Oct 4 MN 117 - The Great Forty - The Effect of Precepts in Meditation

I suggest we start. First of all, good afternoon, good morning, or good evening, wherever you are. It's quite rainy in the Netherlands, so I hope everybody is safe. Welcome to this Dhamma talk of Delson Armstrong. Starting today, we are planning to have a weekly Dhamma talk at this time on Sunday, and this first Dhamma talk will be covering the sutta from the Majjhima Nikaya number 117, which is the Great Forty, covering the factor of support, the eightfold path. The schedule for today will start with Delson reading out the sutta, and this will last approximately 20 minutes. Then he will give an explanation, which will last another 20 minutes, before we open up for questions and answers. That's roughly the last 20 minutes of this call, so it should last approximately one hour. Before we end the call, we will share Merit together.

It will show up a slide on the screen, and Whit has kindly offered to read it out for us. So before I give the word to Delson, two practical points. Number one is please do keep your microphone muted. I see all of you are muted, so thank you very much for that. If you have a question during the Q&A, you can come off mute and ask a question, or we can ask a question in the chat, and then we will ask it to Delson. It's really up to you. The last point is we will record the call so that it will be available afterwards

on YouTube, so I'll start the recording, and with that I'd like to give the word to Delson. Thank you, Koon. I hope everyone is having a good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you are in the world. I'm going to start with Majjhima Nikaya 117, the Great Forty, and this is a translation that I'm using from Bhante Sujato. So let me begin. So I have heard at one time the Buddha was staying near Savatthi, in Jeta's Grove, Anathapindika's monastery. There the Buddha addressed the mendicants. Mendicants, venerable sir, they replied. The Buddha said, this, mendicants, I will teach you noble right collectedness with its vital conditions and its prerequisites. Listen and pay close attention, I will speak.

Yes, sir, they replied. The Buddha said this: and what is noble right collectedness with its vital conditions and its prerequisites? They are right view, right thought, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, and right mindfulness. Unification of mind with these seven factors as prerequisites is called noble right collectedness with its vital conditions and also with its prerequisites.

There are no duties to mother and father, no beings are reborn spontaneously, and there is no ascetic or brahmin who is well attained and practiced, and who describes the afterlife after realizing it with their own insight. This is wrong view. And what is right view? Right view is twofold, I say. There is right view that is accompanied by defilements, has the attributes of good deeds, and ripens in attachment. And there is right view that is noble, undefiled, transcendent, a factor of the path.

And what is right view that is accompanied by defilements, has the attributes of good deeds, and ripens in attachment? There is meaning in giving, sacrifice, and offerings. There are fruits and results of good and bad deeds. There is an afterlife. There are duties to mother and father. There are beings reborn spontaneously, and there are ascetics and brahmins who are well attained and practiced, and who describe the afterlife having realized it with their own insight.

And what is wrong thought? Thoughts of sensuality, of malice, and of cruelty. This is wrong thought. And what is right thought? Right thought is twofold, I say. There is right thought that is accompanied by defilements, has the attributes of good deeds, and ripens in attachment. And there is right thought that is noble, undefiled, transcendent, a factor of the path. And what is right thought that is accompanied by defilements, has the attributes of good deeds, and ripens in attachment? Thoughts of renunciation, goodwill, and harmlessness. This is right thought that is accompanied by the defilements. And what is right thought that is noble, undefiled, transcendent, a factor of the path? It is the thinking, the placing of the mind, thought, applying, application, implanting of the mind, the verbal processes, in one of noble mind and undefiled mind, who possesses the noble path and develops the noble path.

When you understand wrong action as wrong action, and right action as right action, that is your right view. And what is wrong action? Killing living creatures, stealing, and sexual misconduct. This is wrong action. And what is right action? Right action is twofold, I say. There is right action that is accompanied by defilements, has the attributes of good deeds, and ripens in attachment. And there is right action that is noble, undefiled, transcendent, a factor of the path. And what is right action that is accompanied by defilements, has the attributes of good deeds, and ripens in attachment? Refraining from killing living creatures, stealing, and sexual misconduct. This is right action that is accompanied by defilements. And what is right action that is noble, undefiled, transcendent, a factor of the path?

that is your right view. And what is wrong livelihood? Deceit, flattery, hinting, and belittling, and using material possessions to pursue other material possessions. This is wrong livelihood. And what is right livelihood? Right livelihood is twofold, I say. There is right livelihood that is accompanied by the defilements, has the attributes of good deeds, and ripens in attachment. And there is right livelihood that is noble, undefiled, transcendent, a factor of the path. And what is right livelihood that is accompanied by the defilements, has the attributes of good deeds, and ripens in attachment?

Right view gives rise to right thought. Right thought gives rise to right speech. Right speech gives rise to right action. Right action gives rise to right livelihood. Right livelihood gives rise to right effort. Right effort gives rise to right mindfulness. Right mindfulness gives rise to right collectedness. Right collectedness gives rise to right knowledge, right knowledge gives rise to right freedom. So the trainee has eight factors, while the perfected one has ten factors, and here too the eradication of many bad unskillful qualities is fully developed due to right knowledge. In this context, right view comes first. And how does right view come first? For one of right view, wrong view is worn away, and the many bad unskillful qualities that arise because of wrong view are worn away, and because of right view many skillful qualities are fully developed.

And for one of right thought, wrong thought is worn away. For one of right speech, wrong speech is worn away, and for one of right action, wrong action is worn away. For one of right livelihood, wrong livelihood is worn away. For one of right effort, wrong effort is worn away, and for one of right mindfulness, wrong mindfulness is worn away. For one of right collectedness, wrong collectedness is worn away. For one of right knowledge, wrong knowledge is worn away, and for one of right freedom

wrong freedom is worn away, and the many bad unskillful qualities that arise because of the wrong path are worn away, and because of the right noble eightfold path many skillful qualities are fully developed. So there are 20 on the side of the skillful and 20 on the side of the unskillful. This exposition of the teaching on the Great 40 has been rolled forth, and it cannot be rolled back by any ascetic or brahmin or god or Mara or Brahma or by anyone in the world. If any ascetic or brahmin imagines they can criticize and reject the exposition of the teaching on the Great 40, they deserve rebuke and criticism on 10 legitimate grounds in the present life. If such a person criticizes

right view, they praise and honor the ascetics and brahmins who have wrong view. If they criticize right thought, they praise and honor the ascetics and brahmins who have wrong thought. If they criticize right speech, they praise and honor the ascetics and brahmins who have wrong speech. If they criticize right action, they praise and honor the ascetics and Brahmins who have wrong action.

If they criticize right livelihood, they praise and honor the ascetics and Brahmins who have wrong livelihood. If they criticize right effort, they praise and honor the ascetics and Brahmins who have wrong effort. If they criticize right mindfulness, they praise and honor the ascetics and Brahmins who have wrong mindfulness. If they criticize right collectedness, they praise and honor the ascetics and Brahmins who have wrong collectedness. If they criticize right knowledge, they praise and honor the ascetics and Brahmins who have wrong knowledge.

Why is that? For fear of being blamed, criticized, and faulted. That is what the Buddha said. Satisfied, the mendicants were happy with what the Buddha said. So the Buddha here is talking about the Eightfold Path along with the two fruition factors, and he discusses them in a way that divides them into two aspects. The first aspect is for one who is on the path, who has entered the path and is training using the path.

And first and foremost, one must develop right view. As he explains in this sutta, there are two aspects of right view. There is Because that right view that emerges once you understand on an intellectual level what it means to have right view. And that begins with developing a perspective rooted in morality and ethics. So that's one of the three different aspects that divide the Eightfold Path.

You have ethics which are rooted in the five precepts. So before you even start to develop a mind that can be ready for meditation, that can be ready to enter the jhanas through right collectedness, or as I like to call it, affective collectedness, you have to first maintain and keep your precepts. And that begins with sila, or ethics and morality.

And that is determined by your right choice or right thought, and I like to call it as effective choice. And any time you are practicing the six R's, you're practicing it based on right choice or effective choice. Because you bring up a wholesome thought, or you bring up a wholesome memory, and your mind is rooted in a state that is void of any harmless thoughts, or greed, or attachment. And you easily let go of any distractions that arise in the mind. So that's the training that you go through when you practice the six R's, whether it's meditation or in daily living. So it starts with having the correct idea of what it means to practice the six R's, why you're practicing the six R's.

It's to develop a mind that is rooted in ethics, that is rooted in morality, and that allows you to develop right speech or effective speech, right action or effective behavior, and right livelihood or effective living. And what does that mean? That means when you maintain your five precepts, you are automatically acting from right speech, acting from right action, and acting from right livelihood.

If we take the five precepts, you can see that they're inversely related to the five hindrances that arise in one's mind. Now, there are different ways that people might interpret how that might be so, but from my perspective, from my understanding as I have seen it, when we take a look at the five hindrances, we start off with ill will. If you act in a way or have the intent of harming a living being or killing a living being, you are cultivating the hindrance of ill will, and by doing so it will arise in your mind, in your practice, in your meditation.

So that's important, to keep the precept from abstaining from intentionally harming any being through speech, thought, or action. Now you have the hindrance of doubt. Whenever you use false speech, you are tricking other people into believing things that are not true, and you are starting to create a mind or a mindset that develops doubt in others. Because if you begin to trick other people with false speech, the mind begins to think and wonder if others around it are also speaking untruths and tricking the mind, and that also translates in the meditation to doubt in one's own abilities and one's capacities when they're practicing the meditation and daily living.

When we look at sensual craving, that's when one or even sexual misconduct, you are indulging in the five senses, the five physical senses, and that includes sexual misconduct in the sense of indulging in a way that is unwholesome, that creates pain for yourself and for other beings, that is heedless in nature, that creates disturbances in the mind. And whenever this happens, the mind is prone to attach itself to sensual pleasures, to the sixth sense space, and identifies with those six sense space, and by doing that you start to cultivate and develop the unwholesome hindrance of sensual craving. Then you have restlessness that arises from taking what is not given, but by extension that does not mean just stealing physical possessions, that also means that you start to

look for things that are not given. You start to desire or crave credit in terms of something that you may have done and you expect credit for, or you expect more attention from another being, or whatever it might be. It's not just a physical level, but it's also emotional and mental. So anytime you look out for these things and take what is not given, anytime you take credit where it's not due, anytime you look for attention where it's not due, you start to create a restless mind. And of course, when you take possessions from others without asking or without having it been given to you, you start to develop a restless mind from the perspective of conceit.

You start to get rooted in the sense of I, me, and mine. And by doing so, you start to get paranoid in the sense that whatever credit that might have been given to you, which you maybe not deserve, you have the paranoia and restlessness that it might be taken away from you. Likewise for attention or any other physical possessions as well. So it's important to be mindful of these things when it comes to not just physical possessions but how you behave with others in relation to your expectations from others, and making sure that you're not acting out of conceit but you're responding from a mindful perspective. Then you have sloth and torpor. This is when you indulge in intoxicants, and that doesn't mean just alcohol or drugs or things that might make you feel sleepy. It's also anything related to an overindulgence in, for example, social media, television, the media, news, internet, whatever it might be.

And when you do this, even if you're indulging in, say, a stimulant like caffeine or you're overindulging tea and coffee, you're starting to create an imbalance in your neurotransmitters, that's particularly dopamine and serotonin. And when you do this, what happens is you start to lose a balanced mind. Your mind becomes dull and it dampens its abilities to be able to be collected in nature.

So it's important to be mindful of these things as well and refrain from overindulging in anything that could be considered addictive by nature. So these are the five hindrances that one needs to root out by following and keeping and maintaining the five precepts. This is related to morality and ethics. Once you have that, then you can start to develop the right effort.

Now, in this particular sutta, the Buddha talks about right effort in the way of replacing wrong view with right view, wrong thought with right view, wrong speech with right view, so on and so forth, and that's also by extension the four right efforts, or the four effective applications as I like to call them. And first and foremost, that is to prevent any unwholesome qualities of mind to arise. And what that means is, if you are practicing the six R's, as soon as you recognize that there is a wholesome quality of mind, as soon as you realize that you have been distracted, you are further preventing any kind of hindrances or disturbances to continue to distract you from your meditation. Then you have the second effective application, or the second right effort, which is to abandon any existing unwholesome qualities of mind. So if you're doing the six R's process, that's releasing and relaxing the craving that arose from that hindrance.

You release your attention from that hindrance, and so thereby you abandon any power that hindrance might have over your mind. You release it, and then you relax the mind and body, the tension that is there in mind and body, and that creates an open, spacious mindset which is prone towards more wholesome states of mind. So the third right effort, or the third effective application, is to bring up wholesome qualities of mind, and how you do that is by bringing up a smile in the 6R's process. So if you notice that you've stopped smiling, for example, you come back to bringing up a smile.

And then you come back to whatever your object is, whether it's loving kindness, whether it's compassion, whether it's joy or tranquility. That is the wholesome quality of mind that you bring up. And then finally, the fourth effective application, which is to maintain that wholesome quality, and that's done by returning to that object of meditation and continuing to stay with it, and then of course repeating if you see that your mind is distracted yet again. So that is the right effort in meditation. But in daily living, it's also the process of seeing in every given moment what sort of choices you are making. Are the choices rooted in right view? Are they rooted in a view that is

wholesome, and that is void of any unwholesome states, that is void of greed, that is void of craving, that is void of aversion, that is void of ill will? You have to be mindful, and so that is the other aspect that the Buddha discusses here. He discusses three things that churn each aspect of the Eightfold Path. One is right view: once you understand what right view and wrong view is, and by extension the other factors of the path, and what are the effective factors of the path, or the right factors of the path, and what are the ineffective factors of the path, or the

wrong factors of the path. By doing this, you develop that right view by using right effort to know what is right and wrong in terms of the factors of the path. And then you do this through mindfulness, which is to say that in every given moment, you are paying attention to where your mind is. You're paying attention to the kind of choices and intentions that are arising in the mind.

So whether that is in thought, action, or speech, the more mindful you are, the better it will be for the mind to be able to choose things that are rooted in wholesome qualities of mind, in actions and speech that are rooted in the Eightfold Path. And by doing so, what you're effectively doing is reconditioning the formations that bind to the intention, that activate a certain type of consciousness, and that influence and condition an intention. So if you're using right mindfulness in daily living, what you're doing is you're able to see and stop the craving before it even arises.

You stop taking personally any sensation or feeling that arises. You stop taking personally any kind of perception that might arise, and any kind of contact that might arise. And by doing so, every time you act, speak, or think in a way that is rooted in the Dhamma, that is rooted in the Noble Eightfold Path, you are effectively conditioning those formations and weakening the formations that would influence and condition an intention that would create a choice that might not be wholesome.

So if you start to choose the effective path, the effective action, in every given moment, you start to strengthen those formations that will give rise to an intention that will allow you to make wholesome choices, choices rooted in the Dhamma, that will then continue to put you on the right path, which is the Eightfold Path. And as you keep doing this, what happens is it becomes an automated process, eventually developing and cultivating and coming to fruition in what is right knowledge and right freedom, or what I like to call it, effective insight and effective release.

And the effective insight, or right knowledge, is the knowledge that the taints are destroyed. Once you know that the taints, or the defilements, or in this case I like to call it a virus, a virus that infects the software of the mind, and those are the taints or defilements or viruses of craving, of sensual craving, of being, and of ignorance, once those three are rooted out, then you know that the work is done, and effectively you come to right freedom or effective release. That is the bliss of nibbana that you experience, the bliss that you experience after, let's say, a cessation of perception and feeling event, and that nibbana that arises and that you make contact with, with the nibbana element. So there is, as the Buddha says in this discourse, two different aspects to this. So we just covered the morality aspect first.

which then develops a mind that is prone to right collectedness, and that is the right samadhi, or the right collectedness, or effective collectedness, and that brings to fruition pragya, or wisdom, or insight, whatever you'd like to call it. So those are the three different aspects, but he divides them into two: the entire Eightfold Path. That is to say, there is an Eightfold Path with defilements in one who is still on the path and training the mind, and one who has achieved the goal, who has become an arahant. And by doing so, one who has completed the path, by rooting out the taints or the defilements or the viruses, is no longer able to act in a way that is not in accordance with the Eightfold Path.

In other words, the Eightfold Path becomes the automatic functioning for an arahant. Their thoughts, if any, that arise are rooted in the brahmaviharas, are rooted in compassion and wisdom and right view. And the ultimate right view that arises when one experiences the fruition, the path and fruition of arahantship, is the right view that is the experiential understanding of the Four Noble Truths. That means one has understood on an intellectual level what the Four Noble Truths are, has developed the path to be able to realize the Four Noble Truths, and finally sees for themselves what those Four Noble Truths are in every given moment, as the links to dependent origination arise up to the level of feeling, and then perception, in the case of an arahant.

And then every time a feeling arises for an arahant, it's the automatic view to see all that arises as being impermanent, as being in flux, and therefore not worth holding on to. And since it's not worth holding on to, it cannot be considered as I, me, or mine. So every time a feeling arises, the arahant doesn't have to let go of the feeling or anything that arises from the feeling. The arahant already understands that the feeling that arises is part of the three characteristics. It is impermanent, it causes suffering, and it's not self.

And therefore, the arahant's mind is never abiding in one thing or another, in the sense of a mind in which case might start to proliferate different kinds of thoughts around a feeling through perception, and then create all kinds of delusions and things that would blind the mind of such an individual. The arahant just sees as it is, without projecting onto it any conceptualizations, because they have completely realized the Four Noble Truths and understood the three symptoms of reality, or the three characteristics of existence. And so

it's important, once again I'll come back to that, is first develop the practice of keeping the precepts. This is why it's always emphasized to keep the precepts, so that when you go into meditation, when you start practicing right collectedness and you start experiencing the jhanas, your mind is purified, and your mind is prone to seclusion, is prone towards nibbana, and is undisturbed by any hindrances.

Do we have any questions? Hello. Yes, I have a question. What about generosity? As far as I know, but the Buddha often taught that as even before Sela. Yes. Generosity is as simple as sharing a smile, for example. Generosity is about being rooted in the brahmaviharas, always sharing your happiness with others first and foremost, sharing your loving kindness with others first and foremost, so that arises from the right choice, or effective choice, which is rooted in a mind that is void of any kind of hatred or greed. So you start developing that loving kindness

and by doing so you're naturally more generous, you're naturally more giving of whatever it might be, whether it's your time, whether it's your effort, whether it's your resources. So that also arises from a mind that is grateful. Gratitude is another important aspect, so gratitude and generosity are more important in developing that wholesome line. Yes, thank you very much. I have one question.

Yes. You know, this question was asked by one of the meditators to one day, I think it was less close ago maybe, and I myself wanted to know. I was born in the Buddhist community. I was born in Burma, so we grew up with five precepts pretty much, so I wasn't even thinking about them. But in the Western society, we were not taught by keeping precepts how important that is, of that. They don't really have guilt about, like, having wine or, you know, talking white guys or stuff like that. An interesting question that the meditator asked was, in that case, like

the guilt in the state arises, I would say yes, but I don't know, if I were, you know, someone asked me that question, I do not know what to answer. So it's really interesting to her. I really enjoy it. So your question is about whether guilt would arise in a mind, let's say, that would not follow the precepts and has no, let's say, understanding of the Dhamma, or has no introduction to the Dhamma.

Correct. For the person who never even knew about this Dhamma, or, you know, about the precepts, keeping the precepts, right, would they even have that? It's not so much guilt, although it can be guilt. But you see, in our modern society, if you say Western society, but I would say it's all over the world, all over the globe now, you see the fruits of not keeping the precepts in the form of stress in a lot of people, in the form of being agitated. Their minds are prone to being in a state of anger, or in a state of aversion, or in a state of sensual craving. So yes, there could be guilt that might arise, but you see the effects of it more so in a society that values, you could say, being on top, that values being number one at the cost of everything else. And so it's more of a competition than cooperation.

So and that translates on a personal level to a mind that is disturbed, that is always active, that is always restless, and that always produces agitation and anger and fear. Makes sense. Thank you. Galsram, if I may, I would be really happy to put some questions on this path. There is a normal eightfold path and a super mundane eightfold path.

I have seen this. And basically there is no distinction as far as it is concerned, in that the supramundane noble eightfold path has to go through the eightfold path that consists of morality. Yes, so that is embedded within the supramundane noble eightfold path, so that whatever arahant does, it has inherently followed the morality aspect, the sila aspect. And there is... that's why I just say there is a distinction being made, that is partaking of merits affected by the uh things, and there is a path that is free from all these. Yes. So I mean, this is that has made some distinction. Is there any kind of

reason why Buddha is kind of making this distinction? I mean, to encourage one to develop mind that is heading towards the supramundane or some sort of noble mind? Yes, just going through the suttas, why there is a distinction. He's talking about two different beings who are on the path: a being who has started the path, who is developing the path and cultivating the path, and in such a being there is still the defilements, there is still some aspect of sensual craving, there is still some craving for existence or craving for being, there is still some ignorance, there is still ignorance, there

and there is still the fetters that are involved, especially the first, well, the five higher fetters rather, so especially conceit. And so whatever that being does, they do that from a level of or a sense of me, a sense of I. And so that's where the fruition of karma starts to arise. It's that that is rooted in some kind of attachment to good deeds, to developing wholesome activities, so that you reap the benefits of those good deeds. And it's only a sense of self that begins to reap those good deeds, that reaps the effects of those good deeds. But in the case of an arahant who has cut off the defilements, who has cut off the taints, they do it without any kind of thought in terms of I am now following this precept, for example, or I am now acting in accordance with the eightfold path. It's just, as you use the word inherent, within the, you could say, quote-unquote personality of an arahant, to be mindful in every given moment and to be situationally aware

where they can act out of the eightfold path, act automatically from the eightfold path, so there's no thought to it of a sense of I am following it. So the distinction is more about the intention behind following that path. And so in the case of one who is still training, who hasn't yet been fully realized, there is still some sense of I there, that I am following this, and therefore expectations of rewards from that. And so there's a sense of attachment to it. But one who has perfected the path doesn't really have even any thought regarding the path itself, in the sense that it's second nature to them. It's as easy as folding your hands or blinking your eyes. It's just an automatic process for an arahant, so without giving any kind of personalised intention or personalised thought to it, they therefore or don't produce any new karma out of it.

- Nelson, I have a question. We heard a few words in terms of samadhi, a synopsis for this susan, and we also heard about connectedness and mindfulness and immersion, and I assume that all those words are being used synonymously. But taking away all of those words, can you just say a few words around just the qualities that we should be cultivating in our mind? Because you know, sometimes these words could point you to slightly different directions, and so I'm wondering if you could elaborate a little bit more on that. Yeah. So first and foremost, especially collectedness, immersion and samadhi, they're all synonymous in what they're pointing out to, and what they're pointing out to is the entrance into the first four rupajhanas, and then by extension the formless jhanas. So the qualities that are developed are basically first having that mindfulness, so you are able to see and be aware of where your mind is at in every given moment

that first helps you create the situation in one's mind to be able to enter into the jhanas. So we'll take, for example, the first jhana. The first jhana has thinking or thought and examination as part of its factors that are involved, and the joy and the bliss and the rapture that arises from it. And one of the easiest ways to come to that sense of joy, that wholesome quality, is through the practice of the brahmaviharas, and by extension, having, let's say, a grateful mind or an attitude that is rooted in gratitude. It creates these wholesome states, and by being aware of them, by being mindful of them, by using your attention, which is what feeds the mind, which is what the nutriment for the mind is, or for anything that arises. So if you pay attention to more wholesome qualities of mind, they will feed off of that attention, grow and start to culminate into the first jhana, which is that bliss and that rapture that arises. But that is with thought and thinking and examination. And as you start to let go of that and get into deeper states

you then let go of thinking and examination and are just in bliss and rapture and joy, and then you let go of even that. So there are two aspects to it. One is to create that cultivated wholesome state, but also having the attitude of renunciation, the attitude of letting go. Now, when I say that, that does not mean you intentionally let go. If a mind is collected in the jhana, if a mind is collected through wholesome thoughts, it is prone to let go naturally. It is prone to renounce any unwholesome activities and thoughts in and of themselves, and it starts to deepen and unravel itself. So all you have to do is observe and practice the 6R's, if you're practicing the 6R's, or in other words, be mindful of any time your mind is distracted, then come back to that collected mind.

So it's not intending any of these things. It's just allowing mind to naturally rest in that wholesomeness. Once you have generated that wholesomeness, you let the mind just relax into it and just keep observing. And that observing is the mindfulness aspect. That observing is maintaining that attention towards, let's say, that object of meditation. But it's also not done in a way that is forceful. You have to do it from a standpoint of enjoying, let's say, that meditation, enjoying being there for the time being. And then mind will start to unfold itself even deeper and deeper as you get into

higher states or the higher jhanas. So essentially it's two things: maintaining, keeping and maintaining wholesome qualities of mind, whatever that may be, and secondly, allowing mind the space to let go through keeping your attention on your object. And then anytime it's no longer on your object, you'll let go of that disturbance and the distraction and come back. And so you're developing, you're exercising, if you will, the muscles of letting go and not grasping. - Thank you. - Are there any more questions or should we share some merit?

I have one question. It's about something from the sutta. It's from a right livelihood, and it's wrong livelihood, and that is pursuing gain with gain. What does that mean? So you have to look at it from the perspective of being, let's say, a monk or being a lay person. As a lay person you can develop your wealth that is rooted in wholesome activities. There's nothing wrong with developing your wealth if it's rooted in wholesome qualities, whereas for a monk to

use material gain that might arise. Essentially that's basically just the four requisites that a monk requires, and it's a matter of not using that for purposes other than the needs of the body that are required when you need it for developing your meditation. If you have the intention of using that for anything other than developing the mind and thereby attaining Nibbana, it would be unwholesome, so it would be wrong for a monk to do that. Yes. Yes, thank you very much. Yes, makes sense. I think we can share some merit. Then we will show a slide so everyone can join in.

May suffering ones be suffering free and the fear struck fearless be. May the grieving shadow grieve and may all beings find relief. May all beings share this merit that we have thus acquired for the acquisitions of all kinds of happiness. May beings inhabiting space and earth, devas and nagas of mighty power share this merit of ours. May they long protect the Buddha's dispensation. Sadhu, Sadhu, Sadhu.