Aug 10 Sunday Series -AN10.6-7 Samadhi Sutta & Sariputta

Let me share my screen. This is for everyone. Good. Can you read? Can you see? I can see it. Good. Okay, good. So the sutta we're reading is, well, we're going to be reading two suttas, followed by the other, in the succession of the Book of Tens in Anguttara Nikaya. And it's 10.6 and 10.7. 10.6 is called the Samadhi Sutta, or Collectedness.

And 10.7 is the Sariputta Sutta. They're very similar, you'll see. But they're pointing out to something very interesting. Then the Venerable Ananda approached the Blessed One, paid homage to him, sat down to one side and said to him, Bhante, could a bhikkhu obtain such a state of concentration that he would not be percipient of earth in relation to earth? What do we mean by percipient? He would not be aware of. He would not be recognizing something. There would be no perceptions and specific perceptions.

And it's interesting when it's written in this way, of earth in relation to earth, of water in relation to water, of fire in relation to fire, of air in relation to air. What we're saying is Mulapariya Sutta, which is the root of all things. So it says, one who is unlearned, unskilled in the Dhamma, sees earth in relation to earth, air, you know, the whole elements and everything in relation to them. which means there is a conceiving going on base of the infinity of consciousness in relation to the base of the infinity of consciousness of the base of nothingness in relation to the base of nothingness of the base of neither perception or non-perception in relation to the base of neither perception or non-perception how many of us do this in meditation you know when things are going great oh wow this is wonderful i am doing this i am experiencing infinite space i'm experiencing infinite consciousness experiencing nothingness.

I'm experiencing neither perception nor non-perception. Give me one second. I want to mute this thing here. So yeah, how many times does the mind say, yeah, I've experienced this, and there's this immense sort of, there's a little bit of a pride there. There's a little bit of, like, ownership of that. Like, I'm experiencing this. This is great. This is wonderful. Newbies, for the novices, it's great, you know, because it's a new experience for them. But then what happens is the mind has now created an image of that experience, whether it's the jhanas or the ayatanas, the form jhanas or the formless jhanas. And there's this sort of desire to get there again. And in that desire to get there again, there's a whole lot of trying too hard.

For what? Why? I think, you know, part of it is because when we listen to Dhamma talks, whether it's mine or Bhante's or David's or anybody who's giving a talk on the jhanas, there's a certain kind of image or mindset that is created around it. And this is the double-edged sword of talking about jhanas. The intention, obviously, is to inspire confidence that it is possible to experience it, to give you a certain kind of map, so that you know where you're headed. But it's not to be like, this is what you need to do and this is where you need to go, and if you don't, you're a failure, because that's the mindset that's happening underneath in the subconscious when we try so hard to get to these stages, because we're looking for that relief, we're looking for that experience, we're looking for all of the great things that are talked about in the talk there. Instead, if we just see all experience as just experience, and not relate to it from a core essence of a self, which is illusory, and we are able to understand things as they are

that here is an experience. Okay, I remember, you know, this person talking about it at the Dhamma talk. Maybe this is what it is. As soon as you see that excitement in the mind of, oh, I'm seeing this, you know, relax it. Let it go. Tranquilize it. Bring a microdose, a little dropper of tranquility in the mind and say, okay, no big deal. No big deal. This is something Bhante would always say. Don't make it a big deal.

Don't make a big deal out of it. There should be a certain level of nonchalant kind of expression in the process. What I mean by that is, okay, great, this is happening. Like I said, initially, when new experiences, novel experiences happen, there's a certain kind of, oh, this is amazing. This is interesting. I hope I can recreate this. But the more we want to recreate it, the less it happens. So if we are able to just be in the moment, allow conditions to come up, because we're doing the work, and work is essentially what? Observing and six R'ing. Observing and letting go. The work is to just let go of what? Let go of our misperception of this experiencing belonging to us, or that we are the creators of this experience.

The work is to just get out of the way. You have set up the intention. You have set up the causes and conditions. You have let go of the hindrances. And now it's just being there as things happen. So in the same way, he asks the question of this world in relation to this world, of the other world in relation to the other world, but he would still be percipient. What do we mean by of this world in relation to this world and of the other world in relation to the other world? A couple of ways of looking at it. When we say of this world, meaning our present state of existence on this planet, in this human existence.

The other world can be a future life, a future destination, another place. That's another way of looking at it. But again, those are all conceptual frameworks, human beings with this particular name and form and identity and collection of memories and relationships and kamma and all of these things, that at the end of the day, the only reason they matter is because we make it a big deal.

But if we were to just let that be, because they will be where they are. The reason why they are there, in the way that they're there, is because the mind takes them seriously. The mind takes them as this is me, this is mine, this is myself. Most of the kamma, if not all that we experience, is always because of taking something personally.

Every time I feel like I am hurt, every time I feel like I am disrespected, every time I feel like I am in a conflict with another person, every time I get into a defensive, reactive mode of being, there is a false I there, a false sense of me present. When we are able to just not care, it doesn't mean we are indifferent. It's to see through with disenchantment, the freedom from enchantment, the dispassion, the nonstick mind, where the mind sees that I really don't care because I've seen where this leads. I've seen when I go into this discussion where it leads. I've seen when I go into this central pleasure where it ultimately leads. I see what happens when I react in this way.

There are those cracks in which we still see reactivity. It's because we haven't really learned and become disenchanted enough, dispassionate enough, towards those experiences. And that's just the lesson to be learned. And we recognize that, and we learn to let go of it. We learn to understand what it is. We have all kinds of modalities. One of the modalities is, oh, we should look into the behavior. We should look into the experience. We should look into the trauma. We should look into the trigger.

And I will grant you that it is important to acknowledge and see and understand what is happening. But beyond looking into it, that is to say, beyond that and looking into it, then just trying to figure out, okay, what happened here? Why is it? That's a very surface-level thing. And no matter how deep it feels for us to go into it, it's nothing but propagation and proliferation of the same old nonsense.

The idea here is to acknowledge that it is present, however long that takes you. But remember not to get caught up in it. Have the distance to be able to see it for what it is. Yes, I'm feeling terrible right now. Yes, there's all of this traumatic association with it. Yes, I'm feeling triggered right now. Yes, I'm feeling uncomfortable. I feel tension in the body. I feel my nervous system engaging in a fight or flight mode. I'm experiencing heat, or I'm experiencing anxiety, or I'm experiencing my heart fluttering. I'm experiencing my breath becoming more rapid. I'm experiencing all of these things. As soon as I notice this, this is the mindfulness.

In the four foundations of mindfulness, it also says this: he understands when mind is happy, uplifted, but he also understands when mind is not uplifted. Mind is whatever states are arising. You are just understanding it, acknowledging it, realizing its presence. But then the next step is to let go. And what are we letting go? We are letting go our identification with the experience.

By all means, if you want to try it, go ahead, identify, look into it, analyze it, go nuts with it. You're not going to go anywhere. You're just going to be on the hamster wheel of, oh, I see this trigger. I've chosen to see it. I understand what it is. It's because my father said this when I was five years old. It's because this happened. It's because my mother didn't hug me enough. It's because of this and this and this and this.

Go to it. What you will see at the end of the day is that you are only proliferating the same thing, the crevices of the sankharas, so that you continue to build up and associate those personality traits in the form of clinging and in the form of habitual tendencies. At some point, you will realize and see, why am I doing this? I'm only causing myself more harm. I think I'm solving the problem by going into it. But one day you realize, I'm not interested anymore.

I'd like to just drop it. I'd like to just let it go. And that's when disenchantment sets in. That's when dispassion sets in. And now you go into that dispassionate mode. Doesn't mean you have a lack of compassion. Doesn't mean you have a lack of understanding suffering. Doesn't mean that you don't have empathy for others. But you are at a space of mind nothing affects you nearly as much as it did before.

You have the wisdom mind to see, yeah, been there, done that. I see how this is going to create more suffering. So therefore, I choose not to engage with it. I choose to let it go. And in that is your liberation from the suffering, liberation from the triggers, liberation from the trauma, liberation from anything that is you. And it starts with that attitude of not making it a big deal.

So whether it is in relation to this world, and what do we mean by this world? It could be all of our different things that we bring into this world and we have developed into this world with our sense bases, with our emotions, with our memories, with our whatever it is. And the other world can mean, yes, in relation to the future existence, not only in this. But possibly in other lives. Is that he would not be percipient of any of these things, the four great elements, the four ayatanas of all of the experiences that we're having as humans and the other world.

There is tranquility. This is sublime. There is a transcendental quality to it. That is the stilling of all activities. The formations have slowed down. The formations have stilled. The relinquishing of all acquisitions. There is a total disengagement of all experiences. The realization that this is not me, not mine, not myself becomes deep enough that we don't hold on to a single thing.

The destruction of craving. There is no more going out into something to possess. Desire to hold on to something, or the desire to push away anything, or the desire to even stay in between, or the desire to say, this is me, mine, or myself, to hold on to a standpoint that this is me, mine, or myself. You're looking neither outward, nor inward, nor in between. You have let go of all notions and standpoints from where there can be some kind of craving.

This passion, vairagya, total quote-unquote don't-care attitude, total not-making-it-a-big-deal attitude. Cessation. You become liberated from the thing that bothers you. You become liberated from, on a more transcendental space, and Nibbana. You are free from any further fueling of future existence. So if you truly just embody these qualities and understand and see and experience that mundane Nibbana, whenever you relax and let go, in the mundane world in that moment.

You see the clear, cloudless, blue, expansive sky mind, which is mundane nirvana. Now we'll move on to 10.7. Then the Venerable Ananda approached the Venerable Sariputta and exchanged greetings with him. When they had concluded their greetings and cordial talk, And said to the Venerable Sariputta, He would still be percipient. He could, friend Ananda. But how, friend Sariputta, could he obtain this? such a state of meditation. to the base of the infinity of space, of the base of infinity of consciousness in relation to the base of the infinity of consciousness, of the base of nothingness in relation to the base of nothingness, of the base of neither perception or non-perception in relation to the base of neither perception or non-perception, of this world in relation to this world, of the other world in relation to the other world.

But I was still percipient. But of what was the Venerable Sariputta the percipient? On that occasion, one perception arose and another perception ceased in me. The cessation of existence is Nibbana. The cessation of existence is Nibbana. Just as when a fire of twigs is burning, one spark, one flame arises and another flame ceases. So one perception arose and another perception ceased. So important. Of all of our habitual tendencies, all of our habitual emotional reactions, all of our habitual personalities in that moment.

And more importantly, no more desire for anything beyond what is here in this present moment. Let me be clear on what I mean by that. have goals. It does not mean that we have to be ambitionless. But what it means is that we are completely and utterly in the moment of everything that is arising and passing away. And there is no desire to control the outcome of how things ought to be, should be, must be based on a sense of me, mine, or myself.

There is just this moment and not only just this moment, but there is just a fluidity of moments coming and going with nothing being held onto. Just this is the cessation of suffering. Just this is Nibbana. And it is like we come into that experience and we may not be reflective of that experience. But in the next moment, we become aware: I was free in that moment.

Just as when there is a fire of twigs, one ember, one spark comes up, and that is the experience, and another spark ceases. There is the experience in Nibbana, and then there is the reflective quality of perception that I had this experience. That is why I'm saying the joy, the relief, the seeing of dependent origination, the realization of emptiness, the experience of total joy and bliss and no-thought state, the reflection and realization of that, the seeing of that, is not Nibbana. It is the non-reflective awareness that is conditioned and dependent upon the Nibbana element; that something happened, that I saw, where there is a seer, where there is an experience, there Nibbana cannot be. Simple as that. But when there is a total cessation of experience and experiencer, there is the Nibbana dhatu. And then the realization that there was that experience of Nibbana. That's the ending of that. Thank you, everyone. I'll see you around. Thank you.