..續本文上一頁ant to get away from human beings, you can go sightseeing in hell. It”s nice and relaxing. You can play with the denizens of hell, fool around with the denizens of hell. Any of them who have only a little bad kamma can come up and chat with you, to send word back to their relatives. Once you get back from touring around hell you can tell the relatives to make merit in the dead person”s name.

　　Or, if you want, you can travel in the world of common animals and chat with mynah birds, owls — any kind of bird — or with four-footed animals, two-footed animals. You can go into the forests, into the wilds, and converse with the animals there. It”s a lot of fun, not like talking with people. Talking with people is hard; talking with animals is easy. You don”t have to say a lot, simply think in the mind: tell them stories, ask them questions, like, "Now that you”re an animal, what do you eat

　　 Do you get enough to stay full and content

　　" You find that you have a lot of companions there, people who used to be your friends and relatives.

　　Or, if you want, you can travel in the world of the hungry shades. The world of the hungry shades is even more fun. Hungry shades come in all different shapes and sizes — really entertaining, the hungry shades. Some of them have heads as big as large water jars, but their mouths are just like the eye of a needle: that”s all, no bigger than the eye of a needle! Some of them have legs six yards long, but hands only half a foot. They”re amazing to watch, just like a cartoon. Some of them have lower lips with no upper lips, some of them are missing their lips altogether, with their teeth exposed all the time. There are all kinds of hungry shades. Some of them have big, bulging eyes, the size of coconuts, others have fingernails as long as palm leaves. You really ought to see them. Some of them are so fat they can”t move, others so thin that they”re nothing but bones. And sometimes the different groups get into battles, biting each other, hitting each other. That”s the hungry shades for you. Really entertaining.

　　This is called manomayiddhi. When the mind is firmly established, you can go see these things. Or you can go to the land of the nagas, the different lands on the human level — sometimes, when you get tired of human beings, you can go visit the heavens: the heaven of the Four Great Kings, the heaven of the Guardians of the Hours, the Thirty-three gods, all the way up there to the Brahma worlds. The mind can go without any problem. This is called manomayiddhi. It”s a lot of fun. Your defilements are gone, your work is done, you”ve got enough rice to eat and money to spend, so you can go traveling to see the sights and soak up the breezes. That”s manomayiddhi.

　　Dibba-cakkhu: clairvoyance. You gain eyes on two levels. The outer level is called the mansa-cakkhu, the eye of the flesh, which enables you to look at human beings in the world, devas in the world. The eye of discernment allows you to examine the defilements of human beings: those with coarse defilements, those with thick defilements, those with faith in the Buddha”s teachings, those with none, those who have the potential to be taught, those with no potential at all. You can consider them with your internal discernment. This is called pañña-cakkhu, the eye of discernment. In this way you have eyes on two levels.

　　Most of us have eyes on only one level, the eye of the flesh, while the inner eye doesn”t arise. And how could it arise

　　 You don”t wash the sleep out of your eyes. What are the bits of sleep in your eyes

　　 Sensual desire, an enormous hunk. Ill will, another big hunk. Sloth and torpor, a hunk the size of a hammer head. Your mind calms down and begins to grow still, but this hunk of sleep in your eyes is so heavy it makes you nod…

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