..續本文上一頁impact. It has no impact on the mind at all. This is called seeing the truth. After you”ve done this many times, you”ll be able to uproot your attachments to the body, and the pain in the body will be passed by as well. The only issue remaining will be feelings in the mind.
Sañña and sankhara are important. Once the body, the physical heap, is passed, sañña and sankhara -- thought-formations -- become prominent because there are no more problems involving the body. The mind isn”t willing to investigate the body again, just as when we”ve eaten enough of this sort of food, we put it aside and continue eating whatever else still attracts us. When we”re completely full, we put it all aside, no matter what kind of food it is, meat dishes or desserts. Our investigation is similar to this. It tells us on its own. When the mind has had enough of anything, it lets go and no longer investigates that thing. It then continues with other things, in the same way that when we”ve eaten enough of this sort of food, we go on to other sorts until we”re completely full. Then we put it all aside. Our investigation is so that we will have enough and then let go.
Sankhara refers to the thought-formations in the mind -- good thoughts, bad thoughts, this issue and that. They keep forming all the time. Each of us falls for his or her own issues. Even if other people don”t become involved with us, the mind has to paint pictures and form thoughts, past and future: a big turmoil within the heart. We get infatuated with this preoccupation, saddened by that one. Matters that passed months and years ago, we warm up and serve to torment the mind, to oppress and coerce it, because of our delusion, because of the fact that we aren”t up on the tricks and deceits of this sort of defilement. This is why we have to investigate them. Whatever issues the mind forms, if they”re good, they vanish; if they”re bad, they vanish -- so what sense or substance can we gain from them
Wherever they arise, probe on down right there.
Sañña, labels and interpretations: They come labeling out of the mind. This is how the mind appears when it reaches a refined level. This is the way the natural principles of the investigation are of their own accord. Even if no one tells us, we come to understand on our own. Wherever anything makes contact, mindfulness and discernment spin around right there until they understand and let go.
Once discernment has cut the bridge to the body, it has also cut the bridges to external sights, sounds, smells, and tastes. The only things left in the mind are feelings, labels, thought-formations, and cognizance. These deal entirely with the mind itself. We investigate at that point with discernment, without becoming intimate with any of these four conditions. For example, feeling: Pleasure arises and vanishes. Pain arises and vanishes, there in the heart. The Buddha thus calls them inconstant and not-self. Inconstant and not-self. They arise and vanish. Labels are also inconstant, stressful, and not-self. What is there to become attached to
They”re just like the body. In other words, they”re all a heap of the three characteristics.
When we have investigated them time and again, these four conditions shrink into the mind. This is called giving chase to defilement. Probe into that point with discernment until you know and see it clearly. When the defilements can”t find any place to hide, they”ll go running into the mind. Mindfulness and discernment then come spinning into mano: the mind. This too the Buddha tells us not to hold onto. Listen! The mind too is inconstant, stressful, and not-self. Listen to that! How can the mind not share in the three characteristics when the defilements are in there
How can we h…
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