Unexpected Freedom

‘… and I know I should let go’A loss of predictability comes into our life together with asense of not really knowing who we are any more. Whenencountering such fear, if we’re not properly prepared orsupported we can misinterpret it and think, ‘Oh, I must bedoing something wrong.’ I don’t know about you but I stillfind it very difficult when I encounter fear not to assume thatsomething is going wrong. Somebody is doing somethingwrong and usually it must be me. There’s nothing aroundme that is making me afraid, so it must be something I havedone or am doing wrong.That is not necessarily the case and it’s wise to prepareourselves in advance to withhold our judgement and ourevaluation of the situation. If we bear with the fear and wait,we may come to see that this fear is what in the Buddhistterminology is called ‘One of the defences of Mara.’ Thecloser we get to Mara the more annoyed Mara gets. Maragets really annoyed when we start practising with sincerity.Apparently, what happens is the more dedicated andcommitted a meditator gets in seeing through their delusion,the hotter Mara’s seat gets. Because he is really miffedabout our success in seeing through our apparentlimitations, he will send down his hordes to annoy, distractand tempt us.At the back of the Dhamma hall here at ArunaRatanagiri, there is a mural by Pang Chinasai depictingMara’s attack on the Buddha. Because the Buddha waswholeheartedly committed to his practice and dedicated torealisation, purification and generating benefit for allsentient beings, he was able to stay true to his determination.Nothing upsets Mara more. If you look on the right-handside of the painting you see the arrows that Mara’s hordes arefiring as they ride towards him on strange, hideous beasts.As the arrows get close to the Buddha they are transformed175