The Principle of the Present

　　To practice is to search for principles leading to the truth. To study is like studying a plan — although people for the most part don”t follow the plan — but outer plans and inner plans are worlds apart.

　　With outer plans — like blueprints of a house or a building, or maps that tell where roads and places are located — the builder examines the blueprint and follows it; the traveler follows the routes that appear on the map, but if he gets a map that”s out-of-date, there are bound to be things that have come into being or been torn down that don”t show on the map. This can cause him to misunderstand and to follow the wrong route.

　　Inner plans, though — such as the 32 parts of the body, the elements, and the khandhas, which the Buddha taught us to study and to put into practice so as to derive benefits from them — are fixed truths, unchanged from the Buddha”s time to the present. But with these plans within the mind, we can”t act like a builder who follows the blueprint in his hands, because that would go against the principle of the present, which is where the Dhamma arises. For example, when we study and understand in line with the texts and then practice, it”s hard not to speculate in reference to the texts; and so when we practice or try to develop concentration in the mind, we”ll find that the mind has trouble growing still, because of the disturbance.

　　If, while practicing the Dhamma, we contemplate or reflect on whatever Dhamma we have studied, it”s bound to get all confused, because the mind”s state is not such that these things can be contemplated, pondered, or compared with the mind at the moment it”s gathering itself together to gain strength. This is why we shouldn”t bring anything in to disturb it at all. Let there simply be the ”Dhamma theme,” the meditation theme we bring in to supervise the mind, as if we were charging the mind so as to give it inner strength — in other words, so as to make it still.

　　When the mind is still, it gains inner strength. Regardless of how much or how little knowledge it has, no trouble or confusion results, because the mind has its footing. It”s secure. Calm. Peaceful within itself — all because of the stillness, which is a gathering of energy. This isn”t in the plan at all — because while we are practicing, we aren”t concerned with the texts. We”re intent solely on developing concentration in the present until we gain results — peace, well-being, and various other satisfactory states — there in that moment.

　　If this is in the plan, it”s in the part that says, ”Try to make the mind stay with just a single Dhamma theme — its meditation word.” Don”t get involved with other topics at that moment. If you let it think of the texts while practicing concentration, it won”t be willing to stick just with that practice. A great deal of extraneous knowledge will interfere, disrupting the mind until everything is a turmoil, and no stillness will result. This is called going against the plan taught by the Buddha.

　　Whatever plans we”ve been given, however many, however much Dhamma the Buddha taught, we gather it all to our own confusion. It”s as if we were building a hut and yet went around to gather up plans for hundred-story buildings and spread them out for a look. They just don”t go together. The plan for a building and the plan for a hut are as different as earth and sky, and yet here we are going to gather the mind into one point, which is like building a hut. Only after we have the strength can we then begin enlarging it into a building.

　　When we ultimately reach the level where we are ready to investigate, there are no limits as to how broad or restricted it should be. The mind can investigate everything throughout the cosmos. When we reach the level where we sh…

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