Make Up Your Mind

　　by

　　Venerable Tippakorn Sukhito

　　Translated by Brigitte Schrottenbacher

　　There is no greater happiness than a calm mind. A mind that is calm - is the greatest happiness.

　　For example - the two chief-disciples of the Buddha - Phra Sariputta and Phra Moggallana, when they where young men with the name Upatissa and Kolitta, they tried to find happiness. They tried it in every way. They enjoyed all sensual pleasures that where possible to enjoy - but they could not find lasting happiness. So they decided to ordain as ascetics. They practiced what their teacher told them, to the highest possible level - but still no way out of suffering was found.

　　So they decided to separate their ways and if one of them found the real happiness - he would tell it the other one.

　　One day Upatissa saw a monk on his alms-round. This monk was not like any other he”d seen before. He walked composed and mindfully and faith arose in Upatissa”s heart. He followed the monk on his alms-round and than took his bowl to a suitable place and prepared a seat for him to take his meal. After he cleaned the bowl of the monk and than respectfully asked him who his teacher was and what Dhamma he taught. The monk - it was Phra Assajji, one of the first five disciples that the Buddha taught - answered him that a Buddha is born into this world and He is his teacher and that he himself was still a new monk and can not tell him much.

　　Upatissa told him that he doesn”t want much only a little Dhamma will be enough. Than Assajji told him that the Buddha taught the suffering and it”s cause and that one has to extinguish this cause.

　　Only these few words let the light of the Dhamma arise in the heart of Upatissa. He became a stream-entree (Sotapanna).

　　A meditator has to be mindful - knowing what is the cause - why he can not gain calmness - knowing why there is calmness. Knowing what causes one not to be calm and extinguishing this cause. He will see it”s because the mind is wandering outside of one”s body. The mind thinks about past and future, about family and home, about work and all kind of problems - it does not want to stay with the body. All hindrances arise - like tiredness and laziness - this comes because the mind wanders to the outside.

　　So we have to stop the cause for all of this suffering. We have to fix the mind on the body. We stay with an easy, relaxed and open mind within our body. We try to be perceptive and to know. Whatever is the object in the body which is more clear for us - be it knowing the breath in and out at the nostrils, or be it knowing the rising and falling of the abdomen while breathing. For some it may be the five objects of contemplation (panca kammatthana) like: hair on the head, hair of the body, nails, teeth and skin. Or may it be the 32 objects of recollecting one”s body. However, important is that one stays within one”s body.

　　Merit is having a calm mind. Having a cool and calm mind is having a meritorious mind.

　　If we practice like that often, than we will gain a strong mind. People with a strong mind are able to let go, not to get too attached to things. Whatever contact may happen, be it our eye seeing a form, our ear hearing a sound, our nose smelling a smell, our body feeling tangible objects, our tongue experiencing taste or our mind thinking a thought - the meditator stays with a strong detached mind. Knowing this things arise - stay for a while - and than disappear. They are born in the mind and they will cease in the mind.

　　Happiness arises - we know, suffering arises - we know. Both arise in the mind and stay for a while and than cease. Usually we get attached to these things, they arise, - we cling to them and start to create more mental formations and that increases the heat in our hearts. We rea…

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