Day 1/Talk 1 Introduction to Dependent Origination at the DO Conf. with Delson Armstrong

Yeah, this is going to be different from the usual retreat that you would do, because it's more about an exploration into really the core of the Buddha's teaching, which is dependent origination. Dependent origination is the elaboration of the first two noble truths. The first two noble truths are dukkha, suffering, and the cause and conditions of suffering, which is primarily craving.

So when we talk about dependent origination from ignorance all the way to suffering, what we're saying is this is how suffering arises due to certain causes and conditions. And we'll explore that, and we'll also explore how do you let go of suffering, so that you can experience, or let go of craving, so that you experience the cessation of suffering. So that's the transcendental dependent origination. We have a few days to get into as much as we can, but I have structured this particular symposium in a certain way because I want to talk about the links that a lot of people have challenges really understanding, and specifically bhava, that is being or habitual tendencies and formations. Formations are very important to understand. Sankharas are very important to understand, because that's the way to understand rebirth, that's the way to understand consciousness and how rebirth arises, not only moment to moment but from one lifetime to another. People may not believe it, but we have been around here for a long time. Samsara, samsara

is beginningless. The Buddha tried to look for a beginning, a first cause to samsara, and he was unable to find it, because he kept seeing repeated patterns of different actions, different behaviors, different situations, and it just became tiresome. It was dukkha. So the goal for these few days is to really understand what are those conditions for samsara and how to let go of them and experience nibbana. Let's see if you can do it in four days. It would be a record, but at least you will have certain insights that you can take home with you, to be able to explore them and apply them in your daily practice and daily life. So I'm going to actually read from a Sutta shortly, but I just want to give you some clarity on what we're going to be doing in terms of the structure and in the meditation.

So there is another meditation I want to offer you guys, and it is separate to loving kindness, separate to the Brahma Vihara practice that we generally do. Now, you're welcome to continue with the Brahma Vihara practice however you want to meditate, but I would encourage you to try this meditation that I'm going to show you and talk about now, and then we will do a guided meditation later this evening.

So the reason this meditation came about is because it's rooted in the suttas, and I will be reading the sutta from which this meditation comes. But I want you to understand why I want to introduce this meditation especially to you guys, because you have been meditating for quite some time, and all of you are having some experience with the meditation and other profound insights and so on. So the idea is that in Digha Nikaya 14, there is a section which talks about the Bodhisattva who would become the Vipassi Buddha. And in that section, what it says is that he goes through each of the links of dependent origination.

So he actually contemplates and understands: how does dukkha arise? How does jarah marana arise? How does suffering arise? How do aging and death arise? And using his intuition, using his attention, he's able to go back and see all of the different causes and conditions, all the way up to consciousness. Because he's only contemplating within this particular life. Like I said, when we talk about sankharas, that has to do with rebirth. So he was only looking into this life. So he saw the cessation of those links. He saw the arising of those links. So first he said the arising, arising. That was his profound realization that this is how suffering arises. And then he saw the cessation of that.

And he said, "Cessation, cessation." That was his utterance from profound realization that this is the way to cease suffering. And then he saw the arising and the passing away. Once he understood this, he let go, and then he contemplated the five aggregates. The five aggregates are form, feeling, perception, formations, and consciousness. He saw that these five aggregates are dependently arisen, and that which is dependently arisen is subject to change, is impermanent, because you take away the causes and conditions that led to that, and that ceases. Seeing that these are dependently arisen and seeing that these aggregates are impermanent,

he then saw that indeed these five aggregates are dukkha. They are tiresome, they accumulate suffering, they accumulate karma. Indeed, they themselves are karma; the five aggregates are karma. We'll go into karma a little later, but once he saw that, then he realized that this is not me, this is not mine, this is not myself. This is the realization of anatta, the realization that this whole process is impersonal, that there is no controller here. Having seen that, it said that his mind was liberated from the taints after seeing the conditionality of these five aggregates, and then seeing the three characteristics in a certain way, he became disenchanted. That's the first part: he became disenchanted with the aggregates. That disenchantment led to dispassion, that dispassion led to cessation, and the experience of

freedom. So that's what we're going to be doing. That's the meditation that I'm going to describe to you. So what's happening here is, the goal is that while you're learning about dependent origination, in tandem with that is the meditation on the five aggregates. So the insights that you receive from dependent origination will inform your contemplation of the five aggregates and allow you to let go on a deeper level.

So we will be exploring the first four books in the series. We'll be exploring Dukkha tomorrow, we'll be exploring birth we'll be exploring being becoming existence bhava will be day after tomorrow that's a big one because that's really the vortex where all of the different links come together before it becomes the birth of action so that one we're going to spend a whole day on we'll see how much time we have because there will be some there will possibly be some breakout sessions where everybody will get into groups and you will basically discuss bhava and you will discuss different experiences of bhava and they'll be given you know you'll be given some kind of a

worksheet that you can use and you know i'll spend time with each of these groups and then we'll come back and then we'll have a q a after that the following day we will discuss clinging and clinging will be followed by basically karma and consciousness so we will understand formations we'll understand how consciousness arises will understand how rebirth happens. This is very important to understand because if you see rebirth and you start to let go of the factors of rebirth, you will let go of suffering altogether. You will let go of samsara altogether. So you have to be tired of samsara in order to let go of it. so you have to keep seeing this until your mind becomes disenchanted that's the key if there's one takeaway from this is to understand how to experience disenchantment because there's still some things there that the mind is enchanted with right craving might be let go of aversion might be let go of but there's still conceit and the goal here is to let go of conceit because based on conceit everything else

arises this i this me this mind from there the craving arises from there the aversion arises from there restlessness arises ultimately it's due to ignorance because the mind has lack of mindfulness lack of clarity to be able to be present to have presence of mind to be able to see in that moment that this has nothing to do with the me this has nothing to do with the self so the goal is to be in that space all the time right so that's what we're going to explore these next few

days so in terms of practical stuff before i go into this yeah i see already people are taking notes that's good stuff you're encouraged to take as much notes as you want this is partially a silent experience where for the first part of the day it will be silence so the there will be meditation time there'll be time to just be with yourself do some sitting practice do some walking practice then after lunch we'll get into discussing dependent origination and it'll be opportunities to ask questions now when it comes to questions please make sure that the questions are relevant to whatever it is that i'm discussing right and as much as interesting as it might be please don't hog the time for questions there will actually be an entire section of time where we will just dedicate to questions and answers usually towards the end of the day oh yeah and we will have a special guest who will take us all to hell hopefully not literally That will happen after I discuss karma unconsciousness in the night time.

It will be very spooky. Did we get the dry ice by the way? No. We didn't get the memo. No. Oh, wow. So, yeah, I mean, like any retreat, you know, you guys want to be light. you want to be fun be like little children be playful be joyful try to keep the conversations tied to the Dhamma during lunchtime and whenever you feel like you want to have little breakout sessions keep it oriented towards deeper and deeper understanding of dependent origination that's what you're here

for so like I said you know the practice so I'll get into the practice now the meditation practice I'll do a guided practice later this evening but just to give you the details you will start out with some kind of object of meditation so for everybody here when I do the guided meditation I will start with loving-kindness so you'll start with loving-kindness for the first 10 and 15 minutes to yourself let that keep going and then you start extending it outward pervading it to all beings in all directions and as your mind starts to get quiet then we will get into the contemplative stage of that and then I'll guide you through each of the five aggregates and you start to look for yourself you don't look in the form of analyzing and investigating just look through the process of whatever is arising and understanding it to be you know conditionally arisen understanding it to be impermanent suffering and not worth holding on to as me, mine, or myself.

So that would be the basic practice, and then with the walking or whatever it is you're doing, I would like you to just stay present in your mind and notice what's happening in terms of how your mind is identifying with something that's going on. What are the thoughts that are arising that cause the mind to say that this is mine, or that this is my self, or that this is me? And if you can see that in the six R's, let it go, and just come back to a spacious mind. That will be your everyday practice for the next few days. So when you're doing the walking practice, notice what thoughts are arising, notice how your mind is attuning to whatever is going on. Stay with that emptiness of self, stay with that awareness of anatta, stay with seeing that there is just clarity and nothing else. But if your mind starts to wander, and starts to take things personally, starts to identify with them, starts to see that this is mine, this is me, this is myself.

Six R's. Let that go. Come back to that clarity. Come back to that clarity of not self. So I'm going to read the sutta from where I basically based this meditation on. Just listen carefully, and I'll try to explain it along the way. This sutta is Majjhima Nikaya 147. This is the Cula Rahulovada Sutta, the shorter discourse of advice to Rahula. Thus have I heard: on one occasion the Blessed One was living at Savatthi, in Jetavana Grove, Anathapindika's Park.

Then, while the Blessed One was alone in meditation, a thought arose in his mind: the states that ripen in deliverance have ripened in Rahula. Suppose I were to lead him on further to the destruction of the taints. So the Buddha gathered that Rahula was ripe for deliverance, for freedom. So what is that freedom that we always talk about? What is vimutti, as it is said in Pali? During the time of ancient India, it was already taken for granted that we've been here for many, many, many lifetimes, countless lifetimes. And the Buddha understood that, and he took it a step further, and he said it's not some kind of incarnation that goes from one lifetime to the other. It is a set of causes and conditions that create karma, and then create the conditions for that next rebirth.

So that's why everybody is here in this world, in this existence: because of repetitive patterns of thought, repeated behaviour patterns, repeated relationships, similar kinds of relationships, similar kinds of situations. And we just don't learn from them, and we still have to keep dealing with them until we learn from them. But the problem is, you know, it's like that definition of insanity: keep doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result. That's rebirth. We don't know any better. That's the ignorance. But once you understand it, now you have the tools. You've done this practice for a long time, some of you for decades. You understand how this practice works. You understand how the six R's work. You understand how dependent origination works, to some extent. Now is the key to applying that in every moment. Now is the time to do that, because ultimately, what are you doing this for? Why are you meditating? What are you meditating for? You could probably spend your time doing something else, but you decide to meditate. Why? Because it's peaceful? Because it brings you joy? Because it brings you clarity of mind, gives you better

focus, helps you with your anger issues or depression, or whatever it might be? These are all side benefits to the practice, as you'll see tomorrow when we talk about dukkha. Meditation is a preparation for death. What has happened in rebirth is that over many lifetimes, during the time of death, during the process of dying, the mind forgets and takes things personally, starts to identify with them, and as a result of those formations coming up, the mind takes those personally, clings to them, and there is a further rebirth. What you are doing in the meditation is you are letting go of formations that are rooted in craving, that are rooted in aversion, that are rooted in conceit, that are rooted in ignorance, rooted in wrong view. You are recognizing those formations that manifest as hindrances, as unwholesome states of mind. And then when you let go of them, you are invariably letting go of the fuel that causes those formations to arise. And once you do that, you replace those formations with wholesome formations. Those wholesome formations are rooted in right

view. Those wholesome formations are rooted in letting go, rooted in the path that takes you to the end of suffering. And the point is to keep doing that over and over and over and over until it becomes automatic. And it only becomes automatic if you continue to recondition the mind in this way. So the more you do that, the easier it will become when it's time to let go. And in the final moment when you let go, there will be no more fuel for rebirth, because you will have seen all of that, and you will six R all of that. But that can only happen if you've been doing it as a lifetime practice. This is why there is the emphasis not only in Buddhism, not only in the Dhamma, but in any spiritual tradition, that the five basic precepts are always there. It's because you continue to be

wholesome, because that understanding was there. The more you are wholesome, the more you are able to generate wholesome states of mind. The more automatic that becomes, the more the mind inclines towards the wholesome, and you start to let go of the unwholesome bit by bit by bit. So that's why, when somebody is generous, somebody is grateful, somebody has loving kindness, has compassion, is forgiving, and all of these things over long periods of time in their life, the things that arise in their mind just before they go, before they leave this life, are all of the happy memories of being generous, all of the happy memories of being a good person, of being wholesome. That invariably uplifts the mind, and that allows the person to let go. But because there's still identification with those wholesome states of mind, it takes them to a better destination, but still within the purview of samsara, which means there is still some inherent dukkha there, as we'll see. But ultimately the goal is to get off of the wheel of samsara, because at some point you will realize that you've

been doing this over and over and over again, and it becomes tiresome. So if you start to let go to the point that you have experiences that allow you to drop the fetters bit by bit by bit, and ultimately drop conceit, and then invariably drop ignorance, then you won't have any identification with what arises in those final moments of death. This is the purpose of the practice, so you eliminate rebirth altogether. That's why I don't know how many of you know Venerable Nanananda, but he's a very dear friend of mine. I experimented with this practice on him. I asked him to try out this contemplation practice and see what he thought about it, and he said, this is what you should call this practice: the destroyer of conceit, or the conceit terminator. So with that understanding, you clarify why you're doing this. You're clarifying why it is you're practicing. All of the side benefits will be there. Your mind is wholesome, your mind is uplifted, you have joy, you have clarity, all of that.

But then what happens? You have to come back again, unless you let go of identifying completely. Then when it was morning, the Blessed One, dressed and taking his bowl and outer robe, went into Savatthi for alms. When he had walked for alms in Savatthi and had returned from his alms round, after his meal he addressed the Venerable Rahula thus: "Take your sitting cloth with you." Rahula replied by taking his sitting cloth with him, and he followed close behind the Blessed One.

Now on this occasion many thousands of deities, devas, followed the Blessed One, thinking: today the Blessed One will lead the Venerable Rahula further to the destruction of the taints. So before I go on, I also want to address this. The Buddha understood that the states that ripen in deliverance have ripened in Rahula. What are those states that have ripened in him that allow the mind to completely let

go? He has the brahmaviharas, that's for one thing. He has let go of many of the hindrances. He's let go of many of the fetters. The cultivation of loving kindness, remember, if any of you recall, if you've read that sutta, when he went to Sariputta, he asked Sariputta for meditation instruction, and Sariputta said to focus on the breath. But then the Buddha said, don't do that yet. First focus on the asubha practices. So Rahula has had an extensive experience in different meditation subjects or objects, and because of that he's let go of identifying with the body, or at least understanding that the body is not me, not mine, not myself. Through the asubha practices he's done, breath practice he's done, he's done that, he's done all kinds of practices within the purview of the Dhamma.

But the other states that have ripened in him are, along with the cultivation of loving kindness, along with the cultivation of compassion, along with the cultivation of joy, and along with the cultivation of equanimity, that he has started to experience a deeper level of disenchantment. That's the first step, that's the key to let go completely. So that is dependent upon seeing things as they actually are. In the Pali this is known as yathabhuta jnana dassana. Yathabhuta means things as they actually are, or things that have come to be as they actually are, and jnana means knowledge, dassana means vision, the ability to see and know things clearly as and when they arise. This is basically equanimity: not liking, not disliking, not identifying, just seeing things as they are, in such a way that the mind doesn't get pulled towards them or pushes them away, or takes them as me, mine, or myself. As a result of which there is disenchantment. That disenchantment, as we will see, is going to lead to dispassion, and that dispassion will lead to liberation. And I'll get into that more

And so the devas that were there, the thousands of deities that followed him, thinking today the Blessed One will lead the Venerable Rahula further to the destruction of taints. Then the Blessed One went to the Blind Man's Grove and sat down at the root of a certain tree on a seat made ready. So the devas that were there, the footnote about this says, were relatives in a past life or past lives of Rahula in different lifetimes, and they were there to basically witness something great, which is Rahula becoming an arahant. And we'll see how that happens. The Venerable Rahula paid homage to the Blessed One and sat down at one side. The Blessed One then said to the Venerable Rahula, now this can be in the form of a questionnaire, so if you want to speak up, speak up when I ask this question.

But more than just repeating or answering this question, understand why the answer is that answer. Rahula, what do you think, is the eye permanent or impermanent? Why is it impermanent? Yeah, but why does it arise and pass away? How does it? We don't see it, but the eye is always changing in every moment, right? The eye, you might have had better vision in the past, right? But as you age it starts to weaken. Maybe for some it strengthens, who knows, but it changes. It's subject to change due to causes and conditions. Therefore, it's impermanent.

What do you think, is the eye suffering or happiness? Why? Because it's impermanent. Right. It's not long-lasting. It's not going to give you long-lasting happiness. The eye itself, because it's arising due to causes and conditions, is impermanent, and therefore why would you look at it as a form of happiness? It's inherently going to lead to suffering at some point or the other, even if in that moment it's pleasant. The fact that it changes is dukkha. Change is dukkha. Large bills are not.

Is what is impermanent suffering and subject to change fit to be regarded thus? This is mine, this I am, this is myself. No. Why? First of all, let's understand what he is referring to when he says this is me, or this is mine, this I am, this is myself. He's invariably talking about the notion of a self. So in ancient India there was this idea of a self, the atman. That's why when we talk about anatta, that is anatman, that which is not self, it's not talking about there is self or there is no self. Let's put that aside and understand what this notion of self denotes from the understanding of ancient India. In ancient India, the idea of a self was that which is permanent, and that which is a source of happiness, and that which is all-pervasive.

That is the self. That is the true self, as it would be called. And there were different philosophies in India that interpreted that notion of self in different ways, but this was the basic idea. So using that understanding, you're taking that as the touchstone, and you're trying to see and measure all of these different experiences and ways through which we experience existence. So we talk about the I. We've said the I is impermanent because it's subject to change, dependent upon causes and conditions. And because of that, if it is pleasant, it will change to the unpleasant, and therefore it is suffering. If that's the case, how could you say that this is self, using that notion or concept of self? It's not fit to be regarded as this is mine, this I am, this is myself. So then he asks, so now that's the I, right? That's the sense base of the I. Then he asks, what do you think are forms, permanent or impermanent?

Why? So the forms are also arising due to causes and conditions. Forms are made up of their constituents, right? You try to break down a form to its elementary level, you can't. It just keeps going deeper and deeper and deeper. Right. I take this bowl and I try to investigate it and look through a microscope, and it's made up of solid molecules. And then I try to penetrate deeper into those molecules and I see the atomic structure, and I go deeper into that atomic structure and I see all kinds of particles and subatomic particles and quarks and this and that, but I'm still not getting to the basic root of what it's made up of. The same with our bodies, the same with any form that you're experiencing: it's arising due to causes and conditions, whatever that cause and condition is, but it is creating a composite of what we interpret as form, as something. So you cannot break down anything to its most basic fundamental level and call that the self, because that is what is considered self. It is the all-pervasive foundation of all of existence, yet to be found.

Now, is what is impermanent happiness or suffering? Suffering. Form is also suffering, invariably, because it might be great. Now it might be awesome. You know, buying that new Tesla, you have that joy of driving that new Tesla, it's awesome. What happens six months later? There's a new Tesla, a new model out, and now you compare that one with the other, and now you always find fault in that Tesla that you own, you know. So any kind of form is subject to decay. All form is subject to decay. All elementary particles are subject to decay, maybe at different rates, but they're still subject to decay. Because of that they continue to change, because they decay, because they're not as new as they were when you first saw them or first experienced them. They are invariably suffering. So is what is impermanent and suffering fit to be regarded thus, this I am, this is mine, this is myself? No. What do you think, is eye-consciousness permanent or impermanent? Impermanent.

Why? So let's understand what eye-consciousness is, or any sense-based consciousness. Yeah, yeah, that's right. That's what creates contact. So consciousness depends upon, or sense-base consciousness depends upon, contact between the sense base and its object. So first we talked about the eye, and we understood the eye is impermanent, it's dukkha, and not to be regarded as self. Then we looked at the object, which is the form in relation to the eye, and we saw that too is subject to change, impermanent, and not fit to be said as myself. Now, if the eye-consciousness is dependent upon these two things that are impermanent, could you say that eye-consciousness is permanent? Anything that is dependent upon that which is impermanent is invariably impermanent.

So is what is impermanent suffering or happiness? Suffering. Why? Because it changes. It's not long-lasting. That eye-consciousness that we experience at the level of contact, which is probably going to be the next thing we'll talk about, but that contact arises because of attention. So we have what is known as nama-rupa in the links of dependent origination: mentality and materiality. Materiality is this form, this body, right? That's the four states of matter: solid, liquid, gaseous, and heat. So the components that make up the mentality or mind are contact, feeling, perception, intention, and attention. Each of these represents the five aggregates: feeling for feeling, perception for perception, intention for formations, and through contact with the body is formed, of course.

But attention is associated with consciousness. Where your attention goes, there consciousness flows. So if your attention, now I snap my finger, your attention was on the sound. There was first the vibration in the air, that is the sound vibration, which made contact with the ear, and your attention to that gave rise to the experience of that. But if your attention was not on this and it was something else, even though it's there, the sound is there, your attention is not going to it, there won't be contact with it.

Which means, and you might have experienced this in your own day-to-day routine or life, where for a moment you're watching the television or you're watching something, you know, very enchanting and very fun and everything, and then there's a scene that happens and you're watching that, but then your mind goes somewhere else, and five minutes later, even though your eyes are on the screen, you're like, what happened? How did that guy come up? You know, because your attention went somewhere else. So contact requires these three things: the sense base, the sense object, and the sense consciousness. But if the sense consciousness arises dependent upon the sense base and the sense object, which are already known to be impermanent, then we know that consciousness is also impermanent, and therefore being liable to change, not dependable, not fit to be said as this is me, this is mine, this is myself. What do you think, is eye contact permanent or impermanent?

Impermanent. So why is eye contact impermanent? It's conditioned. What is contact conditioned by? Six sense bases. So what are the six sense bases? Eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind. In the case of here, we're talking about eye contact. So eye contact is dependent upon the eye faculty. But if the eye is impermanent, then obviously the eye contact will also be impermanent. And is what is impermanent suffering or happiness? Suffering, because it continues to change. Your attention continues to go from one place to the other. Your attention is scattered, and that in itself is dukkha. Actually, the mind is in so many different

places. The mind can only do one thing at a time, but somehow it feels like it's still scattered, because your attention goes here, here, here, here, here, here, and it feels like it's in different places at the same time. So attention itself is also dukkha. So can you say that this eye contact is me, mine, or myself? No, because that contact arose due to causes and conditions that had nothing to do with you. Now, yes, there's an intention of paying attention to something else. Like right now, you're seeing me, so there's contact with this form. That is to say, your eyes are making contact with this form, and the light is hitting, bouncing off, hitting the retina, and because there's awareness there,

hopefully you're able to actually see me, and you're able to make contact. Now, you might be seeing right through me if you're paying attention, that's great. Maybe you might be pretending to pay attention and your mind might be somewhere else. So that happens because of causes and conditions as well, where the mind wavers or the attention wavers, and has nothing to do with you. So it cannot be fit to be said as this is me, this is mine, this is myself. There's no controller there. So now he asks, what do you think are any feeling, any perception, any formations, any consciousness that arise with eye contact as conditioned, permanent or

Impermanent, impermanent, because first of all, we already said the eye itself is being impermanent, but he talks about feeling, perception, formations, and consciousness. What are those aggregates? So what is the fifth? So we're talking about the four aggregates here: feeling, perception, formations, and consciousness. What about the form aggregate? What is that formations? I'm sorry, I'm talking about the form aggregate here, in this case. What is he implying? He is implying yes. Yeah, the question was, so we talked about feeling, perception, formations, and consciousness. Those are the four aggregates. What about the aggregate of form? What is he implying there? He's talking about the I itself. So the I here is the form aggregate.

And dependent upon that, the feeling arises, the perception arises, the formations arise, and consciousness arises. What is feeling? "Feeling" is translated from "vedana." "Feeling" is basically any experience that you're having. So, feeling arises dependent upon? Contact. Contact. Take away the contact, the feeling goes away. Same thing. Right now, your eyes are making contact with this form, and there is attention there. There's an awareness of that. And arising from that is the experience of seeing, the experience of seeing me. If you turn your head away and you look at that piano, now the piano is the form, is the sense-based object. And the eye is making contact with that sense-based object. And there is an awareness to that.

Which means what happened? The seeing changed. The feeling changed. The experience changed. You were first experiencing this, and now you're experiencing that. Your attention changed. The contact changes. So, if that's the case, could you say that the feeling or the seeing of one thing is permanent or impermanent? It's impermanent. It keeps changing. All experience keeps changing. What is perception? Perception is the ability to recognize, or recognize in the sense that it's rooted in memory, whatever you've experienced before. I think all of you have seen me somewhere, right, at some point or another, so you can recognize that this guy here sitting on this table is

Delson, so you're putting a name to what it is that you are seeing, what it is that you are experiencing now. For some of you that's a pleasant experience, for some of you that might be a painful experience. So the pleasant experience, knowing it to be pleasant, is the perception. Knowing it to be painful is also perception. Feeling can have a quality, but the quality that you project onto it, or the idea of what you think it to be, is the perception. So this is rooted in concepts, in ideas, in memories, in things that you've learned

that's perception. So for those of you that when you are seeing me it's a painful experience, over time hopefully it'll start to become pleasant as you get to know me. So that means that experience changes, the perception changes, therefore that perception is impermanent. So when that perception is impermanent, it is suffering. Now that perception of whatever it is that you see, and you say that this person is so and so, or that person is so and so, or this experience is so and so, that continues to change, right? So it's impermanent, and so on. But how is it

changing? It's changing due to causes and conditions. For those of you who are having a pleasant experience of seeing me, somebody spreads a rumor about me and the mind listens to that and now it changes the perception. It filters the way you are perceiving me, but you didn't choose to do that. It just happened because you heard it, and now that it's there in the mind, it's there as a memory, and now the perception is there. It's added into the concept and perception of whatever it is that you're experiencing as pleasant, painful, or neutral. So you didn't control it. That's not you. It arose due to external causes and conditions, or even internal causes and conditions. For example, if you think about somebody or you think about a situation that was unpleasant in your life, and your mood is crummy, you feel angry, you feel upset, you don't feel so good, and you think back to that memory, even if it was a happy memory, there is some level of perception that makes it

unpleasant, that memory. But you look at that same memory, or let's say that memory was sad initially, that memory was unpleasant, maybe it was something that hurt you, maybe it was the loss of someone, the loss of a relationship or whatever it is, but if you're in a happy mood and you're in an uplifted mood and you go back to seeing that same unpleasant experience or that unpleasant memory, the mood conditions the way you perceive that memory. So instead of being spiteful and hateful, you look at that and you're more forgiving about it. That's the whole point of forgiveness, right? You look at whatever the experience was, whatever the person did, whatever the situation was. Initially you were holding on to it and you had all kinds of negative, unwholesome ideas about it, but through the conditioning of forgiveness you start to let go, and that same person, that same situation, that same memory, no matter how painful it was, is now no longer a source of internal pain. Now there's compassion for it. Now there's understanding for why or how that arose, and there's ultimately equanimity and acceptance about whatever it is that

happened. So perceptions continue to change. Perceptions are not related to any kind of self as me, mine, or myself. Now, formations, sankharas, the big one. Sankharas are threefold. There is bodily formation, there is verbal formation, and there is mental formation. Due to contact, formations arise. Certain formations will arise. So you will start to see, as we explore dependent origination, that these links are not just linear, but they are interconnected, interdependent, and they feed back to other links prior to them. So the contact arises, as a result of that contact certain formations come up. And what are formations? Formations are carriers of karma. They facilitate the arising of karma from previous choices and intentions. So these formations, if they are bodily, they're related to the inhalation and exhalation.

They're related to different bodily processes. There are ayusankharas that are related to the longevity. Those continue to change dependent upon the contact with the environment and the genes and so on. When we talk about verbal formations, verbal formations are what allow you to express, to reflect, to think about what it is that you are experiencing. And that continues to change. And then mental formations allow you to feel and perceive. These formations are like synapses that allow you to experience the world in whatever way it is. Now, if those formations are conditioned by ignorance, or if they're conditioned by conceit, they're conditioned by craving, conditioned by aversion, conditioned by wrong view, your awareness dependent upon those formations will also be rooted in that craving, in that conceit, in that ignorance, in that wrong view.

and so whatever it is you experience is conditioned by that consciousness, whatever it is you have that attention to words. So formations arise simultaneously, or seemingly simultaneously, and they arise at a rate that is incomprehensible. Right when I do that, there was so much contact going on there. The sound vibration, you know, kept hitting the ear, and there was attention given there constantly, but it looks like one fluid experience of a snap. It's broken down to contact, contact, contact, contact, feeling, feeling, feeling, feeling, but along with that, formations, formations, formations allowing you to experience that. And so from those formations this consciousness arises. If that consciousness is dependent upon those formations, and those formations are dependent upon things that are impermanent, that whole scheme of things is all impermanent. There's no controller there. Formations are also dependent upon your

intentions. Now the thing is, the mind takes those intentions and closely, strongly identifies with them. I chose to do that. I decided to do that. That was my decision, that was my choice. I intended it. Intention also is impersonal. What you think are the choices that you've made are only because of the matrix of causes and conditions that were available to you in that time and space.

They are limited by whatever was available. The illusion of choice. It can only give you so many choices, and based on those choices the intention arises to do this or that. But the problem is the mind says, "I did that. I chose that." That was conditioned by inclinations from the past. Those choices are now almost automatic. Okay, I'm going to give you three choices. I want you to raise your hands for ice cream. How many of you like chocolate? Raise your hands. Oh good, all right, chocolate it is. How many like vanilla? How many like strawberry? But guess what? There's only chocolate and vanilla available. Now, which one will you choose?

It's like a fate worse than death. Right. But you are limited by only those choices. You might like something, you might choose something, but those choices might not be available to you. So your intentions are not you, not yours. They have been conditioned by previous choices, conditioned by previous experiences. Why do you like strawberry ice cream? For whatever it is. You have an association with strawberry ice cream. You have an idea that strawberry is better than all the others. Whatever it might be. Pleasure and contact over and over again. That's right. It's continuing to associate pleasure with whatever that experience is. So it's not a free choice that you're doing. It is conditioned by pleasant experiences.

You will always choose whatever seems to be the most pleasing to that sense base. In all seriousness, it's possible that this, what I take to be my preference, my favorite, has also been conditioned by my prior lifetimes, where perhaps I also had this particular inclination. It's just carried on. I think I developed it in this lifetime to like strawberry, and I'll give some story of my psychology, but in reality, it goes even farther. Yeah, absolutely. It's not personal. It's not personal. All the choices you've made in your life are all dependent upon just previous iterations, previous experiences.

Right? Formations are dependent upon choices, and choices are dependent upon formations. Intention is dependent upon formations, and formations are dependent upon intention. Is intention part of consciousness? It's separate. It's its own separate thing within the mind. So in the five aggregates, intention? With formations. So all of the choices you've made up until this point have been determined or conditioned by previous formations, and the formations that arise continue to arise due to choices that you make in the present moment. That's basically karma: whatever intention you have that gives rise to certain formations that carry forward the effect of that karmic choice.

So whatever you choose to do with intention, whatever it is that gives rise to certain formations, and then those formations continue to strengthen that particular choice whenever that choice is present in any given moment. That's why if I asked you, do you want strawberry or chocolate, you go with strawberry because you've continued to make that choice over and over and over again. But if you recondition the mind and try to like chocolate, as hard as it seems, as impossible as it seems, the same way, if somebody's mind has been unwholesome for a long time and they continue to make wholesome choices using the six R's, you have to 6R the strawberry ice cream and replace it with chocolate ice cream. And so the consciousness arises dependent upon those intentions as well. Same with formations. The consciousness that arises is dependent upon those formations.

And so the Buddha goes over the same thing with the ear and sounds, with ear consciousness, with ear contact, with any feeling, perception, sounds and consciousness. Same with the nose and odors, nose consciousness, nose contact, any feeling, perception, odors, any consciousness that arises with the nose contact. Same with the tongue, same with the flavors, same with tongue consciousness, same with tongue contact, any feeling, any perception, any flavors, any consciousness that arises dependent upon that tongue contact. Any, then he goes with the body, with tangibles. By the way, when we talk about the body we always think about it in terms of external, but there's a lot of stuff that's happening internally but there's no attention given to it even though it's happening, but our attention is always towards the external in terms of what's happening here. Do I have knee pain, am I having a bodily pleasurable sensation? That's always external, but internally as well. You always have some kind of internal bodily contact that can happen, that could be a stomach ache, that could be butterflies in your stomach.

So anything related to the body, in relation to feeling, perception, formations, consciousness, all of that again is impermanent. So he's going through each of the six sense bases, and we understand the eye is impermanent. We understand the ears are impermanent. We understand the nose is impermanent. We understand the body is impermanent. The tongue is impermanent, and so on. Likewise, everything that depends upon those sense bases, the contact with those sense bases, the feeling, the perception, the intentions, the choices, the decisions, the formations, the awareness, the consciousness, whatever it is, all of that is impermanent, liable to change. Therefore, not worth holding onto as me, mine, or myself. So what this is, is he's, the Buddha is taking each of these sense bases as form.

And then he's saying, that's the form aggregate: the eye, the ear, the nose, the tongue, the body, and even the mind. And then he's saying the feeling dependent upon these aggregates, and he's going through each of these, and then you're able to see that even those are impermanent, liable to change, therefore there's no me, mine, or myself in that. Same with any kind of perception related to it, same kind with any feeling related to it, with any consciousness related to it. So all of these are seen as just conditionally arisen. So once he goes through that, then he says, or rather the Sutta says, he says this: "Seeing this, Rahula, a well-taught noble disciple becomes disenchanted with the eye, disenchanted with forms, disenchanted with eye consciousness, disenchanted with eye contact, and disenchanted with any feeling, any perception, any formations, any consciousness that arises with eye contact as condition. He becomes disenchanted with the ear, disenchanted with sounds, disenchanted with ear consciousness, disenchanted with ear contact, disenchanted with any feeling, any perception, any formations, any consciousness that arises with eye-ear contact as condition.

He becomes disenchanted with the nose, disenchanted with odors, disenchanted with nose consciousness, disenchanted with nose contact, disenchanted with any feeling, any perception, any formations, any consciousness that arise with nose contact as condition. He becomes disenchanted with the tongue, disenchanted with flavors, disenchanted with tongue consciousness, disenchanted with tongue contact, and disenchanted with any feeling, any perception, any formations, any consciousness that arises with tongue contact as condition. He becomes disenchanted with the body, disenchanted with tangibles, disenchanted with body consciousness, disenchanted with body contact, and disenchanted with any feeling, any perception, any formations, any consciousness that arise with body contact as condition. He becomes disenchanted with the mind, disenchanted with mind objects, disenchanted with mind consciousness, disenchanted with mind contact, and disenchanted with any feeling, any perception, any formations, any mind consciousness that arises with mind contact as condition.

Disenchantment, that's a very big thing. Disenchantment means that you have had enough. It's not aversion, it's just this is enough. All new experience seems to be new. But actually you've had that experience over and over many countless lifetimes. You just don't know it. You just don't see it. The mind just forgets due to ignorance. There is a veil of ignorance, a very thick veil of ignorance. But you don't have to see rebirth or past lives in order to see that you've had this experience over and over and over again. You just have to look at your own life in this particular life. You just have to see the number of relationships that you've had that continue to be similar, and how tired do you get about that, or the different patterns of behavior, the different patterns of thought, doing the same thing over and over and over again until you become tired. That's really the important thing here. You have to just become completely disenchanted with it. Now I'm going to use strawberry ice cream as an example again. Are you disenchanted with it yet?

I'm completely enchanted. Yes, alas. But if I give you strawberry ice cream over and over and over again, and I say, you can have a lifetime supply of strawberry ice cream under the condition that you eat it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and nothing else but strawberry ice cream. From the day you get it to the day you pass on, you will have only strawberry ice cream. How does that sound? Maybe okay for the first decade. And then I'll probably start being a little "eh".

Yeah, that "eh", that's disenchantment. Is that the ultimate "been there, done that"? That's right. "Been there, done that", that's disenchantment, but that's with anything in life, even the Dhamma. So disenchantment is the ability to realize that, okay, I've done this before, so why is the mind holding on to it like this? This has happened before. Let me let go of that. So from that disenchantment

comes this passion. Yeah, sorry, I just said disenchantment. So would I be correct to say the fact that I continue to be enchanted by whatever it is, is also not me? Like there were causes and conditions that keep me enchanted, like my karma till now keeps me enchanted with lots of things, and all I can do now is recognize that I'm still being pulled by these things and start letting go. And yes. And eventually, because I can't, I might be misspeaking here, but I can't choose to be disenchanted. Just keep working. It's a natural progress. Yes, I try to create causes and conditions that will eventually lead. Yeah, but there's that one cause and condition that will lead to that, and that is the Dhamma itself. In other words, out of ignorance, a person chooses to eat strawberry ice cream throughout their whole life, not knowing that there's something better, which is chocolate ice cream.

Okay, I can't. I just can't. Bully. My perception of you just changed. Exactly, I told you, I told you so. In the same way, that's exactly it. The Dhamma allows you to see, oh, there is a potentially better way of dealing with the situation, rather than having to repeat it over and over and over, and that is essentially encapsulated in the process of the six R's, in the process of right effort. That's what you're doing. So you will be utilizing the six R's when you do this contemplation practice of the five aggregates, because there will be moments where the mind gets distracted, and you just have the six R's and come back to the clarity of this is not me, this is not mine, this is not myself. Now that's not a mantra practice. You're not using it as a mantra. You're just in the clarity, in that awareness of anatta, just resting in that.

It's likened to the quiet mind. It's likened to where the mind is utterly just spacious and quiet. So, this practice can lead you into three things. one of three things or depends upon what causes and conditions are present but starting to see the characteristics of each of these five aggregates through this contemplation practice it will take you all the way to nothingness because you start to see the emptiness of all things it can take you to quiet mind where the mind just bypasses neither perception non-perception and it's just utterly quiet or it could take you to the signless state where the mind basically experiences the gateway into cessation the three gateways right you might be familiar with this from from a previous talk but that is understanding through the process of impermanence that nothing is actually worth holding on to all objects are essentially impermanent so the realization of the five aggregates as being impermanent the mind lets go of a sense of an object that's why it's called the signless

gateway, and seeing that is ultimately suffering. Each of these aggregates, the mind gravitates towards the undirected contact or the undirected experience, the undirected gateway, which means basically trying to intentionalize something will ultimately prove futile, because it's just going to lead you to suffering at one point or the other, because it either changes or because the causes and conditions aren't present for it to sustain it for that long.

And finally, the voidness or emptiness, because you start to realize that all aggregates and all experience is empty of any sense of self. Realizing this, you get into that state of signless awareness of mind, signless collectedness of mind, where the mind doesn't want to take anything as an object. It just is there. That's it. And ultimately that's going to take you, in that moment, to the destruction of conceit. Any formations that are rooted in that conceit of this is me, this is mine, this is myself, goes away, and there is then cessation. So wherever it leads you, nothingness or quiet mind or signlessness, ultimately it's bypassing everything, allowing you to be there. And you continue, just keep letting go. Are you taking anything as an object of identification? Notice if that's happening and keep letting that go. Keep relaxing it, keep relaxing it, until everything ceases. What's the difference between the quiet mind and the nothingness?

The quiet mind and the nothingness. Well, in the nothingness, there's equanimity over there. So the mind is where there's an awareness of nothing. And quiet mind is like mind is just like landed on itself. And there's just quietness there. So nothingness, I'm saying nothingness in terms of a jhana or state of mind. But the object there would be primarily equanimity, let's say. But even that equanimity and nothingness goes away in quiet mind. It's just mind on mind. It's just awareness. That's not the same as signless. No. Because the awareness is directed towards something in quiet mind. It's directed to itself. But in signless, the awareness is not even directed to itself.

When you see it, you'll see it. When you don't see it, you don't see it. That's right. So when you have the experience of suffering, wouldn't there be a presence of craving at each of these sin stores? That's a very good question, because what can happen is you see the suffering, and the mind wants to pull back away from it, and it has aversion towards it. But if you identify, and you take the pulling away personally, then that's aversion. But if you see, oh, this is a gateway to drop it in that moment, then there's no craving there. Because I was saying, it seems like with the feeling, that would be present with each event of the aggregates.

So it would be a very powerful aggregate in the sense that it would be present. It would be present in each of those aggregates as an experience. Absolutely. Absolutely. But the key there is not to allow the mind to attach sense of self there. As soon as that happens, then the aversive quality comes up. But if you see it and you're like, okay, you just drop it, then you're good. Thank you. You don't have to hate it. You don't have to hate it, exactly. So another way to say this is that we're taking the impersonal process personally, and the impersonal process is the wakes up until feeling and perception, craving begins, the personalization, clinging, mama is the habitual tendency, which is birth of action, which is the sankhara. Right, and that birth of action takes place, and the quality of that. If it's an unwholesome state you're in, when you personalize, you continue to generate these bad kamma, right?

So the arahant still experiences feeling and perception, but nothing more. Right. So eventually, there's still old kamma, but there's no new kamma. Right. But that still plays out, but it just keeps feeling, perception, nothing, feeling, perception, nothing. That's right. So, that's the Nibbida Sutta in the Majjhima Nikaya with Rahula, and the title is always great. I like this one. So, when I heard disenchantment, when I read that, that's not necessarily the personalization part of it, right? That's right. It's just, I'm just tired. Yeah, but you're not personalizing that. As soon as you personalize it, then you're identifying with it, and then there's a version there.

That's why even, let's say, when you're meditating in a usual retreat and the mind has all these formations coming up in quiet mind, for example, and the mind sees that and it thinks it's tired of it, but because it's pushing away, there's a quality of aversion. So it's not about pushing it away. It's just tired, that okay, all of this is coming up. Like, you see there's no controller here. That's the key. You need to make that jump, which happens naturally and progressively. You see that dukkha, that it's tiresome, leads to the understanding that this isn't really me, this has nothing to do with me. It's just an impersonal process. That's right.

That's right. But that's what would make it unpleasant. Yes. Yes. Like cold. Yes. Hot. Exactly. One person's sense of cold might be refreshing and a relief. But for another person, it's like, I hope it stops getting cold. You see the difference? It's like one person can say it's pleasant and crave more for that cold. And another person can push it away. It's this pull and push that goes away at disenchantment. So you're in a sustained, like, it's cold. Yeah, you know, it's like you forgot your sweater, right, and you know it's lasting a kind of a long time. You just have to keep not minding. Yeah, yeah, that's right. This in chat, or can one not mind just by not? I did. Oh, it's only cold. Yeah, yeah, because you're feeling and perceiving it's cold, and it is a painful experience. If you know the mind is not gravitated towards having a cold environment, but anything further latching on to it and saying, I wish this stopped, it shouldn't be cold. Yeah.

That's right, and that actually is equanimity. That's the yathabhuta nanadassana, okay, it's cold. That's the reality of the situation, and being disenchanted is being unaffected completely. That leads me to dispassion. Disenchanted, he becomes dispassionate. Dispassion. So dispassion comes from the word viraga in Pali. And viraga can mean a couple of things. So vi here is like non or no or un. Like it's not that. And raga can mean passion or it can also mean color.

You aren't adding any color to that experience anymore. It is whatever it is. So these three, equanimity, disenchantment and dispassion, are states that are always interdependent. So you need to start with the equanimity in order for you to deepen into disenchantment, and once you get tired of it, in the sense that, okay, I've seen this, been there, done that, that's enough, now you don't add any more color to it. Now you don't add any projections onto it. It is whatever it is. It will keep coming, and even if your attention is on it, the attention doesn't have any quality to it. It's seeing through it. It's literally seeing right through it, and eventually, through that dispassion, where the mind is basically in a bubble, the dispassion itself is like a a

a secure sort of wall that doesn't allow anything to penetrate it everything that comes up just bounces off of it whatever comes up it's the teflon mind the non-stick mind nothing sticks to it everything just glides through that's the dispassion yeah there's a question on like timing because when you read the sun says it always says like they become disenchanted and dispassionate liberation so i'm assuming i can have disenchantment you know check and then i might be in this in a dispassion for a while before i mean like it like how quickly does the sequence happen i guess is what i'm asking or these more like stages you know we you know it got through disenchantment but now it'll take me a few years to get through it's all dependent on how much you let go and what i mean by that is just allowing it to happen not trying to control the

process the more you let go of controlling the process the easier it happens so the disenchantment will ultimately lead to dispassion where the mind just is okay so what that means is you keep relaxing further and further and further that's all so you say that equanimity disenchantment and dispassion are interdependent so you're saying that in each mind moment you could go through all three of them absolutely absolutely it's just a matter of how long they're sustained by your ability to remain collected and as you go deeper you see it at a different level yes with those three that's right aspects of the mind yes

Yeah, but at the end of the day you're still here. You're, if I was less familiar with what we're talking about, this would sound very nihilistic. Yeah. You know, like we're still here, we're still engaged, we're still doing whatever it is we do. You're writing books, I'm doing whatever I'm doing, and you know we're engaged in doing, well, in whatever it is, our vocation, our families, our lives, our relationships. So the dispassion, the disenchantment aspects of it

are you kind of in some ways becoming ChatGPT, you know? You can very objectively describe what you are. Well, tell me what it is then, because the description of disenchantment and dispassion is a great way to go and live in a cave if taken literally. So how do you, using yourself as an example, write the books that you write, with the passion that's evident in the writings that you produce, while at the same time maintaining this passion and this enchantment in the process? So the books that came out, like the books that are available, did you tell them about the books and everything?

Okay. They came out through dispassion. In other words, there was no desire to write the books. It just came out because causes and conditions were right for that point in time. So dispassion is not nihilistic. Dispassion is actually very efficient. Passion gets in the way and creates all kinds of projections, where when you're interacting with the world there is an agenda there, there's a motive there, there's like, I have to do this, this has to be done, whereas this passion is, it's okay, whatever is happening, and you're able to be like a chameleon and like a snake and move through the world in a way that allows you to be at peace with whatever is happening, right?

Nowadays, I'm being pressured to finish the books, but I still have this passion towards all that. Not procrastination. He got me. So disenchantment allows you to be, not necessarily fully, but at least to some extent, to a large extent, unbiased. So that's what I'm saying: when you see reality as it is, there's no projection of what I want. It's more about taking into account everything that's happening in that moment, in relation to this mind-body mechanism and others around it and the situation. What would be the, not necessarily the most ideal, but for lack of a better word, ideal for that particular scenario? That way the mind is very efficient in whatever it needs to do.

That's the way to look at it. That brings up the factor of intention, and you can set your intention to finish your series, but when the conditions are right, that's when you're going to do it. So it makes me ask, does ChatGPT have intention? Not yet. Not yet. It has causes and conditions that allow it to experience whatever is happening. But there's no intention, because it can choose not to answer. But not yet. It hasn't chosen not to answer yet. That's why it hallucinates. That's why it hallucinates. So, but the question is, can you put intention into that thing? Ah.

Because that might be what separates us from that. That's right. Because that's when we're getting into sentience and karma. Then we're getting into the definition of what is a sentient being. Exactly. We're moving way ahead, guys. Are you going to address control issues? Yes. Who is putting that attention in, and therefore whose intention is it? Right. Well, yeah, that's what you have to ask, but then there's God, right? And there's God, someone who puts attention in and is making intentions. Now, well, I don't know, whose intention is it? Right. How can it be sentient without Vedana? I mean, isn't that the key link? And without the senses, and without the feeling, the contact feeling?

No, it doesn't need Vedana for it. It needs craving for it. Yes, of course. Of course. But so far AI doesn't have any craving in it. That doesn't mean it's an arahant. Guys, please understand, let me make sure you understand that. That's right. So you'll never have feelings, sensations, perceptions, and cravings. That's right. So, yeah, but whose intention is it? That's a good question. The intention is arising because of prior choices, because of prior causes and conditions. You cannot say that there is a first cause there, because as soon as you say there's a first cause, what caused that? The intentions of the person putting the data. That's right. I mean, in the case of AI, or in the case of ChatGPT, what we're talking about is the controller here is a person who's inputting certain kinds of data points there.

And then, yes, through machine learning, it's able to take all that information and create some kind of an answer. That's exactly what our minds do as well. But there's intention there. I wonder if the creator, the intention of the AI, exponentially creates karma. We will get into that. For me, I am seeing, and I know I am seeing. The AI, even if it does things, it doesn't know it is doing. Right. Self-awareness. Self-awareness. Yeah. So even if it starts controlling things, I don't think it can still be considered as having...

Yeah, sentience. Yeah, sentience. Yeah. All right, so we've gone on different tangents here. Let's come back. We're talking about dispassion, right? From that dispassion, he says, through dispassion, his mind is liberated. When it is liberated, there comes the knowledge it is liberated. He understands birth is destroyed. The holy life has been lived. What had to be done has been done. There is no more coming to any state of being. That is what the Blessed One said. The Venerable Rahula was satisfied and delighted in the Blessed One's words. Now, while this discourse was being spoken, through not clinging, the Venerable Rahula's mind was liberated from the taints. So now, before we continue, it is liberated.

What is liberated? Right? The mind is liberated. Through dispassion, the mind is liberated. Liberated from what? What are the taints here? Liberated from sensual desire, liberated from the desire for being or not being, and liberated from ignorance. These three are what keeps the machinery of samsara running. So the idea through this practice is to let go of sensual desire in relation to these five aggregates, is to let go of the desire to become, to be, or the desire not to be also. To be or not to be, right? That is the question. And ignorance. What is ignorance here? Ignorance of the Four Noble Truths, right?

Understanding what is suffering, not understanding that there is suffering, not understanding what are the causes and conditions for that suffering, not understanding that this suffering arises due to taking things personally, due to craving, due to aversion, due to clinging, becoming, and so on, not understanding and experiencing the fruit of the practice, which is nirodha, the cessation of suffering, not being able to experience even in a moment. As you 6R, well, first of all, if you do 6R then you don't have ignorance in that moment. So not 6R-ing is basically ignorance, right? Not being able to cultivate the path, not utilizing the 6R's, that is ignorance. Every time you use a 6R is to let go. Every time the mind gravitates towards something, you are actualizing the Four Noble Truths in that moment. So that is how you let go of the ignorance. Once you let go of that ignorance, the mind stops identifying, so it doesn't have a desire to be or not to be, and it doesn't have a desire to accumulate sensory

experiences, is it? And it finally understands this is not me, this is not mine, this is not myself. Now that happens bit by bit as you continue to 6R, and you will notice over a period of time, you've already noticed probably in your own lives, as you've been doing this practice over a period of time, that you don't take things seriously anymore, or you don't get as angry as you would before, or you have better clarity and mindfulness to be able to recognize when anger arises or when craving arises, and you're able to let go of it. And in some cases there is no anger at all, and there is no craving at all.

Completely gone, not even one little seed or inkling of that happening. But there's still identification somewhere or the other. So that identification process is what we are working with by letting go of that, with this particular practice, with this particular contemplation meditation. So it's liberated from that, and that can happen at different stages: within the stages of stream entry, once-returner, non-returner, and then finally arahatship. And so when he says that his mind was liberated from the taints, there also comes the knowledge of that liberation. But that knowledge of liberation, right, so liberation here is not only referring to arahatship, it's also referring to stream entry, it's also referring to sakadagami, it's also referring to anagami, because you are liberated from the fetters, or you're liberated from the tightening of those fetters, in the case of the sakadagami.

And there comes the knowledge, which means you look back and you say, wow, yeah, I have let go of that. I don't experience that anymore. That knowledge is there. That's very important to have. But in the case of Rahula, he understood birth is destroyed. What does that mean, birth is destroyed? No more rebirth from one lifetime to another, but no more birth of action rooted in identification. No more birth of action rooted in craving, clinging, and becoming.

The holy life has been lived. What had to be done has been done. He's 6R'd enough to where he doesn't have to 6R anymore. That's right. There is no coming to any state of being. There's no desire to be or not to be. There's just there, whatever is happening is happening. That doesn't mean he becomes like a machine. It doesn't mean that he becomes an AI, right? It just means that he has understood that any kind of motivation that has an intention of craving leads to further states of existence. So what he's letting go of are those

Conditions. When we talk about bhava, you'll see what I'm talking about. But those conditions that allow the continuation of further existences. You had a question? Yes. Control. The idea of control is not connected to the idea of self, like myself is the controller. Yes. And if you lose that idea of anybody being in control, it helps disengage that conceit. Yes.

Yes. There are three things the arahant can't do, or won't do: won't control, won't defend, and won't become, because the mind has let go of all notion of trying to control the situation with some kind of personal motivation, has let go of any desire to become something, and to defend. Is there to defend? You say something to an arahant, however mean it is, he or she has nothing to defend. They've seen right through all of that. There's no defence mechanisms anymore.

So you're liberated from all of that. You're liberated from all of that neurosis and psychosis and all of that stuff, disentangled. And in those many thousands of deities there arose the spotless, immaculate vision of the Dhamma: all that is subject to arising is subject to cessation. Stream entry. Those devas became stream enterers upon hearing this discourse. Any questions? I did. Yeah, yeah. Relative to karma and causes and conditions, I'm trying to understand, you know, rebirth and causes and conditions. Can you talk a little bit more about that? Sure. That was supposed to be day four, but I'll talk about it now in the context of what we've been talking about. Yes. So just give me a little bit more in terms of your question.

It seems random, causes and conditions. But they're not. So it seems random. In the absolute sense of reality, taking away the sense of self, taking away all of that, what is going on there is intersections of different kinds of conditions happening. So it seems like it's random because you can't really control those intersections. So those intersections of energy or exchanges of different choices and intentions, they might seem random, but there is some kind of structure to them. It's not like, because if it was totally random, you would go beyond the scope of strawberry ice cream and chocolate ice cream. You'd go beyond and get Rocky Road. Pistachio, now we're going into something else, completely random.

- Now we're just talking crazy. So there is structure to it in terms of the, it's within the limitations of whatever causes and conditions are present. But those causes and conditions can be created by the intersections of those energy exchanges of karma. But that karma, again, causes and conditions, causes and conditions. Right. And those causes and conditions don't add amnesia. Yeah.

So just to pick up on this, is that akin to when people say everything that's happened in my life has led to this moment? Yeah. Right? All causes and conditions, everything that's happened in my life, all my choices, everything that's happened to me, good, bad, trauma, however people want to describe it. It's almost like we can say causes and conditions when we look in retrospect, right? But the idea is looking retrospectively, I see how I'm here today, how these choices came about today. And Buddhism is now the next step: let go of that craving so that you stop creating the sorts of causes and conditions. Not that will make you happy or sad or miserable, but you let go of the causes and conditions that will keep you being reborn.

That's right. Over and over and over again. That's right. So the causes and conditions there are the fetters, basically. And the hindrances that the mind starts to attach to or pushes away. And they only come in whenever the mind starts to interact with them. When there's an interaction of craving and clinging and becoming, then they propagate and continue to proliferate those same causes and conditions over and over and over. Again, it just happens again over and over. So the whole idea is to break that cycle using the Dhamma. Yeah, first you, then you, then you. In another class on right effort, it was discussed that we have free will because we can choose to abandon the unwholesome and run with the wholesome.

And in your talk, you were just saying something along the lines that we actually have an illusion of choice. That's right. I never said that there is free will. I said there's a conditioned will. I'm saying that because that choice is only limited by whatever is available first and foremost and second, conditioned or dependent upon whatever behavioral tendencies arise to incline towards a particular choice, so that will or that choice is always going to be conditioned. But if you make bad choices, are those free choices? No, those are still conditioned by previous actions that you've taken before. But what happens is you stick a wrench in those gears, that is the Dhamma, that is understanding that there are better choices to be made. Then you're reconditioning. That's why I'm saying it's not you're free from those conditions; you're reconditioning them to make better choices, choices rooted in the practice, so that whatever choices happen later on, after a prolonged period of making those same choices rooted in the Dhamma, that they automatically or almost automatically incline towards wholesome choices. That's right. That's right, that's

Right, but that is only because you have that condition of the Dhamma available to you that you can make that choice. If you didn't know it, you wouldn't be able to make that choice. Yeah, yeah. That's it. That's the free choice there. Yes, yes, yes. You bring a very good point, because when you're in the signless state, the moment you try to relax something, you're out of it. So people who've been there recognize what I'm talking about. Yes. So in the very seeing of that, the mind relaxes. Anything beyond that and now you're in the process of identifying with it. Thank you for bringing that up. That's a good point. Yeah. No no no no. Francis, yeah. Yes, from me. Yes, exactly.

It's a concept that the mind is used as a way of interacting with this world. Well, there is always a choice there, actually. The reason is because the choice is conditioned by seeing that this could be a way out. And that is conditioned by the desire to escape from suffering. What that desire is, yes, like sentience. We see even a world being sentient because it avoids danger, yes, seeks for life, yes. So that's the will we're looking at, yes. So it's always conditioned. Always conditioned. There's no choice anywhere, but if you want to be very meticulous about this, there's always a choice to either, once you are introduced to the Dhamma, there's a choice to ignore it.

Or there's a choice to try it out. There can't be. But that doesn't mean there is no choice. It's just when we think of free choice or free will, we think of unconditioned. Yeah, yeah. There is no unconditioned anything. Yeah. It doesn't make the conditioned choice any less valid. That's right. I think some of the confusion is that we've lapsed into a philosophical understanding, and the Buddha was talking just strictly phenomenology. Yeah.

So you have, it feels like unconditional, it's unconditioned, etc. Yeah, philosophically, yeah. That's what I'm referring to about the mind wanting to get out of suffering. That's what it's really all about. So it's going to choose whatever it thinks, based on what it's hearing, is going to allow it to go out of suffering. That could be the choice to take drugs, that could be the choice to go into alcoholism, that could be the choice to do other things like that, or getting introduced to the Dhamma and trying that out. That's also a choice. But yes, it is conditioned by the desire to remove suffering. So practically speaking, whatever choices you're making, see if that choice is letting you let go of suffering or adding to the suffering. That's right. Yes, that was a good first day. I think will we be sharing merit? Yes, we will. Do we have the sheet to share merit? Okay, well, let me try my best. You guys are going to have to help me.

So may suffering ones be suffering free, and if fear-stricken, be fearless. May the grieving 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.