..续本文上一页ped a certain sense of confidence that so far the Buddha has been right, so you give him the benefit of the doubt on meditation.

　　This confidence is what allows you to overcome a lot of the initial difficulties: the distractions, the pain. At the same time the spaciousness that comes from generosity gives you the right mindset for the concentration practice, gives you the right mindset for insight practice—because when you sit down and focus on the breath, what kind of mind do you have

　　 It”s the mind you”ve been creating through your generous and virtuous actions. It”s a spacious mind, not the narrow mind of a person who doesn”t have enough. It”s the spacious mind of a person who has more than enough to share, the mind of a person who has no regrets or denial over past actions. In short, it”s the mind of a person who realizes that true happiness doesn”t see a sharp dichotomy between your own wellbeing and the wellbeing of others.

　　The whole idea that happiness has to consist either in doing things only for your own selfish motives or for other people to the sacrifice of yourself—the dichotomy between the two—is something very Western. But it”s antithetical to the Buddha”s teachings. The Buddha”s teachings are that true happiness is something that, by its nature, gets spread around. By working for your own true benefit, you”re working for the benefit of others. And by working for the benefit of others, you”re working for your own. In the act of giving to others you gain rewards. In the act of holding fast to the precepts, holding fast to your principles, protecting others from your unskillful behavior, you gain as well. You gain in mindfulness, you gain in your own sense of worth as a person, your own self esteem.

　　So you come to the meditation ready to apply the same principle to training in tranquility and insight. You realize that the meditation is not a selfish project. You”re sitting here trying to understand your greed, anger, and delusion, trying to bring them under control—which means that you”re not the only person who”s going to benefit from the meditation. Other people will benefit—are benefiting— as well. As you become more mindful, more alert, more skillful in undercutting the hindrances in your mind, it means that other people are less subject to those hindrances as well. Less greed, anger and delusion come out in your actions, and so the people around you suffer less. Training in acts of generosity creates a mindset, creates a state of mind, that”s essential to the meditation. It”s basic to all the practice.

　　The quality of generosity, what they call caga in Pali, is included in many sets of Dhamma teachings. One is the set of practices that lead to a fortunate rebirth. This doesn”t apply only to the rebirth that comes after death, but also to the states of being, the states of mind you create for yourself moment to moment, that you move into with each moment. You create the world in which you live through your actions. By being generous—not only with material things but also with your time, your energy, your forgiveness, your willingness to be fair and just with other people—you create a good world in which to live. If your habits tend more toward being stingy, they create a very confining world, because there”s never enough. There”s always a lack of this, or a lack of that, or a fear that something is going to slip away or get taken away from you. So it”s a narrow, fearful world you create when you”re not generous, as opposed to the confident and wide-open world you create through acts of generosity.

　　Generosity is also counted as one of the forms of Noble Wealth, because what is wealth aside from a sense of having more than enough

　　 Many people who are materially poor are, in terms of their attitude, very wealthy. …

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