..續本文上一頁e. Someone may just come along with a hook and pull you up. At home, being pestered by your children and grandchildren, and possessions, you are even worse off than the frog! You don”t know how to detach yourself from them. When old age, sickness and death come along, what will you do

　　 This is the hook that”s going to catch you. Which way will you turn

　　Fruit Tree

　　When a fruit tree is in bloom, a strong gust of wind will blow some of its blossoms to the ground. Those that don”t fall will eventually grow into small green fruit. But then another gust comes and some of them will fall, too. As for the rest, they will grow to become fruit nearly ripe, or even fully ripe, before they fall. And so it is with people. Like flowers and fruit in the wind, they, too, fall in different stages of life. Some people die while still in the womb, others within only a few days after birth. Some people live for a few years, then die, never having reached maturity. Some die in their youth. Still others reach a ripe old age before they die. When reflecting upon people, consider the nature of fruit in the wind - both are uncertain. Our minds are also uncertain. A mental impression arises, draws and blows at the mind, and then the mind falls - just like fruit.

　　The Buddha understood this uncertain nature of things. He observed the phenomena of fruit in the wind and reflected upon the monks and novices who were his disciples. He found that they, too, were essentially of the same nature - uncertain! How could it be otherwise

　　 This is just the way of all things.

　　Garbage Pit

　　If your mind becomes quiet and concentrated, it is an important tool to use. But if you”re sitting just to get concentrated so you can feel happy and pleasant, they you”re wasting your time. The practice is to sit and let your mind become still and concentrated, and then use that quiet concentration to examine the nature of the mind and body. If you make the mind simply quiet with no investigation, however, then for that time it”s peaceful and there is no defilement, but that is like taking a stone and covering up a smelly garbage pit. When you take the stone away, it”s still full of smelly garbage. You must use your concentration, not to attain temporary bliss, but to accurately examine the nature of the mind and body. This is what actually frees you.

　　Gift

　　We should investigate the body within the body. Whatever”s in the body, go ahead and look at it. If we just see the outside, it”s not clear. We see hair, nails, and so on and they are just pretty things that entice us. So the Buddha taught us to look at the inside of the body, to see the body within the body. What is the body

　　 Look closely and see! We will see even though it is within us, we”ve never seen it. Wherever we go we carry it with us, but we still don”t know it at all. It”s as if we go and visit some relatives at their house and they give us a gift. We take it and put it in our bag and then leave without opening it to see what is inside. When at last we open it we find it is full of poisonous snakes! Our body is like that. If we just see the shell of it, we say it”s fine and beautiful. We forget ourselves. We forget impermanence, unsatisfactoriness and not-self. If we look within this body, it”s really repulsive. There”s nothing beautiful in it. If we look according to reality, without trying to sugar things over, we”ll see that it”s really sad and wearisome. Dispassion will then arise. This feeling of disinterest does not come from feeling an aversion toward the world. It”s simply our mind clearing up, our mind letting go. We see all things as not being substantial or dependable. However we want them to be, they just go their own way, regardless. Things that are unstable are unstable. Things that are not beauti…

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