..續本文上一頁 to know and see the marvel of the Dhamma is that first we have to speculate and then we follow with practice. This qualifies as following the principles of the Dhamma the Buddha taught, and this is fitting and proper. No matter what the difficulties and hardships encountered in following the path, we shouldn”t let them form barriers to our progress, because this is where the path lies. There are no other byways that can take us easily to the goal. If our practice is difficult, we have to stick with it. If it”s painful, we have to bear it, because it”s a duty we have to perform, a burden we have to carry while working so as to attain our aims.
The Dhamma of a pure mind is like this: The mind is the Dhamma, the Dhamma is the mind. We call it a mind only as long as it is still with the body and khandhas. Only then can we call it a pure mind, the mind of a Buddha, or the mind of an arahant. After it passes from the body and khandhas, there is no conventional reality to which it can be compared, and so we can”t call it anything at all.
No matter how marvelous that nature, no matter how much it may be ours, there is no possible way we can use conventional realities to describe it or to make comparisons, because that Dhamma, that realm of release, has no conventions against which to measure things or make comparisons. It”s the same as if we were in outer space: Which way is north, which way is south, we don”t know. If we”re on Earth, we can say ”east,” ”west,” ”north,” and ”south” because there are things that we can observe and compare so as to tell which direction lies which way. We take the Earth as our standard. ”High” and ”low” depend on the Earth as their frame of reference. How much higher than this, lower than this, north of this, south of this: These things we can say.
But if we”re out in outer space, there is no standard by which we can measure things, and so we can”t say. Or as when we go up in an airplane: We can”t tell how fast or how slow we”re going. When we pass a cloud, we can tell that we”re going fast, but if we depend simply on our eyesight, we”re sure to think that the speed of the airplane is nowhere near the speed of a car. We can clearly see how deceptive our eyesight is in just this way. When we ride in a car, the trees on both sides of the road look as if they were falling in together down on the road behind us. Actually, they stay their separate selves. It”s simply that the car runs past them. Since there are things that we sense, that lie close enough for comparison, it seems as if the car were going really fast.
As for the airplane, there”s nothing to make comparisons with, so it looks as if the plane were dawdling along, as if it were going slower than a car, even though it”s actually many times faster.
This is how it is when we compare the mind of an ordinary run-of-the-mill person with the mind of the Buddha. Whatever the Buddha says is good and excellent, we ordinary people tend to say that it”s not. Whatever we like, no matter how vile, we say that it”s good. We don”t admit the truth, in the same way as thinking that a car goes faster than an airplane.
The practice of attending to the mind is something very important. Try to develop mindfulness (sati) and discernment so that they can keep up with the things that come and entangle the mind. By and large, the heart itself is the instigator, creating trouble continually, relentlessly. We then fall for the preoccupations the heart turns out — and this makes us agitated, upset, and saddened, all because of the thoughts formed by the heart.
These come from the heart itself, and the heart itself is what falls for them, saying that this is this, and that is that, even though the things it names ”this” and ”that” merely exist in line with their nature. Th…
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