..续本文上一页I want

　　" I use that as a mantra as I walk along the meditation path, or as I sit if my mind is restless. "What do I want

　　" I”ve been in this world long enough now - forty-eight years - and I have experienced much of this world. I wasn”t born in a monastery, and from all that I have experienced and seen, from all that I have known, I know there is not a corner of this world where I can find happiness [1]. By its very nature, sensory experience is going to be disappointing, and I know that if I ask for something the world can never give me, I will suffer. When I crave for something I cannot reach, I know I am just torturing myself more than necessary.

　　Putting Make-Up On The Mirror

　　Instead of craving for something else you learn to be content with what you have. When you talk about contentment you are talking about the Third Noble Truth. The Third Noble Truth is letting go of craving. Contentment is the letting go of wanting something else. It is learning to be at peace with what you have. This is where in this struggle - and it is always a struggle - you can be at peace. How can you be content when everything is going wrong

　　 How can you be content when the body is on fire with pain

　　 How can you be at peace and content when the mind is going crazy with so many thoughts

　　 Even in these situations you can find contentment in letting go, letting go of the ”controller”.

　　I gave a simile to some Thai”s last week. I gave this simile to the Thai ladies because some of them are very vain - you”ve all seen the way they dress up when they come to the monastery. I told them it”s just like when one sees oneself in the mirror, and sees this ugly person, but instead of actually doing something with one”s face, one puts make up on the mirror. One tries to make the mirror look good! Of course, it”s a complete waste of time. The mirror might look good for a while with all the make up on it, but when one walks somewhere else and sees another mirror one is back to square one again. Putting make up on the mirror is like trying to solve the ”outside” by craving instead of trying to solve the ”inside” through contentment.

　　For the last sixteen years I”ve worked hard - extremely hard, as many of you would know - trying to build up this monastery. It”s been a complete waste of time trying to make a perfect monastery, or even trying to make an adequate monastery, because it”s never good enough. The way that craving works, the Second Noble Truth, is to delude you into thinking that if you just try and do a little bit more, if you just strive harder, work harder for just one more day, then everything will be O.K. "I”ll just work another year and I”ll pay off my mortgage." "I”ll just sit for one more retreat, that”s all I need, and I”ll get my Jhanas." "There”s this one last course of medicine then I”ll be healthy again." You might put off sickness for a while, but you”ll never escape it. It”s just the nature of the body. You might put off suffering for a while, but you”ll never escape it in that way. You”re just putting it off.

　　The Happiness And Suffering Of The Senses Are Just Contrast - That”s All

　　It is the nature of a human being to get suffering and happiness in roughly equal proportions. If we”re suffering now, it”s because of some happiness that we had before and lost. Happiness is no more than the end of suffering, just as suffering is no more than the end of happiness. We go around in this cycle throughout our lives.

　　This existential fact is why the Lord Buddha says in the First Noble Truth that the five aggregates (khandhas) that make up a human being are suffering. By their very nature they are suffering. So, if anyone comes for an interview with me and says she is having a terrible time, often I want to say, "Of course, what”s wrong with that

　　" …

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