..续本文上一页 be to live in a person”s belly for nine months
Yet you want to stick your head right in there, to put your neck in the noose once again.
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Why are we born
We are born so that we will not have to be born again.
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When one does not understand death, life can be very confusing.
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The Buddha told his disciple Ananda to see impermanence, to see death with every breath. We must know death; we must die in order to live. What does that mean
To die is to come to the end of our doubts, all our questions, and just be here with the present reality. You can never die tomorrow; you must die now. Can you do it
If you can do it, you will know the peace of no more questions.
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Death is as close as our breath.
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If you”ve trained properly, you wouldn”t feel frightened when you fall sick, nor be upset when someone dies. When you go into the hospital for treatment, determine in your mind that if you get better, that”s fine, and that if you die, that”s fine, too. I guarantee you that if the doctors told me I had cancer and was going to die in a few months, I”d remind the doctors, "Watch out, because death is coming to get you, too. It”s just a question of who goes first and who goes later." Doctors are not going to cure death or prevent death. Only the Buddha was such a doctor, so why not go ahead and use the Buddha”s medicine
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If you”re afraid of illness, if you are afraid of death, they you should contemplate where they come from. Where do they come from
They arise from birth. So, don”t be sad when someone dies - it”s just nature, and his suffering in this life is over. If you want to be sad, be sad when people are born: "Oh, no, they”ve come again. They”re going to suffer and die again!"
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The "One Who Knows" clearly knows that all conditioned phenomena are unsubstantial. So this "One Who Knows" does not become happy or sad, for it does not follow changing conditions. To become glad, is to be born; to become dejected, is to die. Having died, we are born again; having been born, we die again. This birth and death from one moment to the next is the endless spinning wheel of samsara.
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Body
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If the body could talk, it would be telling us all day long, "You”re not my owner, you know." Actually it”s telling it to us all the time, but it”s Dhamma language, so we”re unable to understand it.
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Conditions don”t belong to us. They follow their own natural course. We can”t do anything about the way the body is. We can beautify it a little, make it look attractive and clean for a while, like the young girls who paint their lips and let their nails grow long, but when old age arrives, everyone is in the same boat. That is the way the body is. We can”t make it any other way. But, what we can improve and beautify is the mind.
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If our body really belonged to us, it would obey our commands. If we say, "Don”t get old," Or "I forbid you to get sick" does it obey us
No! It takes no notice. We only rent this "house", not own it. If we think it does belong to us, we will suffer when we have to leave it. But in reality, there is no such thing as a permanent self, nothing unchanging or solid that we can hold on to.
Breath
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There are people who are born and die and never once are aware of their breath going in and out of their body. That”s how far away they live from themselves.
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Time is our present breath.
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You say that you are too busy to meditate. Do you have time to breathe
Meditation is your breath. Why do you have time to breathe but not to meditate
Breathing is something vital to people”s lives. If you see that Dhamma practice is vital to your life, they you will feel that breathing and practicing the Dhamma …
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