Deerpark Retreat Day 7 'Deeper Aspects of Dhamma Pt 1' w/Delson Armstrong

So today we're going to go into some deeper aspects of the Dhamma. The sutta I'm reading is Majjhima Nikaya 43, Maha Vedalla Sutta, the greater series of questions and answers. Thus have I heard on one occasion, the Blessed One was living at Savatthi in Jeta's Grove in Anathapindika's Park. Then when it was evening, the Venerable Maha Kotthita rose from meditation, went to the Venerable Sariputta and exchanged greetings with him. So, Maha Kotthita was another arahant, and of course, Sariputta was also an arahant. So now, this dialogue is between two fully awakened beings, and in the question and answers, one question is asked by Maha Kotthita, and then it's answered by Sariputta. But it's not like Maha Kotthita needs to know these answers.

He already knows the answers. This is like a modern-day fireside chat, you know, between two experts. So their students are listening to them chat. When this courteous and amiable talk was finished, he sat down at one side and said to the Venerable Sariputta: "One who is unwise, one who is unwise, friend, is said with reference to what? One who is unwise, one does not wisely understand. One does not wisely understand this is suffering. One does not wisely understand this is the origin of suffering. One does not wisely understand this is the cessation of suffering. One does not wisely understand this is the way leading to the cessation of suffering."

One does not wisely understand. One does not wisely understand, friend. That is why it is said, one who is unwise. So one does not wisely understand the Four Noble Truths, meaning one does not have the awareness of the Four Noble Truths in every experience, being able to apply the Four Noble Truths the same way we were talking about when we were talking about applying the framework of the Four Noble Truths to the links of dependent origination, or to the hindrances, or to whatever it might be.

So the application of the Four Noble Truths is the ability to recognize when the first noble truth arises, the ability to abandon the second noble truth, then the ability to experience the third noble truth and then cultivate the fourth noble truth. This is facilitated through the process of right effort, through the six R's. The first noble truth of suffering and the different aspects of suffering are fully understood. The different causes and conditions for suffering are fully abandoned. And one fully realizes and experiences Nirodha, the third noble truth. And one does this through the cultivation of the Eightfold Path, which is facilitated through right effort. Consciousness. Consciousness is said, friend, with reference to what is consciousness said?

It cognizes, it cognizes, friend. That is why consciousness is said. Cognizes, what does that mean? Cognize: to become aware of something, to understand something. What does it cognize? It cognizes this is pleasant. It cognizes this is painful. It cognizes this is neither painful nor pleasant. It cognizes, it cognizes, friend. That is why consciousness is said. That is the utility of awareness: to become aware of the quality of experiences, just being aware of the experience. That's it. When there is a superimposition of the self into the awareness, then the awareness is taken to be me. The awareness is taken to be I. The awareness is taken to be myself, mine. But awareness arises dependent upon its object. That awareness changes. Right now you're looking at me. Let's say that cat was coming in, you'd see that cat. The awareness switched from the awareness of me to the awareness of the cat, but it was not the same awareness. There was the awareness of me arising in dependence upon the experience of seeing. Then, when the attention moved, there is the awareness of the cat, arising in dependence upon seeing the cat.

In the same way, when you are meditating, there is the awareness of loving kindness. There is the awareness of radiating compassion. There is the awareness of quiet mind. When the attention moves towards a hindrance, towards a distraction, the awareness of the object disappears and what arises is the awareness of the distraction. Then recognizing this, recognizing, perceiving there is a distraction, releasing the awareness from that, coming back to mind and body, relaxing, re-smiling, and then returning back to the object. Right effort.

Then the awareness of that hindrance passes away, and there is the renewal of the awareness of the object of meditation, a new awareness of the object of meditation. Now the feeling of the object of meditation, if we are to understand it based on what we were talking about yesterday, that feeling is made up of micro-moments, many, many, many, many trillions of experiences, and tied to each of those many, many, many arising and passing away. There is a consciousness, an awareness of each of those. But because it's so fast, it feels like one fluid awareness.

Between wisdom and consciousness, these states that are conjoined, not disjoined. The difference, friend, between wisdom and consciousness, these states that are conjoined, not disjoined, is this. Wisdom is to be fully developed. Consciousness is to be fully understood. These states are conjoined, wisdom and consciousness, but there is a difference. Wisdom is to be fully developed, meaning you have to fully understand the first noble truth, fully abandon the second noble truth, fully experience the third noble truth, fully cultivate the fourth noble truth. The awareness of cognizing the Four Noble Truths, that is to be fully understood.

Fully understood in what way? Understanding it as an aggregate that is made up of composites, that is dependently arisen, therefore impermanent, therefore to be taken impersonally. This is how it is to be understood. Feeling, friend, feeling, with reference to what is feeling said? It feels, friend, it feels. That is why feeling is said. What does it feel? It feels pleasure. It feels pain. It feels neither pain nor pleasure.

It feels, friends, it feels. That is why feeling is said. So here what it's saying is, consciousness is not some kind of self. Feeling is not some kind of self. It's a mechanism. The mechanism of consciousness allows the mind to be aware. The mechanism of vedana, feeling, allows the experience to be felt. To be experienced. To be sensed.

Perception. Perception is said, friend, with reference to what is perception said? It perceives. It perceives. That is why perception is said. What does it perceive? It perceives blue. It perceives yellow. It perceives red and it perceives white. It perceives, it perceives, friend. That is why perception is said. So the mechanism of perception that is there in our mind allows the mind to label what is being experienced.

Just as you would see the color red, you would recognize it as the color red. Just as you would see this table, you would recognize it as a table. So the mechanism of consciousness is to understand. The mechanism of feeling is to experience, and the mechanism of perception is to label what is being cognized and what is being experienced.

And you understand and cognize it as an experience of seeing red. What one feels, what one experiences, that one immediately labels. And that one immediately understands to be there: this is a pleasant feeling, this is an unpleasant feeling, this is a neutral feeling. So feeling, perception, consciousness, these three run around each other. Using the example of one who puts the hand over the stove fire: you put your hand on the stove fire, you feel warmth, that's the experience. You perceive that it feels warm, in other words, you feel the heat and you're able to label it as being heat. You say it is one, that is the perception. The cognition of that, the understanding that this process is one, that's the cognition, that's the consciousness. And then the fire gets hotter and it becomes painful. Then you perceive it, so you experience the pain, you perceive it as painful and understand that it is painful. These three states are interlaced within each other: feeling, perception and consciousness. What one feels, that one perceives. What one perceives, that one cognizes.

Friend, what can be known by purified mind consciousness, released from the five faculties? What is beyond the experience of the five physical sense bases? Friend, by purified mind consciousness, purified in what way? Free from hindrances, meaning that mind is in a jhanic state of mind, free from hindrances. Friend, by purified mind consciousness released from the five faculties, the base of infinite space can be known thus, space is infinite. The base of infinite consciousness can be known thus, consciousness is infinite. And the base of nothingness can be known thus, there is nothing.

Meaning, when the mind is detached from the experience of the five physical sense bases, when you are meditating in the first four jhanas, you still feel some contact with the body. You still can experience things, but then eventually you go deep into your mind. You might still hear things, but there is the awareness of infinite space. There is the awareness of infinite consciousness. There is the awareness of nothingness. Because it's first of all purified from the five hindrances, purified of the five hindrances, so now it's a jhanic state of mind. That mind consciousness is just aware of mind itself, the experiences of mind, and for that reason they can experience infinite space, infinite consciousness, and nothingness.

Friend, with what does one understand a state that can be known? Friend, with what does one understand a state that can be known? What is the tool? What is it that sees? What is it that understands? What is perceivable? What can be known? What can be understood? What is that? Friend, one understands a state that can be known with the eye of wisdom, pannachakkhu, the eye of wisdom.

This eye of wisdom, or the eye of the Dhamma, or however you want to put it, is not some kind of pervasive consciousness that's the substratum of everything. That eye of wisdom that understands arises as and when the experience arises. So in other words, the observer, that which observes an experience, that which observes what can be known.

The observer arises dependent upon the object of observation. The knower arises. The notion of the knower is superimposed upon the process of knowing. Friend, what is the purpose of wisdom? That's a fair question. Why are we doing all of this? The purpose of wisdom, friend, is direct knowledge. Its purpose is full understanding. Its purpose is abandoning. Wisdom is not gained for the sake of knowledge, for the sake of some kind of thing that you can show off. Wisdom is gained for direct knowledge, direct knowledge of what? The cessation of suffering.

Full understanding of what suffering, and abandoning of what causes and conditions lead to suffering. When there is wisdom, there is immediate, automatic understanding of what is suffering. Immediate, automatic letting go of the causes and conditions of suffering. An immediate and automatic experience and realization of the mind. Friend, how many conditions are there for the arising of right view?

Right view is synonymous with wisdom, samma ditthi. Right view, meaning full understanding and grasp of the four noble truths. Friend, there are two conditions for the arising of right view. The voice of another, and wise attention. These are the two conditions for the arising of right view. The voice of another. In the time of the Buddha, that was the Buddha's voice, or the disciple of the Buddha. In today's world, it's YouTube.

Somebody to point out the way, that this is right for you. That way you know what is right for you, at least on an intellectual level. And wise attention, yoniso manasikara. Attention rooted in reality, seeing things as they actually are. Recognizing when mind takes something to be permanent and letting go of that, and seeing the impermanence. Recognizing when the mind sees something as personal, letting go of that and understanding its impersonal nature.

and experiences the destruction of the pains. This is the difference. One experiences the first four jhanas in paññavimutti, and then experiences the destruction of the things. One goes through each of the eight jhanas, then experiences the destruction of the things. That is cetovimutti. So the question here is, how many factors is right view assisted by when its benefit and its effect are deliverance of mind and deliverance by wisdom? Meaning, the effect of right view is ultimately the destruction of the things.

Friend, how many kinds of being are there? How many kinds of existences are there? How many kinds of ways of becoming are there? How many types or categories under which habitual tendencies are present? There are these three kinds, friend: sense-sphere being, fine-material being, and immaterial being. Sense-sphere being, in the context of the cosmology of the Dhamma, starts from the hell realms all the way up to the sixth central heaven. This comprises the sense-sphere beings. And then from there, the first Brahmaloka all the way up to the fourth Brahmaloka constitutes the fine-material beings, luminous beings. And then, from infinite space all the way to either perception or non-perception, that constitutes the immaterial beings.

When I spoke about habitual tendencies the other day, this is what we were referring to. The mind has certain kinds of habitual tendencies that can be hellish and create psychological hell. It has deva-like tendencies that can create deva-like existence, in the same way, deva-like psychological states, like being generous, compassionate, forgiving, patient, and so on. As you cultivate the jhanas, you start to cultivate brahma-like tendencies, depending upon which jhana. Likewise, when you cultivate the formless attainments, you cultivate immaterial-like tendencies or psychological states. Friend, how is renewal of being in the future generated? The renewal of being, how are the renewal of these habitual tendencies? How do they come about? Friend, renewal of being in the future is generated through the delighting in this and that on the part of beings who are hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving.

It's a very important phrase to understand: hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving. When the sankharas, the mental formations, are fettered by craving and influence, conditioned by ignorance, then that can give rise to the potential for craving, sensual craving, craving for existence, craving for non-existence. Acting upon that, there can be clinging, and then becoming, or being, or habitual tendencies.

Friend, how is renewal of being, the renewal of these habitual tendencies, in the future not generated? How do you stop the generation of these habitual tendencies? Friend, with the fading away of ignorance, with the arising of true knowledge, and with the cessation of craving, renewal of being in the future is not generated. The fading away of ignorance, how does that happen? Through awareness, observation, mindfulness, attention, being aware and attentive of what's going on, allows you to get a deeper understanding of the impermanent nature of things through seeing dependent origination, which then lets you see with right view. And so there is a fading away of ignorance, replaced by right view, replaced by wisdom.

The arising of true knowledge is just that, the seeing into the links of dependent origination. And the cessation of craving, letting go of all craving, is facilitated through having complete, pristine mindfulness of every moment, of every experience. Seeing that it is conditioned, therefore impermanent, therefore not to be taken as me, mine, or myself. By seeing it in this way, every feeling, every experience, no potential through the underlying tendencies can arise. And there cannot be the arising of craving, clinging, and being, or becoming.

Friend, what is the first jhana? Here, friend, quite secluded from sensual pleasures, secluded from unwholesome states, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the first jhana, which is accompanied by applied and sustained thought, with rapture and pleasure born of seclusion. This is called the first jhana. By now everybody understands that, right? This is the first jhana. Mind is secluded from unwholesome states, no hindrances.

Quite secluded from sensual pleasures, staying in the mind, not paying attention to what's going on, not getting your attention scattered through the sense bases, enters upon the first jhana, which is accompanied by thinking and examining thought, starting the process of bringing up the object of meditation and resting your mind on the object of meditation. With rapture and pleasure born of seclusion, letting go of the hindrances provides relief. From that relief there is joy and happiness and comfort in the body.

Friend, how many factors does the first jhana have? Friend, the first jhana has five factors. Here, when a bhikkhu has entered upon the first jhana, there occurs applied thought, sustained thought: bringing up the object, staying with the object. Rapture, the joy, piti. Pleasure, comfort in the body. And unification of mind, ekaggata, letting the mind not be dispersed. The mind's attention is not dispersed, not refracted, but rather collected, orbiting around its object of meditation.

This is how the first jhana has five factors. Friend, how many factors are abandoned in the first jhana? And how many factors are possessed? What do you think? How many factors are abandoned in the five, oh, I just told you. All right, what five factors are abandoned? Friend, in the first jhana, five factors are abandoned, and five factors are possessed.

Here, when a bhikkhu has entered upon the first jhana, sensual desire is abandoned, ill-will is abandoned, sloth and torpor are abandoned, restlessness and remorse are abandoned, and doubt is abandoned. And there occur, again, the applied thought, the thinking, the bringing up of the object, the sustained thought, staying with the object, the meditation, rapture, the bliss, the happiness, pleasure, comfort in the body, and unification of mind. That is how the first jhana, that is how in the first jhana five factors are abandoned and five factors are possessed.

I do want to bring up something here. So, what he's saying is that the eye only experiences the different forms. The ear only experiences the different sounds. The nose only experiences the different smells. The tongue experiences the different tastes. And the body experiences different touches. But there is something known as synesthesia, where the eye apparently can see smells or see sounds. Or the ear can hear smells, or hear tastes.

Or the nose can smell sights. Or the tongue can taste sounds. Yeah, it can happen under certain kinds of influences. But there are some people who actually have inborn synesthesia. But regardless, they're still experiencing it through those sense faculties. The idea here, or the question here, is what is their resort, what is it that experiences their fields and domains? Friends, these five faculties each have a separate field, a separate domain, and do not experience each other's field and domain. That is, the eye faculty, the ear faculty, the nose faculty, the tongue faculty, and the body faculty. Now, these five faculties, each having a separate field, a separate domain, not experiencing each other's field and domain, have mind as their resort.

Mind experiences their fields and domains. Like we said earlier, mind is chief. Mind is the forerunner of all states. Ultimately, everything that you're experiencing, the mind is experiencing. Even the concept that you have a body is experienced through the mind. Friend, as to these five faculties, that is the eye faculty, the ear faculty, the nose faculty, the tongue faculty, and the body faculty, what do these faculties stand in dependence upon? What are they dependent upon? Friend, as to these five faculties, that is the eye faculty, the ear faculty, the nose faculty, the tongue faculty, and the body faculty, these five faculties stand in dependence on vitality. Vitality. We were talking about this yesterday, life faculty.

Here it's translated from the word ayu. A-Y-U, ayu. But that's another word for jivit indriya. And I did some contemplation on this. And in the Abhidhamma, it talks about two types of jivit indriya. There is the nama jivit indriya, and there is the rupa jivit indriya. So, we were talking about this, that the eye faculty is dependent, or the eye and the ear, the nose, the tongue, the body, they're all dependent upon this life faculty. Then the question arises, what does vitality stand in dependence on? Vitality stands in dependence on heat. Friend, what does heat stand in dependence on? Heat stands in dependence on vitality. Just now, friend, we understood the Venerable Sariputta to have said, vitality stands in dependence on heat.

And now we understand him to say, heat stands in dependence on vitality. How should the meaning of these statements be regarded? You just told me that vitality stands in dependence on heat, and now you're telling me heat stands in dependence on vitality. How am I supposed to understand this? In that case, friend, I shall give you a simile. For some wise men here understand a meaningless statement by means of a simile. Just as when an oil lamp is burning, its radiance is seen in dependence on its flame.

And its flame is seen in dependence on its radiance. So, too, vitality stands in dependence on heat, and heat stands in dependence on vitality. Friend, are vital formations things that can be felt? Or vital formations, one thing, and things that can be felt, another? Vital formations. Ayu-sankhara. Ayu-sankhara. Vital formations, friends, are not things that can be felt.

If vital formations were things that can be felt, then a bhikkhu who has entered upon the cessation of perception and feeling could not be seen to emerge from it. Because vital formations are one thing and things that can be felt another, a bhikkhu who has entered upon the cessation of perception and feeling can be seen to emerge from it. In other words, what he is saying is, if vital formations were things to be felt, they would be part of mental formations. Because through mental formations, one can feel and perceive.

But vital formations are separate. So you have bodily formations, verbal formations, and mental formations. In the cessation of perception, feeling, and consciousness, mental formations cease. But if vital formations were something to be felt, then they would be consolidated with mental formations. They would be part of mental formations, because they would be felt. But they are not felt, in the sense that all of the different bodily processes, like the cellular activity, like blood pressure, like all of the different vital signs that we have, all of those things are not necessarily always under our control. Although certain yogis can do that.

But they're not always being, you're not always aware of them unless you put your attention to them like in the eighth jhana you become aware of your heartbeat but you or you might hear your blood flow so they say so some people experience but vital formations are those that maintain the longevity of the body i use some kindness they are separate to mental formations that allow us to experience through the sixth sense basis perceived through the sixth sense basis so when there is a cessation of perception feeling and consciousness there is a cessation of bodily formations there is a cessation of verbal formations and there is a cessation of mental formations but the ayus and karas Those continue.

Those ayu-sankharas and [kaya-sankharas] are basically the heat and vitality that we're talking about. That continues. And we'll see why. It says here, friend, when this body is bereft of how many states is it then discarded and forsaken, left lying senseless like a log? Meaning, when the body is dead, there is no more life process in the body.

There's no more inhalation, exhalation going on, for example. His verbal formations have ceased. There's no more thinking and reflecting in the mind. And his mental formations have ceased and subsided. There's no more ability for the body to feel and perceive, the mind to feel and perceive. His vitality is exhausted. There's no more life principle in the body. No more bodily processes that maintain homeostasis in the body, maintain the life in the body. Gone. Exhausted.

His heat has been dissipated. When you touch a dead body, it's cold. It doesn't maintain the same heat that we possess as living beings. And his faculties are fully broken up. The sense spaces no longer experience anything. No longer able to make contact, because there's no consciousness there. In the case of a bhikkhu who has entered upon the cessation of perception, feeling, and consciousness, his bodily formations have ceased and subsided.

His verbal formations have ceased and subsided. His mental formations have ceased and subsided. But his vitality is not exhausted. The bodily processes that maintain the temperature of the body, maintain homeostasis in the body, continue. Life is still present in that body. His heat has not been dissipated. And his faculties become exceptionally clear. The sense spaces, although they are not active, are exceptionally clear. Why?

When you're experiencing whatever it is you're experiencing, the eyes, the ears, the nose, the tongue, the body, the mind, they are always bombarded by a traffic jam of sensory data, impeded by sensory data. But when there is cessation of perception, feeling, and consciousness, the sixth sense bases are active, dependent upon the vitality and the heat, but there is no more sensory data being presented to them, or no more sensory data being received by them.

There's no traffic going on there. That's why they're exceptionally clear. No traffic jams going on. This is the difference between one who is dead, who has completed his time, and a bhikkhu who has entered upon cessation of perception, feeling, and consciousness. Now we're going to talk about the different liberations of the mind, including the emptiness liberation of the mind. This is known as deliverance of mind. Friend, how many conditions are there for the attainment of the neither painful nor pleasant deliverance of mind?

What does that mean? Neither painful nor pleasant deliverance of mind. Total equanimity. This is the fourth jhana. Friend, there are four conditions for the attainment of the neither painful nor pleasant deliverance of mind. Here, with the abandoning of pleasure and pain, and with the previous disappearance of joy and grief, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the fourth jhana, which has neither pain nor pleasure and purity of mindfulness due to equanimity. These are the four conditions for the attainment of the neither painful nor pleasant deliverance of mind.

The jhanas are also known as liberations, because they are temporary liberations. While you are in a jhanic state, your mind is liberated from craving, liberated from any kind of aversion, liberated from restlessness, liberated from sloth and torpor, liberated from doubt. So anytime craving does arise, you are not in jhana. Anytime any hindrance arises, you are not in jhana. So how do you come back to jhana? 6R's. Friend, how many conditions are there for the attainment of the signless deliverance of mind? We talked about this, jhana 8.5.

The signless collectedness of mind. How many conditions are there for that attainment? Friend, there are two conditions for the attainment of the signless deliverance of mind. Listen to this. Non-attention to all signs and attention to the signless element. What is the signless element? So when you are in the sign of this collectedness of mind, what happens? Your mind starts to, the edges of your mind start to dissolve.

Your awareness is not landing on anything, not attention to all objects. But there is attention. Attention to what? Reality. Include in reality. Just the awareness of the self. You can't possess it. There's no object there. It's just awareness. The awareness that's looking but not looking at anything. Resting in that awareness. The awareness of awareness. These are the two conditions for the attainment of the signless deliverance of mind. Friend, how many conditions are there for the persistence of the signless deliverance of mind? Friend, there are three conditions for the persistence of the signless deliverance of mind: non-attention to all signs, attention to the signless element, and the prior determination of its duration.

So this is an attainment. When we say it's an attainment, it means that the mind is able to go at it at will. Go at any jhana at will, and be able to determine how long to be in that state. So, people have kind of stumbled into, for this retreat, that signless collectedness of mind. As you start to perfect your understanding and awareness and experience of it, and as you start to develop your ability to make determinations, then you can attain to it, and that's an attainment.

That's another bragging right that you can put up there. You can say, I can attain the signless collectedness of mind. Friend, how many conditions are there for emergence from the signless deliverance of mind? Friend, there are two conditions for the emergence from the signless deliverance of mind. What do you think? You need the attention to an object, attention to all signs.

So now you take an object. And non-attention to the signless element. So you don't become aware of the awareness, you become aware of the object of its attention. These are the two conditions for emergence from the signless deliverance of mind. Friend, the immeasurable deliverance of mind. The deliverance of mind through nothingness. The deliverance of mind through emptiness.

The deliverance of the signless deliverance of mind: are these states different in meaning and different in name, or are they one in meaning and different only in name? In other words, are these states that I've just described, that I just told you, the immeasurable deliverance of mind, the deliverance of mind through nothingness, the deliverance of mind through emptiness, and the signless deliverance of mind, synonymous with each other, or are they different states that are being described? Friend, the immeasurable deliverance of mind, the deliverance of mind through nothingness, the deliverance of mind through emptiness, and the signless deliverance of mind. Listen to this. There is a way in which these states are different in meaning and different in name, and there is a way in which they are one in meaning and different only in name.

You can never get a straight answer out of an hour. What, friend, is the way in which these states are different in meaning and different in name? Here, so now, how are these states different? They have different names, but they're also different in terms of their qualities. They're different states. How are they different? Here, one abides pervading one quarter with a mind imbued with loving-kindness. Likewise the second, likewise the third, likewise the fourth, as above, below, around, and everywhere, and to all as to himself.

He abides pervading the all-encompassing world with a mind imbued with loving-kindness, abundant, exalted, immeasurable, without hostility, and without ill-will. Does this sound familiar? He abides pervading the world imbued with compassion, with altruistic joy, with equanimity. Likewise the second, likewise the third, likewise the fourth, above, below, around, and everywhere, and to all as to himself. He abides pervading the all-encompassing world with a mind imbued with these qualities, abundant, exalted, immeasurable, without hostility, and without ill will. This is called the immeasurable deliverance of mind.

So when you radiate in the six directions, for those who are doing the six directions, if you're doing it in a way that you're experiencing the irradiating, you're experiencing the world, everything around you, including yourself, being imbued with that loving-kindness, with compassion. This is that immeasurable deliverance of mind. That's the quality of the mind. And what, friend, is the deliverance of mind through nothingness?

Here, with the complete surmounting of the base of infinite consciousness, aware that there is nothing, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the base of nothingness. This is called the deliverance of mind through nothingness. So this is the seventh jhana, or the formless state of the ayatana of nothingness. After the rising and passing away of consciousnesses, then you start to see the gaps, and the gaps start to widen. Then your awareness and perception become more cognizing of the actual gap, which then widens, and it becomes nothing, and there is no thingness.

This is the deliverance of mind through nothingness. And what, friend, is the deliverance of mind through emptiness? Here the bhikkhu gone to the forest, or the root of a tree, or to an empty hut, reflects thus: this is empty of a self or of what belongs to a self. This is what we talked about yesterday. This is called deliverance of mind through emptiness. One takes each of the five aggregates, each of the six sense bases, and just observes them, and then realizes this is empty of any kind of self, empty of anything belonging to what could be considered yourself. Another way of looking at this, you can do this as an exercise on retreat.

Although I don't know if some of you will do it on retreat or not, because some of you don't listen. But you take a thought, and then you look at how that thought arose. And then look at how the content of that arose. And then you look at how the source of that thought arose. And eventually you see that it is empty of any kind of self.

The mind comes to this state, which is similar to the signless collectedness of mind, just completely quiet, observing things as they actually are. And what, friend, is the signless deliverance of mind? They already said this. Here, with non-attention to all signs, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the signless collectedness of mind. This is called the signless deliverance of mind. This is the way in which these states are different in meaning and different in name, meaning these are different states.

And what, friend, is the way in which these states are one in meaning and different only in name? How are they synonymous? How do they point to that one singular state? Lust is a maker of measurement. Hate is a maker of measurement. Delusion is a maker of measurement. When they say maker of measurement, what does that mean?

Of all kinds of immeasurable deliverance of mind, the unshakable deliverance of mind is pronounced the best. Now, that unshakable deliverance of mind is void of lust, empty of lust, empty of hate, empty of delusion. So in other words, when we talk about the immeasurable deliverance of mind, what we're saying is that mind, that is the mind of a fully awakened person that has no more greed, hatred, or delusion, doesn't measure things. It doesn't project the idea of this is me, mine, or myself. It doesn't compare in relation to a self-concept.

In that way, it is immeasurable. And because it is empty of craving, empty of hatred, empty of delusion, it is empty, it experiences emptiness in that sense. Lust is a something. Hate is a something. Delusion is a something. That is to say, greed, hatred, and delusion are something in the mind. They are qualities of the mind, or they can be qualities of the mind. In one whose taints are destroyed, these are abandoned, cut off at the root, made like a palm stump, done away with so that they no longer are subject to future arising. Of all the kinds of deliverance of mind through nothingness, the unshakable deliverance of mind is pronounced the best, arahantship. Now that unshakable deliverance of mind is void of lust, void of hate, void of delusion.

Lust is a maker of signs. Hate is a maker of signs. Delusion is a maker of signs. In order for greed to arise, when there is greed, there is also an object of that greed. When there is lust and when there is hatred, there is an object of that hatred. It doesn't have to be an external object. It can even be the mind itself. I hate myself, I hate the way I am. Those kinds of thoughts can arise too, or delusion, ignorance of me, my, myself, taking things personally. They can be an object of that, a sign, nimitta, which is an object. These three are makers of sign. These three are makers of objects.

Now that unshakable deliverance of mind is void of lust, void of hate, void of delusion. This is the way in which these states are one in meaning and different only in name. That is what the Venerable Sariputta said. The Venerable Maha Kotthita was satisfied and delighted in the Venerable Sariputta's words. Any questions? Of course. So, there was one question which I had about Satipatthana Sutta. There was one line in that which I didn't get, which says for the body, for the mind, also for feelings and the mind objects, that in this way he invites contemplating the body as a body internally, or a body as a body externally.

What is the internal and external part of this? My body and other people's bodies, internally and externally, or different components of the body. That makes sense for the body, but I'm not able to understand that for the feelings and the mind. When you have telepathy, you will. That's what it is. There's also another way to understand that, too, of your reactions to things. So, like, the thing itself, and then your mind's reaction to it. Like, your perception of it is the internal part, and the external part would be the actual sensory field. And, Rachel, would you be able to explain it with regard to the four objects which that speaks about? Like, how is this for the body, how is this for the mind, how is it for feelings and for the mind objects?

I could explain in terms of the feeling. It would be the sense, the sense base, and the sense base object. Then there's the feeling dependent upon the two things. Right, yeah, the object itself and then your mind's perception of it, in each case. So you spoke about the difference between being dead and being conscious. There was an experiment on it about, I think, 1960s, where they froze a hamster and then a microwave. They didn't go back to life. They microwave them? Yeah. So if you get out a technology, you'll freeze a small animal and get it back to life. So, how do you think it was that?

So, the difference is actually between one who is dead and one who is in cessation of perception of human unconsciousness. So, there's no consciousness in the one who also sees all perception of human unconsciousness. The only thing is, their bodily processes still function. No, so the hamster was chosen. Kept in the freezer for two weeks. It's dead. It's cold. There's no heat. Right. And then comes back to life. That is the way we are doing it. We are freezing the embryos and we are using it made it up to two years or three years. Right, but a hamster is a slightly higher life form. So it's easier to... But then would you say it's in suspended animation?

I would like to consult the physicians, the medical team that we have. Would you say that it's in suspended animation? Yes, but in the case of the hamster, well, I would think that because of that, maybe the hamster goes into hibernation, because the bodily processes slow down. They're not what you call completely stopped. The micro-eating body. Yeah, that's, wow. So I was reading about this piece where they freeze human bodies and they're trying to figure out technology to bring them back to life. But they could only do it to smaller objects. When you do it with larger bodies, it tends to burn.

Interesting. Well, I would say in that case, that would be interesting, right? When you have cryogenic freezing, things like that, where you cryogenically freeze a body who's still alive, or that is still alive, and then wait for a hundred years until, you know, they find out they have some cure to the disease that probably has.

So I think, I don't know how far science has gotten there, but... Nowhere close. Yeah, nowhere close. One more question. So a lot of Suttas talked about devas and nagas. Is it symbolism or is it like permutation and combination of choices or is it like parallel existence of planes? How do you? So devas and nagas, I think if you see that sheet that we have, which is the sharing of the merit, it says a deva is an angel and a naga is an arahant. But actually, there's also Nagas, which are like other beings. Devas are beings and Nagas are beings. Yakkhas are beings. Asuras are beings. Kinnaras are beings. There are all of these different kinds of non-human beings in the Buddhist cosmology.

As for the prism, they exist, they are not parallel planes. They exist in the same sphere, along with us. Yeah, they exist in the same sphere of samsara. The way I like to look at the 31 planes of existence is that they are refractions of one light. So just as you would put light through a prism and it would refract into seven different colors, the way I would see it is that they are all on one, let's say, level of existence.

but different layers, so dimensions within, dimensions within. It's not symbolism like, to look at Mara, it's very easy to look at Mara like symbolism. But that there is Mara as an actual being, that is also the case. Where can we understand the cosmology of Buddhism? Because we understand what is this formations. And if I want to understand Buddhism because there are many words which come through so fast. How can we get the information? There was a book by, what was his name, Punna Dhammo? Do you remember this? Yeah, Punna Dhammo. If you search for Puna Dhammo Cosmology on YouTube, he does a great sort of analysis of the different planes of existence. And he also wrote a book called Buddhist Cosmos or something like that.

And it's available online for free as a PDF. And in terms of the Buddhist, you said terminologies. The Pali English Dictionary would be the best way of understanding some of these Pali terminologies. My favorite resource actually is SuttaCentral.net, because it gives you the different translations, and Sujato's translations are great because it's both the Pali and the English together.

And once you start to get a hang of Pali, you see how similar it is to the other Indic languages, Sanskrit and Indic both. I think it's kind of cool about Buddhist cosmology is that the math is pretty similar to certain psychedelic experiences that people have reported. And like these psychonauts who take high doses of, say, LSD, like Christopher Bache, who wrote Diamonds from Heaven, and Dr. John C. Lilly, they kind of have, they talk about these different planes of consciousness and being in these different places, and they describe it just as it is in the ancient text. So that kind of gives some kind of, whether ontologically, you can't prove that something exists, but it's kind of cool that you can access it with different ways, and the reports seem to match up.

What did you say the name was? Christopher Bache or John Lilly? Yeah, John C. Lilly, the inventor of the sensory deprivation tank, and took high doses of LSD and ketamine and explored his mind. And he experimented with dolphins, right? Yeah, he said he could communicate with dolphins. But he also had numbers for them, and there was like six levels of hell, just like in the Buddhist cosmology and different levels of heavenly realms. And then Christopher Bache did 70, over the course of 20 years, he did 70 very high-dose sessions of LSD and charted that out. And that's in a book called Diamonds from Heaven.

How high a dose? I don't know. Pretty big. He said you wouldn't recommend it to anyone. I had a friend who would remain unnamed, who is older than me, much older than me, but he did something like 85 tabs of acid a week, just constantly on acid that whole month. And he too was exploring all of these different states, and he saw demons and creatures and mystical beings and all of these things. So, go figure. Wouldn't these be hallucinations?

But the interesting thing is that they kind of mapped onto the stuff that we see both in Vedic and Buddhist cosmology. And the people who report them, there's like simultaneous reports of seeing the same thing. There's another, there's a pretty cool story. It's on Netflix. This guy, the comedian, he was taking DMT, and he went into this place, in this realm of his mind, where there was this kind of purple fairy being, and he spent what felt like a really long time with her, had some kind of romantic relationship, and then came down from his trip. And then later on, I think a couple weeks later, he was with a friend.

He was just sitting for his friend while he took a large dose of DMT. And his friend took what he thought was way too much. He was like, whoa, I just took way too much. Like, I'm blasting off. And then at some point, his friend kind of just turns to him and says, Hey, I'm seeing this purple lady, and she says that she knows you really well, and she says, what's up? I don't know what to make of that, but that seems to imply that there's some kind of continuing existence of that being, that it's not just a hallucination.

So, I've read a couple of detailed reports, and what they say is your brain cannot create new content. It probably latches onto the previous content and tries to amplify that. Probably the previous trip that his friend had some interest through that. But he didn't, his friend didn't know about his own trip. Right. Classic. I was about to ask, so, sorry, it's not that I'm just waiting. So a lot of the things that we feel in meditation are these formations, visual and very cinematic at times, right? And I was wondering if some of these are very subtle versions of how when you're in a psychedelic influence you feel. I've never tried it so I can't see a pussy.

But are they similar? Are they, like, do we know? They can be. Because some of these formations, like I said earlier, are gateways to seeing past lives. Because some of the things that you might see, you're like, I have never experienced this before. Like, where is this memory from? Or where did this image come from? Perhaps, like you were saying, it might have been from a small inference at some point that you saw somewhere. But still, it's like, they can be gateways into seeing past lives, for sure. Huxley talks about the doors of perception. He has a book, Doors of Perception. I think he took it himself and tried it out. Yeah, so the idea is that the brain is filtering things and there's just a lot that we don't normally perceive.

And so through meditation, you can kind of decondition your habitual tendencies to view the world in a very limited way, basically just taking in the information that your brain needs to survive or basically that your brain is craving for, in a sense. And then as you decondition that, all these new possibilities open up in the same way that psychedelics might do that.

If I'm not wrong, meditation also tries some sort of, turns out the default mode network in the brain and tries to rewire it. It's the same way as psychedelics work. Right. "Wisdom eye". Can you talk a little bit more about it? What is it? What are the different interpretations of "Wisdom eye"? How it gets triggered and opened by Dharma talks? When "Wisdom eye" is open, it's synonymous with entering the stream, or you have a path attainment? So the wisdom eye, the eye of wisdom, or the eye of the Dhamma, is that which actually sees the Dhamma. But like I said, it arises in dependence upon what it sees. So when you have the experience of cessation of perception, feeling, and consciousness,

Your mind touches the unconditioned. And then when there is consciousness arising again, for a brief moment you become aware of the links of dependent origination. You see the links of dependent origination. That seeing, that process of seeing, is the eye of wisdom seeing it in that moment. But then that's it. It's not like it's always there. It's just now imbibed in your mind. In that sense it's unshakable, irreversible.

What you have seen is what you have seen, you can't take it out. So now you have seen for yourself that this actually is a completely impersonal process, and that this thing that is created in terms of our experience happens through seeing these different conditions, which are the links of different originations. So that which sees it is called the eye of the Dhamma. That eye of the Dhamma is conditioned. It's not unconditioned.

So because it's conditioned, it means it's impermanent. It arises because of what it sees. It arises in relation to what it sees. When arahants die, the wisdom mind dies. It's conditioned. Asana, Hushinasana. Regarding the vitality and heat. The autonomic nervous system automatically controls circulation. Right. So that can be sort of the controller of vitality, and it can control the temperature and pulse and blood pressure, etc. So that makes sense here, that is the vitality and heat is the metabolism. In the earlier sentence, the sense bases are dependent on the vitality. So the autonomic nervous system does not, the sense bases report to the higher brain, not to the brain stem, but the autonomic nervous system.

So what is that? I just didn't follow how this works. So the autonomic nervous system, there is sympathetic and parasympathetic, where the centers are then in the stem of the brain. And they control, so a person can be brain dead and be fully functioning. So the metabolism will be functioning, circulation will be functioning, because the brainstem is functioning and the circulation is intact, but the sense bases would report to the higher centers. They'll pass through the brainstem and go to the higher centers. I was just going to say that I think it's worth also remembering that the Dhamma and these teachings are from a subjective standpoint. Like someone was, the Buddha in this case, was looking into his own bodily processes using introspection.

So it might not always perfectly map on to medical science. It's kind of, it's a different vantage point. In theory, it should map on pretty well, but like the concepts or the way that they splice it up from the subjective standpoint won't always perfectly match a medical understanding of the body. But it is interesting to explore it all, I would say, because... It could happen. Why does this go ahead and do you want the sense-based work function? Right. So even if a person is brain dead or their brain stem is non-functional, would the sense-based still function?

No. Because there is no circulation at all, so the body would die, so the sense-based would perish, through that, in that sense, not directly, but indirect. Indirectly. Can I have two questions? One is reborn in the subhuman realm. Is there a possibility of going up to the human or above the... When you say something, you mean the lowly human, right? Animal, hungry ghosts, and hellish ones? Yes. In the suttas, in what's known as the Petavatthu, the section on the hungry ghosts, and the section on the Vimanavatthu, which is the section on the devas, it talks about how even people or beings who are hungry ghosts, for example, they're not able to produce their own merit, but people can dedicate their merit to the hungry ghost, and from that merit the hungry ghost can be reborn as a human or even a higher being. That's what the notion is. So it's possible for any being on the low, the human level, to actually

come back to the human existence either through the experiencing of the karma that led to that subhuman experience, and then any other karma that arises that leads to a human realm will lead them there, or that the merit is dedicated to that being and from there they can elevate to a human existence or a kind of world. - One more thing is rebirth would occur in, sorry, in the same gender or a different gender? - Oh, that's a good question because sometimes, majority of the time, how the suttas explain it, and even I think the Abhidhamma explains it, is there's actually three kinds of internal faculties. The feminine faculty, the masculine faculty, and the life faculty.

The idea is that if a person has been predominantly masculine, then they will be reborn in a masculine gender, let's say in a subsequent life, but not always necessarily. It's like, nowadays some people identify as a different gender, so because of that it's possible that they could be reborn as a different gender that they identified as. You wanted to say something? No, the point which I had was, he said that, which was that if the brainstem happens to stop working, then in which case all of the sense, the faculties which we have anyway are going to fail. What is receiving merit from this? For example, the idea is that there is a story of someone who became a hungry ghost.

Now this is the story in the suttas. And this hungry ghost was wandering from place to place and unable to satisfy their desires, and then met upon a group of sailors. And this hungry ghost said, I made a lot of mistakes and now I descended into a hungry ghost because of all the things that I've done. Can you please provide dana to the sangha and then dedicate that merit to me? So the sailors found a sangha of bhikkhus and bhikkhunis and offered them food and requisites and everything. And the merit that they received, they then dedicated to that hungry ghost. And then that hungry ghost became a deva. Is this similar to Hindu mythology?

Yes, I was having a similar thought, yeah. I think it's culturally similar. Because the fact that Buddhism, or the Buddha, or the Bodhisattva was in the cultural milieu of things, I think it's pretty much similar. What are the factors of intuition, or how is one of the left intuition? So the faculty of intuition, let's say, is basically a mind that is always experiencing insight. It's a mind that is not dependent upon always past causes and conditions. It's like it just bypasses the whole process of analysis and reflection.

But to bring up that quality of intuition, there's a few things that you need. Number one, you need to have good sila. Always good sila. Keeping your precepts all the time. That way your mind remains in some form collected, or at the very least not restless. And then you ask that mind a question. And then you do whatever task it is you're doing. And out of nowhere, seemingly out of nowhere, the mind will come up with an answer. So first you need sila, and then that gives you a mind that is predominantly stable.

And then ask the mind a question, and then you get an answer. So can I ask a few questions surrounding the deliverance by emptiness and the deliverance by all of the signless elements? Here, the answer was a monk goes to a village or a hut and contemplates the sense basis and the experience and the aggregates as not-self.

And you mentioned that it's similar to the experience of that. It's similar to the signless elements. But whereas the silence itself is, can I say, it's more to samadhi? Right, it's more to letting go of any objects. There are three samadhis, three categories of samadhis, let's say. Or let's say six categories of samadhis. More technical. There is that which is directed, that which has an object, and that which has a sense of self.

There is that which is undirected, that which is empty of self, and that which is objectless. And in a sense, those three categories qualitatively point to the same kind of experience. Right, right. So do you need any type of jhana, per se, to actually enter the deliverance by emptiness? Yes, you need a mind that's collected.

So you need a mind free of hindrances, which is the foundation of being in a jhanic state of mind. Not necessarily you need to be in the first jhana, second jhana, third jhana. But I would say that it's easier for you to be in the fourth jhana to get to emptiness, to get to a signless state of mind. But not a prerequisite. Not a prerequisite.

So here we enter the signless elements to the quiet mind. Because that's why you would say it's 8.5. Right. You know, you kind of tie it to the quiet mind. It has the quiet mind as the base. But what other factor leads to the silenced elevates from the quiet mind? Tranquility. Relaxation. That's why I say when I give personal instructions to you guys, I say to whoever is in quiet mind, don't do anything.

I used to say to people, relax, observe, be attentive, be aware. But I now just say, don't do anything. Because there's a tendency in the mind to say, oh, he said to observe, so what do I observe? I've got to look for something to observe. Oh, he said to relax, what should I relax into? Oh, he said to be attentive. Where should I put my attention?

Don't do anything. That don't do anything assumes that there are no hindrances, there is enough tranquility, there is... So this is facilitated, I'll just continue with what you were just saying. Yeah, it's facilitated by disenchantment and detachment. Remember when I talked about disenchantment, what is disenchantment? Revulsion, being sick of that thing. Like I've seen enough, don't care anymore. That's one. This passion is a mind that's in a bubble. I've told the story to a few of you guys in personal interviews. But are you guys familiar with the king Janaka? Janaka? Sita's. Yeah, Sita's father. He was known to be a Raja Rishi. Of course, now this is not within Buddhist context, but it will give you some insight.

He was a Raja Vishnu, who was known to be one who was an enlightened king, an awakened king. And Vishis, his son Sukkak, he told his son, go see Janakam to get a good understanding of what Vairagya is, what detachment is, dispassion is. So Sukha went to meet with Janak, and Janak said, I will give you some instructions.

He gave him a bowl of oil that was filled to the brim. He said, Go out into the city carrying this bowl of oil. Make sure not one drop of oil falls to the ground while you're walking. Because if it falls, there is a soldier behind you who is ready to chop your head off. So what did he do?

He went into the market. There were people selling all of these things. Hey, look at this. Hey, look at that. Half off if you buy two right now. All of these things. Colorful images, dancers, and this and that. Spices, amazing smells. Food sizzling. All of these things. But here he was, paying attention to the bowl of oil.

So in your own mind, when you're in the periphery, there's going to be all of these thoughts and ideas. Hey, look at this. Hey, look at that. But you are okay with just paying attention to this. This is dispatching. So there's a similar story of Narada carrying oil because Vishnu asked to carry. Yeah, I'm good, thanks. Cool. What category yours of Arati comes into? I really don't know.

My question is related to the infinite consciousness, infinite space, nothingness, and signless state. These are different for non-Arahants, right? For Arahants? Sorry, say the question. Today I got different understanding of the sutra, I just want to clarify that. So it says that these jhanas are different in the meaning. It is same in the case of Arahant because Arahant does not see these jhanas as different because... No, no, no. Is it like that? No, no, no. They can experience that in different meanings and different names. But what that's pointing out to is that they are categorizing the mind of an Arahant. Immeasurable meaning, being able to send loving kindness in all directions, immeasurable is one kind of thing, but the arahant's mind is also immeasurable because there is no measure. Nothingness is a jhana, it's a state of meditation, but an arahant's mind has none of the greed, hatred, and delusion, so it has nothingness there.

Emptiness. Understanding the emptiness of self. But the Arahant's mind is empty of greed, hatred, and delusion. Signless, because there's no object there. But the Arahant's mind is free of any objects of greed, hatred, and delusion. So an Arahant can experience in all of these states the emptiness, liberation, liberation through nothingness, loving kindness, immeasurable, but it's pointing to the quality of an arahant as well. In that way they are synonymous. Thanks for this clarification. I read this sutta many times, but I didn't catch this. I just want to comment on the ayu and heat.

I am not a medical expert, but I heard this from another monk. Heat is heat, and ayo is metabolism. So when we eat food, that food needs to be converted as energy. So when the process of converting food to energy is metabolism, during that process heat is generated. So whatever food we eat, it will digest and some heat is generated to carry out this metabolism process. Heat is mandatory, and if there is no heat, metabolism does not work. So in the case of somebody who died, their heat is dissipated, so there is no metabolism process going on. But somebody who entered into nibbana, in their body the metabolism and heat is going on, that's why you lost your weight.

I would still stick to Venerable's explanation that the days were different, and today's days are far away different, so maybe it's a debate whether to compare those things actually. My question is a bit very general. What are the views of Buddhism on three things? One is entertainment, specifically dancing and singing in that context of those days. Two, physical exercises.

Three, charity. See, why I ask this? Because we are, this is say, not to indulge in singing and dancing. One, there is no very specific mention of any physical exercise as in other Indian traditions like say doing yoga or any physical exercise. And number three, charity. The empathy factor which was mentioned, they said do have compassion but do not take them out of their suffering. They studied a story that the person was having a lot of pain and he was burning with pain. He was given a story and he got, you know, but he was not helped per se. So what are the views of charity for other human beings as far as Buddhism is concerned in the present day context, be it financial or whatever exercises we do these days.

So these three things: entertainment, physical exercises and charity. First entertainment. Dhammasukha, have you said that for monastics, going to live shows, theater shows, and watching dancing and all that, that was just time better spent in meditation, contemplation, and study. But for laypeople, there's no injunction that they can't go out for shows and watch live theater shows or movies and things like that. When you're in the context of a retreat setting, the idea is that you want to be concentrated on your practice. So we keep the precept for not watching shows and things like that. Physical activity? Absolutely. I mean, the Buddha was understood to have... He woke up in the morning, first thing he did was, after washing up and everything, he did an hour or so of walking meditation.

That's kind of like a physical activity. And then he radiated compassion to all beings for a couple of hours and then started his day and stuff like that. And so, in terms of physical exercise, absolutely, you can do yoga, you can do stretching, you can do running. In fact, one of the things we tell you as you're starting to sit for longer periods of time is to walk up and down the stairs to get your blood moving. Right? And then come and stay. So, absolutely, do whatever physical exercise you'd like to do. Just don't overdo it. And charity. So, this is a very important component of the Dhamma. This is generosity. Dhamma. Which is, now you mentioned yesterday, Anathapindika's story, where Sariputta helped, he actually did help him.

He understood that this man was suffering, and he let him go, let his mental suffering go. He did help him in that sense. The highest Dhamma that you can give is the Dhamma of Dhamma. There are different expositions in this sutta, actually a specific exposition that talks about charity, whether it's financial or providing food, providing shelter, to people who need it, right? And it talks about how the giver of whatever it has been given, his mind is pure, their mind is purified. And the receiver, if they accept it with loving kindness and gratitude, their mind is purified. And then it goes into higher things like, if you give it to somebody who is a stream enter, give it to somebody who is a want-to-turner, a long-to-turner, and an arahant.

And what if an arahant gives to another arahant? Is there any merit that's created? All of those things go into it. So the idea is that there is big emphasis on generosity in the Dhamma. And that charity that we talk about is in helping people with medical supplies, helping people who require food, shelter. So this should not be overlooked, the charity aspect. It's a vital aspect of sila, samadhi, and panya. So sila and dhana and samadhi, and that leads to panya. So the more someone is generous, this is the understanding at least, the more someone is generous, their mind becomes more purified through that process of giving to one who requires something. And because of that, that mind becomes stable, and it's easier for that mind to go into samadhi.

Also, which one? This is Sutta No. 142, Majjhima Nikaya 142, Dakkhina Vibhanga Sutta, the Exposition of Offerings. Also, by the way, Sariputta was known to be somebody who actually helped those who were sick as well. So if somebody was sick at the monastery or whatever, he'd be the one who'd make sure that they were taking their medicines, he'd be the one making sure they were well-rested. If they had open sores, he would clean that, bathe them, all of these things.

So, absolutely, it's important to help your fellow persons. Thank you. Yeah, when I talk about that, I'm referring to not being a crutch, because sometimes somebody is in suffering, and then you're there to help them, but they can take advantage of you, and then you become a crutch for them. And that's a very toxic relationship. This is what I prefer. It's back with me. I think there's a better momentum. I wanted to add something before you go. Just on the training principle or the precept of entertainment and shows, the spirit of that off-retreat would just be not to overindulge and basically don't fuel your mind with mental junk food. It's kind of an oversimplification, but in the same way that a high-calorie, nutrient-deprived diet is bad for your body, you have high-dopamine, low-value kinds of mental inputs, in whatever form that takes, whether it's some juicy clickbait or something like that.

That's going to leave a lot of sankharas and different ideas floating around in your head that might make it harder to meditate. It might be a lot more six-hour-ing when you sit down. So the idea is to kind of minimize, or at least be mindful about, what you're consuming with your mind. So just based on what you just said, this is something I was telling you, which is what we're doing in retreat. It's a dopamine detox. You're not with your phone, you can't check your emails, you're not on social media, you're not checking Netflix. You're relaxing and letting go, so it's a kind of dopamine detox as well. I think that would be fair to say. Yeah, that's the low information diet. I would add to that, with intention.

I think intention is the biggest key. Like in the Vinaya, I think for exercise, as long as you're exercising for medical reasons, then it's completely acceptable. And I've used that many times, for example, for swimming. And once you enter that intention, that you're not doing this for distraction but you're doing this for the good of everything, then you feel it. You feel it in your body. So when I'm in the water and I swim, I feel it. If I'm swimming, or if I'm not, like the people next to me, or just playing and splashing, it's a very different quality.

So it's all about a quality and intention. How to treat your colleagues? It's all about intention and quality. Bringing that, it's not about distraction. That if this is equal to sitting on the cushion, if it cannot be equal to sitting on the cushion, then you get to question it. It speaks all about these things of what you can do and cannot do, and for the callings, it's the intention of love. If you're speaking to them with love, then it's all fine. Love has a sword too. It's not just on the sheet. That's a really good point, and also with regards to exercise and diet, if you think about the intention behind why a lot of people are working out at the gym, I mean, to be kind of cynical, it might be more about outer appearances, it's more about how do I look good, and how do I, yeah, how do I be, sexually attractive, or it might be to extend their life, which is a little more wholesome, but if your intention is just, I want to feel good, I want to be healthy, then,

You know, that's very different. And same thing with diet. If it's all about how you look in the mirror versus how much energy you have, how good you feel, how much joy you're generating for yourself, that's a very different intention. Yeah, Clara, thank you. Did you have a question? I just wanted to say that looks like Mr. Neon from The Matrix. I know. He speaks like it sometimes, Steve. Speaking about music, that's something that I have thought about over the different years. A few years back, when I was more into learning about neuroscience and things, and I began exploring it more as far as just information going into the different strata of the brain, and I began being more aware of what I would ingest.

But then in the past years, as I've had different solitary retreats for weeks and months where I've basically had no external interactions, I've been amazed at how songs will come up long after people's voices come up. If I had arguments or whatever, those go in the days or weeks. But songs, they just keep coming up. And it's amazing. It's really opened my eyes. Partly, I think, just as it purifies the mind, I listen to less music. I just find less attraction in it. But also, having those sorts of experiences definitely gives me pause before I intentionally listen to anything, because it seems like it's at the very lower parts of the brain. It's just looping down there unconsciously or something.

And I haven't looked into it as much. Maybe you all have more insight as far as, I mean, there is something magical about music. Obviously, it exists all over the world, and we have things like OM that are a base of sound and a base of existence and things. But it seems like there's something more powerful with music than just with the spoken word or with the written word or something like that. And so as much as it's not currently practiced in our society because this garbage music is just everywhere all over, it seems like it should be something that we should be much more aware of. Yeah, I want to say something about that a little bit.

For example, you were talking about how sometimes in meditation you'll just hear, like, a song that you've heard from the past and it just loops, like you were talking about. So, obviously, the way to do that is to say sorry, but I have a musician friend of mine who talked to me about this, and they said that, you know, the best way to let go of or to stop that whole process, they call it earworm, just always going on and on and on, is to actually listen to that song.

To actually, consciously listen to that song, so play it on the radio, play it on whatever, and hear it, and then it just goes away. So you might want to try that, see how it works. Yeah, also, I kind of think about these kinds of things. There are cultural memes that are basically mind viruses, and they can infect an entire population, and songs can be forms of that, where it's just like a bit of code that can just enter people's heads and it becomes this mantra almost. And also a funny anecdote, a little off topic, but on my first Go Anchor Retreat, I had this song stuck in my head. I'm a little embarrassed.

It was Skater Boy by Avril Lavigne, wouldn't leave my head for some reason. I'd listen to it in years. But at the end of the retreat, we'd circled up with the people in the retreat and I was talking about this, and I was like, there's a song that was stuck in my head, and this other kid who was about my age said me too, I had Skater Boy, so go figure. But have you noticed how, maybe, the older generation would know this, how they feel like their music, the music of their generation, is so much better and all of the music over here is trash

That's another kind of clinging to view, right? Clinging to ideas like the music of our generation was great. There was somebody on retreat actually, in one of the down the circuit retreats, who asked me, or they said, I'm a big fan of Star Wars. They knew I was a big fan of Star Wars, and they said the original trilogy was really great but the sequel trilogy is terrible, and I said, that's clinging to views. Laughter. I was just curious if you all have any insight as far as it going into deeper parts of the brain or operating in some way to where it is stronger than, you know, if I were to say the same words to you versus you were to hear them in a song, I was to sing them to you and those lasting or being more powerful in some way.

Do you have anything to say about that? Yeah, I'm definitely not an expert on that, but I would say that the memories that are the stickiest often have some kind of emotional salience to them. Because music can evoke strong emotions, there might be a saliency factor there where the mind hangs on to it stronger.

In your experience, just as in your evolution, do you listen to the same amount of music, less music? I'm just curious. For me, no lyrics. Yeah, for the most part. Even that, I've found for me personally, it started maybe three years ago with no lyrics, maybe five years ago, no lyric music. But even now, I don't really want to listen to that much. I can't remember the last time I consciously made the effort to listen to music. I've found, especially in the past, maybe, I guess this year, maybe before, I've been more aware of the initial unconscious movement towards turning music on, and this story in my mind of, oh, yeah, I want to hear music because I'm just so used to hearing music because it's everywhere. But then I will pause and I'll reflect, and I'm like, actually, I'm feeling really good right now and I don't really want to hear music. Yeah, because music is interesting, because it does evoke so many different kinds of emotions, right?

And you can tie a certain kind of memory to that music. And when you listen to that same music, it unpacks that same kind of memory. So I think it's because it probably does hit certain kinds of centers of the brain that evoke emotion. Because something that is emotional, you're able to remember more easily than something without emotion. At least this is the way I would... That's how I speculate it might be.

It is taking you away from the present reality, if you are listening to music. You are not with what is happening with you. Yeah, but again, I don't want to demonize listening to music. It's not like you can't listen to music, I'm just saying this is what could happen when you're listening to music. But if you're listening to music for enjoyment or relaxation, just like you would watch a TV show for relaxation, I don't see anything along with it. It would be interesting to know how people's musical tastes change as they start meditating more, because I know for me, again, this is before I ordained, I have tried to... But suddenly, what I thought was really energizing before was suddenly full of craving attention.

So, you might notice that. Also, there's a beautiful chant across various religions and cultures. Oh, yeah, yeah. They're also very uplifting. Even with the Pali chants, right? Sometimes I've heard monastics sing it in a very sing-songy kind of way, chanting the Pali suttas or chants. So, I think there's some power there too. You hear the different mantras and the different chanting of the different religions. Yeah, there's something to be said about that, but again, when we talk about music, for the monastics, they have to be more aware of what it is that they put into their minds, and be more aware in terms of the cultivation of the mind. Likewise for lay people, it's all about that. What kind of music are you listening to, and what is the intention behind listening to that music, and are you aware of the quality of your mind, the thoughts that arise when you're listening to a certain type of music as well? I had a comment on the psychedelics. I noticed that

When I did a very large dose of shrooms in Amsterdam, the experience, or I had an experience with TWIM where I was like, whoa, that was just like the shrooms. And then lately, when I get into quiet mind, it's like everything is flashing. My visual field is flashing. The ringing in my ear, it's not just a tone, it's a flashing. And then the sensation, my body is like my whole body splashing, and that felt just like Ayahuasca. So that was pretty interesting, and then my question was

So as people are going through the different stages of enlightenment or awakening, and you do that by doing cessations, how come, for example, when someone gets first path and then they get second path, wouldn't they have gotten the hang of it, where they just kind of coast along to our house ship, like, oh yeah, just get it, and just get it real quick? Yeah, you would think that wouldn't you? So tomorrow I'm going to be reading from Majjhima Nikaya 44, which talks about contact with the divana element and what happens after that. It's all about the input that leads to what happens in terms of the output.

So it is a consistent effort of using the Eightfold Path. That's why it is entry into the path and the fruition, and then re-entry into the path and then fruition, until it becomes second nature. And then one quick question, maybe quick, is I've noticed it's hard to get into first jhana now, or the earlier jhanas. It's like I'll try and say I want to go into one of the earlier jhanas, and I just go straight to equanimity, and I can't. That's the only thing I can do. Is there an antidote to that?

Well, I can give you an analogy for why I think it works that way. Because that's very normal, and I don't... Yeah, you might notice that it creates a little tension in the mind to try to be an earlier jhana. And it's kind of like there's water at the top of a mountain that wants to flow down because of gravity. And let's say in the first jhana, you carved a path down to this pool where the water's pooling, and that's the first jhana. But then eventually it finds a way down to a second pool, which is the second jhana, and so forth, all the way down to quiet mind. Now that that ridge has been carved all the way down, the water just wants to go to the low gravity point where there's the least tension, the least craving in the mind.

So it'll just go there very quickly because you've conditioned. Yeah, the mind doesn't want to suffer, right? It's PLT, right? Yeah, the point of lowest tension, we call it. And so is it a process of just re-establishing a different route that doesn't... You don't have to go back to the first jhana? Yeah, yeah, to make a new pool. Yeah, ski on some fresh tracks or something. Yeah, maybe. That's a good question. I don't know, because I think when you get further in retreat, I would just say when you're on retreat, don't worry about getting to lower jhanas. You want to always just get to that point where you get to quiet mind. The quicker you get to quiet mind, the better.

And then later on you will start to develop your ability to come back to the first jhana, second jhana, third jhana, fourth jhana. It will become easier for you to be able to do that. But, you know, people should be happy if they're getting a quiet mind in equanimity in these higher, more refined states, because that's much closer, let's say. I'm not saying it's closer in terms of distance, but it's just easier for the mind to let go from there. Back to singing and dancing. You know, he mentioned that people during the days of the Buddha are somewhat different to what we are now. But even in the Mahaparinibbana Sutta, the Buddha, there are people dancing and singing in front of the body of the Buddha.

And it happens even today if you go to something new. So it's a bit like you send that person happily to... to wherever they are going. And I think even on a very general level, we're not so different to any of these people that you meet in the suttas. It's just that, if you have a Buddha in front of you who has such special conditions and you hear from that Buddha, you just go to that place much faster than what you're saying, you just zoom through the cessations. And the other thing is, I think once the Dalai Lama mentioned, because he meets a lot of these scientists and neuroscientists, he mentions that in the last thousand years or so we have kind of lost our ability to memorize. We lost our ability to put our attention on stuff longer than, I mean, we're not having that attention longer than things.

So there is a brain component to our evolution, especially in the last thousand years or so, but I don't think we're much different. Yeah, I mean, what I would say about that is, one of the things I mentioned earlier, a long time back, relatively, was that if you take somebody from the Buddha's time and you just drop them into the 20th, 21st century, their head would explode.

Because there is so much hyper-stimulation that we are experiencing. So there is something to be said about the fact that they had less stimulation going on, and they had more free time on their hands to be able to do these things, and attending Donatox and all of these kinds of things. But, yeah, about that, that's an interesting point too. Because there used to be a time where, while I was still living in India, for example, I would ask my grandfather, all right, how do I get to this place? And he would say, okay, you take this number bus to this bus station, and then you'll come to this Hanuman Mandir, and you make a left from there, and then you take a right from there.

And I was able to retain all of that and be like, okay, yeah, I see the Hanuman Mandir there, take a left. And when you see that stop, if you go past that stop, you've gone too far. There's a gully on that side. You remember all of these things, but now with Google Maps and all of that, it's like you don't need to. You used to remember. I used to remember as a kid all the phone numbers of my friends. There's no need to now. So that's interesting. Yeah, I don't think our brain has evolved very much in the last 2500 years. That's not a lot of time, but they do say that in the last 30,000 years it's shrunk a bit.

But I think most of it's that program B that I talked about, just a lifetime of conditioning, short attention span. And then also the brain is just trying to conserve energy at any possible turn. So if we can outsource knowledge, like Delson said, to our phone, then why remember? It's just going to use that energy somewhere else. But what's kind of cool is I think you can still train these abilities. And there's one example where Viktor Frankl, who was a Holocaust victim, was in this isolated, what do they call it, an isolated cell for a while. And he just started to develop this incredible memory because there was no input coming in. And he actually said that he wrote his entire book there in his mind before he came out and wrote Man's Search for Meaning.

So I think it's still accessible. I don't think we've devolved it all. I think there's hope. You had a question? As to why monks should not practice medicine? You mentioned that Buddha forbade monks. Yeah, I remember in the Genekanya it says one of the things is to actually practice medicine. My two cents about it is that practicing medicine is not blameless, and monks have to have a blameless life. So you can be accused of negligence, or for something like adverse outcomes. - Interesting, you're on the hook, standing in the court.

Facing a negligence charge. - Plus they don't have liability insurance. - I consider loving kindness to be a form of medicine. - Any other questions? This is not really a question, but I want to give more clarification when we're really talking about the heat, vitality, and the heat, and heat to the vitality. So question number one, what is the vitality?

I think, in fact, I have been trying to understand this phenomenon. I've read quite a few books, and I find that it's only Swami Rama who has said that the vitality is the first unit of energy. So, I don't know what the first unit of energy is. It is not really defined. But the fact is that, at the time of death, clinically the body may be dead, but there are a lot of cases where the body remains very fresh, alive. Even in Dharamshala also, I know the case.

The teacher of his holiness, he passed away, his body remained totally fresh for 13 days. And it was kept there. So what is that? Which release is in that? Even I think, what is this book, The Autobiography of a Yogi? If you read, there also, yeah, he passed away in San Francisco, California, and the doctor, the American doctor, he certified, his photo is there in that book. I think for 18 days or 21 days, it remained alive. So the question is, what is that vital energy which is really keeping that body alive? So that is one. And the second question is, if the organs are not really working, if it's already dead, how is that vital energy really sustaining those dead senses, or dead body?

So you're saying in the case of the dead body, the vital organs are non-functional? No, I'm saying that in the case of the normal physical body, it's dead, it is not oxygen, but the vital part is still working, if we call it that, and still the body gets that energy, it doesn't decay. How did that really happen? So I think, so I'm going to posit, I think the doctors may have some... yeah, I think maybe they might have some. Do you guys want to do some input on this? I do want to posit the process of dying the way I've understood it.

And this could be incomplete, completely medically not sound, what I'm going to say, but I can say it from my contemplation, so take it for what it's worth to you guys. The way I've understood the dying process is that the elements, or the four great elements of the body, unravel in a certain kind of sequence. In my understanding, first the air element starts to dissipate.

Then the fire element starts to dissipate. It might still be present, it starts to dissipate, then the water element, and then finally the earth element. The solidity of the body starts to dissipate. In conjunction with that, the sixth sense base is also unraveled in a certain sequence. The way I have understood this is that first the sense of smell goes away, and then the sense of taste goes away, then the sense of sight, then the sense of touch, then the sense of hearing, and finally the mind sense.

Based on that, the way I would look at it is that the mind is still functional in that kind of clinically dead body. Which is why I would posit that when you are with your loved ones, and even after they are clinically dead, don't start weeping right away, because the hearing is still going on. You could chant mantras, you could chant whatever it is you want to chant, or just be grateful for them, and kind of guide them to a better existence, make them feel uplifted.

And the way I posit is, again, the body seems to be clinically dead. What I posit is that from one and a half hours to even longer than that, the mind faculty is still present. And so the mind faculty would be the thing that's probably keeping the freshness of that mind. Yeah, I think what you're saying is correct, but at least in Tibetan Buddhism, the resolution of the body is the opposite, in the sense: the first earth, then water, then heat, and then air, and space, that is. And it's also correct that most of the teachers, particularly the teaching Buddhism, they said that, at least for three days, if possible, the body should be kept as it is, without disturbing, because the connection, though it may be dead, but still the mind is getting connected to the body.

It's only on the third day the consciousness realizes that it is separated from the body. And very correct, I think that's why they do a lot of chanting, mantras. So, essentially, what I had to ask was about real-world advice: what's the right way to help bring someone to the Dhamma? In the sense, I have friends, I know friends, who fall into one of two buckets. One of them is like, everything is going well and right in life, they're doing well work-wise, everything is going fine, why should I change anything? And I've heard things like, in fact, one of my colleagues, he was saying that he probably wouldn't want to start any of this, at least for the next 20-odd years.

And the other bucket, which I've seen, has been that they're not really doing well, and they're maybe going through something. They don't see this, they don't see Dhamma as what is going to solve their troubles. And I am not really so articulate that I could probably give them a Dhamma talk, which would. So that's, so what's the best way to deal with this in life? You don't. The reason is because we don't evangelize, or at least I don't evangelize. We try not to evangelize. The idea is that when somebody wants to come to the Dhamma, they will come to the Dhamma. And then your example, you leading by example.

So a lot of times people will approach a person who's, even in really stressful situations, this person seems to be very calm and able to deal with the situation in a practical way. What's going on with them? My friend, my assistant, who works at Microsoft, he was saying, oftentimes at the meetings it will get really heated and he'll just remain in equanimity, and oftentimes the managers will come to him and ask what's going on with him, how is he able to be so calm. And he says, well, I do this practice, and things like that. And now he's starting to give full-blown Dhamma talks to those guys.

So let them approach you, or let them see, like, okay, there's something about this, or, hey, I heard you were doing meditation, so what is that all about, can you tell me? So wait for that opportunity. Sorry, I'm occupying too much time today. Just continuing on that: the very reason why this being is sitting here is because she saw the way I handled my father's medical condition and his passing away. And she asked me once, hey, you're going for this retreat, can I come? I didn't actually respond much to it, because that's just the initial intention. She asked me the second time. And yes, that's when I understood that she's actually being serious with this.

So, there is some merit to not sharing too much information at the onset, and just letting them be aware that you are in this process, and then they come back to you again. But I've seen cases where I've shared more information than what I should march, and they just walk in. And on dying, that you mentioned that the ear organ, the ear base, goes last to the morning. That's very interesting, because I kept whispering to my father two days before he was about to pass. He was in a semi-conscious state. He could not understand much of what's happening, but I would ask him, can you hear me? Can you recognize me? And then he would go back to a semi-conscious state.

And then a month before that, he kept telling me, it's time for me to move on, just inform everybody. And I told him, did you say that? I was not at home. And then he said, no, no, I may have said something in confusion. I didn't even say that, I don't know. Then I told him, I will tell you when the time comes.

And then two days before, I know she was at home. I had a silent moment with him and I said, don't hold on to anything. Whatever you see, just seeing. Whatever you sense, just sensing. Whatever you think, just thinking. I didn't know whether he heard it or not, but I heard it from my brother that he said, just leave me alone guys, don't give me anything, just leave me. Then, on the day he was about to pass away, I actually played the Ratha Sutta. I didn't know all this, the ear-organ functions, but it's interesting. That was the last thing that he heard. But by what you're saying, the mind could still function for a few more hours or a few more days, like what the Tibetan tradition says.

Yeah, it takes you to interesting places to come here. What I would say about that is that your faculty would still function even after the body is clinically dead. There have been cases, somewhere in some research paper or some stories, where people who have had near-death experiences, for example, can be seen floating around, seeing what's going on, or hearing their loved ones and everything like that, and then coming back and reporting exactly what it is that they saw and heard. So, yeah, even while the person is passing away, but even after they are clinically dead, if you continue chanting or giving good advice or lifting them up, that's still helpful. So if you ever feel like you are not there in time to actually give them good words of advice before they left, doesn't mean that the time is done.