highlight the passage at 23:45

24:06 When I start looking at the origins of those feelings, I see that it's not just feelings giving rise to feelings, but in fact there are other cognitive processes taking place, cognitive desires, intentions. I start looking into my mind and say, whoa, there's quite a zoo in there. A lot of things are going on and some of them are contributing to my suffering and to my happiness. So maybe I should start inspecting that terrain, that wild zoo I call my mind. Report an error in the passage at 24:06 Highlight the passage at 24:06

24:32 And so that leads us to the third, close application of mindfulness to the mind. We're getting down to the nitty-gritty. What's really causing us to suffer and what really gives rise to happiness? What's leading to that which we care most about for ourselves and our loved ones, people we identify with? Report an error in the passage at 24:32 Highlight the passage at 24:32

24:48 So we turn to the mind. And then we finally just turn to the whole package. Phenomena. And that is, okay, now let's take everything into account here. We're embodied, we have minds, we're engaged with the environment, with other people and sentient beings. Now let's take a global look here, a panoramic look. Report an error in the passage at 24:48 Highlight the passage at 24:48

25:08 And with special emphasis, it's on not just moment-to-moment awareness, a whole bunch of snapshots. But there's a lot of coherence here. There are patterns, there are regularities. Scientists, for their domain, call them the laws of nature. In Buddhism, we call them patterns, regularities, causality, prachitta-samuppada. Report an error in the passage at 25:08 Highlight the passage at 25:08

25:26 And start to understand, by careful examination, the close application of mindfulness to phenomena and their causal relationships. Because of this, this arose. This didn't happen, then this didn't happen. This whole array of causal sequences, and some of them happening in a very regular, predictable fashion. Report an error in the passage at 25:26 Highlight the passage at 25:26

25:46 And other ones look like causality, and they're not. Like an American baseball player carrying a rabbit's foot to the home plate. But when I carry the rabbit's foot, I hit a lot better. You know, it looks like causality. I doubt it is, but he tried it once, and he hit a home run, he tried it twice, he hit a double. Report an error in the passage at 25:46 Highlight the passage at 25:46

26:05 It looks like the rabbit's foot's working. Or they wear the same old pair of undershirts. It's very common in sports. This is my lucky socks. This is my lucky rabbit's foot. There's my wife. Wave at me twice. Okay, thanks, honey. And now I'm ready to go. So there are things that look like causality and they're not. It's more just coincidence. Report an error in the passage at 26:05 Highlight the passage at 26:05

26:23 But then other ones are much more regular, like inverse square law of gravity and many, many other natural laws or patterns, regularities. Well, as the scientific community has To our great benefit, illuminated many regularities in terms of causality in the physical world. The Buddha Dharma, the Buddha himself, has identified regularities, especially in the relationship between subject and object and in terms of internal causality, in terms of the mind, things that we care enormously about. Report an error in the passage at 26:23 Highlight the passage at 26:23

26:56 And that's what the fourth close application of mindfulness is about, to closely apply our mindfulness to phenomena. Especially attending to those phenomena, those type of events, mental and so forth, that lead us towards liberation and those type of mental events and processes that lead us away from liberation. Report an error in the passage at 26:56 Highlight the passage at 26:56

27:15 That's maybe some of the most important information we'll ever get. And by knowing that, implementing that, we might actually be able to free ourselves from an awful lot of unnecessary suffering and find a greater sense of well-being than we've ever known. That's what the path is all about. Report an error in the passage at 27:15 Highlight the passage at 27:15

27:33 We have a few minutes. Why don't we linger here? Mindfulness of breathing? Any points of clarification? Because we are now going full-fledged into Vipassanā for the rest of the retreat. Doesn't mean we can't allude back to shamatha, but anything coming up with respect to mindfulness of breathing? Or is it crystal clear? Yes, please. Report an error in the passage at 27:33 Highlight the passage at 27:33

· · · silence, 1 minute

28:29 Understood, yeah. Very good question and relevant to everybody here. The first answer is, I'll give a short answer and then a longer answer. The short answer is it's your choice, of course. It's your choice. Do what you feel. I'm turning it right back to you. When that happens, then it's for you to evaluate what's more meaningful at this point. Report an error in the passage at 28:29 Highlight the passage at 28:29

28:49 Shall I just let it go and maybe come back to it later if it's really worthy? Or shall I say, I think I just want to suspend my shamatha for a little while because this is worth lingering on. Which means for a little while, if I go through door number two, this means I'm going to stop temporarily. I'm going to stop my shamatha practice because this is mindfulness of breathing and I'm not going to disengage my attention from the breath. Report an error in the passage at 28:49 Highlight the passage at 28:49

29:09 And I'm going to tend to this impulse, this memory, this emotion, whatever's coming up. And I would say both are very, very worthwhile. And then, which is which? And so, I'll mention not only, I'll kind of elaborate your question just a tiny bit, and it's not only that memories can come up that may arouse a very strong emotion or desires and so forth, but it's also, this happens a lot, it happened a lot to me, I really know about this, is when you're really settling in, And the mind becomes very relaxed, very porous, that is not rigid, not tight, very calm, clear, have some continuity. That may be an occasion when some real bursts of creativity come up. Report an error in the passage at 29:09 Highlight the passage at 29:09

29:52 In whatever field, if you're an artist, artistic creativity. I write a lot, sometimes a lot of creativity, fresh ideas, insights that relate to my teaching, my practice, my writing and so forth. They may come up. When I was studying physics, when I was studying physics at Amherst, I remember very specifically, I want to elaborate here, I want to give a short answer, but wonderful breakthrough to some one very difficult physics problem I was working on. Report an error in the passage at 29:52 Highlight the passage at 29:52

30:16 And I couldn't do it when I just applied my mind to it, I couldn't get anywhere. I went up and practiced mindfulness of breathing and boom, out came the entry to the practice, to the how to solve the problem, and I did. And so then it's a matter of simply evaluating in the moment, is this meaningful enough that I think I'd just like to break the session and give this let it speak. Report an error in the passage at 30:16 Highlight the passage at 30:16

30:38 Let it all flow out and see what it leads to. To my mind, there's just no question there are times when that's the best decision. Whether it's creativity, whether it's knowing ourselves, knowing some of the underlying impulses, emotions, maybe traumas, maybe good things coming up. And so what we're doing on that occasion is what we're doing is saying, I'm going to temporarily suspend my Shama to practice, I'll get back to it, but for right now I'm going to Vipassanā. Report an error in the passage at 30:38 Highlight the passage at 30:38

31:04 Because Vipassanā is all about understanding. It's gaining insight. It can be meaningful and transformative. And it may be mostly on a psychological level. Fine, we are a psychological being. So good, very helpful. And so I think that's the answer. Whether it's creativity, whether it's psychological, or whether you're starting to gain some really kind of more existential or existential contemplative insight that maybe go beyond the domain we normally call psychological. Report an error in the passage at 31:04 Highlight the passage at 31:04

31:32 More existential, more in a spiritual nature, but some very deep insight. If that's coming up, By all means, you can say, alright, I think I'm going to, the Shammata, thank you, you've served me very well for this session, thank you, salut, and then go right into your Vipassanā practice. So, it's a judgment call each time. But it's enjoyable. These are good choices. Choices between two good things. And then we can decide which one is more meaningful, valuable, on the spot. Report an error in the passage at 31:32 Highlight the passage at 31:32

32:01 You're welcome. Anything else coming up with respect to mindfulness or breathing? We'll have plenty of time for Vipassanā. Yes, please. And your name again? Alastair. I think, okay, for the first time. Alastair. Gotcha. Yes. It Report an error in the passage at 32:01 Highlight the passage at 32:01

32:36 can be both. And it is both. But depending on the approach. So if you go back to, there are a number of, at least one good translation. I have it as a book. Remember paper? I have one of those. It's a very short discourse. It's 16 phases. But the Ānāpānasati Sutta, or the Buddha's discourse on mindfulness of breathing. Report an error in the passage at 32:36 Highlight the passage at 32:36

32:58 I think Jnana Molitara did a translation. There are good translations out there. And then also, it's probably on the internet by now, so much is free, especially from the Charavada tradition. Buddhaghosa's commentary. That's a definitive commentary for the whole Charavada tradition. So you have the discourse and then Buddhaghosa's commentary. A lot of information there. And you'll see in terms of sheer modality, for the first four out of the sixteen phases, it's straight shamatha. Report an error in the passage at 32:58 Highlight the passage at 32:58

33:24 And so you're practicing mindfulness of breathing as a method for developing samādhi. In other words, it's technology. And the technology has the task of subduing the five obscurations and making the mind serviceable, stable and clear. There we are. That's it. So why not call it technology? It's like you just developed a laser. Now good. You got one? Good. Now start using it. Right? The next 12 phases are all about Vipassanā. Report an error in the passage at 33:24 Highlight the passage at 33:24

33:47 But now Buddha Dasa, who's passed away some years ago, but he was quite a prominent Thai Theravāda Buddhist teacher. I read his writings on Ānāpānasati. A decade, more than 40 years ago. And I remember him translating Ānāpānasati as mindfulness with breathing rather than mindfulness of breathing. So clearly that's an interpretation. But it's not a foolish one. He was not a foolish man. And the way he pointed out here is that it starts with mindfulness of breathing. Report an error in the passage at 33:47 Highlight the passage at 33:47

34:18 You really are attending in the Theravāda tradition to the tactical sensations of the passage of the breath. So that's breath. But as you go deeper and deeper, the awareness of the breath winds up being peripheral. Or even you would disengage from it. I want to elaborate on this right now. But it's more like, like, what's it kind of, I always forget the name of it, but you know these, the Oxford and Cambridge when they have their boat races up and down the Thames. Report an error in the passage at 34:18 Highlight the passage at 34:18

34:46 What's the boat called? But the point of it is, it's not really important, but we all see in it, they're rowing like that, you know, it's a good old school tie and all other business, but there's a person on the boat and his task is just to keep pace. So he's taking up, he weighs under 50 pounds or whatever, he's not pulling at all, but he's the one that's keeping the pace for them. And so it's a bit like that. Report an error in the passage at 34:46 Highlight the passage at 34:46

35:08 The breathing is the pacekeeper. It's just there. It's peripheral, or maybe you can actually fade out, but along the path it's there, but it becomes more and more mindfulness with breathing, and when you enter, now to answer your question, when you enter in the Vipassanā mode, there's an element of inquiry. Report an error in the passage at 35:08 Highlight the passage at 35:08

35:26 And that is the breath is going on of course, you're still breathing, but now you're attending to these jhāna factors that are coming up, you're attending to the rising of bliss, attending to the sense of well-being, attending to these mental factors that are arising. The focus is primarily on mental factors now, you can see it in the commentary, in the root text. And then you're examining them. Are they permanent or impermanent? Report an error in the passage at 35:26 Highlight the passage at 35:26

35:47 Are they by nature sources of well-being or not? Are they atta or anattā? Are they self or not self? The three characteristics. So you're inquiring. You weren't inquiring in shamatha. You're just placing your mind and developing the tool. Now that you've developed it, you're inquiring into these phenomena that we so easily, readily and habitually identify with. Report an error in the passage at 35:47 Highlight the passage at 35:47

36:09 Oh, I like bliss. I like joy. I like this. I like that. Say, okay, open your talons, thank you. And now just observe them arising. And as you observe them, now inquire into their nature. And as we'll see here in the Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta, examine closely the factors of origination. How do they occur? How are they present? Report an error in the passage at 36:09 Highlight the passage at 36:09

36:30 Permanent, impermanent. How do they dissolve? The factors of dissolution. How do they dissolve? That's Vipassanā. Not simply bear attention. Bear attention is a good entry. That's how you open the door. But if it's not inquiry, it's not Vipassanā. And you're inquiring. There are many things one can ask. Report an error in the passage at 36:30 Highlight the passage at 36:30

36:47 Psychologists ask many, many questions. Cognitive psychologists, clinical psychologists ask many, many questions about attention, emotion and so forth. Very useful. But these are the questions that are being posed, the insight into which will actually liberate your mind from the causes of suffering. So those are very pinpoint, not like darts. These are the really crucial questions that will liberate your mind. We grasp onto the impermanent as permanent. Report an error in the passage at 36:47 Highlight the passage at 36:47

37:14 You might want to stop doing that if it's not true. We grasp on things that are not by nature of the very nature of joy as being of the very ancient joy. Recognize that, you're free. And then finally and most subtly, we're grasping onto that which is not by nature I or mine as being I or mine. Recognize them as they are and you're free. And so it's that inquiry into those three marks of existence that's core, core practice. Report an error in the passage at 37:14 Highlight the passage at 37:14

37:38 And that's what makes it Vipassanā. But it can still be in that same continuum of mindfulness of breathing. So that's why that one method, but with multiple gradations in 16 phases, starts with shamatha, culminates in vipassanā and becoming an arhat. Okay? Quite something. Enjoy your lunch. We'll come back at 2 o 'clock. And maintain the flow. Report an error in the passage at 37:38 Highlight the passage at 37:38