..续本文上一页”re not believing that those are personal problems, but instead taking fear and anger, mentally, to an absurd position, to where they”re just seen as a natural progression of thoughts. We”re deliberately thinking all the things we”re afraid of thinking, not just out of blindness, but actually watching and listening to them as conditions of the mind, rather than personal failures or problems.

　　So, in this practice now, we begin to let things go. You don”t have to go round looking for particular things, but when things which you feel obsessed with keep arising, bothering you, and you”re trying to get rid of them, then bring them up even more. Deliberately think them out and listen, like you”re listening to someone talking on the other side of the fence, some gossipy old fish-wife: ”We did this, and we did that, and then we did this and then we did that ...” and this old lady just goes rambling on! Now, practise just listening to it here as a voice, rather than judging it, saying, ”No, no, I hope that”s not me, that”s not my true nature”, or trying to shut her up and saying, ”Oh, you old bag, I wish you”d go away!” We all have that, even I have that tendency. It”s just a condition of nature, isn”t it

　　 It”s not a person. So, this nagging tendency in us -- ”I work so hard, nobody is ever grateful” -- is a condition, not a person. Sometimes when you”re grumpy, nobody can do anything right -- even when they”re doing it right, they”re doing it wrong. That”s another condition of the mind, it”s not a person. The grumpiness, the grumpy state of mind is known as a condition: anicca -- it changes; dukkha -- it is not satisfactory; anatta -- it is not a person. There”s the fear of what others will think of you if you come in late: you”ve overslept, you come in, and then you start worrying about what everyone”s thinking of you for coming in late -- ”They think I”m lazy.” Worrying about what others think is a condition of the mind. Or we”re always here on time, and somebody else comes in late, and we think, ”They always come in late, can”t they ever be on time!” That also is another condition of the mind.

　　I”m bringing this up into full consciousness, these trivial things, which you can just push aside because they are trivial, and one doesn”t want to be bothered with the trivialities of life; but when we don”t bother, then all that gets repressed, so it becomes a problem. We start feeling anxiety, feeling aversion to ourselves or to other people, or depressed; all this comes from refusing to allow conditions, trivialities, or horrible things to become conscious.

　　Then there is the doubting state of mind, never quite sure what to do: there”s fear and doubt, uncertainty and hesitation. Deliberately bring up that state of never being sure, just to be relaxed with that state of where the mind is when you”re not grasping hold of any particular thing. ”What should I do, should I stay or should I go, should I do this or should I do that, should I do anapanasati or should I do vipassana

　　” Look at that. Ask yourself questions that can”t be answered, like ”Who am l

　　” Notice that empty space before you start thinking it -- ”who

　　” -- just be alert, just close your eyes, and just before you think ”who”, just look, the mind”s quite empty, isn”t it

　　 Then, ”Who-am-l

　　”, and then the space after the question mark. That thought comes and goes out of emptiness, doesn”t it

　　 When you”re just caught in habitual thinking, you can”t see the arising of thought, can you

　　 You can”t see, you can only catch thought after you realise you”ve been thinking; so start deliberately thinking, and catch the beginning of a thought, before you actually think it. You take deliberate thoughts like, ”Who is the Buddha

　　” Deliberately think that, so that you see the beginning, the formi…

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