..續本文上一頁 its small moments of stillness and peace, all the way up to the refined and stable levels of stillness and peace. If the mind isn”t trained, isn”t improved, isn”t forced with various tactics backed up by mindfulness, discernment, conviction, and persistence, it won”t be able to attain peace till its dying day. It will die in vain. It will die restless and confused, straying off to 108 different preoccupations. It won”t have any mindfulness or self-awareness. It will die without any principles or standards to hold to. It will die just as a kite whose string is cut when it”s up in the air floats wherever the wind blows. Even while it”s still living, it lives without any principles or standards, because of its absent-mindedness and heedlessness, its lack of any sense of reason for it to follow. It lives simply drifting. If we live simply drifting, without any good principles to hold to, then when we go, we”ll have to go simply drifting. What purpose will it serve
What goodness and certainty can we have for our destination
So as long as we”re alive and aware as we currently are, we should build certainty for ourselves in our hearts by being strong and unflinching in matters that are of solid worth. Then we can be certain of ourselves both as we live and when we die. We won”t be upset or affected by life or death, by being separated from other beings or our own bodies -- something we all have to meet with, because these are things lying within us all.
It”s not the case that discernment arises automatically on the heels of concentration when the mind has been centered. It has to be exercised and trained to think, explore, and investigate. Only then will discernment arise, with concentration as its support. Concentration on its own can”t turn into discernment. It has to remain as concentration. If we don”t use discernment to investigate, concentration simply makes the mind refreshed and calm, content with its preoccupation in tranquillity, not hungering to think here or there, not confused or straying -- because once the mind is still, it”s calm and refreshed with the Dhamma in line with the level of its stillness. We then take the mind that has been refreshed by tranquillity and use it with discernment to investigate and unravel various things, none of which in this world lie over and beyond inconstancy, stress, and not-self. All things are filled with these same conditions, so use discernment to contemplate -- from whatever angle most suits your temperament -- by investigating these things with interest, with the desire really to know and see them as they truly are. Don”t simply investigate without any intention or mindfulness in control.
In particular, the theme of unattractiveness: This is a good, a very good cure for the mind obsessed with lust and passion. However strong the lust, that”s how strongly you should investigate unattractiveness until you can see your own body and that of others throughout the world as a cemetery of fresh corpses. Lust won”t have a chance to flare up when discernment has penetrated to the knowledge that the body is filled with repulsiveness. Who would feel lust for repulsiveness
Who would feel lust for things with no beauty
For things that are disgusting
This is one form of the medicine of unattractiveness, one of the prime medicines for curing the disease of lust and craving. Once you”ve made a really full investigation, make the mind grow still in a restricted range. Once the mind has investigated unattractiveness many, many times, to the point where it becomes proficient, adept at contemplating external bodies as well as the internal body, able to visualize things in whatever way you want, then the mind will converge to the level of unattractiveness within itself and see the harm of the pict…
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