..續本文上一頁, by closing your eyes and practicing concentration, attaining the first jhana, directing your thoughts to the present and evaluating it until you can see yourself clearly. If you don”t go into the darkroom now, someday the King of Death is going to blindfold you, tie up your feet and hands, and drag you into his darkroom. In other words, when you”re on the verge of death you won”t be able to open your mouth or eyes. Nobody will be able to feed you. You”ll want to eat but won”t be able to eat. You”ll want to speak but won”t be able to speak. Your ears will get closed off so that you can”t hear anything clearly. You won”t be able to see your parents, family, children, or grandchildren. You won”t be able to tell them your last wishes. That”s called the darkroom of the King of Death.
*
The mind is the only thing that senses pleasure and pain. The body has no sense of these things at all. It”s like taking a knife to murder someone: They don”t hunt down the knife and punish it. They punish only the person who used it to commit murder.
*
If your mind isn”t good, then the goodness of your actions isn”t really good, and the goodness of your words isn”t really good, either.
*
You have to develop power within yourself, like stocking up on gunpowder. If a gun has no gunpowder, it can”t be used to destroy anything. People who have to be servants are the ones who lack the power to be anyone else”s boss. As for the people who have that power, all they have to do is point their fingers, and other people will jump up and run. If we don”t develop our own powers, we”ll have to be servants — slaves to defilement — throughout time.
*
The body is like a knife. If you have a knife but don”t keep sharpening it, it will get coated thick with rust. In the same way, if you have a body — physical elements, aggregates, and sense media — but don”t train it and keep it polished, it”ll get coated thick with defilements. If it were a gun, it wouldn”t even kill a fly.
*
Normally, the mind doesn”t like to stay where it is. It keeps flowing out the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and body — like a river that splits into five streams instead of flowing as one. In a river like that, the force of the current is weakened and can”t run at full strength. In addition to flowing out the five senses, the mind also leaks out through thoughts of the past and future, instead of staying firm in the present. This is why the mind has no peace or strength, because it never gets to rest. When the mind loses strength, the body loses strength as well and won”t be able to succeed at anything.
*
If the mind doesn”t stay with the body in the present, and instead wanders around exposed to external perceptions, it”s bound to get into all sorts of difficulties, just like a person who doesn”t stay in his house and instead goes running around outside. He”s bound to be exposed to sun and rain, and he may get run over by a car or bitten by a rabid dog. If we stay in our home, then even though there may still be some dangers, they won”t be too serious, and we won”t get into difficulties.
*
When the mind isn”t quiet, it”s like running around with a flaming torch. You”re bound to burn yourself. Only when you stop running will you be able to cool down.
*
People who accumulate merit but don”t develop the heart”s foundation are like people who own land but don”t have a deed. They might be able to sell it for money, but they”re an easy mark for a swindler, because they don”t have any firm basis for their claim. If you practice generosity and virtue but not meditation (the heart”s foundation), it”s like taking a bath on a hot day only from the waist down. If you don”t bathe all the way from the head on down, you won”t get totally refreshed, because the coolness doesn”t go all the way…
《The Skill of Release - Why Meditate
》全文未完，請進入下頁繼續閱讀…