Interview#6: Dependent Origination, Nibbana, Relax Step & 6Rs with Delson Armstrong

so the whole time throughout this process because you're not clamping the mind down on one object and you're able to observe how the mind actually works you can notice this at each level of jhana as you mentioned and then those insights lead to this letting go and you also made it clear that this process unfolds on its own so there's not this efforting to you know jam shift into the next jhana right your mind's just letting letting go and letting go and going deeper and then seeing

more and more deeply how the mind works in each jhana and then you mentioned eventually the deepest insight is the links of dependent origination which leads to a complete letting go into nibbana meaning no fire meaning no craving yes so could you talk more unpack more about nibbana and the links of dependent origination sure so when we talk about nibbana what it's talking about as you said it's the no fire it's the nimbana and the bana here is referring to the fires of greed hatred and delusion greed and greed hatred and delusion are the roots of where the mind responds from it's this beginning process of filtering your perception of reality and what happens there is these roots take hold into the formations, and so they, when I say formations, what I'm talking about is the verbal, physical, and the mental formations that we were talking about earlier, and formations are essentially the building blocks of perception, if you will.

There's different ways to explain formations and understand them, because they're so multifaceted in the way that they function. But one way to understand it is, if you want to understand formations, understand your intention. If you see that the intention that you have is unwholesome, then you know that the formations are rooted in the fire, or in the roots, of greed, hatred and delusion. When we talk about greed, that's the mind that says, I like this and I want more of this. When we talk about hatred, that's the aversion that says, I don't like this, I want this to stop. And when we talk about delusion, that's taking things personally and saying, this is mine, this is me, this is myself. And so that is the opposite of the experience of anatta. That's the atta, that's taking something as a self. So when we talk about the experience of Nibbana, it's the letting go completely, that quenches these fires. And another explanation of Nibbana is, bana also means forest, or it comes from the Sanskrit vana.

And that forest is the forest of mental proliferation. This whole process of craving, clinging, being, and creating all of these different ideas, thoughts and perceptions. Conditioned reality. Conditioned reality. So in other words, everything that the untrained mind sees, they take it to be belonging to a self, or they take it to be real in the sense that it affects some sense of me. And when they do that, they immediately have all of these kinds of self-referential thoughts. How does this affect me? I like this, or I don't like it, and this thing is my favorite, and I don't like this thing in particular, and it creates a personality. And what we're talking about, really, is this process of papancha,

this process of conceptual or mental proliferation. And Nibbana is no longer having the mind becoming lost in that forest of mental proliferation. And so another synonym for Nibbana is Nipapancha, that is no proliferation, or non-proliferation, of any kind of conceptual reality. Now, when we talk about the links of dependent origination, it really starts at ignorance. Most of the suttas, when they talk about dependent origination, they're talking about ignorance.

And when we talk about ignorance, we're saying that is the ignoring of the Four Noble Truths. So there is the intellectual ignorance, where nobody actually, they don't actually know about the Four Noble Truths. Nobody has introduced them to the Four Noble Truths. But once they have an understanding, or they've been introduced to the Four Noble Truths, there is that process of ignoring that. Meaning, you're ignoring seeing and recognizing that there is suffering present right now. You're ignoring the ability to recognize the impersonal nature of this experience. When you do that, you're liable to take it as a self. You're liable to take it personally. And that's what causes the dukkha.

And that's in the form of the craving. The craving here is the mind that says, as I said, I want this, I like this, I don't want it to stop. And the other one says, I don't like this and I want this to stop. And that's really the basis of that: taking it personal. So the craving, which is the second Noble Truth, needs to be let go of. It needs to be relinquished. It needs to be relaxed.

That's the crucial step in the six R's process. When you go through the process of the six R's, when you recognize there is present a hindrance or craving, you're seeing the first Noble Truth of suffering right there and then. When you release your attention away from it and come back to the relaxed part, you're basically abandoning the craving when you tranquilize the formations in the relax step. That's why when you relax, the mind feels so open, the mind feels so clear, the mind feels like it's expansive. And in that moment you're experiencing what would be known as the mundane nibbana, the mundane nirodha, the mundane cessation of dukkha. This is complete cessation of suffering.

And then you're cultivating a force with your re-smile, and you are collecting the mind by returning to its object, and then repeating whenever that process arises again. If I could just interject for a second, because I think it's not always clear to people what's meant by relax, and as Bhante says, the craving is recognized as attention and tightness. Yeah, and then that's what you're relaxing. So it's not like a big, like, your body. It's more a mental relax. When I was trying to explain this to my brother, I came up with this little trick. So you can, if you focus on the tip of your finger, you can just kind of feel the tension in your mind of trying to focus in on your fingertip. And now release your mind and let it be aware of the whole room in front of you. That's the kind of subtle relaxation

of releasing the tension in your mind. Yeah, that's a wonderful way of explaining it, and that's really what it is. One of the other ways I explain it, it's quite rudimentary, but you think about, you tighten your fist, and that's just basically tensing the muscles. But then relaxing is just letting go and just relaxing the muscles. So when you notice that tightness and tension in the head, what you basically do is, as you said, you open up your awareness, and it's just this feeling of letting that go. Whether it's a thought, whether it's an idea or a concept, whether it's a hindrance, whether it's just this attention to that hindrance, whatever it might be, just letting it go. And so it is a sense of relaxing in that sense, because you recognize that when you do the relax step there is a certain opening in the head, and that's in the form of opening of the awareness. It can also be an opening in the muscles and the entire body as well, because

what we have to see is when we talk about nama-rupa, which we'll get to, it's really talking about not just the mind but the entire body as well. And so the brain, the nervous system, the spine, all of that is interconnected. So when you relax here, you're also relaxing the body to an extent.

So that relax step, as you said, is that opening up of that awareness and letting it go. And then that invariably tranquilizes the formations, the bodily formations that we talk about. And why do we talk about that? Why do we say, tranquilize the bodily formations, or tranquilize formations in general? What we're saying is, when we see the hindrances, when we see any kind of craving that arises, there is a formation, or a set of formations, that are rooted in that craving.

And so every time you relax and you let go and relax that tightness and tension, you're relinquishing that craving, you're abandoning that craving. And in doing so, you're also resetting the formations. So you're letting go of the craving within the formations as well. And so the choice you make in the next moment after that won't be rooted in craving. You make a decision then that it will be a wholesome choice, void of any kind of craving, which is to say you don't take it personal.

So we were going back to the experience of ignorance, and the ignorance here, as we said, is the ignorance of the Four Noble Truths. That comes in the form of a lack of mindfulness, a lack of seeing in that moment the experience, the feeling, the perception being impermanent and being impersonal, and not taking it personal. The moment you take it personal, you activate the craving, and then you feel it in the form of these ideas and thoughts and the tensing up. There's a subtle tensing up of the brain, and there's a subtle tensing up of the nervous system and the mind and the body, and so on and so forth. And then there's the clinging and the bhava, the becoming, that we'll talk about.

So this ignorance influences the formations, and these formations are the effects of previous choices and previous intentions. So in other words, if your mind has been wholesome throughout your life, then your choices will be basically automatically deviating towards wholesome choices without any kind of thought process there. It takes the right effort, it takes mindfulness, it takes understanding to see if your mind has been unwholesome, and to make a conscious decision in that moment to say, I'm letting go of this, and then making a wholesome choice. Or the mind is letting go of this and deviating towards a wholesome choice. Every time that's done through the six R's process, you're whittling away at that craving. You're whittling away at that taking it personal in the form of conceit. You're whittling away at the ignorance that was there because of the lack of mindfulness of that moment. I think you likened formations to synapses at one point. Yeah, you can call them synapses, because when you think about the neuroplasticity of the brain, depending upon your behavior and the reconditioning of the behavior, certain synapses are activated and certain synapses are deactivated.

Or don't fire up, and through their non-use, through their non-activity, there is a weakening of them and a replacement of them with the stronger synapses, or in this case the stronger formations, which are rooted in the wholesome. And so when we talk about the remainderless fading away of craving, we're talking about the remainderless fading away of those formations as well, that are rooted in that craving. And what arises then is the pure formations, because formations generally, what they are, as I said, are also carriers of karma, the carriers and effects of different choices you've made in the past, and they arise with contact with the outside world and contact in the mentality. So these formations then activate a certain kind of consciousness.

Now, consciousness is a big word in the realm of spirituality. The idea is there is this all-pervading, unifying consciousness that is eternal. But within the context of the Dhamma, what we're seeing is that consciousness is dependent upon, or arises dependent upon, an experience. So in other words, the analogy that's used is just as a fire is known by its source. So there is a wood fire, there is a trash fire, there is a cow dung fire. The consciousness is that fire that arises dependent upon its fuel, and the fuel for that is the experience. So there is the cognition. It's just the bare understanding, the bare cognition, the cognizing of what has arisen. So there is the eye consciousness, the ear consciousness, the nose consciousness, the tongue consciousness, the body consciousness, and the mind consciousness.

So this consciousness can actually be influenced and have a certain quality to it based on the formations. If the formations are rooted in the unwholesome traits, that is to say greed, hatred, and delusion, then it is liable to create a consciousness that starts to filter your perception of reality and you see it a certain way. So if that happens, then there's always an interdependency between consciousness and nama-rupa, which is mentality-materiality. And what that means is mentality-materiality cannot function without consciousness being present, but consciousness is dependent upon the mentality-materiality for it to arise. It's very interesting right there, because what we're saying is when there's a descending of the consciousness into a new being at the point of conception, that consciousness that gives life, or it gives vitality and experience, to the new nama-rupa that's being

developed. But then when that dissipates, there is consciousness arising and passing away in every moment, dependent upon the experience of that mentality-materiality, that is to say the mind and body. And you're not making the claim that there's a soul descending, right? Just to be clear, because it isn't a rebirth process. Yeah, it's more of an analogy you're using. I'm using an analogy. So when we talk about rebirth, we have to understand there's rebirth and there's reincarnation. The understanding is that reincarnation is there's just this one soul that goes from lifetime to lifetime to lifetime, but rebirth is the arising and passing away of consciousnesses, and it happens just like that. So when I do this, that's like hundreds of thousands of arising and passing away of your consciousness. So when you're looking at me, you're seeing color and form and so on and so forth, but you're seeing the arising impact. Well, what you're experiencing really is the arising and passing away of the eye consciousness, millions and millions per second. So the analogy that I use is, you have like a ray of light

and it looks like one ray of light. It's like one fluid ray of light, but it's made up of quintillions, actually more than that, of individual photons. So what we see as this awareness seems to be quite fluid, but actually it's just made up of the arising and passing away, and this arising and passing away is what is the rebirth of consciousnesses. So it's not an old consciousness that then takes new life into a new rebirth, but it's just the passing away of that consciousness and the arising of a new one, dependent on the formations, dependent upon the karmic intentions from those formations. And so when I say there's a descending of the consciousness, that's a new consciousness that arose because of karmic intentions in a previous life. And how do we know that the mind works this way? It is through that process of practice, investigating. But I don't like to use the word investigating, because that kind of connotes that there's a connotation there that

you have to do something, like I have to look, I have to analyze, and I have to think about it. That comes from the word dhamma vicaya, which is basically the investigation of states, usually translated, but I just say understanding. You're just understanding in that moment how things are working, just by having your observation there. Through the process of observing, there is an understanding. So when we talk about infinite consciousness, the realm of infinite consciousness, what's happening is once you have the experience of infinite space, it comes to a point where things start to slow down, and you're aware. Your observation becomes so refined, your mindfulness becomes so refined, it's able to now start to see the flickers, whether it's in the eye consciousness or the ear consciousness or any other sensory consciousness, and it starts to see the arising of one consciousness and the passing away of another. And this is a natural process, and what you're seeing right there and then for yourself

it's not something you study, it's not something you read about. You are seeing in that moment, in that practice, for yourself, rebirth. And so now you know anicca. Now you know there is an impermanence to consciousness. Now you know that there is suffering because you can't control it, and it becomes tiresome after a while, and that is the dukkha, that's the inherent dukkha, the inherent dissatisfactory nature of life, as you put it. And I just want to add to that, and that's important to see, is that when we talk about dukkha, it's not like life is suffering. It's just that there is inherent a sense of suffering within other parts of life. Within life, it's not like all of life is suffering. If that was the case, then what's the point of the jhana practice, right? I mean, that's one understanding that we have to see: when the Buddha was talking to the Nigantas, the Jains, their understanding was you need painful feeling.

You need to have painful feeling to purify the mind. But the Buddha said, how can you tell that the mind is being purified? And is there some kind of balance of understanding that this much karma has been purified by these processes? Rather, what the Buddha is saying is, to let go of your attachment to sensual pleasures, there is a higher pleasure in the form of jhanas.

When you see that and you start to let go even of that, then you understand that there isn't suffering. I mean, life isn't suffering. It's just there is suffering in the form of painful feeling. There is suffering in the form of a disappearance of a pleasant feeling. And that suffering comes about because we try to fight with the present moment. We don't accept what is happening in the present moment. Rather, we take it personally, and we either say, okay, I really like this present moment, I want more of it, but it goes away. The pleasant feeling eventually dissipates

or it's an uncomfortable present moment and we say, I don't like this, but we take that personally and we think it's permanent in that moment. And so we're losing sight of the three characteristics of existence, which is liable to create craving, which is liable to create suffering, right? So there's like levels of suffering. Right, there's the macro level of not getting what you want, not getting the right partner that you wanted, or the house or car or job you wanted. But then there's also, on the micro scale, just having a pleasant sensation on your skin and your mind wants a little bit more of that, or an unpleasant one and your mind's pushing it away, right? And then it sounds like even on the more minute, micro level, in every link of dependent origination there's this agitated craving to it. Yes. So we talk about the big craving, which is the link of craving, but there's also the small craving, which is enchained with that link or with those links of dependent origination. So there is that slight agitation, as you said. And so

what happens is, as we're talking about the infinite consciousness, the experience of that, you see it as being tiresome, and eventually you see there's no controller here. It's only arising dependent upon causes and conditions. There's no personal self here controlling all of this. So you are actually getting right there and then the insights into the three characteristics of existence. You're understanding for yourself impermanence, suffering, and anatta. When you do that, you get to let go on a much deeper level, and you experience this. So, coming back, the experience of the link of consciousness, now we go to mentality-materiality. So just to, thanks for bringing us back, but just to clarify, we're still talking about the links of dependent origination. We've gone through ignorance, formations, con, and consciousness. Yeah. Now this is the fourth link. This is the fourth link, which is mentality-materiality. When we talk about mentality-materiality, we're talking about materiality in the form of form, that is to say this body is materiality

this body and everything else that's physical is made up of the four great elements. When you think about the four great elements, what we're also talking about in modern context is the four states of matter. So that is to say, you have the earth element, you have the water element, you have the air element, and you have the fire element. And the modern understanding is you have the solid state of matter, you have the liquid state of matter, you have the gaseous state of matter, and you have the plasma state of matter. So what's happening there is you're seeing for yourself that this body itself is impersonal. This body itself is just made up of different components of molecules and atoms, which are the great elements.

And then the mentality are basically the processes of contact, feeling, perception, intention and attention. So the way I like to explain it is, mentality-materiality is really another way of understanding the five aggregates. So the aggregate of form is in the materiality. Then there's a contact with that form, whether it's the eye, the physical eye, the physical ear, the physical nose, the physical tongue, the physical body, or the physical brain, which experiences thoughts and ideas and concepts. And then, based on that, there is the experience of feeling. That is a sensation, that is an experience that you have, which can be painful, pleasant, or neither painful nor pleasant.

Then there is a perception, which is the recognition of what that feeling is, and that is rooted in your memory. So if you know, for example, that what you're seeing here is your hand, you know it because you have learned that this is what you call your hand. That's the recognition, and it happens very quickly. It's conjoined with the experience of seeing the hand. So as soon as you see the hand, there is an experience of knowing, this is a hand. Right. So it's like color and form, and your mind immediately layers on everything it knows and recognizes to be hand. Exactly, exactly. Or this table. You know it's a table because you've seen it before, and somebody has pointed out to you that this is a table, or anything else for that matter.

So that's perception, and that adds to labeling and understanding the experience of feeling. Then there's intention. And as I said, there's an understanding of formations by understanding your intention. So whatever intention or choices you have drives forward the formations. And so the aggregate of formations can also be understood as intention within the mentality. And then you have attention. And the way I like to explain attention is, it comes from the word manasikara, which means to take something to heart, to really consider something.

Attention is like speed and velocity. Velocity gives a direction to that speed. Attention gives direction to the mindfulness. So when you say pay attention here or there, you're basically directing your awareness, directing your mindfulness to a particular spot. So you say directing your consciousness too, well, directing awareness or consciousness, in the sense you're directing your cognition there? Yeah, right, got it. And so that is how it is equivalent to consciousness, awareness, or consciousness, if you want to put it. So these are equivalent to the five aggregates, and they become interdependent with the consciousness that arises and passes away. And so however they change, so too does the consciousness, and how consciousness changes, so too there's the experience of the mentality, so too there's the experience of form, and so on.

Now there's the six sense bases, which come after nama-rupa, after mentality and materiality. But the six sense bases are actually just part of the mentality and materiality. So they condition the six sense bases, dependent upon previous choices. So that means even your six sense bases are not always going to be the same. They're always changing in every moment. And sometimes you're able to see that on a macro level, when you make some kind of choice to do something clumsy, or you're doing something that is careless or reckless, and you fall and you break a bone. And so your body changes, or you look too much at a computer screen and your eyes become weaker and more tired.

So the choices you make, the actions you take, affect your six sense bases. So they're not just stationary sense organs, if you will. They're always changing, dependent upon the experience of nama-rupa. Now, through these six sense bases, there arises contact. And what we mean by contact is when you are looking at me, you are seeing the color and you're seeing the form, and the light that bounces off of this color and form hits your eye. So there is a contact between the form and the eye, for example, and dependent upon that is eye consciousness.

Now, we already talked about consciousness just a couple of links back. That's the very same consciousness that arises dependent on the experience of the eye. Now, when you listen to my voice, there's another consciousness that arises, dependent upon contact between the ear and the sound. And so when we were talking earlier about how, if the formations are rooted in something that is wholesome or unwholesome, well, in this case let's take the example of the unwholesome, it's liable to create a consciousness that's rooted in some kind of filtration process, rooted in the unwholesome as well. So that means that that contact, the experience, has already been filtered. The experience has already been painted for you. So now when the contact arises, there is an experience.

And when you see that experience, you have a perception of it, dependent upon how you think about it, based on that experience of the consciousness, dependent upon the formation. So this is happening at millions of links arising and passing away in every microsecond. It's happening really quickly. So when we get to feeling, this is really the crucial element. The feeling is the experience that we're having, whether it's the experience of listening to my voice, the experience of seeing me, the experience of reflecting about what's going on, and conjoined to that is perception.

So what we're saying is there's feeling and perception that come together. When there is a feeling, there is a perception. And dependent on that, there is an awareness of that feeling and perception. So these three run together. If you have feeling, there's perception and consciousness. If you have perception, that means there is a feeling that you are perceiving, and there's a cognizing or cognition of that feeling. If you have cognition, there is a feeling of that cognition in the form of thinking about it or seeing it or whatever it might be. And there is a knowing of what it is that you're seeing or thinking about, in the form of perception. So they're intertwined, they're conjoined.

It's difficult, or basically impossible, to separate the three together. But when you have feeling, what happens is there are these underlying tendencies that are there in feeling. And these underlying tendencies are seven in number, but we'll just focus on the craving aspect, craving and aversion. And when you take that experience to be personal, when you say, this is my experience, and you say, I don't want it to stop because it really makes me feel good, now that's because the feeling is pleasant.

Because of that quality of pleasantness in that feeling, and the perception of that being pleasant, it is liable to cause or activate the underlying tendency towards craving more for that experience, craving more for that feeling. If you react to it with a sense of self, if you take that personally and react to it, then you are basically adding fuel to that underlying tendency. It bridges the feeling, or the link of feeling, to the big craving that we talk about, which is the link of craving itself, which now says, this is me, this is mine, this is myself, and I really like this. When you do that, then that creates or activates clinging.

And clinging is really the opinions you have about something, the thinking about this thing. It's like, you know, I see that color red and I really like that red, and that's my favorite color from now on. Or I just really enjoy this cup of coffee, and I really like this particular brand of coffee. Or, you know, I listen to this piece of music and it just gave me this amazing experience, and I really like it and I don't want it to stop, and now this is my favorite musician, or this is my favorite song. So these ideas of creating favorites, that's the whole process of clinging, holding on to it, and then starting to create a sense of identity that is made up of different habitual tendencies and habitual emotional tendencies, which are present in the link of bhava.

Now, bhava is sometimes translated as being, or becoming, or existence, or whatever it might be. But the easiest way to remember it is, it's basically where identity is most concrete. The sense of self is most concrete. Because now this personality, this sense of self, has been built up by all of these ideas of who you are, based on the things you like and don't like, and so on. And so you have reactions.

And these reactions are basically automatic. So when this bhava arises and one acts from there, there is the birth of action. And this birth of action is the birth of having taken that action to be personalized, taking that action to be me, mine, and myself, which is liable to cause further karma, which is liable to cause dukkha.

And when you say take something personally, is someone maybe their initial reaction is, yeah, well, it feels like I'm doing all these things with my mind. How do I create that separation, so that I'm not taking something personally? And at what level, at what link, can you start to do that? Right from the link of feeling. And the reason I say that is because everything from, let's say, ignorance or formations until contact and feeling is what is known as old karma. When we talk about karma, we talk about karma as two things. Karma as action, the birth of action, which is either mental, verbal, or physical. And when we say mental action, we're talking about the thinking process, or the process of having an intention about something.

When we talk about verbalizing, it's a further thinking process where we then express in speech. So that's why it's verbal. And then the physical action is the intention to move, or if it's something that's aversive, maybe trying to push something away physically, or, you know, if you become violent, trying to punch somebody, or whatever it might be, which is a completely unwholesome action.

But it's really at the level of feeling, in the experience of feeling, that you can realize, understand and recognize if the mind is taking that personally. If the mind immediately jumps and says, I don't like this, or if the mind immediately jumps and says, I like this, but if you can recognize it and relax it, because when you have those kinds of thoughts about the experience, that's where the tightness and tension start to come together.

And that tightness and tension then comes to craving. So when you're identifying with something, you're so involved in it, there's no separation. But if you have mindfulness, and if you use the relax step, you're no longer identified. Right. So the mindfulness that we talk about is being able to pay attention and understand and observe how mind's attention moves from one thing to another, if mind is taking it personally.

So when we talk about mindfulness at the level of feeling, we're talking about the mindfulness and understanding of seeing this as being impersonal. So then you don't react to it. If it's a good thing, if it's a bad thing, if it's a neutral thing, you don't react to it from a sense of self. When you don't do that, then there's no craving. So the cutoff point is really at the level of feeling, which is that old karma.

You can't do anything about it. It's just going to arise based on the previous set of choices. It's the effect of your previous set of choices, and those previous set of choices is the new karma. So let's say you did crave, which meant you took it personal. If at that point you recognize and let it go, it won't get to clinging. But if you don't recognize it and get to clinging, it'll be a little more difficult. But if you do see it and you say, oh, I'm starting to make opinions about this, I'm starting to create views about this, I'm starting to take this more personal, I'm starting to look at this and say, oh, this is me, this is mine, and this is my favorite, and so on.

Then you recognize it and you use the 6R process to let go and relax, and then there won't be any habitual tendencies. But if you recognize now that there is a huge sense of identity around what's going on, but you let that go, then there won't be further birth of action. But if it's at birth of action that you can't do anything about it, because at that point you have decided that you are going to say something, you're going to think something, or you're going to act in a certain way. You've sent the text. Why did I send that? Exactly. You can't retrieve it back. It's the arrow that you've let go, and you can't call it back.

So all of that whole process is new karma. And then what you can only do is then feel the effect of that action as a fruition of it, as an effect of it, in the old karma, in the form of formations, in the form of the nama-rupa, the consciousness of the nama-rupa, the experience of the sixth sense spaces and feeling. So when we talk about mindfulness, what we're talking about is paying attention and not holding things, not holding on to things, not taking them personal. That prevents any new karma from arising. I think one that, thank you, that's a really great explanation. And there's another question that seems to always come up around this, which is who is 6R-ing?

Who is seeing the links of dependent origination coming out of cessation? If there's no self in that process, then who are we really referring to or what is that? Right, that's a very deep question. And the understanding there is, let's first talk about the links of dependent origination. Because the question does come up, like, what is this mindfulness that is seeing it? Who is it that pays attention to this arising and passing away? And the answer is, it is not the same consciousness, but it is that process of the arising and passing away of consciousness dependent upon an experience.

So when there is an arising of one link, there is the arising of consciousness dependent upon that link and the awareness of that. And when there is a passing away and arising of a new link, there is the arising and passing away dependent on that, a new consciousness. So while consciousness is one of the links itself, there's also in some sense a consciousness attached to each link? There is the awareness of those links arising and passing away. But because it seems like that awareness is fluid, it seems like it's one awareness. But really it's multiple awarenesses dependent upon each link. So yes, that consciousness

or awareness of being conscious or cognizing is that metacognition that we talk about. But if you're aware at each link, then how would you know that that consciousness is not always there? I guess because cessation is a thing, right? Well, you see consciousness when you go into cessation. So now you realize, okay, I am not the consciousness, because there is no self in the consciousness. And whatever arose again when the mind comes back on, it's not that same consciousness. It's a different consciousness that arises dependent upon the experience. So the other way to explain it is, what's understood is, it's the mind or the eye of wisdom that sees it. But this eye of wisdom is the cognizing. It's something that sees it, it's something that understands it. But that process of understanding is dependent upon the experience of the links, which means it's not independent, which means it's not some outside external consciousness. It's just that it seems like it is because you're watching it from afar, so to speak, or it seems like you're watching it from afar, but

Actually, when it arises there is an arising of consciousness. So when the activation of the new consciousness arises at cessation, already a formation has arisen, and already a new consciousness has arisen, and already the experience of nama-rupa has arisen. And there is a contact with the experience of nibbana, which gives that experience of relief and joy and so on.

Now when we talk about your second part of the question, which was, I guess that's more of a who is 6R-ing? Yeah, at a larger scale, who's doing the 6R-ing? Right. So at a larger scale, when we look at, for example, you notice that there is a tension in the mind, or there is a tightness there. What's happening is there is the attention given to that, and it's all impersonal.

It's just there was a consciousness or cognizing that the mind, or when you say recognition, for example to recognize there is a recognition or cognition of that, of the fact that there's a hindrance present. Then based on that there is an intention to let that go, but that intention itself was dependent upon the recognition of that. So what I need to say is, it's not one fluid mind that is recognizing, releasing, relaxing, re-smiling, and so on.

It's different types of intention going on. So with the arising of the intention of releasing, there is the awareness that there is a releasing going on. With the intention of paying attention to the relaxed up, there is a movement of consciousness, meaning an arising of consciousness of the relaxed up. With the intention to re-smile, there is a new awareness dependent upon experiencing that smile. When there is an intention to return, there is a new consciousness that arises dependent upon the intention to collect the mind around an object, and then with the repeat and so on.

I see. And this is a reconditioning process, right? So the idea is it's a training, and you're developing the ability to see that in everyday life. Because we started talking about the jhanas, but this process can occur throughout everyday life. Yeah, like Bhante says, if you're doing something and you can smile, then you can meditate. Which means, if you're on the computer, you can still meditate by using the 6R process. The 6R process isn't just something that happens while you're walking meditation or while you're in sitting meditation.

You could be taking a shower and you recognize there's a craving thought. You could use the 6R process right there and then to let go of that craving. Or you're driving down the road and there's a traffic jam, and then you start to notice there's irritation arising because of it. If you're mindful enough, then you recognize and you use the rest of the 6R process. So the more you 6R, what you're doing is you are reconditioning the mind to basically let go of all craving altogether, bit by bit, bit by bit. And this is the right effort.

We talk about right effort, and that's the right effort to get from the wrong view to right view and the wrong path to the right path. So what we're talking about is you change your wrong view to the right view. You change your wrong intention to the right intention. You change your wrong speech to the right speech. You change your wrong action to the right action. You change your wrong livelihood to the right livelihood. You change your wrong mindfulness to the right mindfulness. And you change your wrong collectiveness to the right collectiveness. And all of that is facilitated by right effort. And that right effort is the 6R process, which is basically the fourth noble truth of the Eightfold Path.

So every time you're doing the 6Rs, what you're inevitably doing is practicing the Eightfold Path. And so when we were talking a little bit earlier about the deviation between old karma and new karma, there's a sutta in which the Buddha talks about what is the cessation of this karma, and it is the Eightfold Path. And now we understand why, because at that level of feeling, if you see the arising of craving and you recognize it and let go of it, then there's no new karma. That karma has ceased. There's no momentum for the links. Exactly, exactly. And so that's why even in the meditation when you see a hindrance and you use the 6Rs successfully, the hindrance weakens. It might come up again.

That's the same thing with karma. I mean, a hindrance is basically karma. It's the effect of previous choices you've made, but it will be weaker because you haven't reacted to it. You haven't tried to change it with your reaction, and you haven't added to the fuel of that hindrance through your reaction. Instead, you have acknowledged it, said, okay, I recognize you, but now I'm letting go of any craving attached to it, and I'm relaxing, and I'm using the rest of the 6R process. So now, because there's no fuel for it, it doesn't get stronger. It actually gets weaker. And then when it comes back again, it might get even weaker. You do it again, it gets even weaker, and eventually it completely fades away. It's a beautiful process. Thank you for laying it out. And I understand you do have a book coming out, about the 12 links. You want to plug your work? Okay.

There's actually a few books that are coming out. So this current book that I'm working on is about the links of dependent origination, but it's also about the 23 links. So there is the 12 links of dependent origination, which is making up the second noble truth, which talks about how craving arises. And then there's the 11 links, which are about the third noble truth of how craving ceases. So that work is a work in progress. I am just starting it and I've gotten maybe just maybe four or five chapters into it. But there is a current book that is coming out in the next month or two, maybe in November or December, which is called A Mind Without Craving.

That book is based on an online retreat that was done, and it takes the Dhamma talks that were done and transcribes them. It takes meditator experiences of the jhanas and the different processes of the 6Rs, and it has some deep insights for each day to reflect on. So that book is expected to be out later this year. It will be on Amazon, it'll be on the different websites. It will be available in hardcover, it will be available in Kindle, it'll be available in other ebook formats, and as a free downloadable PDF on the Suttavada website, suttavada.foundation, and the Damasukha website. And if you go to Suttavada, we will be coming up with a pre-order page so you can pre-order your copy now, whether you want a physical copy or an ebook copy, or if you want to donate towards the printing of it, you could do that as well. Thanks, Delson, it's been a lot of fun. Thank you.