..續本文上一頁laming, this is what I”m pointing to.

　　We can look at things in different ways. We can choose. The programme from the culture and family that we”re born into might not be a very good programme. Sometimes it is, but still it”s limited. Now we have this opportunity to explore, to investigate reality, to know it in a direct way. Enlightenment is not something remote and impossible. You can see it in terms of some very abstract state that you hold up and aim for but that you don”t think you”ll ever achieve. That way of thinking is based on what

　　 If I depended on my personality, I couldn”t do anything, I”d never hope to get enlightened because my personality can”t possibly conceive myself as a person being enlightened. My personality is conditioned to think of myself in terms of what”s wrong with me, coming from a competitive society where you are very much aware of who”s better and who”s worse. So I can”t trust that. My personal habits are conditioned things, so they”re not flexible in themselves. If we just attach or interpret experience through those perceptions and never learn to look at things in any other way, then we are stuck with a limited view that can be a very depressing way to live a life.

　　Awakening; wake up and begin to see beyond the rigid dualism or the initial programme that you acquire through your family and social background. Trust in your own intuitive awakened sense. Don”t trust in your views and opinions about anything - about yourself, about Buddhism or the world - they are oftentimes very biased. We get very biased views about each other; we have racial prejudices, class identities, ethnic biases and feelings of social superiority. These are not to be trusted.

　　We can look at things in many different ways. We don”t have to look at something always from the conditioning that we have acquired. So when the Buddha talks about the Buddha-mind, it”s very flexible and malleable; it”s universal. The mind has a radiant quality to it. Consciousness has a radiance. So when we begin to let go of limiting ourselves through the distortions of our conditioned mental states, then we begin to understand, to see things as they really are, to know the Dhamma - enlightenment. This is not something remote and impossible, unless you want to hold to those views about it and about yourself as a person, holding it so high that it”s way beyond your personal ability to achieve. Then you haven”t awakened to what you”re doing. You”re merely operating from a conditioned view of everything.

　　”There is dukkha”, and ”dukkha should be welcomed”. This is my new interpretation. Usually it”s ”dukkha should be understood.” ”Dukkha should be welcomed”; how”s that

　　 Try that one. You can experiment with these different words. You don”t have to say ”Pali scriptures say "understand," they didn”t say "welcome"!” Pali scriptures don”t say ”understand”, they use a Pali word that we translate as ”understand”. Maybe we don”t understand what ”understand” means. Did you ever think about that

　　 We”re so limited to a particular narrow view of the word ”understand” that we can”t expand it. That”s why we can experiment with the words. Just observe the effect. So I say ”welcoming” now. I”m not interested in proving that I”m right, that my translations are the best, but rather seeing how they work, what the effect is in the here-and-now. I am sharing this with you as a way of encouraging you to have that right and that freedom to know for yourself. You don”t always have to try and fit yourself into the views and opinions even of our tradition - orthodox forms or definitions, our particular group”s way of looking at things.

　　”There is dukkha”, and ”dukkha should be welcomed”. ”Dukkha has been welcomed”. What is that like

　　 Try that one. I don”t know if it works f…

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