Simply This Moment - Buddhist Meditation and Theravada ...

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We have a story in Buddhism of the worm in a pile of dung. Being so attached to thatpile of dung, the worm thinks it’s in heaven. This is the trouble with people andsuffering: they have some suffering and they get used to it. They then think thatsuffering is heaven.Coming to a place like this – to the monastic life – we have an opportunity to seesomething else, something deeper, something more. We have the opportunity to seereal happiness. Not some happiness which is promised when you die, not somehappiness which is somehow in a distant future. “If you make good kamma, thenyou’ll be happy. Just believe me and then you’ll be okay.” The happiness that youcan experience in monastic life is the happiness, which is sandihika, available in thisvery life. It’s right in this moment if you care to look at it. One of the things that Ifind in my meditation is that in any moment we can get to that peace. All we need todo is flick the right switch in our mind. It’s a momentary attainment. All we need todo is find that ‘letting go’ switch. Once we know that switch, that movement of themind, whether it’s our meditation or when we’re eating our meal, or whatever else wemay be doing, it becomes so easy, so peaceful. That is because we’ve found the ThirdNoble Truth, the letting go of suffering.Once we get to that point it’s so easy to repeat it and just let go. It’s the simplest thingto do once we know how to do it. It’s like riding a bike, once we’ve learned to ride abike it’s the simplest thing in the world. We don’t need to think about it. When wefirst get onto a bike we wobble all over the place. I think many of you canunderstand, or a least appreciate, what I am saying. The path to real happiness, thepath to the ending of suffering is the ability just to open up, to let go and be free fromcraving. The whole monastery here is shouting out to us to let go and renounce.That’s the meaning of this monastery.Oh What Bliss!Last night, I was talking to the lay people in Armadale about the conception ofemptiness. Emptiness is another word for letting go. If we let go of things we are leftwith this beautiful, awesome emptiness. Because emptiness is something that is soprofound, people often don’t realize what it is, so they miss it. They can’t see it.55
People have got a blind spot to emptiness. That’s why in the Cūlasuññata Sutta (MN121) the Buddha explains the way to develop the perception to recognize what themind is free from. Recognize that in the monastery this evening we are free from somany burdens. We’re free from television, free from relationships. We’re free frombills. We’re free from having to go to work. We’re free from all the bitterness thatcan so easily oppress us in life.In one particular Sutta the Buddha encouraged the monks to bring up the perceptionof what we’re free from, because that gives us a sense of happiness, the happinessborn of freedom. “Aho sukha! Aho sukha! Aho sukha!” a monk said this as hesat under a tree. He was an ex-king, and the other monks thought he wasremembering his life as a king, with all the sensory pleasures he then had. When theyasked him afterwards if that was the case, he said, “No, no”, I was saying “Ahosukha! Oh what bliss! Oh what bliss!” because now I am free from all of that, freefrom the concerns, the worries and the bitterness of being a king. “Oh whathappiness, oh what bliss!” This is what I encourage you to do in your meditation;remember what you’ve left behind. “Oh what bliss, oh what bliss, to be free of thestreets!” “Oh what bliss, oh what bliss, to be free of the work place!” “Oh what bliss,to be free from the pressures of relationships!” “Oh what bliss, oh what bliss, to befree from concerns about money, and acquiring possessions!”In a monastery such as this you are free from so many things. Even if you’re just herefor a few hours or days you’re free from many burdens, and the mind dwells upon theperception of what you’ve let go. This is dwelling on the Third Noble Truth. This isdwelling on cessation, ending and emptiness. This is dwelling on Nibbāna itself or, atleast, it is leaning in that direction. When you cultivate the perception of the ThirdNoble Truth in this way, it points out to you what this happiness in monastic lifereally is. If we forget that perception of emptiness, we just don’t see it and we thinkthere is nothing there.There is a big difference between nothing and emptiness. Nothing is something youcan’t see, emptiness is something you can really appreciate. Once we start to developthese sorts of perceptions we say: “Hey, this is real happiness! This is real peace!56
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Simply ThisMoment!A COLLECTION OF T
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CONTENTSPage1 Ways and Means into J
Page 6 and 7: This gives one great insights into
Page 8 and 9: ūpaloka, even though we are only a
Page 10 and 11: too much body-awareness. With body-
Page 12 and 13: and thoughts - apart from the exper
Page 14 and 15: faculty of the mind to sustain and
Page 16 and 17: - and this is a natural phenomena -
Page 18 and 19: involved I stress the word ‘fully
Page 20 and 21: though he was a Noble disciple pass
Page 22 and 23: Anyone who claims the experience of
Page 24 and 25: Sometimes people have so little con
Page 26 and 27: the shelf and we know how this whol
Page 28 and 29: The Delusion of Freedom‘That whic
Page 30 and 31: monk telling me once that his fathe
Page 32 and 33: say that in the Anupada Sutta (MN 1
Page 34 and 35: it’s been still for a long time,
Page 36 and 37: 3 DETOXIFYING THE MIND2 nd of Febru
Page 38 and 39: consciousness - or as I would prefe
Page 40 and 41: is letting go of the pleasures of t
Page 42 and 43: never overcome thirst in that way.
Page 44 and 45: Use the triple practice of sãla, s
Page 46 and 47: after another, hundreds, thousands
Page 48 and 49: much fire in their minds. This is w
Page 50 and 51: 4 LOOKING FOR THE SWEET CHILLISeeki
Page 52 and 53: Listening to fine music. Is this it
Page 54 and 55: freedom is not freedom at all becau
Page 58 and 59: This is real contentment! This is r
Page 60 and 61: Watch this inner conversation going
Page 62 and 63: monastic life does respect the sile
Page 64 and 65: delusion because it has kept us goi
Page 66 and 67: This is the opposite of suffering.
Page 68 and 69: ight view. It’s very hard for a h
Page 70 and 71: always be on the wrong path, and on
Page 72 and 73: “Look, if this is causing sufferi
Page 74 and 75: out of control. The monastery goes
Page 76 and 77: the past and the future, and we’r
Page 78 and 79: at all. Who can trust memory? In me
Page 80 and 81: can. Give it full attention every m
Page 82 and 83: in the morning, afternoon or evenin
Page 84 and 85: yourself from all that’s happened
Page 86 and 87: mutti is releasing and anālaya is
Page 88 and 89: instructions without question.It’
Page 90: comes into the mind, then we start
Page 93 and 94: hold in the mind’s eye and I was
Page 95 and 96: of letting go, not stages of attach
Page 97 and 98: Sayutta there is something that imp
Page 99 and 100: pushes you out of sasāra whether y
Page 101 and 102: 7 DHAMMA PRACTICE10 th May 2000I’
Page 103 and 104: Adult people look after their own k
Page 105 and 106: many people in the world who write
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What if you make that your goal, an
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things really complicated. It’s s
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‘The monks here, or the teacher,
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and surrender to the path. Surrende
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8 HUMAN RIGHTS IN BUDDHISMDhammalok
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doesn’t really have any meaning o
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These things are not freedoms, they
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told me in Malaysia and Singapore t
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When Jerusalem fell in 70AD, becaus
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To question is a right for people.
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embarrassed by my fellow Buddhists.
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many countries between laws which a
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It’s a very narrow truth. The tru
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guilty you have to be punished! You
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the Zendo - but the more you smile
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Having planed off the rough parts,
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got the flu and cancelled your appo
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I was taught to choose to watch the
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From Diversity to UnityMeditation i
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usually if someone is dead they wou
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There are other cases like that. On
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10 CONDITIONED REALITYDhammaloka Bu
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The Buddha very clearly outlined th
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even your bare perception is alread
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way, there has to be some other exp
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Seeing Truth and RealityI want part
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talked with one of the people - who
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was able to follow to get into deep
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ideas are not actually the true Nib
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that the air around it is not movin
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and find out what that pain really
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mantras, all words of instructions,
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just observing. Surely the thinking
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without valuing, without weighing o
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so difficult to attain. It is becau
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12 REFLECTIONS THAT ARE CONDUCIVETO
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the mind, and that’s the jhānas.
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need the calm which is developed by
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can try it with virāga.VirāgaPeop
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with all of its difficulties and al
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clinging stops us from experiencing
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the thirteenth giving up the critic
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13 THE OUTFLOWINGS OF THE MIND12 th
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from peace. The will ‘to be’ is
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the future, to fantasies, to the pa
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taught here. Going into the present
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that the core of all this is ‘emp
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14 STARVING THE TIGER TO DEATHOverc
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inappropriate for a monk to be doin
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When a person really understands wh
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getting angry and upset. This way y
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You will find simplicity means that
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use them to make progress in your m
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By developing seclusion from all th
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People in the world say everything
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15 THE LAW OF CONDITIONALITY3 rd Ja
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elate that sort of smell to a very
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When you start to see the will ceas
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up. You see that anger is not the c
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Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be a
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Once you can see this whole cause a
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whether you like it or not. So you
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anymore than you can break the laws
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is the barrier of the five hindranc
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experiences, resting on them, based
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attention to the sensory world, we
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Instead of having kāmacchanda we h
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distraction of ill-will? Outside, w
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Sloth and TorporSloth and torpor ar
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wherever you want mind, I’m compl
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Wherever there’s thinking, it goe
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17 I KNOW YOU MĀRA25 th August 200
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“Come on, who do you think you ar
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you don’t have a clue, that so ma
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unfolding. In fact, the more you le
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they’ve got into that habit. What
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As the Buddha said in the Indriya S
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about anything because worrying is
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seeing clearly. Sometimes people ge
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There is just so much happiness. Th
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see so much detail. It was always t
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after us, yet there is this loud mu
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When you start to see that, it’s
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this. So if we see where that disco
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mindfulness, you get pīti, more jo
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you can meditate, you can teach, be
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and restlessness cannot survive. Th
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19 PERFECT STILLNESS29 th June 2005
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Have You Come Here to Die?At one re
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At the last retreat I taught in Ipo
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process is about. You also understa
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go of everything. Letting go is wha
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the moment. It doesn’t matter wha
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moving up and down, the nimmitta is
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So, look upon your life as a journe
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Nirodha. Nirodha means cessation, t
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20 THE ENDING OF EVERYTHING7 th Dec
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delusion, to think of things as bei
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samatha and also the word upasama b
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quoting the suttas here; they are t
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I was talking earlier this evening
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opposite is true. The less ‘self
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senses are. Before that it’s just
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The mind creates; this is what it d
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Get into the jhānas, the real jhā
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whatever things come into existence
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2. Dukkha - suffering.3. Anattā -
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Painissagga: “Letting go”, aban
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