Online Retreat 23 Dec 2021 Group Q & A With Delson Armstrong

We're going to be doing a Q&A today, and you're welcome to ask any questions, but I want to preface this with a small reading from the Samyutta Nikaya. This is Samyutta Nikaya 56.10, and it's called "Pointless Talk." Bhikkhus, do not engage in the various kinds of pointless talk, that is, talk about kings, thieves, and ministers of state; talk about armies, danger, and wars; talk about food, drink, garments, and beds; talk about garlands and scents; talk about relations, vehicles, villages, towns, cities, and countries; talk about women, and talk about heroes; street talk and talk by the well; talk about those departed and days gone by; rambling chit-chat; speculation about the world and about the sea; talk about becoming this or that. For what reason? Because this talk is unbeneficial, irrelevant to the fundamentals of the holy life or the practice,

and does not lead to revulsion, to dispassion, to cessation. Revulsion also means disenchanting, to peace, to direct knowledge, to awakening, to nibbana. When you talk, because you should talk about this is suffering, you should talk about this is the origin of suffering, you should talk about this is the cessation of suffering, you should talk about this is the way leading to the cessation of suffering. For what reasons? Because, Bhikkhus, this talk is beneficial, relevant to the fundamentals of the practice, and leads to disenchantment, dispassion, cessation, to peace, to direct knowledge, to awakening, to nibbana. Therefore, Bhikkhus, an exertion should be made to understand this is suffering; an exertion should be made to understand this is the origin of suffering; an exertion should be made to understand this is the cessation of suffering; an exertion should be made to understand this is the way leading to the cessation of suffering.

So, with that preface, you are all welcome to ask whatever questions you'd like under those parameters. The most difficult precept is to follow the purity of speech. So, in daily life, when one is confronted with people, or people or situations, who seem to provoke one towards impure speech, how to deal with it? Right. So first you need to have right intention. The right intention consists of three things. First, you want to have the ability to let go of any outcome or expectation of an outcome, expectation of what should be and what should not be. So this is called nekkhamma in Pali. It also means renunciation. And you should be having loving kindness, or non-ill will, and compassion, or non-cruelty.

Now, when it comes to right speech, you also want to keep in mind this particular acronym, which I often use. It's very simple to remember. It is THINK, T-H-I-N-K. THINK. T stands for timeliness: is it the right time to say what you want to say, what you're about to say? H is for honesty: is it truthful, is it factual, do you know it to be a fact? I is for intention: is the intention there wholesome or unwholesome? So again, does it come from right intention? N is for necessity: is it necessary to speak, for the benefit of yourself and those involved? And K is for kindness.

And what you say, or you're about to say, should be rooted in loving kindness. Can it be said in a soft, gentle, loving, and kind manner, rather than reciprocating the conflict, reciprocating any kind of resistance or aversion that might be arising from others? So anytime you're about to speak, take a couple of seconds of pause, because this really allows the mind to settle in with what is being said by the other party or parties, and you have a chance to notice in your mind: is there any craving, is there any aversion, is there any resistance, is there any annoyance, or is the mind spacious and open and filled with loving kindness, or filled with equanimity, whatever it might be.

And if it is in a reactive state, in a reactionary state, you can notice the tension arising in the mind and in the body when you want to say something and reciprocate the angry, you know, conflict and strife-filled words that are being said by others. When you notice that arising, don't react, just see it for what it is, and use the 6R's to let go. In a couple of seconds you just let go, take a pause, and allow the mind to recover from that, if there is some kind of temptation to speak in a disharmonious manner.

Notice if what you're about to say fulfills the parameters of THINK, T-H-I-N-K, and then speak. It really takes no more than two or three seconds for you to just wait, take a pause, and instead of reacting, you respond. Reaction and reactiveness come from craving, come from needing to be right rather than getting it right. It comes from this sense of conceit, that I have to be right or I have to have the upper hand here. But if you let go of that and see if what you're about to say is going to give yourself peace and it's going to give others peace, and if it is, and if it fulfills the THINK acronym, then go ahead and respond.

Another question is: do all the four stages of nibbana occur in sequence, or can one attain directly the second, third, or fourth stage? Well, it depends. Because if somebody has already been a sotapanna in a previous life, for example, and they've already had fruition, and they come back to this life, they will just have sakadagami. So it's not necessary that they attain sotapanna in this life if they've already attained it before, or if they have attained

you know, if they've just attained sotapanna in the previous life, then they will attain sakadagami, and they have the ability to attain anagami. So it's not necessary that one has to enter into the stream, because one might have already entered the stream. And how do you know if somebody's entered into the stream? By their behavior, by their actions, by their speech, by their inclinations. You start to see that such a person is inclined towards the Dhamma from a very early age, not that they're inculcated by their parents or by elders, but they just have a genuine natural interest towards the Dhamma. It's very easy for them to experience a lot of these states and absorb the information about the Dhamma, and from the get-go they really won't have any doubt. They won't have any interest in rites and rituals, and they won't have any belief in the soul, they won't have any belief in the personal self. It's quite possible that such a person will just attain, obviously, sakadagami. But usually, because of the way the mind is in today's world

in today's reality, it will be in successive, progressive stages of attainment. So one will go from sotapanna to sakadagami to anagami. And then, may I ask two more questions? If yes, go ahead. What is the difference between magga and phala, that is, path and fruition? Yeah. So path is really the moment where, let's say, you enter the stream. That's the moment where you actually break the fetters, the first three factors. The fruition is an experience like path, but it's a confirmatory experience. In other words, it sets in, it locks in the experience, if somebody enters path.

If they enter magga but they don't attain fruition yet, then they are bound for fruition when they pass on from this life. Let's say somebody had sakadagami path, but they died or they didn't attain fruition in that life. When they die, they will attain fruition of sakadagami. And I have read somewhere: how true is it that when the student is ready, the teacher appears? Yeah. I can say from my own personal experience that that seems to be the case. There is something to be said about a person's mindset that is inclined towards the teaching, inclined towards understanding the Dhamma and wanting to know more deeply the principles of the Dhamma.

Where they, because of that mindset, because of that intention, their choices lead them in the direction of a competent teacher or a competent guide who can help them walk that path and guide them along that path. So I would say it's very much true. In today's world, I would say probably maybe the majority of you, if not everyone, I know from my own self, I got through this practice through YouTube and through Google. So it's not just going to the library or going to different kinds of sangha meetings and things like that. Even just searching something, one thing leads to another, and then the mind immediately opens up and realizes, hey, this is for me, and then one thing leads to another, and you have the experience

Yes, that has happened. Like, some questions arise and I get some answers from some source. Thank you. Till now I did not hear the text from the Buddha on his son Rahula about brahma viharas, and I wonder, I wonder if that came because you have a different... you do not go via Visuddhimagga but to the earliest text. Is that correct? Yeah. The thing about it, because, yeah, or that you can say something about it? Yeah. The thing is, you know, I don't pre-select the Dhamma talks anymore, so it's just a matter of what seems to be best suited for that particular day. Before, when I used to do Dhamma talks, I would have, for example, the Mind Without Craving program. It was all pre-selected to follow some kind of pattern of understanding. But nowadays, when I'm going to be doing more live Dhamma talks for each retreat, it might be that I might choose to do instructions to Rahula about loving kindness. It just didn't seem relevant at that point, because based on everybody's interviews

based on individual interviews, there came to be a decision that let's do this particular sutta based on their experiences. So it's not like it'll be an overgeneralized sort of sutta for everybody. It'll just be something that seems to fit the mindset for that particular day. Dhammatang, because I never heard that the Buddha was speaking about them. Yeah. Because the text from the sutta on metta is also not from the Buddha himself, is it? It was already a text, it was already known. They told, which one are you referring to? Which one are you referring to? Karaniya Metta Sutta? Oh yes, yes. Karaniya, and that's from the Sutta Nipata, I think, 1.8, which I think might be attributed to the Buddha. I'm not sure, I might be wrong on that, but they say that it already existed and that the Buddha is using it. But I never heard that the Buddha had spoken to his son, and it is very beautiful, I think. Yes, yes. That's one of the suttas that I like to use.

When suitable, because it really goes through the whole path. It talks about how to use metta, but it also talks about sila. It also talks about meditation, and it also talks about nibbana at the very end. So it's a pretty all-encompassing sutta. But the other thing is, are you going... the source is more in the early teachings of the Buddha? Are you primarily... primarily yes, primarily. Most of the teachings will come from Majjhima Nikaya, because they're a good length to discuss, and there's a lot of topics that you can pick from, but I'm not limited to that. Sometimes I'll choose Samyutta Nikaya, sometimes I'll choose something from Anguttara, and then sometimes even Digha Nikaya. Okay, it's okay. So the question is, what sutta number is the Karaniya Metta Sutta, Sutta Nipata 1.8?

Do you know how and in what circumstances the Buddha first introduced the Brahma Viharas? Because I remember a story of a couple of monks going deep into the forest and staying there overnight, and they were suffering from fear of ghosts and all those sort of things, and the Buddha taught them loving kindness to counter the fear. Yeah, yeah, that's the story. I've also heard, but I've also heard another story in which the brahmins approached the Buddha and said, is there a way, is there a direct path leading to

the Brahma, because that was for them the highest. And so he gave them instructions on the Brahma Viharas as well. So I think there's a couple of stories about how the Buddha tried talking about the Brahma Viharas. But in a lot of sutras you'll see, when the Buddha talks about different meditation objects, he'll always, more often than not, include the Brahma Viharas at some point or another. It's like he'll say something like, "And such a bhikkhu will above and below and all around pervade with loving kindness." And he calls this the immeasurable samadhi, the immeasurable meditation, because after you start radiating you do experience the immeasurable experience of infinite space, and so on and so forth.

But also, often I heard that it is just the difference between the metta meditation and the vipassana, and that metta will not lead to cessation, but it looks... Well, yeah, it's interesting. I would say metta itself doesn't directly lead to cessation. Rather, if you start to progress on this path, the gradual transition will be from metta to karuna, then karuna to mudita, then mudita to upekkha. And then from upekkha, the pabhassara citta, quiet mind, luminous mind, which is always radiant after having gone through these refined states of the different jhanas. And then from there, it is conjoined with insight. All throughout the practice you have insights still going on, in the sense of understanding how mind's attention moves, understanding when craving arises and how craving ceases, and so on.

so meta itself it will not lead you to um freedom of mind it will lead to a pleasant abiding for sure but progressively with matter being the start it will take you to ibana even the meta sutta the the one we were just talking about 1.8 and it says in the end that one develops wisdom after having perfected metal and then from their experiences nirvana yeah maybe to add that it's still possible in every jhana to attain nirvana but what delson is explaining is the general tendency to go to increasingly more subtle levels of mind then the radiating stops we also tell you that it stops that is the end of the brahma viharas and then it goes to neither perception or non-perception and then cessation but still you have the opportunity when the insight is there when the lack of craving is there to attain nibbana even in the first or second or third or whatever jhana yes what was the pali term again for quiet mind i would say i i am saying that it is papasara chitta papasara means luminous in chitta of course mine

So that's how you spell it: P-A-B-H-A-S-S-A-R-A, pabhassara. So you are saying, once metta meditation is ripened, it goes naturally to karuna and mudita and upekkha. So for that we don't have to intentionally practice, right? That's what I understand. That's correct. What you will see is, when you start radiating the metta, you start to experience it accompanied by that infinite space. Yeah, and eventually you'll see a change in the quality of the feeling. It starts to get softer, and then that turns into compassion, then eventually that turns into mudita, and then that transitions into equanimity. You don't have to

create any intention of that. You just watch how it changes. Okay, but be aware of the tone of the feeling, you mean? Yes, yes. When you have collectedness and mindfulness as you're going through the jhanas, do they kind of go up evenly, or is it possible that you could be going through jhanas but your mindfulness is still slipping? Can they be kind of uneven? No. I would say that the jhanas, when you are in jhana, then that means that you possess all of the enlightenment factors. Now, if your mindfulness starts to slip and then it leads to where the mind is inattentive, then you're no longer in jhana. Jhana will always mean that there are present enlightenment factors, including mindfulness, to one degree or another. Okay, what are your minimum criteria for a meditative state to be called jhana? They have to be the jhana factors. The relevant jhana factors have to be present.

Yes, the relevant jhana factors. I would also say no hindrance is present, and the enlightenment factors are present to one degree or another. That would be the minimum. And if you start to see that the collectedness becomes so strong, then you are losing the equanimity, you're losing the other factors. So if you go back to Anupada Sutta, Majjhima Nikaya 111, there it's really talking about all of the different factors that are present in each of the jhanas. Now, the jhana factors themselves change when you go through each of the jhanas, and then in the arupa jhanas, in terms of the piti, it disappears in the third jhana, the sukha disappears in the fourth jhana, and so on and so forth. But there are certain factors that are always present, and these are, for example, contact, feeling, perception, intention, attention. That is the nama, the mentality.

the the enthusiasm the zeal that is the chanda the decision making the adhi mocha the resolution the um equanimity uh mindfulness um and other factors which are always repeated because they're still present in every jhana it's only in the eighth uh jhana in the neither perception or non-perception you'll notice that sariputta said or it says that sariputta reflected on the states that were present that's why when we have some instruction to you in in the individual interviews we suggest to look back on what happened because then you're actually reviewing what were what was present in terms of what are their hindrances there were their formations there what was uh you know what was more was it more restlessness or was it balanced or was there more slot and torpor and so on and so forth and then very multi-six are that so in terms of neither perception non-perception it is very difficult to kind of locate when the contact happens when the feeling happens when the perception happens or where there is attention or where there is the decision making, where is the resolution, and so on.

But when you reflect back, you'll be able to see all of these things much clearer. You've used the stock phrases for the jhanas several times in your talks, and so they go like, "I've got them here: quite secluded from sense pleasures, secluded from unwholesome states, one enters and dwells in the first jhana," for example, "which is accompanied by..." etc. Then typically these stock phrases continue by saying something like, "One drenches, steeps, saturates and suffuses one's body with this rapture and happiness born of seclusion," etc., so that there's no part of one's entire body which is not suffused

by this rapture and happiness. How do you interpret that part of the stock phrase? So, I know there are some suttas that talk about it in this way, and I know there have been some interpretations which take that to mean that the mind becomes very concentrated with the jhana factors, that the joy is suffused within the body, and so on. But when they talk about the body, I wonder if they're really talking about the body itself, or if they're talking about the kaya, because you have rupa and then you have kaya. Kaya being the mentality, the mental body, meaning the entire mind is pervaded with this loving kindness, or with karuna, or whatever it might

be. And of course some people do experience it, it's just because of the way their faculties are or have been developed, that they are able to experience quite almost overwhelming levels of piti, and it can be quite pervasive throughout the body. But that's not the object there. It's just one of the sensations or factors that co-arise with having become collected around the object. Here, it sounds like the phrase seems very active. Is it just something you do? Yeah, does this "steeps, one drenches, one"... Yeah, yeah. It does sound very active, actually, because it does say that they intentionally suffuse, they intentionally drench. But again, like I said, the way I see that is that the mind becomes more and more collected, so the mind, or the intention there, is to suffuse the mind with loving kindness. I don't know if it's really the entire body or if it is felt in the entire body in terms of the physical materiality, the rupa. I'd have to go back to the Pali, but I'm venturing to guess that it's probably more to do with kaya, which is always related with the mental body or the mind itself.

Okay, somewhat related. If one were to do a much longer retreat, would you recommend getting to quiet mind as soon as possible and staying there as long as possible, or would you recommend what other teachers recommend, for... for January? Oh, you just went on mute there. At what point did I go on mute? What did you miss? I'll just repeat it, as I know what you said: as other teachers recommend, and then right after that you went on mute. Okay, so they recommend, actually, spending maybe the first weeks if you're doing a month retreat, spend maybe the first two weeks really deepening your concentration by just staying with the anapanasati, even if you feel the jhana coming up. Six are it, keep building that concentration before you enter the jhana. And that's actually also my own experience, that if you want to deepen your jhana, it's easier to do that by first building deeper concentration. You are using anapanasati or metta, for example.

and then entering the jhanas then trying to deepen them while you're in the jhana. Well, I would say that if you have such a long retreat, if let's say you do a two week or three week or one month retreat, I would say that if you want to experiment and just really get in touch with the different factors of the jhana, you're welcome to do that just to get an understanding of what's going on in each process. That only provides further insight, that only provides further experience of what you can recognize as being a jhanic factor and what is not a jhanic factor. But the way I see this whole process is it's very much an integrated process.

So the jhana factors develop, or in my own experience and in many other people's experience who've done this practice for some time, is that the jhana factors co-arise with becoming collected. So as you start to develop your concentration to an extent where the mind's attention is no longer scattered but at the same time there's not one point in focus, you do start to notice, oh, here is the piti. You start to notice, oh, here is the sukha. You start to notice, oh, here is the equanimity, and in the fourth jhana, the mindfulness and so on and so forth.

So just experiment on what works for you best. But if you had a shorter retreat, like if you had an extra 10 days after this, my suggestion is continue with progressing how you did before. In other words, if you were in quiet mind, spend more time in quiet mind, spend more time in cultivating the experience of quiet mind so that you achieve deeper levels of disenchantment, dispassion, which leads to cessation. Thank you. Maybe to add that, I feel that a lot of people are already quite analytical

and then what you are describing is very much a trying and a doing and getting it right before you start the true meditation, but when you are meditating the collectedness becomes stronger because you keep letting go, and mindfulness will sharpen because you keep recognizing when the mind is distracted. So without trying or doing or changing or tweaking, when you practice it happens by itself. The collectedness will become very strong and the mindfulness will become very sharp, even when not trying to do first anapanasati or whatever it is. I would tend to say that it would be better to just accept that this is very much a gentle practice where you don't do anything, where it develops by itself.

And it doesn't matter in which jhana you are or whatever jhana factors there are, because for this meditation it's not even important to know where you are. The mind guides you, and it becomes stronger and more balanced by itself. Yes, thank you. Earlier you mentioned a little bit about YouTube, where you're finding teachers and so on. On YouTube there are a number of guided meditations related to this, like with Dhammasuka and Suttavada, but there was one that I saw that you guided, that was the five aggregates. I'm just wondering, not to veer off what we're doing, but what is there a utility in that guided meditation?

regarding what we're doing now. Yeah, especially since if you're starting to get into quiet mind, there is some utility in it. I'll give you a little background on how that particular recording happened. It was not actually intended to be public, but here we are. It is now public and it's fine, but it's not a big deal. Somebody, a monastic, had basically asked, could you do a small guided meditation for understanding the five aggregates? So it became available on YouTube, and there was one particular individual who actually went through that process, really following the way it was instructed in that meditation.

And they quickly went to quiet mind. So that's obviously just one person, so obviously that doesn't prove either here or there, but if you want to try it you can see what it leads to. It might lead you to being, you know, in a state of quiet mind or in a state that is quite open in terms of that quiet mind. But what was the intention behind it when it was recorded was to really understand the five aggregates in terms of their three characteristics: understanding the five aggregates as being impermanent because they continually arise and pass away, and then therefore not holding on to it, and seeing it as being impersonal, seeing each of the five aggregates as being impersonal. So if you want, you can definitely take a listen and see if it has any benefit for you. Another follow-up question, which is like this, there was a question I've read before about whether one

does metta while syncing it with the breath, and that was not to be done. You just keep it like apples and oranges, right? Just keep it simple. I found it kind of shocking. You're not trying to really go through this whole process. It's just stepping stones. It's not don't get hung up on one thing, it's just, okay, you're done, do this, do this, do this. But some practices, even not related to this, they combine a lot of things together.

So there's a lot of things. What happens there if somebody does combine things like breathing and metta and so on? Is there a kind of veer to different outcomes or something? I would say that, if we talked about this a couple of days ago, about how this particular practice is a very deconstructive practice, so we're not adding a lot of things to it. We're trying to just see how things unfold in terms of the mind, but using one object at a time, which naturally unfolds into another object. Bhante Vimalaramsi talks about it in the sense that each of these are just separate meditations. Metta is one meditation, karuna is one meditation. It's just the transitions from one object to the next object, but there's no intention here to sync two objects of meditation at the same time. If you really think about it, at the very subtlest level of mind, mind can only think of one thought at a time. So you're either aware of the breath or you're aware of metta, but you can't be aware of both at the same time.

And that just creates this ping pong at the micro level, of going back and forth between the breath and metta. Even though on the very mental level, or let's say at the level of where you're perceiving things, you feel like, or someone feels like, as if the breath is being suffused with metta, or they feel like they are experiencing metta in concordance with the breath, it would not be the case. It would actually be jumping back and forth between breath awareness of breath and awareness of metta, and then away. So I would say, if you want to do the breathing, anapanasati, then just do the anapanasati, or if you want to do the metta, just do the metta. And if you start to see that you're starting to become

synchronous with the metta and the breath, then you have to de-link those, you have to divorce them, so that you just stay with the metta or you just stay with the breath. It will be more beneficial for you in the long term if you just stick with one object. Thank you. You're welcome. Would you agree that this early Buddhist meditation works from the heart up, and everything downwards is discarded, like the Buddha says the body is like repulsive and stuff? I wonder because I've always had a tendency to be ungrounded. It's one thing to be like that in the meditation, but if you walk around all the time feeling a bit ungrounded, I've done the practice before, breathing into the lower belly to try to get the energy down.

And do you think that would be bad for this practice if I do it at other times, maybe not in retreat, but at least when I'm out of retreat? Yeah, no, I'll tell you what. Sometimes what happens is the energy becomes unbalanced, where somebody has less grounded energy. So this is something that happened while somebody was on retreat with Bhante, or I think at some point in time with Bhante, and what Bhante said was, actually, if you're ungrounded, if your energy is too

elevated to a point. Yeah, what he recommended was they go and have a mud bath, so do something that grounds you, literally grounds you. He had her take dirt and just put it on her arms, all around her body and limbs and things like that, because that literally earths you. That earth literally grounds you. You're getting in touch with the earth element, which is a very coarse and grounding element. So if you start to get into this territory where you're starting to feel floaty and things like that, then that is you're getting into the air element, getting into the space element. So when that happens, do things that ground you. Maybe going out for a walk, or sitting, or walking barefoot is also actually really good. It feels really great to, well, at this point you can obviously hug the trees. You can hug the trees. Yeah, if you want to hug the trees, I think that would be nice. But do something that grounds you in terms of just being centered.

And I would say if somebody is feeling quite ungrounded, then there's a point where the mind is starting to really push out the compassion, push out the metta. If you're pushing out, you're going to notice that there's imbalance in the mind, and it starts to become quite elevated, quite ungrounded. But if you just observe, this is what I've told other people: when you're doing the radiating, the attention should be 70 on the feeling, the object, with the intention of radiating. So if you are pushing it out, then your attention is more on radiating, which can make you feel spacey or spacious.

or too spacious but if you pull back a little bit and stay in the center of the metta, stay in the center of the compassion, and just watch how it just starts to bubble out, but staying rooted in the experience of the metta rather than getting out towards radiating in the directions. That will help as well. Okay, thank you. And then I wonder if you can say something about the difference between a guru and a spiritual friend. Did the concept of guru, that didn't exist at the time of the Buddha?

A guru, guru basically is a Sanskrit word which means one who dispels darkness. That's somebody who sheds light on a subject. So guru has become this, because it's a non-English word, it sounds exotic, and it sounds all very, you know, highfalutin, but it just basically means teacher, somebody who dispels your ignorance of something. So you could have a wonderful mechanic who's a car guru. You could have somebody who's really great in software, and you have a software guru. Or you have somebody who's really great at, you know, riding a horse, and they're a horse riding guru, right? So guru in a general term denotes somebody who's a teacher, somebody who helps you along the path. But the notion of the guru as it's understood now, as being this spiritually elevated spiritual teacher and things like that, they did exist in the Buddha's time, but not within the Buddhist community. So the idea wasn't that, for example, the arahants were gurus, or that Sariputta or Moggallana were gurus. They were just guiding students or participants, or those who came into

the going forth and helping them along the path. So in Buddhism, or at the time of the Buddha, the only teacher that was there was the Buddha. The idea that there was a spiritual hierarchy, or that there was a spiritual inheritance from the Buddha, that there was somebody who replaced the Buddha as a teacher, that never happened. Basically it was that the teachings themselves are the teacher. So that's why a few days ago I said, you know, there's no such thing as a Dharma teacher. There's only somebody who's walked the path and helps you along the way. And a spiritual friend is anyone who helps you be uplifted, helps you to be having chanda, having wholesome desire from practice. Anyone who helps you, not only in guiding, they might not even guide you, but they can just encourage you. This is what's known as beautiful friendship. Or spiritual friend is somebody who, within the community, you have a community of people who help you by dispelling certain questions, doubts, and things like that.

and helping you with keeping you motivated, keeping you motivated to be on the path. And if they see that you're starting to head in a different direction which causes you unwholesome states of mind, they'll be there to make suggestions. They'll be there to even point it out and say, hey, why don't you try it this way and let go of that particular practice or let go of that particular way of doing things, because it seems to be causing you pain and suffering. So that would be a spiritual friend. I have the idea that the guru often comes with a bit of a hook. You take the bows and you pray to the lineage and all these kinds of things.

And that is not there with a spiritual frame. No, not at all, not at all. Okay, thank you. You're welcome. Yes, yes. And how should we meditate when we are not well? Say we have fever or body ache or some kind of intense pain? Yeah, I would say. When you're sick, when you have a cold or fever or some kind of intense pain, it's better to rest. It's better to take the prescribed medication if that's going to help you recover faster or alleviate symptoms, but you can still practice the meditation informally, so to speak. You don't have to sit if it doesn't feel comfortable to sit, and if you're lying down and resting you can still radiate love and kindness. You can still radiate compassion. You can still radiate joy. You can still radiate equanimity. And outside of that, you can watch how your mind is responding to these painful feelings of sickness and disease and, you know, being unwell. There are a few suttas, I think it's in the Samyutta Nikaya, on the section about the enlightenment factors.

So, this one, these couple of suttas. There's one sutta where, I believe it's Moggallana or another monk who's not feeling well, and the Buddha gives a discourse on the enlightenment factors and helps him, reminds him how to balance the enlightenment factors, and after a while he becomes well. And there's a point where actually the Buddha himself is unwell and he's sick, and somebody else gives him a talk on the enlightenment factors and balancing the enlightenment factors, and he starts getting well. So, not to say that the enlightenment factors are the be-all and end-all of, you know, curing disease and things like that. Rather, it helps to keep the mind active, keeps the mind balanced, keeps the mind tranquil, keeps the mind collected, which then leads to better meditation, where it doesn't have to be formally sitting. I said you can just continue to radiate, be aware of what's happening in your mind in relation to the painful feelings. It might be. Yeah, I think it might be that one. Yeah, thank you so much. When you're going to sleep, what do you recommend?

uh doing like as you drift off into sleep do you just you can just watch how mind is acting as it slowly yes yes you are so you're mindfully going to sleep you're mindful of what's going on in terms of is the mind active or it's starting to become more and more tranquil it will be challenging at first to be able to maintain mindfulness as you drift into the deeper stages of sleep but it can happen that you start to become lucid even while entering a light level of sleep or even dreaming not this not to the extent that you can control your dreams not that kind of lucid dreaming just being aware that the mind is in a dream state and you can also get to a point where you become aware that the mind is now in deep sleep um and then transitioning from one to the other and then back and forth and so on so as a starting point for that kind of awareness or development of awareness is to just maintain

observation of what's going on in the mind, and that's all you have to do. It's as simple as just observing what is going on right now. Eventually you will drift into sleep, and there won't be any awareness of what's going on exactly, but you start to prolong the awareness and prolong the ability to observe into the deeper stages of sleep if you practice over and over. So in a way you could, I mean, you could do any of the practices, but probably just observing, like being mindful

is the most useful. Yeah, yes, no. There are people who have radiated loving kindness in their sleep. There are people who get into the dream state and they start sending out loving kindness intentionally while they're still in that dream state. So there is that lucidity. It really is developed through that process, but first you want to really strengthen your mindfulness. Yes, related to the former question, I've heard it recommended that you should sleep sitting up, or laying down a little bit, like this, and that makes your awareness more... work well. I mean, I think that's rooted in the dhutanga practices, which are some of the ascetic practices that monastics go through, where they don't lie down at all. Like there's one practice where you have only three postures, but you don't lie down, so even when you're sitting you fall asleep while you're sitting. But it's not recommended for people in the lay life. That is really for people who are monastics, so as a practice it's not really recommended. It's more for developing awareness and things like that.

I've actually asked Monte about the dhutanga practices, and I've asked him, is this something that lay people do? And he says no, it's not something for lay people. It is strictly in the territory of somebody who's a monastic. If they want to develop certain things in terms of the dhutanga practices, they can do that. So I have a few questions, and the first one is about, you talk about quiet mind, and is it one of the eight jhanas, or what is it in Pali? Yes, it is called, which means luminous, right? Yeah, luminous mind, great, bright, radiant, quiet mind. This occurs

primarily in neither perception non-perception so it's it's accompanied with neither perception nor non-perception but that mind can be brought out in doing whatever it is you're doing as your mindfulness mindfulness and collectedness gets sharper and deeper you can actually start to bring in that quiet mind in whatever it is you're doing and you actually start to notice there's no thoughts no vibrations at all that's going on even though you're taking a walk or you're driving or whatever it might be there's just nothing going on there and then vedana there is pleasant or they're not there it is pleasant it is pleasant pleasant in the sense that um

in the sense that it has no suffering. There's no dukkha there. There's no sense of dukkha there, and pleasant not in the sense of it feeling joyful and things like that. It's not pleasant feeling in that sense, but it is a feeling nonetheless that is free of any kind of dukkha because it's quiet. Yes, there's no foam or yeah. Okay, and the next one. Previously there was somebody asking about the big difference between magga and phala, and you said actually in the same life there is a chance that you don't experience phala even after magga. Is it correct what I heard? No, then, if that's the case, I misspoke, because I've always talked about how if you do have phala, you're bound to have fruition. You're bound to have... I'm sorry, if you have magga, yeah, yeah. Bound to have. If you have path, you're bound to have fruition, whether at a next point in your meditation or at the passing on, the dissolution of them. Yeah, but in the same life, right?

Oh yes, in the same life, yeah. In the same life, yeah. So, is it possible that, because once one has reached, for example, sotapanna, but the next life you said this person will go to sakadagami, but then maybe they will experience phala, or in the next life...? No, no, not even that. If they have the path, if they have magga in stream entry and sotapanna, yeah, then when they pass on, before they pass on, they will experience the phala. Yeah, yeah. And then in the next life, next life, yeah, they can go and become a sakadagami. They don't have to experience... they don't experience the phala in the next life. They experience the phala just before they pass on. Okay, so any experience will be the next one in next life, if right? So, I'll give you an example. Yeah, yeah. So I'll give an example: somebody experiences stream entry, but then they don't experience phala until their last moment of that life, and they experience phala, and now when they come into the next existence...

They're already a sotapanna, they already have stream entry, so the next path for them, if they continue to develop, will be sakadagami, the next one. Okay, okay. So, okay, so the only way is to look into what fetters are left? Exactly. Okay. And another question: so when you practise, I am not aware, I don't know well about what is kundalini, or that's not my area. However, when you practise your meditation and your concentration is getting stronger, there can be happening in some place of your body, is more kind of with a lot of energy, warmer, warm, or all these strange things happen, right? So how can you explain? Because normally when I ask in the Burmese tradition, they say it's just piti and observe, that's all I got. But how can you explain? Um, I could explain it in one way, which is from a neuroscientific level, with the caveat that I'm not a neuroscientist.

Okay, so, but I will say that it is possible that when you experience the piti, what's happening is you're getting surges of serotonin in the brain, and serotonin can make you... sorry, Siri suddenly started acting up when I said serotonin, so I had to cancel that. So you have surges of serotonin in the brain, which is accompanied by that piti, and serotonin can make you experience warmth in the hands, warmth in the face, warmth in different parts of the body, even though there's not actually a temperature increase. So, for example, I'll give you a couple of examples. People who take SSRIs, for example different kinds of antidepressants, serotonin reuptake inhibitors... what is it? Serotonin re-uptake inhibitors.

Um, they will experience certain warmth in some parts of the body. That's because there's been a release of the neurotransmitter serotonin. And when people take, for example, ecstasy, when they take what's also known, commonly known as Molly nowadays, which is basically MDMA, it brings a lot of surge of serotonin, and they feel warmth around their chest, they feel warmth around their head, they feel warmth in different parts of the body. But in that case, if they take too much, they actually start overheating. So obviously that's not a recommended thing to do. But I'm saying that when you experience the gigantic factors of piti, and when you experience sukha, there is a surge of dopamine, there is a surge of serotonin, which can translate to a physiological or psychophysiological experience of heat, of warmth, of energy. That's one way of understanding. So how to work with it? Just observe it, just let it go, don't get detached. It'll come, it'll come, and it'll go. It's not... because what happens is eventually that starts to taper off, and then you experience deeper levels of tranquillity.

and equanimity. So now that surge of serotonin has washed off, it's been gone, and now there's just this clarity of mind because of that release. But the actual experience of kundalini, for example, has to do with other things that are happening, depending upon the practice. So kundalini is primarily experienced as this surge of energy up the spine, and that is related with manipulation of the nervous system using certain breathing practices and certain concentration practices that manipulate the different nervous systems, your sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems. And so, when you do that, you're actually activating the vagus nerve, which is one of the longest nerves in the body, which actually runs through the majority of the spinal canal, or, I mean, is accompanied through the spinal canal. So when you're doing that, it feels like there's some kind of heat going on in the body, it feels like there's some kind of energy going on in that body. But at the end of the day, it's dependent upon these breathing practices, it's dependent upon these concentration practices. So people who do experience kundalini, kundalini...

some of them experience some kind of um you know discomforting or uncomfortable sort of releases that happen and some people go through a process of psychosis and things like that because they're ungrounded you know and it just causes haywire in a sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system so there's too much going on which creates hallucinations and creates other things that people experience but that fades away if you stop the practices and you let go of that it fades away and it doesn't have a altering effect if you don't if you choose to discontinue it okay because that could also happen i mean even if it's not they are not following the

official kundalini practice and just doing something else. But I've seen, right, if somebody, if somebody is very concentrated... I mean, it doesn't have to be kundalini practice. If somebody is just really one-pointed in their concentration, that can also bring about an experience where they become very ungrounded, or they start to think that people are speaking to them in the mind. I say this from certain experiences of other people who've done really one-pointed concentration, and they do get eventually into a nervous breakdown or into a psychotic break. But that's because they're suppressing all of those hindrances. That's why. Okay, that's why there's an emphasis in this practice not to do that: to acknowledge the hindrance, to understand that it's there, and then to gently let it go, instead of pushing it with the force of concentration. What that does is it's only building up the energy of that hindrance, and then when you stop your practice, that whole flurry of hindrances arises and manifests as a nervous breakdown, or manifests as whatever it might manifest, that will be unwholesome and uncomfortable for the mind and body.

so maybe the my next question which is related so nowadays the trend people are saying meditation you know the after the mbs are boom now people are talking about like meditation also can cause uh some some problems and at the same time they say meditation that cannot it's not enough so you need you need a psychotherapy and so so or even you should not meditate if you have issues and what do you think about that comment or the trend yeah i the trend i've noticed is especially from my own personal journey let's say through the different practices that those who've done it to such an extent that they become super concentrated they can experience like i i just said before that those nervous breakdowns and things like that and so for those people it's recommended you take a break you want to get back to the meditation afterwards then you want to be able to have a gentler practice and so this whole process that we're talking about is gentler softer more about being open and aware rather than becoming super concentrated

But as far as meditation being the only aid, I would say in the beginning, if somebody has, let's say, some kind of neurological disorder or some kind of psychological disorder, and therapy is recommended, and even medication is recommended, I would say that should be followed. Psychotherapy depends, obviously, on the kind of psychotherapy, but also depends on what kind of meditation has been given. But if it helps to relieve the neurological conditioning, the neurological condition that's there, and then they use meditation in conjunction with that, I see nothing wrong with that. But I don't think for those cases meditation is the only way out. It should be one of the supporting processes for the release of suffering. But if psychotherapy seems to be more important or more beneficial, then the person should take that route, with meditation being a secondary tool.

Okay, so then my next question is, what's the use of being an ariya? Well, if you become an ariya, then you're doing it right. You're doing it. There is obviously in this theory we have this goal, right? Yes. Yes. So, and you know, it's interesting, they can be an ariya, or, if somebody has... oh, I don't know about that. Yeah. So I don't know about that. I don't know about that, because the reason I say that is, first and foremost, when you think about right view, the mundane right view, where we talk about the understanding of karma, the understanding of action and consequence, the understanding that there is gratitude to be there, there's an understanding that there's this world and the world beyond, and so on. The cultivation of that opens up certain things, or certain qualities of mind, that lead to greater empathy. So that empathy is not precluded by being an ariya. Rather, the development and cultivation of empathy, the development and cultivation of compassion, and so on, leads you towards having an attainment, not the other way around.

Okay, so if somebody has certain psychological tendencies, first they have to work with that, start developing their empathy, start developing the wholesome qualities of mind, which can lead to getting into a stage of ariya. Now, that doesn't mean that if somebody is a sotapanna they're completely perfect, they're completely, let's say, cured, or they no longer have any kind of disorders. There might be disorders that might arise. But what I'm venturing to say is that those disorders are easier to manage. Now they're much better managed. And secondly, I will say that in one of the suttas, it talks about how the Buddha says that everybody, until you become an arahant, is

Excuse me, is mentally unwell? Okay. But the degree to which that mental unwellness or that mental issue is there subsides with every subsequent attainment. I know it sounds strange, but the question about, so what is the use of being arya in this world, because obviously this world right now is very opposite direction of what we are practicing and all this philosophy we are learning, right, and how we can use it to the world besides being a Buddhist community? So once you are inside of this Buddhist community or sangha, you have the same idea, you have same goal in life, but we are living in this earth together. So yeah, yeah. But I think we should clarify, when you talk about arya, how do you understand that word? So arya has a without less greed and anger and aversion and then ignorance. Yeah, yeah. So that's the opposite direction of the word. So yeah, yeah.

The way I tend to have a very specific way of looking at arya, because when you look at the sutras and they talk about the noble disciple, which comes from the word arya savaka, what they're saying really is somebody who has attained stream entry at the very least and now is in higher training. So if that's the case, then yes there will be the lessening of greed, there will be the lessening of hatred, there will be the lessening of delusion, but there will be a lessening, not that there will be complete eradication. That only happens once you're an arahant. That's why I say that you might still experience certain disorders even as a sort of panna, but they will be more manageable. You'll be able to manage with them and you'll be able to actually even deal with them, whereas you wouldn't have been able to deal with them before, because there is a shift in the mind to be able to perceive reality in a different way now. And so that alleviates

degrees of suffering. So as you get higher and higher attainments, the degrees of suffering less and less and less, until there's no more mental suffering at home. Yeah, I mean, that I understand, and so what I'm saying is that way of life is working inside of the Buddhist community. So for example, if you're a monk or nun, or you become a teacher, or you live like most of people, they just live in this way with these people, the Dharma friends. But if not, if not, yeah, it's a kind of in the society, it's very hard to live, right? So I'm just changing, I know, I'm just thinking outside of the box. Yeah, yeah.

because obviously we are aiming and we are practicing, but then in general, in the bigger picture. Yeah, yeah. I know. When you start practicing, one thing people notice is when they start to cultivate loving kindness more, when they start to practice the 6R's, and when they start to have these shifts in perception

and shifts in perspective and shifts even in personality, where now they're no longer doing the same unwholesome things that they were doing before. They've lost interest in that. Let's say if we talk about the non-Dhamma practitioners, they start to take notice of it at some point or another, and they want to know what is it that that person might be doing differently, or they might not even ask, but they become inspired. I've had situations where people have had non-practitioners come up to them and say, 'I hear you speak and I see how you react in a positive manner in challenging times. What is it that you're doing? Can you tell me what is it that you're doing?' And that's an opportunity for them to say, 'Hey, well, this is what I'm doing.' And that's it. So this is not a form of preaching the gospel or something like that. This is just leading by example. There's no conceit there to try to change or convert anybody. It's just that people get inspired by seeing that there are actual perceivable

changes in the way that the person is behaving or reacting in situations, and because of that eventually they ask them what is it that they're doing differently, and that's an opportunity for them to say, 'Well, this is what I'm doing.' And then if the person is more interested, then they will see if they want to try to do the practice for themselves. So I think if a person just continues to develop the wholesome qualities of mind and makes an effort to let go of the unwholesome qualities of mind, it will translate for them into a better life, and eventually into a better life for others around them, whether it's their family members or friends or larger social circle or co-workers or whatever it might be. It does have some form of perceivable

radial effect on others around them. Yeah, I hope so. But most of people, they are not living the way of, I mean, their jobs are different than before. That's what I saw too. So I was thinking if they can survive, is a stock broker or you know some other job, if that's even possible, or, you know, because the stream over the grid is so strong. Well, that's the thing. I mean, there's nothing wrong with having a business or being a stock broker or anything like that if you're still, if you're still maintaining precepts, if you're still being wholesome. I mean, there are a couple of sutras where the Buddha talks about how to be a good shopkeeper, how to be a good money manager, how to save your money, and things like that. So some of his discourses were not just for monastics and for the life of just meditation, but even for the general population of lay people. Like, what's a good way to know who's a good friend and who's not a good friend? What's a good way to know

who's a good co-worker and not a good co-worker? What's a good way to save your money? What's a good way to make a profit when you're a shopkeeper, and things like that. So the only thing a person should see after they see some benefit from this practice is to see if their livelihood is wrong livelihood, in the sense that they trade in alcohol, trade in poisons, trade in weapons, trade in human trafficking, trade in meat, things like that.

And one last question. So you heard about Buddha's nature, which is not actually spoken in the Theravada tradition, but experience itself, because one of your talks I heard is this experience of being connectedness with the whole, with the light, there is some other level. But is it something also we can do to have this experience within our vipassana tradition, or is it something else? Infinite space and infinite consciousness. Specifically, infinite space provides the sense of connectedness with the entire universe, so the experience of Buddha nature or the experience of the Brahman or the experience of the dharmakaya, it's also known as

This is really rooted in the experience of infinite space connected with all beings. Yeah, and when you're radiating compassion to all beings in infinite space, you get a sense of connection with the one. It's the sense of everything is unified, even with the open eyes. Even with the open eyes. Yeah. Okay, thank you. You're welcome. Yes, hello, hello. So I have a few questions. It's more intellectual curiosity this time around. So about the piti that we were just talking about, piti, kundalini experiences, things like that, I have felt it in the past, like energy on the base of the spine going up to the brain, and I always wondered, is this, and am I feeling something in the body, or is it just in the mind, or in the map, because the mind has a map of the body, and maybe this is just in the map of the mind? What do you think about this? Every bodily feeling is also mental, so it can be that it is a physical feeling but it is rooted still in the mind.

This kundalini energy also is working with what we call the fire element. That's another reason why you feel, let's say, burning energy or fire, or like a warmth in the body, or a surge of energy in the spine. So it's both physical and mental, in the sense that it is rooted in the experience of the nervous system, centralized at the brain, but you are actually experiencing certain things along the spine because of all the nerves that are there. But so you think there is something happening in the spine, not just in the mind? Right? Exactly. Okay, okay. All right, so the other question.

Do the jhanas change a lot as you deepen the practice? Change a lot in how, you mean, change frequently, or no? I know, I mean, if, let's say, for instance, the first jhana, the way I experience it now as a beginner, is it very different from what you experience, for instance? Yes, it can be, it can be, because your mindfulness becomes sharper and you're able to notice more refined qualities in each factor. As you start to deepen your progress in this process, you will start to notice more clearly the piti. You'll be able to pinpoint when the contact happens. You'll be able to pinpoint, here is the sukha. You'll be able to pinpoint, here is the equanimity, and so on, the different factors. So there is a deepening of the experience.

I know, I know, you practice Tibetan meditation. I have a question about, is the personality change very different between the practices? Yes. The reason being is because in that other practice, the experiences that you get are dependent upon certain things that you do, and then when you lose the awareness of that, so also any kind of personality change there might be, some minute change in terms of perspective, there might be some little change here and there, but it's still dependent upon the experience of, let's say, we talk about rigpa or exhaustion and things like that. But when you have an experience of an attainment where the fetters are gone, it's like black and white, like there is a complete 180 in terms of how you experience that, and it's not dependent upon having to go to a state of mind. It's just that the mind has let go of these fetters and now it just sees things in a different way. Now it's irreversible. So in Tibetan Buddhism they don't have the same attainments.

No, they don't, because they are rooted in the bodhisattva vow, which means that if somebody has taken the bodhisattva vow, they won't go any farther than the eighth jhana. You're freezing, you're freezing up. Sorry, go ahead. No, I was just saying it's surprising, because to me it's surprising. I always thought that these traditions were more or less in the same place, but that's not the case. I see it. Okay, and then one last question. There's another arahant, I know, who does not have mental suffering, but does another have bad feelings despite not having the suffering associated? When you say feeling, like painful sensations, I mean like fear, things like that? No, no, they won't have fear. They won't have anger. They won't have sadness. They won't have grief. Wow, okay, and that's it. And that is a progressive thing along the path.

So not only does the path change the suffering, it also changes the feelings that make the suffering. Because I was wondering, maybe it only changes the suffering, you still have the feelings but you don't have the suffering, but it chases both. Yes, because the fear is associated with mental suffering, or anger, or any other, let's say bad feelings as you put it, is associated with the mental suffering as a reaction to a painful feeling. So an arahant will still experience disease, will still experience illness, will still experience pain in the body, and things like that, but it won't be accompanied by fear of death or irritation or sadness or anything like that. Okay, okay, thank you very much.

so the if i understand correctly so those who are going the bodhisattva path fetters are still there even if they can practice until the sdana yes so in personality there are patterns yes so the bodhisatta the whole bodhisatta path let me let me just clarify a couple of things about the bodhisatta path the idea of taking the bodhisatta vow in certain traditions is this idea that i am going to um postpone my own awakening until all other beings are fully awakened that's that's the traditional understanding at least in in certain traditions the majority of certain traditions but if that was the case and the buddha before he became a buddha was a bodhisatta he became fully awakened then none of us would be here then all beings would have been fully awakened before he became a buddha so somewhere along

history somehow that bodhisatta vow changed in terms of what it's supposed to be because the bodhisatta basically is somebody who's on the path to develop the the paramis or the paramitas to to cultivate the loving kindness to cultivate generosity to cultivate patience to cultivate all the other things that we talk about in terms of the parameters the perfections and eventually they cultivate it to such an extent then eventually they go to to see the heaven and then that's their uh life before they become a human and then become they put that in that particular life so in that whole journey of developing the paramis they are not letting go of the fetters they are they don't attain stream entry they don't attain any of the different attainments they they go through this whole process for many eons and then in their last life they attain the stage of the buddha they rediscover the path they rediscover

how this process works in terms of the four noble truths and have a deep understanding of dependent origination and then become arahats because i mean that's what the buddha did he became an hour he was the first arahat of that time and then everyone else after him became an and Aranhat because of following the same path that he rediscovered. - Because of the vow and big intention to be. - But not the vow to say that, you know, I will postpone my enlightenment until everybody else is enlightened because logically speaking, it doesn't make sense. - Oh, okay. So I had one more question.

think I mentioned before so what if there is a machine or if there is a drug where if there's a surgery which can make you experience Nibbana before that as an enlightenment or you become aria you know because I said no because it's not a noble path but how can you say because I know there are people who are trying to make the on you know those things you know yeah i would say that uh if you have some kind of a artificial intelligence or some kind of machinery or some kind of app or some kind of um medicine or drug that makes you experience the unconditioned or what seems to be the unconditioned that's not going to lead to attaining an attainment it's not going to lead to stream entry the reason being is because that's still dependent upon certain conditions

the unconditioned itself even though you have you have certain processes like when we talk about the upanisha sutta we talk about faith and we talk about promoja we talk about collectiveness and equanimity and all of these are basically dependent leading to a dependent cessation meaning these are the factors leading to the experience of cessation and then from there the unconditioned is experienced because conditions cannot lead to the unconditioned they can only take you so far where everything switches off and then there's the contact with the nibbana element but the the practice leading to that is what's important is vital which means developing the sila developing the samadhi developing the pania meaning cultivating and holds wholesome intentions called cultivating wholesome qualities of mind so that would be always the foundation and the reason why is because that's predicated on knowing how this process works just because somebody has the experience

they don't know how they got to it they don't know what led to that state they don't know what were the processes that they did so there's a gradual path here that leads to that awakening and all of those vital factors are important you can't just have like a miracle drug or some kind of you know thing that you plug into your brain and you have that experience if you did it's just an experience it's still an experience within conditioned existence so that will not change the person it won't i mean they they'll have some amazing experience and they'll for a few days they'll be like wow but then because there hasn't been that reconditioning process through the right effort the same formations rooted in greed hatred and delusion and still come up okay thank you you're welcome

yes so far actually i had been practicing intellectually at levels of this algorithm of contemplating brahma viharas in daily situations not for the meditation session like metta for hatred compassion for suffering mudita when we have jealous or envious feelings and equanimity when situations we think that are out of our control so how to proceed with that exactly that way exactly that way so in other words when you start to notice that there are situations where loving kindness is required then you can intentionalize loving kindness when you see there are situations where people are suffering um and it requires compassion

then you can cultivate compassion in those moments when you start to see that there's a jealous mind or envious mind of somebody else's success then you can cultivate mudita in that moment but also i would say on the flip side you can cultivate mudita as a practice of when somebody does experience some kind of wholesome success make it a point to actually celebrate in that success in your mind so cultivate mudita for that reason and equanimity can be used in any moment it can be used for any situation so i would say your default should always tend towards equanimity because you'll you never know when situations change so if you have a mind that is always equanimous then it keeps you balanced and allows you to have that mindfulness

that is purified by the equanimity to be able to know do i need love and kindness in that moment do i need buddhata in that moment do i need compassion - Thanks. - I kind of hesitated to ask this question 'cause it's, I didn't wanna veer off too much from the subject, but it more has to do with after this retreat i guess when i think for myself like where do i go from here right because i kind of came into this from like the tibetan tradition but then it was kind of i mean i liked it but it was kind of frustrating and i'm more of an apples and oranges kind of guy like i just want what's simple get to the point um and this served it and this is amazing um

but at the same time is like there's still an attachment to i guess the other types of traditions that i felt i still wanted to explore them a bit because there's the what you just explained about the bodhisattva thing was i get a little confused because there's also lamas who have said that you know buddhisattvas are just really talented arhats and i'm like whoa that's pretty simple you know he kind of it was not within the framework of you know what's traditionally understood and i thought you know and and another one said like uh in one course i went to they asked do we really have to take eons of rebirth and uh um this teacher he said well you just hang around as long as you can and then you just cash in you know and so i'm kind of hung up on

is is it like like um um she was saying was is it kind of all the same but like i can kind of see differences but it puts me in it's just like you know for me where where would one go after this what would be a wise choice to do because you have the experience in the different um traditions as well yeah i would say take take this practice that you've been introduced to through this retreat as far as you can take it and when i say the far far as as far as you can take it means at least experiencing cessation for one time because when you experience cessation

I can guarantee you that you will not have that experience in any other tradition. It is something that is going to eradicate any doubt of this eightfold path being the way leading to that cessation experience, because it is so. And this is the problem. I'm, I'm going in that direction, but a lot of people tend to say that it's just this amazing, magnificent experience, and all of this other stuff. And they're not wrong, it's absolutely true. But at the same time, a lot of people will also say, when they experience it, is that it was... was that all? It's like that, actually. It is in the Tibetan tradition somebody said, and it's an interesting thing that they said. I can't remember the name, but I know they were from the Tibetan tradition, and they said enlightenment or awakening is the ego's greatest disappointment, because everybody who talks about what's going on in terms of awakening has all kinds of peripheral stuff. Somebody sees lights, somebody sees an explosion, and somebody else sees fireworks.

Somebody has this attainment and all these other things, but if you can see a drastic reduction in your suffering, that should be your benchmark for how this practice is, or any other practice for that. If it provides clarity in understanding how your cognition works and how it perceives the world, if it provides clarity in being able to understand when suffering arises and how you can let go of it, then you should do that practice, whatever that practice is. But I will say, until you... I mean, you want to continue this practice until you experience cessation at least, because at that point you'll have no doubts whatsoever. At that point you'll say, okay, I have not experienced anything like this before, and now I understand what's going on. My suffering has drastically reduced, and your mind is not at that point inclined to do anything else after that. It won't deviate in other traditions, it just won't, because everything else that you see will be understood as being okay. That's all well and good, but it's not taking me to where what I've experienced.

Because if you do it in this systematic way of sila, samadhi and panya, and then you have the attainment, then there won't be any question about it. It's just a matter of, you know, your commitment level at that point in regards to having the open-mindedness and doing it. As I said, you're free obviously to do whatever you want, anybody is free to do whatever they want. But if you want to use a litmus test, a benchmark, then understand how free your mind is after doing that practice, how much more relaxed you feel, how much more happy you feel, how much more uplifted you feel, and how much reduction of suffering actually has taken place.

I kind of felt the same way too, to take it, to at least take it to the cessation first, at least once. I felt the same as well. And when a teacher says you can spend eons in samsara and then you can cash in whenever you like, that is not actually true, because you would be needing a Buddha to be able to cash in, because you can only cash in when you practice like the Buddha taught, and most of the time there is no Buddha, and the teachings will disappear, and then you can't cash in, however badly everyone would like to. There is no knowledge about how to do that. Yeah, so in other words, take advantage of a Buddha having been, the Dhamma still being there, and take full advantage of it. Get off the wheel of samsara as fast as you can.

Yeah, I would just say, if you are interested in the bodhisattva path, the Lotus Sutra claims that our hearts will go on to become fully enlightened Buddhas. So if that is what you're interested in, I wouldn't worry about it, because if you're still interested in, after our house... and then also I thought about the same. Yeah, they say arahants take conscious rebirth in order out of compassion, and that's, I guess, how they explain how the Buddha was a bodhisattva, that he was actually always a Buddha but was consciously being reborn, and that his parinibbana was actually a kind of skillful means, a kind of allusion to enlightened people. And then the other thing is that that quote is attributed to... well, it's a beautiful quote, and you should find wisdom

from anyone who has wisdom, even if they don't understand themselves. That quote is attributed to Shoyim Trungpa, who has his own set of baggage that goes along with him. But again, the quote is the quote, and it has nothing to do with yourself. Thank you. like to thank Delson and Syl for this retreat and all the support and the advice. It was very inspiring and it's been extremely helpful for me. Thank you very much.

Well, thank you. Thank you for doing all the effort, everybody. You make our jobs so easy. I mean, it's just a matter of telling you, do this or do that, why don't you try this, why don't you try that? You guys are the ones who are actually making the effort, so thank you very much for everybody who's attended and done the work. I would like to thank for something specific, for bringing the suttas alive, because I've never been able to really connect with them, because they're not poetic like the Mahayana and Vajrayana language, but here I really felt the transmission. So thank you. I guess it depends on what place they are being read from.

So thank you, thank you all, thank you very much. It was really quite great having you all here. People had beautiful insights and experiences and progressed all on the path. So, you know, that is basically our only goal, to help you reduce some suffering. That is it. And obviously, yeah, go ahead please. I want to thank you Delson, and I want to thank you Liz, for, of Sil, for that you are so easy, reachable, and so patient with me at least. The real experience of metta I felt. Thank you very much.

It was great for me. Thank you very much, sir, and Delson, and I'm so glad I found my Dhamma, piti and passion back, even if passion is super awesome, and thank you for answering all my questions, and I'm so grateful, and we all are watching you, and so I hope you are leading a good life and wholesome life, and then, because also once, a very beautiful Dhamma teacher sometimes just appoint us, but I hope you keep your protected and then you keep your way pure and wholesome. Yeah, thank you so much.

Shall we share merits? Yes, and of course, before we share merit, obviously I just want to let everybody know you're welcome to, after the retreat, send us an email if you have more questions, if you have any doubts, if you want to just talk about the Dhamma over email, because you might all know that from now until March or April, Suttavada is going into self-retreat mode. Everybody in Suttavada is just going offline for quite some time, but there will still be some access to email, so if anybody still wants to communicate and stay in touch, please do so by email. And obviously, if you've been you've been

on the newsletter list or whatever it might be, the mailing list, you'll get updates on when we're going to be back online. And of course you can't forget Kuhn, who's made this possible. He's the guy who's been working in the background, the architect of the Matrix, like I like to call him. He's always doing this for that. But it's not just Kuhn, it's a whole bunch of people, a whole team, so I'm very grateful for them as well. So thank you all, and share some merit. Thank you, Delson. May all beings be free from suffering, may the fear-struck be fearless, may the grieving find all all great and shed all grief, and may all beings find relief. May all beings share this merit that we have thus acquired for the acquisition 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. Thank you.