..續本文上一頁are equally important.

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　　Dhamma

　　17

　　What is Dhamma

　　 Nothing isn”t. 18

　　How does the Dhamma teach the proper way of life

　　 It shows us how to live. It has many ways of showing it - on rocks or trees or just in front of you. It is a teaching but not in words. So still the mind, the heart, and learn to watch. You”ll find the whole Dhamma revealing itself here and now. At what other time and place are you going to look

　　19

　　First you understand the Dhamma with your thoughts. If you begin to understand it, you will practice it. And if you practice it, you will begin to see it, you are the Dhamma and you have the joy of the Buddha.

　　20

　　The Dhamma has to be found by looking into your own heart and seeing that which is true and that which is not, that which is balanced and that which is not balanced.

　　21

　　There is only one real magic, the magic of Dhamma. Any other magic is like the illusion of a card trick. It distracts us from the real game: our relation to human life, to birth, to death and to freedom.

　　22

　　Whatever you do, make it Dhamma. If you don”t feel good, look inside. If you know it”s wrong and still do it, that”s defilement.

　　23

　　It”s hard to find those who listen to Dhamma, who remember Dhamma and practice it, who reach Dhamma and see it.

　　24 It”s all Dhamma if we have mindfulness. When we see the animals that run away from danger, we see that they are just like us. They flee from suffering and run towards happiness. They also have fear. They fear for their lives just as we do. When we see according to truth, we see that all animals and human beings are no different. We are all mutual companions of birth, old age, sickness, and death.

　　25

　　Regardless of time and place, the whole practice of Dhamma comes to completion at the place where there is nothing. It”s the place of surrender, of emptiness, of laying down the burden. This is the finish.

　　26

　　The Dhamma is not far away. It”s right with us. The Dhamma isn”t about angels in the sky or anything like that. It”s simply about us, about what we are doing right now. Observe yourself. Sometimes there is happiness, sometimes suffering, sometimes comfort, sometimes pain …this is the Dhamma. Do you see it

　　 To know this Dhamma, you have to read your experiences.

　　27

　　The Buddha wanted us to contact the Dhamma, but people only contact the words, the books and the scriptures. That is contacting that which is "about" Dhamma, and not contacting the "real" Dhamma as taught by our Great Teacher. How can people say that they are practicing well and properly if they only do that

　　 They are a long way off.

　　28

　　When you listen to the Dhamma you must open up your heart and compose yourself in the center. Don”t try to accumulate what you hear or make a painstaking effort to retain what you hear from memory. Just let the Dhamma flow into your heart as it reveals itself, and keep yourself continuously open to its flow in the present moment. What is ready to be retained will be so, and it will happen of its own accord, not through any determined effort on your part.

　　29

　　Similarly when you expound the Dhamma, you must not force yourself. It should happen on its won and should flow spontaneously from the present moment and circumstances. People have different levels of re3feptive ability, and when you”re there at that same level, it just happens, the Dhamma flows. The Buddha had the ability to know people”s temperaments and receptive abilities. He used this very same method of spontaneous teaching. It”s not that he possessed any special superhuman power to teach, but rather that he was sensitive to the spiritual needs of the people who came to him, and so he taught them accordingly.

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