..續本文上一頁in the heart, ruining every aspect of your practice. Try to train yourself in the habit of being dependable and intent in your proper activities, within and without, at all times. Don”t let carelessness or negligence incubate in your character at all, because people who have trained themselves in the habit of being true to their every duty are sure to be able to succeed in every sort of activity, whether inner or outer, without any obstacle to thwart them. Even when they train their hearts, which is the important job within, they are sure to succeed with circumspection in such a way that they will find nothing with which they can fault themselves -- because outer activities and inner activities both point to the same heart in charge of them. If the heart is habitually careless, then when it takes charge of any inner task, it”s bound to ruin the task, without leaving even a scrap for itself to take as its refuge.

　　So for a bright future in the tasks that form your livelihood and source of happiness, you should train yourself in the habit of being dependable and true in your duties. Perform each task to the utmost of your ability. Then when you turn inward to perform your inner work for the sake of stillness or for the sake of discernment and discovery, you will be able to perform both sorts of work with precision and circumspection because of the habits you have developed in training yourself to be true and circumspect all along. To follow the practice from the beginning to the highest level depends mainly on your basic habits. The ”beginning” of the practice and the ”end” both refer to the one heart whose condition of awareness will develop when it”s modified by the Dhamma, both in terms of causes -- the striving of the practice -- and in terms of the results, or happiness, just as a child gradually develops from infancy to adulthood when nourished by food and all sorts of other factors. The beginning of the practice thus refers to the training of the mind in the beginning stages so as to change its habits and sensibilities, making them reasonable and right, until it is knowledgeable and can maintain itself without any deviations from the reasonability and rightness appropriate to it. But when we come right down to it, the beginning and end of the practice are like a piece of fruit: We can”t say exactly where it begins and where it ends. When we look at it, it”s simply a piece of fruit.

　　The same sort of thing holds true with the mind. We talk about the beginning or the end of the practice in the sense that the mind has its various preoccupations, coarse and refined, mixed in with it. In modifying them, we have to keep coming up with new techniques, changing those preoccupations from their original state to more and more refined levels that should be called, where suitable, the beginning or the end of the path. Those of you listening should make yourselves reach this sort of understanding of the defilements and evil qualities in the heart that are given such a variety of names that they can go beyond the bounds of what the suppositions of a single mind can keep track of and resolve. Otherwise you won”t have any techniques for curing yourselves of the condition just mentioned.

　　Let me stress once more the principle that guarantees sure results: Train yourself in the habit of being solid and true in your work and duties at all times. Don”t be unsteady, uncertain, or undependable. If you say you”ll go, go. If you say you”ll stay, stay. If you say you”ll do something, do it. Once you”ve settled on a time or a task, keep to it. Be the sort of person who writes with his hand and erases with his hand. Don”t be the sort who writes with his hand and erases with his foot. In other words, once we”ve made a vow, no one else can come in and…

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