Austria 2025 | Awakening Intuition

Today, I want to talk about the factors of awakening, the seven factors of awakening. They run in tandem with the Eightfold Path. And they can be utilized as independent tools for our practical life, in terms of how we live life, along with the meditation. So what are the seven factors of awakening? Mindfulness, discernment, energy, joy, tranquility, collectedness, and equanimity. I don't like the word mindfulness, but it has become the popular word to use. S-A-T-I, S-A-T-I, S-A-T-I. And S-A-T-I is a Pali of the Sanskrit, which is Smriti, S-M-R-I-T-I, Smriti. And Smriti actually means memory, to remember, to recall.

So mindfulness, it's a very nebulous term. Mindfulness, mindfulness is, we hear about mindfulness of breathing, mindfulness of the body, mindfulness of emotions, mindful eating, mindful walking, you know, all of these different ideas. But when we talk about mindfulness, it is a few things, or really a couple of things that are conjoined together. It's the Sati and the Sampajanna. So what here we're talking about is the memory, the remembrance of something.

And what are we remembering? We're remembering to stay present to whatever it is that the mind is paying attention to. As I was saying yesterday, Bhante Vimalaramsi's definition of mindfulness was remembering to observe how mind's attention moves from one object to the other. But to simplify that, it just means present moment awareness.

Aware of this moment as it arises. And conjoined to that is something known as Sampajanna, which means comprehension. Comprehending or understanding what is in this particular present moment. When you have these two, then you have what is known as present moment. So in the context of meditation, mindfulness is the foundation for meditation.

Without mindfulness, there cannot be right collectedness. When we spoke of the Eightfold Path yesterday, we spoke of right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right collectedness. They seep into one another or into each other. Right view leads to right intention. When my perspective is geared towards awakening, then my intention is to let go.

My intention is to disengage from that that doesn't serve me, that which is harmful towards me and harmful towards others. That right intention leads to right speech and right action. I speak through thinking. I make sure that what I'm about to say is timely. Is it honest? What is the intention behind it? Is it necessary to say what we have to say? And can I say it with kindness?

And keeping the precepts in right action. Conjoined with this is right life. The business, the trade, the work that you do does not cause yourself or others harm. All of this allows us to actually be able to relax. Which is right effort. All of this allows us to engage with our mind in a way that can discern between what is wholesome and unwholesome. Let go or disengage from the unwholesome and bring up the wholesome and stay with us. This is what is mentioned in Majjhima Nikaya 43. It's a dialogue between Sariputta and Mahapothita. And one of the things he asks is what are the three aggregates.

We've all heard of the five aggregates, which is form, feeling, perception, intention, and attention. But in this case, when they ask for the three aggregates, he's talking about Silas, the morality, which leads to Samadhi, which is the cultivation of wisdom.

And what he says there is that the equipment for right collectedness is right effort and right mindfulness. So right effort is disengaging from the unwholesome, staying with the unwholesome, which will lead to right mindfulness, which is where is my mind right here, right now.

In standing up, I am present with the process of standing up. In sitting down, I am present with the process of sitting down. When entering a room, I am present with the process of entering the room. When leaving the room, I am present with the process of leaving the room. When I am eating, I am present with eating. When I am walking, I am present with walking. This is the function of mindfulness in terms of Sati. Sampajanna, the comprehension of that mindfulness is what is my mind doing in relation to that particular activity.

So when we talk about loving kindness or the awareness of loving kindness, compassion, joy or equanimity, we are doing the mindfulness of loving kindness. We are doing the mindfulness of compassion. We are doing the mindfulness of joy. We are doing the mindfulness of equanimity. That is the practice.

And in other words, what I am doing is, when I am walking, I am present with mindfulness. And I am also present with mindfulness of loving kindness. And I am present when loving kindness is not there. In other words, I am aware my mind has shifted from the loving kindness.

And so I utilize right effort to disengage and return, to relax into the object again, thereby bringing my mindfulness back to loving kindness, to the present moment. So you may have been the most important. So you may have heard of something known as the four foundations of mindfulness.

This is a sutta in the Majjhima Nikaya and the Digha Nikaya. Mahasatipatthana Sutta. Mahasatipatthana means the great discourse on the foundations of mindfulness. And there are these four foundations of mindfulness. The body, feeling, the mind and contents of the mind or phenomena. And they are simply just foundations. What do we mean by foundations? What do we mean by foundations?

Patana or prastana in Sanskrit is a base, is a pillar. It is an anchor. We are utilizing a component of the body as an anchor to bring our awareness back to the present. So in the case of the body, it might be the breath.

It might be contemplation of the elements that make up the body. It might be looking at the sensations in the body. And then tied to that can be feeling. What kind of feeling am I experiencing right now? What is feeling? Feeling comes from the word vedana, which means to experience. What is my experience right now? Internally and externally?

Mentally or physically? When I do this, I am establishing mindfulness. I'm just using that as an anchor to bring my awareness back to the present. It's as simple as that. You don't need to complicate it. You don't have to go beyond that to be like, okay, now I have to contemplate this. Now I have to contemplate the arising and passing away of that. Now I have to be like, okay, now I have to do this. No. My mind is back here in the present moment. Can I return back to the object?

Whether the object is mindfulness of breathing, or mindfulness of loving kindness, or being in the silence. Whatever the object is. So this mindfulness, it will be present for most of the time. Most of the time during your meditation practice. Why do I say most of the time? Yes, there will be times where the mind goes into what's known as sloth and torpor, or the mind is restless, or the mind is experiencing anger, or irritation, or annoyance, or the mind is experiencing anything other than the object of meditation.

Discernment is the foundation for intuition. There are two paths leading out of discernment. One is the intellectual path, which leads towards analysis, and thinking, and wondering, and contemplating, and trying to figure things out. And it will only take you so far. The other path is intuition. Trusting in the process.

Trusting in the equipment of your mind. This trust is a direct polar opposite of doubt. Whether it's in yourself, in the practice, or anything else, to just trust in the process. It's in the practice. It doesn't matter. And it says, oh, I should go to this village today.

Or I should go for alms in this particular area. And invariably, when he goes there, as per the suttas, he connects with a particular monk, or he connects with a particular ascetic, or he connects with a particular person, who for them, it's perfect. Because now they have the ability to speak with the Buddha. And the Buddha is there now to serve him through his wisdom.

And you will find yourself in these situations, in these synchronicities. And the more you capture these synchronicities, the more they happen. And this is all due to discernment. The simplest approach is, where is my mind right now? And wait for the answer, see what comes up, and then act accordingly.

And that action in accordance with whatever is required is the utilization of what's known as energy. And that action in accordance with whatever is required is the utilization of what's known as energy. So it's not just any kind of energy. It's not just any kind of energy. It's not just any kind of effort. It is an effort that is rooted in discernment.

That is conditioned by discernment. Mindfulness leads to discernment. Discernment leads to an action. And that action is an action that has nothing to do with what I think is best. It's an action that is rooted in intuition. And so the more you're able to take refuge, you know, in the morning, for example, you do this process of taking refuge in the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Sangha. Why do we do that? What is the purpose of that?

Is it just a ritual? Is it a religious thing? Is it a spiritual thing? What are we doing there? As I understand it, this is what we're doing. When we take refuge in the Buddha, we're taking refuge in the possibility of our own awakening. The possibility of our own ability to access the awakened mind, which is always there.

When we take refuge in the Buddha, we're taking refuge in the Buddha. When we take refuge in the Buddha, what are we doing? We're taking refuge, actually, in our own intuition. It is only through intuition that the Buddha unfolded. Quite literally, in the sutras, you will see the Buddha asking, what is the cause and condition for suffering.

And he waits for an answer. And the answer that arises is birth. What is the cause and condition for birth? And the answer comes becoming. And likewise, he asks for each one of those. And so dependent origination, which is the Dhamma, which goes out of intuition. So we are trusting in our mind's capacity to access that intuition.

We're taking refuge in that. And when we say we take refuge, it comes from the word Sharanagati. Sharanagati means surrender. What are we surrendering? We're surrendering the ego. We're surrendering the mind that is the thinking, analytical mind. At the feet of intuition. At the feet of the intuitive mind.

And we take refuge in the sangha. What does that mean? In one level, it says we take refuge in the sangha in terms of the bhikkhus and the bhikkhunis. At another level, it's the community of meditators and fellow participants. But it's also trusting in our own capacities. The Buddha has said that when you don't find a community or a group of friends that are conducive for your practice.

Be like a tusker. Be like a rhinoceros. Go into the forest. That could be literal or just figuratively. And be with your own company. The ability to enjoy your own company. Take refuge in that. Take refuge in solitude as well. The things that you do in the morning, they may seem ritualistic. They may seem like, okay, we're just repeating and so on and so forth. No, when you take the precepts, they are there for us to remind us that here we are to be in a wholesome state of mind so the mind is unagitated and can be in samadhi. And when we take refuge, this is what we're doing.

It is not a reaction. It is not a reaction that is rooted in the ego. It is actually an action that is arising from the utility or utilization of the Eightfold Path. And when you walk the Eightfold Path, your actions are non-productive of new karma.

Your actions are appropriate for whatever is required in that moment. And sometimes the best action is not doing anything. And you will hear me say it in the practice. In the interviews. I have said it thousands of times at this point to hundreds of people. Many hundreds of people. Don't do anything. You get to that space. Don't do anything. And of course what happens is we try our best not to do anything.

And of course what happens is we try our best not to do anything. And so it's surrendering. Again, it's going back to it. Sometimes the best action, the best effort is to surrender, is to let go. So that mindfulness leading to discernment. That discernment leading to this letting go. This process of relaxing. This process of relaxing. This process of disengaging. This process of disengaging.

This will lead into something known as Piti. P-I-T-I, Piti. Which comes from the Sanskrit Preeti. Which is sometimes translated as joy. But really what that is, is relief. The relief of letting go. The relief of disengaging. This whole practice of meditation that we're doing when it comes to the jhanas and so on and so forth. We try so hard to get to these states because we've heard about it so many times. And that is the irony of these talks. And it creates these concepts in the mind. And we mistake those concepts for the real thing. We mistake the finger pointing to the moon for the moon itself.

But when we feel relief from having to do anything, we are disengaging. Then the practice of meditation is seamless. Is effortless. The practice of meditation is less about us doing something and more about observing how meditation is happening. So this joy can be felt. It can be felt as bliss in the body. It can be felt as exhilaration in the body. It can be felt as a certain sense of relief.

A certain sense of appreciation. It doesn't matter. It really doesn't matter whether you feel exhilarating joy or you feel a certain appreciation. Or you feel a sense of contentment. A sense of, okay, this is good. This is fine. And when we have this joy, there is a certain level of tranquility that arises.

So before we move forward, I want to recap what we're doing here when it comes to this practice. Mindfulness is the foundation. It's the basis of everything. It's the basis of uncertainty and doubt. The effort that arises from that allows us to make or take the right action. It's the basis of everything. It feels heavy. There's too much gravity in the mind.

But joy lightens it up. Both in terms of brightness and in terms of lightening it up, in terms of elevating it. And obviously when you have joy, when you have appreciation, you don't get bored. This is why gratitude is such a powerful practice and yet it's so overlooked. You have that childlike appreciation for everything in the moment. When you have that childlike appreciation for everything in the moment.

When you have that, there is a natural bubbling joy that comes into you, comes out of you. You laugh without restraint. You smile with people. You smile at people. There is a certain playfulness to every moment. We need more of that. You have to be in this moment. That joy is not conditioned by a desire for something. That joy arises naturally.

Effortlessly. And so this joy leads to what's known as tranquility. Tranquility comes from the word passaddhi. Passaddhi means to tranquilize, to relax. When you are at ease, when you have that joy, you are naturally at ease. When you can laugh without restraint, when that laughter bubbles out from you, you are at ease with the world and the people around you.

And actually it's more difficult than what it actually is, because the mind has grown through many different experiences, through many different kinds of trauma, through many different kinds of events, circumstances, relationships, situations, where we become brittle and hard. And we're unable to be at ease. For some people it's more likely because of the depth of trauma they may have gone through.

And they're always on edge. They can't really fully be immersed in every moment. There's no sense of ease. But if you start to see the connection. If you start to see how one leads to the other, then you can kind of reverse engineer that.

If the sense of ease arises because of joy, because of appreciation, because of the ability to be here fully relishing in the moment, then that's one step to take. But if I'm unable to do that, then I take one step back and I see what is the discernment here.

What is the message that is coming in when I surrender my ego? And that will help us to break down the patterns that cause us to tighten up. Sometimes physically, sometimes emotionally, sometimes mentally. So that we can experience relaxation. We can experience joy. This joy and tranquility are interrelated, interconnected. As I say, when you have joy, you are at ease, you are relaxed. When you are relaxed, joy naturally can arise.

And tranquility is a good antidote towards restlessness, the ease. When we have restlessness, there's agitation in the mind. There's agitation in the mind about something. But the more we try to do something about it, there's more resistance there. And there's more agitation there.

But when we are at ease, when we allow the flow of thoughts to come and go and just observe with ease, then that slows down. And that tranquilizes. So mindfulness leads to discernment. Discernment leads to that energy. That energy leads to joy. That joy leads to tranquility. That tranquility leads to something known as collectedness. Samadhi. Even-mindedness. A mind that is collected.

Which means what? It means that our attention is non-dispersed. Our attention is not going in many different directions. Our attention, for the most part, is around a specific object. Or, in the case of an objectless meditation, our attention is generally at rest and ease. There's no need to complicate samadhi. Samadhi is just the mind that is even-mindedness. The mind that remains in balance.

The mind that is fluid. The mind that is malleable. And we come to it when our mind is relaxed. You will see for yourself. When the mind is distracted, there is a certain hardness that's there. There's a certain brittleness that's there.

But when we relax back into the object, then there's a certain softness there. There's a certain fluidity. A certain level of flow that's going on. And this flow is what we're referring to as samadhi. From this samadhi, we have what is known as equanimity. It's interesting, this word equanimity comes from the word upekkha in Pali, which means upeksa. And really, it's kind of related to the word apekkha, which means expectation.

So one way of interpreting it is equanimity is the lack of expectations. Don't expect anything in the meditation. Don't artificially create or construct anything in the process of meditation. Let there be a process of flow. Expectation is just another word for craving. As I've said before, expecting the world to be a certain way.

Expecting the world to be a certain way.

Expecting the meditation to be a certain way. Equanimity can also, well, it is synonymous with what's known as yatha bhuta nana dassana. Big word. Big Pali word. Basically it just means the knowledge and vision of things as they actually are. Letting the mind observe things as they are, without getting caught up one way or the other.

And the beautiful thing about this practice is when we have that, it circles back to mindfulness. And that mindfulness becomes even further stabilized. Which means what? Our discernment becomes even more clarified. Which means what? Our actions are better informed. Which means what? The joy and relief that arises becomes more natural. Which means what? The tranquility we have, the ease we have, becomes more natural. Which means what? Our attention remains collected.

And therefore, we have greater clarity in seeing things as they are. And this is what's happening under the hood of the car of meditation. I'm giving you a certain level of reverse engineering of what's happening in meditation when you go through the jhanas. Because when you go through the jhanas, the enlightenment factors, the awakening factors, these seven things, are present to one day. And they circle around until you go through the jhanas. The manifest. And they circle around until you get to the fourth jhana. The main factor of which is he has mindfulness due to equanimity.

Or mindfulness born of equanimity. And this is because the equanimity. The ability to discern and see things as they actually are. Further deepens and establishes that mindfulness. Purity of mindfulness. Purity of mindfulness due to equanimity. That is the phrase that he uses. There the mindfulness is very clear. There's a certain level of calmness and tranquility. So this collectedness that we talked about earlier.

It is a great antidote for, again, a restless mind. But if you have too much collectedness, your mind can start to become hard again. And that is because there is an imbalance of effort. Every time there is a sense of, I can do a little bit more, let me just tweak a little bit more. Let me do a little bit more. Let me push a little bit more. What does that mean? Now, we're engaging with the intellectual mind that thinks that it knows better.

We're losing our discernment. And therefore, we're losing the wise action. And therefore, we're out of balance. And this can cause restlessness. And this can cause any kind of hindrance. So the idea of balancing these things. It's not like an intellectual game of, okay, I see there's a little bit of this and there's a little bit of that. Now I've got to have a dropper of this and that and that. Yes, to an extent, it is helpful when you have a certain hindrance that's there. And you may use, for example, a little dropper of joy or, with restlessness, a micro dose of tranquility.

And that might be helpful to a certain extent. But I'm telling you, from my experience, if you can just surrender to the practice, let go of the mind that says that I know what is best and I will do it this way. Because what you're going to do is you're going to run in the hamster wheel.

And eventually you realize this is getting nowhere. And you stop. And at some point you realize, oh, I don't have to do that. I can just be in the flow and surrender to the process. Yes, I start with spinning the top, initiating the spinning of the top with some gratitude, with some words, with whatever it is that helps, or with just the intention, and then I let it flow.

And so, in life as well, when we use these different components, these seven factors, it is to get into that intuitive space. We don't have to bog ourselves down with a decision-making process that has all of these things to take into account. We can just trust in our intuition. I can tell you from my own experience. Every time I have not trusted in my intuition, it has screwed my life up.

There was a time where I was, and I'm never going to do it again because I've learned my lesson, investing in something known as decentralized finance. And we found out that whole thing was a Ponzi scheme, and I lost a lot of money.

The second time I did not listen to my intuition was about a person. It was this sense you get about certain people. It's not prejudice. It's not like judging. It's just that there's something about the energy of this person, and I sensed it, but I didn't voice it, and I didn't say anything about it. And I stayed silent. I didn't listen to my intuition.

And months later, this person just created havoc in my life in many different ways. And those are the two main lessons, but especially the second one that has made me realize that the more I listen to my intuition, the less stress I have to deal with. And how do you listen to intuition? How do you know what is intuition?

What is the difference between intuition and the thought? What is the difference between intuition and an intellectual analysis? An intuition arises from, it will arise as a thought. It will arise as maybe I should do this. But there is a certain level of I know that this is the right answer. There is the right answer. There is a knowing there.

Your entire being just knows that that is the answer. It's like when you were in school and the teacher asked you a question. Or they asked the class the question. And you had no idea about what the subject was. But there was an answer that came. And you decided not to because you were shy or you felt embarrassed to raise your hand and give the answer. Maybe it was wrong. And lo and behold, it was the right answer.

That's what intuition is like. And the doubt in that is what we have to look at. And we will make mistakes. We will obviously make mistakes. We will have to try and see for ourselves and experiment with this process. But we start to see. But we start to see. But we start to see. The more we start to see the synchronicities, the more we start to engage and actually discern. Ah, I was thinking about this a few days ago and here it is. This is a message.

Let me follow through with this. You can brush it off as magical thinking. You can brush it off as magical thinking. You can brush it off as delusion. You can brush it off as delusion. I would rather be delusional than have a very boring life. But for me, in seeing the synchronicities, it has helped in many different ways.

In your meditation, you are your own teacher. You have probably heard me say this many times. You are your own teacher. This is what it means. Trust in your intuition. Trust in your intuition. Trust in your intuition. Trust in the discernment that the mind brings up. And you can always make adjustments. Trust in your intuition. Trust in your intuition.