← B. Alan Wallace

Four Applications Of Mindfulness Retreat 2013 with B. Alan Wallace (part 35)

B. Alan Wallace · 2013 · 53 min · Vajrayana Institute via Internet Archive

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  • 2:58

    And so this is specifically for settling the mind in its natural state. And it says the entrance to the practice, when you know you've cracked the door open and you're actually getting access to this practice you're doing correctly, is a signpost for that is being able to recognize experientially the difference between stillness and motion, between stillness and motion. And that can be interpreted in two ways. And one of these, as I've already suggested, is recognizing quite clearly what's it like. When your awareness is simply still, when it's not caught up in anything, not carried away by anything, it's just like, again, like that unflickering candle flame, like right now.

  • 9:55

    There are four types. Here's the first one. It can be useful to remember. Utterly experiential. There's no metaphysic here at all. And that is the first one, we'll just give it a name, it's called single-pointed mindfulness. Single-pointed mindfulness occurs and it can occur quite quickly. It's not something you necessarily have to wait weeks or months before you get it.

  • 13:46

    Then you slip into, you just gradually segue into the second type of mindfulness, which is called manifest mindfulness. And this would be corresponding very closely to the Csikszentmihalyi notion of flow. And that is just, you're kind of just cruising. Can't say that there's no effort involved, but it's very little, relatively little, little effort. And here's a nice image, quite a beautiful image, and that is of a falcon kiting into the wind.

  • 20:10

    And that means all of its mental factors have dissolved. And so the third type of mindfulness, ironically, It's called absence of mindfulness. Mindfulness in the sense of recollection, remember that's its primary meaning, retention, bearing in mind, recalling. At this point, the coarse mind has just, it's basically gone to sleep. It's as if you've fallen deep asleep, but there you are, instead of having a little flickering candle, you have a thousand watt bulb that's brilliantly illuminating pretty much nothing.

  • 22:39

    Rangan, self-illuminating. And then you've achieved shamatha. That's the end of the line on the shamatha express, with four types of mindfulness, with the preamble of being able to distinguish between stillness and motion.

0:06 In terms of shamatha itself, there are very different ways for achieving that quality of attentional balance. One that's taught very frequently in Tibetan Buddhism, in all the schools, is generating a mental image of a Buddha, or it really could be of anything, but like in the space in front of you, it wasn't there before, so you're freshly generating it, and then lock onto it, stabilize, and take it all the way to shamatha. Report an error

0:35 That's kind of your vehicle. And when that method is taught, it's very often taught in conjunction with nine very reasonable, very transparent, logical steps of attentional development. Stages one through nine and then finally achieving shamatha. So that's very classic teaching. That's the first teaching I received about 42 years ago. And I would call that a developmental model because you're developing the qualities of stability, of vividness. Report an error

1:02 With respect to an image that you're also developing, generating, refining and polishing. And then you develop your way, you progress your way through these nine stages and eventually achieve shamatha. And it's been done many times, so it's a method that works. But it's not the only method. And this practice that we've begun to venture into here is settling the mind in its natural state. Report an error

1:27 It's a bit more in the mode of discovering shamatha than it is developing shamatha. The practice remains homogenous, that is the method doesn't change as you develop along the way. I've received teachings on this practice from multiple traditions, multiple teachers, read a variety of written presentations from meditation manuals. Report an error

1:46 And what I find remarkable about it, or simply something noteworthy about it, is that when this is being presented, and by the way often, or just about invariably in my experience, in the context of either Mahamudra or Dzogchen, these two schools of Tibetan Buddhism, There's no reference to the nine stages. There's no refutation of them, or in the Galupad edition a brief reference, but then nothing elaborated there, simply saying you will pass through these. Report an error

2:12 They don't tend to be so highlighted. So it's a bit more of a road without clear markers. The method stays the same. And there it is. You're just sustaining that flow of mindfulness without distraction, without grasping. And then... You proceed along the path but it's kind of like going through space rather than going on earth and you've got a lot of signposts along the way. But there is a very helpful explanation of different phases of mindfulness that one transverses as one is developing shamatha and eventually achieving shamatha. Report an error

2:48 This is from the Dzogchen tradition and I thought I might share these with you because they are very practical. I mean they're all practical and this one I just find very accessible and meaningful. And so this is specifically for settling the mind in its natural state. And it says the entrance to the practice, when you know you've cracked the door open and you're actually getting access to this practice you're doing correctly, is a signpost for that is being able to recognize experientially the difference between stillness and motion, between stillness and motion. Report an error

3:21 And that can be interpreted in two ways. And one of these, as I've already suggested, is recognizing quite clearly what's it like. When your awareness is simply still, when it's not caught up in anything, not carried away by anything, it's just like, again, like that unflickering candle flame, like right now. Report an error

3:44 What's that like? So you have a marker. Okay, now I know what that's like. Just like eating an orange. Now I know what an orange tastes like. Now I know what that's like. It's not that difficult. It may not last all that long, but nevertheless, at least for a few seconds, okay, there's stillness. There's stillness. And then... Report an error

4:01 What's the motion business? Well, the motion is the thoughts, images, all the stuff that comes and goes within the space of the mind and being able to recognize, oh, yeah, that certainly is, that's the thought that came and went, there's an image, there's a video clip and so forth. Report an error

4:14 So there's one, I think, very sound interpretation and clearly that's going to be necessary if you're going to proceed along this path of settling the mind in its natural state because if your awareness is always in motion as soon as your thoughts and images are in motion, you'll never be able to observe them. Report an error

4:30 It's just going to be one rumination after another. Oh, it got me again, it got me again, it got me again. I was never able to observe it because I was always caught by every single one. That's kind of frustrating, and if that's all that happens, I'd say back up to mindfulness of breathing. But if you can recognize, ah, that is movement of the mind, and we're not thinking about the mind monolithically, like one big chunk of something, but rather the movement of a thought, an image, a desire, a memory, whatever it may be, that's enough. Report an error

5:01 So that's one interpretation of being able to recognize the distinction between stillness and motion. Report an error

5:11 Another interpretation, which is also useful, is recognizing when your awareness is still and then recognizing, perhaps retrospectively, when it was in motion. That is, oh, I was carried away again. That time I was carried away to the past. Oh, that time I was carried away to some imaginary future. Or off to some place distant in the present moment. Report an error

5:34 So this recognizing the stillness and the motion of your own awareness. So being able to distinguish or to recognize those two distinctions, those two modalities of stillness and motion. If you can do that, then okay, you're ready to go. You gain access to the practice. Then you venture in and say, okay, now I know what to do. Report an error

5:57 And as you become more accustomed to this quality of mindfulness, And this way of focusing the mindfulness, which again has no clear tangible target, that is if you think the space of the mind is in front of you, you might consider, can you visualize right now of sitting on a pile of sugar? See, see, we all know it looks like a big pile of sugar. Can you imagine right now that you're sitting right on top of a big pile of sugar? You do that, can't you? Report an error

6:30 In other words, you visualize something beneath your body. Now can you imagine there's a great big, why not, pile of sugar or Mickey Mouse, anything pile of sugar it's going to be. Right behind you there's a big pile of sugar. Report an error

6:44 Yep, got that. Okay, there's a great big bag of sugar right above your head, suspended over your head. Great big bag, 50 kilo bag of sugar suspended over your head. The point here is that the space of the mind is not just in front of you. Wherever you can visualize, the space of the mind is there. You can't visualize something outside the space of your mind. Report an error

7:04 I don't even know what that would mean. So wherever you can visualize anything, you can be sure that visualization is taking place in the space of the mind, which means, of course, the space of the mind is not just in front of you. It can be inside yourself. Can you visualize a little pearl of light right in your heart chakra, a little like a pearl, white, right in the center of your heart chakra, center of your chest? Report an error

7:25 Visualize that? Okay, that's where the space of the mind is. Wherever you can visualize anything, that's where the space of the mind is. And so... It's quite intangible, doesn't clearly have borders, but we're attending to that by a process of elimination. You might recall that's how we first approached this practice of settling the mind in this natural state. Report an error

7:48 Remember it was by a process of elimination. Checked out the visual, the auditory, tactile, skipped right through the olfactory and gustatory, and then asked, okay, what else are you immediately aware of? Probably thoughts, but not by way of the five physical senses. So you can say, okay, where is the thought? Report an error

8:07 Well, we're going to just say it's in the domain of the mind because it's only with mental perception that you detect it. Just as all dreams, when you're dreaming, all the dream imagery, but of course it's not just visual and auditory. You can also touch something in the dream. You can smell something in the dream. Report an error

8:28 Taste. Sure, you can eat a watermelon in a dream. In other words, you can have... right? Report an error

8:32 Appearances of all the five sensory modalities, that is facsimiles of them, all occurring in the space of the mind when you're dreaming. Because your nose isn't picking up anything, there's no molecules coming into the nose that you're detecting, you don't feel your body in bed, you're probably walking around in the dream. Report an error

8:47 And so you're having all these five sensory modalities appearing in the dream context, but they're all appearing in the space of the mind. So the point is that in this practice, you're focusing on that one modality, that one field, space or domain, that is purely mental. And as you progress in the practice, getting used to that, being able to find it quickly, and you're not wondering where is it, or just giving yourself a target, like a skeet, a skeet with a shotgun. Report an error

9:14 So the skeet goes up, so you know exactly where the space is. Because that skeet, when they shoot it up, it's going to be in space, not going to be in the ground or underneath the ground. So the skeet goes up, pull, and then as soon as you've identified the skeet, you know you're focusing in space. And then the skeet comes or goes, but at least you found the right domain, that space. So likewise, Mary had a little lamb, pole. Mary with her little lamb, that's the skeet, placed in the space of the mind. Report an error

9:43 She vanishes, keep your attention right where it was. So as you proceed, as you become familiar with the practice, then after some time you'll experience the first type of mindfulness. There are four types. Here's the first one. It can be useful to remember. Utterly experiential. There's no metaphysic here at all. And that is the first one, we'll just give it a name, it's called single-pointed mindfulness. Report an error

10:09 Single-pointed mindfulness occurs and it can occur quite quickly. It's not something you necessarily have to wait weeks or months before you get it. It could happen in this retreat. Not that difficult. Even if it's rather fleeting. And the single-pointed mindfulness occurs when you're simultaneously aware of the stillness of your own awareness and the movement of thoughts. Report an error

10:40 So this means that you're attending to the thought, the image, the memory or so forth, without being dragged away by it. Because if that happens, your awareness is in motion, your thought is in motion, and they're going along together. Whereas here, your awareness remains unflickering, it's illuminating the thought comes and goes, but it's not dragged along by it. In this mode of mindfulness, you're also aware when the space of the mind is still. Report an error

11:03 One of you mentioned with frustration that I was trying to do the practice and I'm looking for thoughts and I don't see any. That's fine. That's called symmetry of stillness. And that is your awareness is still. And the domain of experience you're attending to is still. Because as closely as you inspect it, you're not seeing anything that's moving. That's okay. There's no reason to be frustrated. You're doing the practice correctly. Report an error

11:29 And for the time being, you're getting an empty space with no movement in it. Cool. Hang in there for a little while. Something's going to move. It's only a matter of time. But the single-pointed mindfulness occurs when you are simultaneously able to be aware of the stillness of your awareness and the movement of thought. Very valuable. Report an error

11:49 Very, very valuable. And again, as I mentioned this morning, valuable in the marketplace, the workplace and so forth and so on, when there's a lot of activity around, whether it's simply physical activity or you can see the speaking, you can see a lot of turbulence, perhaps you're inferring turbulence in other people's minds, that you're the one, you're the rock. Report an error

12:07 You're the one that's still, you're the one that's stable, clear, sound, grounded, not carried away by all the other people's turbulence. It would be very helpful to them to be an example of somebody who's not swayed by every gust of mental afflictions. And so that's the first type of mindfulness. And then it's simply a matter of familiarization, just going deeper and just doing it a lot. Just developing the skill, becoming more habituated or familiar with the skill. Report an error

12:34 And at the beginning, it certainly takes some effort because it's so easy to be swept away. But the effort is not by clamping down more tightly, it's by loosening up more fully. And so it's something like developing a Teflon awareness. So when the thoughts, images, memories, desires and so forth, they come with their little talons. Report an error

12:54 They try to get their hooks into you and they just keep on sliding off. They can't yank you. Because you don't have a Velcro awareness that can be yanked by anything. You have a Teflon awareness and as much as they may be pawing at you, trying to carry you away, they just can't do it. Because you're so loose. So that's a really strong emphasis of the practice, the looseness. And that's why the antidote to excitation, when you are carried away, is not by slapping it or cutting it. Report an error

13:23 It's by just getting more loose and then the talons release. And there you are, and you just naturally come back and settle in the natural stillness of your own awareness when it's free of grasping. So the first type of mindfulness is single-pointed, and as you become more and more adept, more familiar, it does get somewhat easier, easier. Report an error

13:46 Then you slip into, you just gradually segue into the second type of mindfulness, which is called manifest mindfulness. Report an error

13:57 And this would be corresponding very closely to the Csikszentmihalyi notion of flow. And that is just, you're kind of just cruising. Can't say that there's no effort involved, but it's very little, relatively little, little effort. And here's a nice image, quite a beautiful image, and that is of a falcon kiting into the wind. Report an error

14:19 We've all seen it, probably in real life, at least in documentary films, nature films. And that is when the falcon or other types of hawks and eagles and other birds that will do this. But it's called kiting into the wind. You've all seen it. We're facing into the wind. And with just the very, very subtle movements of their pin feathers, the tail, they're remaining stationary with respect to the ground. Report an error

14:42 While the wind is flowing over them, they're probably looking down for some prey. But you see it's quite beautiful to see. And they're just hovering there. So the wind is moving. What they're facing is just an ongoing flow of wind and it's not always even. Sometimes it will be a gust, maybe going updraft, downdraft, left or right. Report an error

15:00 But with these minor modifications of their feathers and their wings, tail, then they remain stationary. And they're remaining stationary, again, obviously, not by holding on to anything, but just by being very sensitive to the flow of the wind from moment to moment to moment. So they have to be very much here and now. Report an error

15:21 Otherwise they'll be swept backwards or forwards. So in a similar fashion, by being very sensitive, a light touch right in the present moment, very sensitive to the flow of the winds of thoughts, memories, images and so forth, that you're not drawn forward into an imaginary future, you're not swept backwards into a past that has already disappeared, you're hovering right there in the immediacy of the present moment. Report an error

15:47 And again at the beginning, It's kind of hard. It takes some effort. It's the effort of releasing, grasping, releasing again and again. It takes some effort. But as you become more adept at it, then it just becomes easier. And you have this manifest mindfulness where you're just kind of in a flow of stillness. And it's a stillness that is relaxed, it's loose, and it's clear as your awareness is buffeted by memories, fantasies, desires, thoughts, images, whatever. Report an error

16:14 But they just keep on flowing through, flowing through. And you maintain this ongoing flow of relaxed, still and clear mindfulness. Quite pleasant. Quite unperturbed. So you continue with that. And for those of you, I know a number of you are Buddhist scholars, stage four out of nine stages, that would be pretty close correspondence. Report an error

16:41 Where you're not simply swept away or carried off and away from your meditative object. So then you simply continue. Again, the method doesn't vary. It stays the same. Report an error

16:54 And it's in that kind of that long backstretch, so to speak, of your development of shamatha or your discovery of the natural stillness and luminosity of your awareness. Report an error

17:05 And that backstretch that over the course of time, and in terms of the nine stages, when you get up to about stage seven or eight, up in that area, that you will be finding in kind of waves, or it's kind of now it is and now it isn't, you'll find that your senses are imploding. And there's nothing scary about it. Maybe the first time or second time. And you see, well, there's no harm. I'm not going blind. I'm not going deaf. I get my awareness right back as soon as I direct my attention to visual, the auditory and so forth. Report an error

17:34 But you'll find that kind of the sense of being incorporated, that is embodied, fades out. And you're just in the space of the mind. You'll find that sounds just kind of seemingly fade out. Vision, even with your eyes open, fades out as just gradually, very gently. And in waves, not all homogeneously or all at once, the whole flow of your awareness is simply coming purely into the mental domain. And then as I mentioned before this morning, and that is as this is happening in that same process, gradually over time, the activities of the javana, the activities of the mind, thoughts, images, memories, activities of all kinds, they're just gradually subsiding. Report an error

18:17 By the time you get up to seven, eight, not much left. Just a few little... Flecks of snow in your snow globe. It's really subsiding until you keep on going and it just gets more and more restful. The amount of effort becomes less and less and less until your senses, your physical senses, have completely imploded. Report an error

18:35 It's now as if you're fast asleep. That is, you're not aware of your body at all or the surrounding environment. And your awareness is now thoroughly flowing, 100%, into the mental domain. And you're still focusing there, the same object of mindfulness. Object of mindfulness is the space of the mind and its contents. But now the contents have vanished. You're really very far along the path. You're up in stage nine or so. Report an error

18:59 And there's just nothing more happening. And again, it's not because you went shh or patted it down or made it scram. They just all just kind of ran out of gas. Just like being in a car. And after a while it just stops growing because the petrol is gone. And so there you are. Your psyche ran out of gas. Report an error

19:17 Which it happens every time we fall deep asleep, but then we're, you know, dull. We're not aware of it. We're non-lucid. But here you are, your psyche has basically run out of material. But you're very, very clear. But what you're aware of is just that sheer vacuity of the space of your mind. And your coarse mind, your psyche, the one you're familiar with, that you identify with, that's now ceased. Report an error

19:46 You've lost your mind. Not in any bad way, in a really good way. Because it's dissolved. The coarse mind is now dissolved into subtle mind. But you're still attending to the space of the mind. And the mental factor of mindfulness that was associated with your coarse mind, the one you're very familiar with, that stopped because the coarse mind is dissolved. Report an error

20:10 And that means all of its mental factors have dissolved. And so the third type of mindfulness, ironically, It's called absence of mindfulness. Mindfulness in the sense of recollection, remember that's its primary meaning, retention, bearing in mind, recalling. At this point, the coarse mind has just, it's basically gone to sleep. It's as if you've fallen deep asleep, but there you are, instead of having a little flickering candle, you have a thousand watt bulb that's brilliantly illuminating pretty much nothing. Report an error

20:43 That is to say you're wide awake. I'm not speaking of light. You're not seeing white light, purple light. It's not that. It's just that you're brilliantly awake, vividly awake. That's the luminosity. It's being just bright, clear, clearly aware, but luminously aware of almost nothing. That is, luminously aware of the vacuity of your own mind. Report an error

21:03 And so you are now experiencing the absence of mindfulness. But once you make no mistake, it's not trance. You're not zoned out. You're not stupid. You're not vegetative. You're brilliantly awake. Report an error

21:17 Aware of much. Substrate. You're aware of that. And you're not remembering anything. That is, personal history, what were the instructions for the practice? That's gone. That faculty of mindfulness and retention bearing in mind of the coarse mind, it's gone. So you slip into this mode where it's called the absence of mindfulness. Report an error

21:41 And then you invert your awareness. That is, you don't simply sustain the focus on the sheer vacuity of the space of the mind, which is called the substrate or the alaya. You don't remain there. You do one last thing. It's your kind of little, almost like a footnote. Instead of keeping your attention there, focused on the space of the mind, which now has no content, then you do the final thing. Report an error

22:04 And then you invert your awareness right in upon itself. You simply, you invert it like a yo-yo. You pull it back. And instead of attending to the space of the mind, you withdraw that vector of your attention and you just rest in the sheer experience. Without a vector, without directionality, you just rest in that knowing of knowing, the awareness of awareness, the substrate consciousness being aware of itself, and that's called naturally luminous, or self-illuminating mindfulness. Report an error

22:39 Rangan, self-illuminating. And then you've achieved shamatha. Report an error

22:48 That's the end of the line on the shamatha express, with four types of mindfulness, with the preamble of being able to distinguish between stillness and motion. So those are the road markers. They don't talk much about nine stages, but they talk about those, and you can see it's entirely internal. There's no external markers for this, and it's all relative. You'll see for yourself how that goes, but that's actually enough. Those are enough road markers to know where you are in the practice, and you simply continue with the same method all the way through. Report an error

23:27 And then you're poised. And just by the way, when you get there, then you experience Classically, and this has been done thousands upon thousands of times. It really doesn't matter what your religion is, your gender, your age, ethnicity. It just really doesn't matter because all that is history. Now, when you come out of samādhi, of course you're going to be a man or a woman, whoever you were. That's going to all be reactivated. Your brain works perfectly well. And so the coarse mind that arises independence upon the brain, assuming your brain is working well, will be the same mind, but it will be purified. Report an error

24:01 And that is coming out of samādhi. You'll find that the mind you're coming out with is much better than the one you went in with months ago when you began to practice because the mind that you're coming out with is really largely free of those five obscurations. And so the benefits, the suppleness, the clarity, the stillness and so forth that you're cultivating on the cushion, there's a great deal of carryover in terms of your post-meditative experience as you're simply out and about in the world. Report an error

24:29 So it's an extraordinarily healthy mind. I would say, frankly, in terms of Buddhist mental health, although such a term doesn't exist in the Buddhist tradition, but if we kind of try to envision, well, what would be a Buddhist model of getting five-star York incredibly healthy? We're not talking about liberation, enlightenment, anything esoteric, anything transcendent here, but just in terms of being in the world, what's the criterion for having just a superbly fit, healthy, robust, How do you say? A mind with a very robust immune system, which is to say you don't easily fall prey to anger, craving and all the junk. Report an error

25:09 And I just described it. It's called having a chief shamatha. And it's really, really good on the cushion, but it's also very good off the cushion. So now you have really a clean bell of health. Tsongkhapa says now you have a mind. Now you have a mind. Report an error

25:24 I'll give you an image. It's an awful one, but it's cute just because it was fiction and no one heard. Anybody see the movie Little Miss Sunshine? So you remember, it's comedy, so I say this, there's no need for tears, because it's a comedy. No animal was injured in the production of this movie. But remember when they got in their station wagon with the dog tied behind? And then they drove off? As a joke, it's really funny, because no dog was harmed. Report an error

25:48 But when the station wagon takes off, and they just forgot about the dog that they tied to the... To the rear bumper. Does the dog have a car or does the car have a dog? I think it's pretty clear, right? And so before you have a shamatha, before you really have some control over your mind, do you have a mind or does the mind have you? Which one's the dog, which one's the station wagon? Report an error

26:16 Any guesses? So once you've achieved shamatha, I mean obviously that's quite a wonderful state and there are many stages in between, but when you've achieved shamatha, you're the station wagon. Report an error

26:31 And you tell the mind, jump, and it says, how far? You've got a mind that you can use. It's supple, it's malleable. And they say in Tibetan, it's fit for service. It's now ready to be put to work. And we all know what it's like when the mind is, when it's unserviceable, and that you say, mind, hop, hop, I want you to now focus on the breath for 24 minutes. Report an error

26:53 Hop, hop, and three minutes, at least three seconds later, it's going hip, hip, and it's off in some other direction. So wait a minute, I thought I gave you an order. Yep, yep, yep. And it's the station wagon where the dog, right? So you all know what that's like. So that's shamatha. The whole idea is to make the mind wonderfully serviceable, balanced, poised. Report an error

27:11 The mind that is settled in equipoise comes to know reality as it is. That's what the Buddha said. But of course you have to use it and that's what Vipassanā is for. Report an error

27:22 And so as we're attending closely, that is closely applying mindfulness to space of the mind and its contents, We can look at the foreground, that is, if the space of the mind is like a stage in which actors come and go, then some of the actors will be exactly those discursive thoughts, the chit-chat, the rumination, but also images, video clips and the like. Report an error

27:47 And we examine them. So, as we did in this last session, one way of examining them is to see exactly, to inspect, to scrutinize exactly where are they coming from. Report an error

28:00 I mean, there they are. Nobody has a better perspective on them than we do. Scientists can't even see them at all, not with tools of science. Scientists can if they're observing their own minds, which makes them contemplative. But this is the perspective. If anybody can see where thoughts come, you're the one when you're observing your own thoughts, because that's how. You won't get it by observing neurons. And so you observe how do they occur, from where do they occur. Report an error

28:22 Once they're present, how are they present, and then eventually, sooner or later, they're bound to dissolve. And then we can ask what are the factors of disillusion and where do they dissolve into. So that's very basic Vipassanā practice. One sees this in the Pāli Canon, in the Buddha's own discourse, and in the Mahamudra and Dzogchen traditions. This is absolutely classic Vipassanā practice. Report an error

28:43 Utterly classic. It's called Jumne Dosun. Examining the origination. Jumma. Ne. How are they present? Where are they located? And Do. Where do they go? And how do they go? Basic Vipassanā. And one can imagine, I mean, that basic thing. How does it emerge? How is it present? How does it vanish? Wouldn't that work for a botany? You've got a certain plant. What kind of a seed does it come from? What kind of soil and so forth? Report an error

29:09 And then how does it grow? And once it's there, how does it manifest? And then eventually when it gets sick and dies, how does that happen? And what happens to it after it dies? Does it turn into mulch? What happens to it? Isn't that true for zoology? Isn't that true for studying stars? Where do they come from? They've now been able to identify a galaxy that was... Report an error

29:30 Just emerging, it's 13.1 billion light years away. 13.1 I think it was. And so it was one of the earliest galaxies in terms of the formation of the universe. And it took 13.1 billion years, of course, from the light from that galaxy to finally get to the telescope. So they're looking that far back in time to a time about 600 to 700 million years after the Big Bang. Report an error

29:58 And they're seeing how, it's really amazing the inferences they can draw, but they're observing the rate of productivity of stars. I mean, how quickly did that very early galaxy, how quickly did it generate stars? The answer is very quickly. Lots and lots of stars. And so they're looking at the origins of galaxies and the origins of stars. And then astronomers observe galaxies. Report an error

30:19 And then they observe how stars get snuffed out, you know, black holes, white dwarfs and all that kind of business. And so this theme of looking at origination, how are they present, how are they dissolved, that runs through a lot of sciences. And so this is clearly being treated as a natural science, which is what William James was hoping for, but didn't really have quite all the wherewithal to develop himself. Report an error

30:38 But he had the right idea. So Jung Ne Dosum, looking at origination, presence and dissolution. Report an error

30:48 then in this, really, this very nuclear approach to Vipassanā, Vipassanā, examining closely something that's so intimate, so up close and personal to our very existence. Then we pose questions about these fundamental marks of existence, so to speak. The realization of which really is enormously liberating. So I'll be brief because we'll take a break very shortly. But the first one we're familiar with, and that is as we're attending to the contents of the mind, Thoughts, images and so on. And we see, we're examining closely how they are present once they've arisen. How are they? Is it like parking a pickup truck in your garage and it just sits there like a great big chunk of something and looks pretty static? Report an error

31:37 Is it like that? Or is it more like a hummingbird? Or is it like a strobe light? How are they present once they've arisen? Are they durable? Are they unchanging for some period? Or for as long as they're there, are they staccato, rising and passing? Do they change? Are they immutable? And so that's the first question. And it's designed to overcome, each of these examinations is designed to overcome a type of delusional projection on reality that gives rise to suffering. Report an error

32:08 And we've heard them before, and that is while attending to that which by nature is impermanent, fleeting, momentarily changing, and eventually a subject, in most cases, to termination. Report an error

32:21 This has to do with people, relationships, possessions, pets, location, etc., etc. Where by nature, that is its nature, and that is in all likelihood, it's going to come to an end, and before it does, it's always in a process of change, always in flux. Where that's reality, that's what's actually presenting to our senses. What we project out there is the facade of stability, the facade, the cloak. Report an error

32:49 Of something durable, abiding, something we can count on, something that will last. Regarding that which is impermanent as being permanent, that which is by nature always subject to change as being stable and unchanging. And that gives rise to all these surprises when we're so shocked when something changes and we thought, oh, but I thought I could count on that, like a job, etc., etc. Report an error

33:14 And so that's the first one. To recognize the impermanent as impermanent. And overcome the old deeply ingrained habitual tendency of regarding the impermanent as somehow being more durable, more enduring than it in fact is. It's a big one. As I said before, I elaborated a lot, the footprint of the elephant and so forth, in terms of bringing about a real revolution in the way we view reality. Report an error

33:40 That's a big one. But the second one I haven't elaborated on so much, but I have referred to it, and that is taking that which is by nature unsatisfying. Report an error

33:52 And regarding it, that which by nature is unsatisfying, that is to say, not a true wellspring of happiness, joy, satisfaction, isn't apprehending it as is, and as any object of mind. Any object of mind. It can be obviously another person. Say, okay, this is my soulmate, or this person, this person I can count on, this person will bring me happiness, security. Report an error

34:18 What I'm looking for, this person will be the wellspring. All I need to do is be with me forever. Be with me forever. There's a relationship, I'll love you forever, but make sure you love me forever too. We have to be tangoing here. It has to be two-way. So love me forever, okay? Because I love you forever. Because I'm sure my happiness is bound up in you. Because you're the source of my happiness. You are what makes me happy. And so regarding another person, or a place, or a job, or a possession, or your own body, or intangibles like your reputation, or certain wealth, numbers in your checkbook. Report an error

34:54 Or what have your bank account, or power and so forth. There are all kinds of things that people regard, we commonly regard, as that's what makes me happy. Report an error

35:04 And if something is veritably, truly a source of happiness, then it will be like an artesian spring, artesian well. And that is, as I said before, every time you go to an artesian well, it always delivers water. And for as long as you're there, it continues to deliver water. It doesn't give any less after you've been there for 10 hours or 10 years. If it's a good well, it just keeps on giving, giving, giving, right? At any time of the day, and the longer you're there, the more water it gives. Report an error

35:30 That's a true wellspring or a source of water, right? And so if there's someone, something, anything out there that is truly a source of our happiness, then it should deliver just like an artesian well does. Whenever you go there, it should make you happy. For as long as you stay there, it should make you happy because it's a true source and you're tapping into the source. So there it is. Report an error

35:52 So have we ever made that mistake of thinking that something out there is going to be a true source and thinking whenever I go back to it, it will make me happy. It, she, him, it, whatever it may be. Report an error

36:04 And the Buddhist premise is no object of mind of any sort, plant, mineral, vegetable. Human being, other sentient being, or abstract, like reputation, etc. No object of mind is a true source of happiness. Report an error

36:25 Many, many things may catalyze happiness, but then we generally find they have a half-life. So whether it's dessert, whether it's music, whether it's another person, some sensual enjoyment, reputation, whatever it is, hang with it long enough. And it will become evident that as much as you thought that would really deliver, it doesn't. It doesn't. After some time, it doesn't. Report an error

36:53 There's a nice story of Charlie Chaplin and Albert Einstein. Sounds like a joke, but I think it's actually a true story. Albert Einstein and Charlie Chaplin walked into a bar. No, not that, not that. I think it's actually a true story. Charlie Chaplin in around 1819 was already a celebrity, big shot, famous. Report an error

37:12 It was around that time, I can't specify the exact year, maybe the early 20s, but he was renowned during his time. And Albert Einstein was simply one more physicist. In 1905, the miraculous year, three incredible discoveries, he was just known to physicists, just one more good physicist, but the general public, Albert who? Report an error

37:34 No idea. And then about, what was it, 1905, 1915, he came out with general relativity, very difficult to understand. Then gradually got caught on. Other physicists understood. He said, well, he's really brilliant. But then I think it was 1819, I believe it was, Sir Arthur Eddington took his sailing vessel down to the tip of South America, I believe. Report an error

37:56 He was doing a particular measurement because Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity made a prediction based upon his theory that space bends, space is warped. And that predicted that the light, I think it was from a certain star, would bend around the sun and they'd be able to measure that. And if Albert Einstein's theory was correct, it would show that light bends around the sun because it's caught in the gravitational field and nothing else predicted that. Report an error

38:25 And they wanted to test it. This was the first empirical test to see whether his elegant theory was actually true or not. And it made that prediction. Well, Sir Arthur Eddington went down there, made the measurement, did the calculations and lo and behold. Albert got it right. And it was just after the First World War, this incredible psychological decimation of the European psyche altogether. Report an error

38:46 And here came this funny man with his funny hairdo with a blackboard and chalk that seemed to have fathomed the mysteries of the universe with a piece of chalk and a really good brain and mind. And it just seemed to be the elixir that European society needed. And he became an overnight celebrity. Suddenly, I mean, it looked so funky. It looked like the absent-minded professor. They loved it. And the fact that he could do the chalkboard, something that would be so esoteric. So overnight he became a celebrity. Report an error

39:16 And so somehow he and Charlie Chaplin hooked up. And I believe it was in London. And it was for a new showing, a premiere of one of Charlie Chaplin's movies. And Albert Einstein tagged along. And so then they got and it was all shown. Then the two of them were in the limousine. Heading off to their hotel or what have you. And the crowd sees Charlie Chaplin and Albert Einstein in the same limo. Well, they just went crazy, you know. Report an error

39:44 I mean, two celebrities for the price of one. And people flocked in upon them, just adulating them. One for being the great comedian that he was, the other one for being the brilliant man that he was. And Charlie Chaplin, for him, this was old hat. He'd experienced this a lot of time, right? Many times. But Albert Einstein, this was new for him. Report an error

40:03 He'd never been treated like this kind of a celebrity before. He didn't know how much was contact high maybe from Charlie Chaplin. But he recognized it was for him too. And so the story, this is a long preamble to a very short end. But Albert Einstein allegedly turned to Charlie Chaplin and said, as he saw people just going crazy, you know, you know what they're like. And Albert Einstein turned to Charlie Chaplin and said, what does this mean? Report an error

40:27 You know, all this adulation, the incredible... All this business. He said, what does it mean? Charlie Chaplin said, nothing. Report an error

40:42 You like the punchline? I thought it was a pretty good punchline. So it's just a really good story. We have to break it up once in a while for a really good story. But you know, once you've had that happen a hundred times, how exciting is it? You know, a hundred and oneth time. For Einstein, it was kind of like, weird, this is weird. I don't know if he really enjoyed it, but whoa, what's up? And for Charlie Chaplin, nothing's up. Report an error

41:03 This is just what happens. You get in a limo, people flock you. What can you do? So there it is. So, you know, it can be pleasant, I imagine, I've never had it happen, but to be having people flocking about you just crazy out of their minds because you're such a great celebrity. I guess that would be kind of a buzz, but probably not after it's happened a hundred times. Or I was with Richard Gere once. We were sitting, there was some meeting, it was finished, he and I were just sitting together chatting in a big auditorium, but we were the only ones left behind. Report an error

41:30 And someone came up, they saw him. They saw me too, but I don't think I figured in something. His eyes seemed to be more focused on him than me. And they came up, Mr. Gere, can we take a photo? And he was gracious. He said, yeah, but now please go. I could see because he was, he'd been famous for like 30 years by then. And I see, well, this must get really tiresome after a while. Report an error

41:57 Every day they can't see you. Can I have your autograph? Can I have a photo? So I thought, well, I'm really kind of glad I'm not him. That's kind of one burden I'm very happy not to have. But there it is, so fame, celebrity and all of that, it wears off, it's not a variable source of happiness and anybody who had it figures that one out pretty quickly. Report an error

42:16 So there it is, it's the second mark. And here's the Buddhist premise. The old adage, going on here, the old adage, it's terrible and I've never seen any basis in Buddhism for it. Ever heard of this one? Life is suffering? Ever heard of that one? Life is suffering. That's supposed to be the soundbite for Buddhism, right? Show me where the Buddha ever said that. Report an error

42:37 I've never seen it, never seen it. It's just one of those dumb sound bites that some non-Buddhist made up to characterize something he didn't understand. What is stated in Tibetan, I'll give it exactly, everything that is defiled, everything that's contaminated is unsatisfying. Now what does that mean? There's a very clear explanation. I'm not making it up. And that is every experience we have of any kind, meditation, non-meditation, hedonic, whatever. Report an error

43:07 Every experience that we have that is filtered or conditioned or contaminated by mental afflictions, as long as delusion, craving, hostility or the derivatives is involved, is implicated, is conditioning the experience, whatever you're experiencing, it's going to be unsatisfying. It's going to be unsatisfying. That's it. So not life, there's nothing wrong with life, any more than something good about death or bad with death and good with life. Report an error

43:36 It's not that. It's just that whatever we're experiencing, whether we're alive, whether we're in the bardo, wherever we may be, as long as those mental afflictions are operative, whatever we're experiencing, we will find it unsatisfying. Not miserable, because a lot of things are very pleasant, but unsatisfying in the sense that if we think that's a real source of happiness, then we'll check it out. Report an error

43:56 And if I know it's got a half-life, it's not satisfying. After some time, you will not want it to continue, because Report an error

44:08 it's not a true source of happiness. So a fair number of people have recognized that. And then the real question is, once you've recognized that, what then? Do you give up? Do you just kind of settle back and say, well, I probably expected too much or what have you? Or do you say, well, maybe there is such a thing as a true wellspring of happiness, but I was looking in all the wrong directions. Report an error

44:32 Maybe it's not in any object of the mind. Maybe it's in the mind. And then you look into the mind and say, you mean this cesspool? You know, with all this crap going on, give me a break. This is not a wellspring of happiness. This is a wellspring of distress. That's true. As long as your mind is afflicted by mental afflictions. Report an error

44:50 But when those mental afflictions fade out, when they go dormant, well then lo and behold, let alone liberation, Yvonne and all of that, but when just the coarse mental afflictions go dormant, then lo and behold right out there out of your own substrate consciousness emerges a true wellspring. It's an artesian well of bliss and a substrate consciousness, not even ultimate. Report an error

45:10 And it is true that once you've achieved shamatha, you keep on going back. It's good every single time. It doesn't get boring. Stay there for four hours, stay there for six hours. Do it every day, do it every other day. It doesn't matter. It's actually a wellspring of happiness. And it doesn't take you any place. That is, if you spend a thousand hours just resting in shamatha versus a hundred hours, the thousand hours doesn't take you any closer to enlightenment than the hundred hours did. Report an error

45:36 So it's a really good place to get to. Because it really purifies the mind and it's a really bad place to stagnate in because it doesn't take you any further. If you're content, satisfied, complacent, then that was too bad. Because now, as Dujum Lingba, this 19th century master, said, if that's all you've done is achieve shamatha and then you stall, then he said, I quote, you've not moved one hair's breadth towards liberation or enlightenment. Report an error

46:02 You're right there, ready to go, and then you didn't. Because you say, well, I'm blissful, I'm serene, I'm luminous, I'm still, I'm happy. That's fine. But then you haven't, you've moved at all towards liberation. So it's quite a big deal. It's really a part of psychological and spiritual maturation to recognize that which is an actual source of well-being, the natural which isn't. Report an error

46:27 And it doesn't just start when you achieve shamatha. It's not then an article of faith, well, maybe what he said is true, maybe it's not, who knows, I haven't experienced it. But on a more moderate level, we're talking about genuine happiness here. And I know some very wealthy people who are also very generous people. Report an error

46:50 In fact, I read one. One friend of mine is at Google. His name is Meng. I just saw him written up this, what was it, today? Yeah, today, in the New York Times. He was referred to. Tutin Jimbo was in the same article. But Meng is an old buddy of mine. Tutin Jimbo, I've known him since he was a kid. That's like 40 years. Report an error

47:07 Meng is a very nice guy. He worked at Google. He was 107th employee in Google. Good number. Because he was there almost at the ground floor. But he commented, because being that early in Google, he says, well, you get rich. So it's nice being rich. You just keep on giving away money. Report an error

47:25 It's really enjoyable. And he's been doing it for years now. I've known him for, I don't know, eight years. And it doesn't get stale. If the motivation is there, of benevolence, of altruism, you'd really like to bring something good to the world. And he'd keep on writing checks. I mean, I haven't done that, but I can imagine. You know, just, oh, a million here, 500,000 there, 10,000. Report an error

47:47 Sure, another one. I can easily imagine. That wouldn't get stale. Each time you're anticipating, you're imagining, this is going to make somebody really happy. Or this is going to alleviate suffering. This is going to be something good for the world. It's easy to imagine, isn't it? You could continue enjoying that and enjoying that until the day you die. Report an error

48:07 There's another friend of mine, also very wealthy. Elderly man now. But he told me that until he was age 50, very smart, very industrious, hard worker, bright businessman, entrepreneur. He told me until the age of 50 that a clear criterion of what success meant. How should he evaluate his life? And it was how much money was he making? And he was fortunate. Report an error

48:28 He was hardworking and he was very smart. And he made a lot of money. Tens of millions. And they just kept on racking up. I don't know how many he made, but it was lots. Until he got to the age of 50. And then he knew, boy, man, oh man, am I successful. He's more successful than most people. Rolling in money. There's just one thing. Report an error

48:47 He wasn't happy. Whoops, that one. I forgot about that. So he's a man of great net worth, but his happiness was kind of like poverty level. And then he had to recalibrate. Because then he's a smart guy. He said, okay, I'm 50 years old. I've made that much money. If I make twice as much money in the next 20 years, I'm not going to be any happier than I am now. Report an error

49:09 He figured that one out. In which case then, what now? Because I'm not going to be stupid here. I succeeded and I'm not satisfied and I'm not content. I don't feel fulfillment. I just got a lot of money and all the stuff that money can buy. It's not doing it for me. And then the light bulb went on. Ah, I know, I can start giving it away. Report an error

49:30 And then he started to enjoy his life. He really enjoyed his life. He helped absolutely millions of people, working with a consortium of people, giving those microeconomics little loans. To Bangladesh, to India, to China. He helped millions of people with his money. But it was so wisely invested, it kept on coming back and he gives that out again and again and again. Report an error

49:51 I knew him for years. He's still alive. But he's just one very happy guy. He's not a meditator. He really likes me a lot. I like him a lot. But never got him to meditate. He was just too content. Report an error

50:05 I could never wait and meditate, but I'm already happy. Alan, I've got a loving wife, I have loving children, I enjoy my life, I'm in good health, and I just love giving away money. I really enjoy being generous. And that was enough for him. And guess who didn't criticize him? You know? Oh, but you should be meditating. Report an error

50:23 I never said that once. No, you're living a really good life and I'm happy for you. He tapped into a wellspring, not ultimate, not esoteric, but you know where his happiness was. It was showing kindness and generosity to others. And he was a non-violent man. He was a good man. Very good man. So, violence, very low. Report an error

50:42 Generosity, very high. A lot of happiness. So, that's getting smart, isn't it? And that is right there on the level of ethics, way of life, with or without meditation. You can really tap into something real. It took him 50 years. Better late than never. Go deeper. Tap into the bliss of the substrate consciousness. Report an error

51:00 It's not irreversible. It's not ultimate. But it's pretty good. And then go beyond that to what, again, Augustine called the truth-given joy, the bliss of vipassanā, the bliss of knowing reality as it is. That's a real keeper. Because that's the one, that's the only one thus far that actually brings about irreversible change. That's why it's called liberation. So that's the second one. Report an error

51:22 We'll get to anattā, non-self later. Went on a long time this time anyway. But those two are pretty, they're really pretty significant. How many times we've given ourselves unnecessary misery. Just by grasping under that which was always going to be impermanent, never had any chance of being anything other than impermanent, and we go, duh, and think it's permanent. And then, duh, then we suffer. Report an error

51:44 Oh man, I didn't see that one coming. So, that happens a lot, and the Buddha said, get over it. Recognize the impermanent as impermanent. You might want to start with your mind. Whatever is happening in the mind, see if you find anything permanent there. Recognize the impermanent as the permanent, as impermanent, and then likewise, when something comes to mind, One of the allures, like, ooh, you could have this, you could have this. Like Jesus out there in the desert and Satan coming to him, you could have this, you could have this. Report an error

52:13 And Jesus is saying, I can see you, I can see you. Happened after the Buddha's enlightenment, after his enlightenment. The Buddha reported, after his enlightenment, maras would come to him. They're not figments of imagination, they're actually beings, they would come to him. And they try to persuade him. Happened multiple times. A Māra would come to him. Report an error

52:34 And say, Gautama, you think you're enlightened, you're not really enlightened, you're fooling himself. They try to seduce him, try to take him away. He had one response. Māra, I see you. Report an error

52:45 And it said then the Maras would be disappointed and they'd fade away. Report an error

52:51 So, there it is, two marks of existence. Two out of three ain't bad. See the impermanent as impermanent. Don't suffer unnecessarily. Recognize what the true sources of happiness are. And don't mistake the false ones for true ones. They'll suffer a lot less. Cover three out of three later on. Let's take a break. Let's come back at 4.05. Report an error

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Talk by B. Alan Wallace. Original at Vajrayana Institute via Internet Archive: https://archive.org/details/FourApplicationsOfMindfulnessRetreat2013. Licensed CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. Transcript generated automatically and may contain errors; the audio is the authoritative version.

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