June 29 AN 35.63 'Craving is a Partner' - Migala Sutta

All right. So here we are. What happened to this? Okay. So we're going to be discussing Samyutta Nikaya 35.63. We wanted to do this last week, I think, but we just didn't have enough time. So here we are. This is called Megajala, which is the name of a monk. At Savathi, then the Venerable Megajala approached the Blessed One, paid homage to him, sat down to one side and said to him, Venerable Sir, he said, a lone dweller, a lone dweller. In what way, Venerable Sir, is one a lone dweller? And in what way is one dwelling with a partner?

Let's take these words and understand what we're talking about here. Obviously, the reference here is to craving, but we're going to go a little deeper than that. What are we talking about when we say, if one seeks delight in them? There are foods that are delicious, that feel pleasant to the tongue, smell wonderful, and they're pleasing to the nose. There are sounds like beautiful music and the voice of someone we love that are pleasing to the ear. And there are sights when you go into a garden and you see all these colorful flowers and beautiful landscapes, you are experiencing the beauty of nature and you're doing that through the eyes and so on.

So these experiences themselves being pleasant, right? That are desirable. When we say that are desirable, that are pleasing, that are lovely, agreeable, sensually enticing, tantalizing. But if we seek delight in them, this is the word, seek delight. What do we mean by that? When we look at the experience, whether it's a pleasant sound, pleasant sight, pleasant... fragrance, pleasant sensation to the body, pleasant thought or memory or ideas, concepts in the mind.

We start to hold on to them. We welcome them. What do we mean by welcoming? Here in the original Pali, the word welcome is actually referred to as giving importance to. Making it a big deal. Where have we heard that before? Bhante would always say this to his students. Don't make a big deal out of it. Somebody would come to the interview and say, oh, I've just experienced this and this and this. It's amazing. It's wonderful. Bhante will congratulate you and say, oh, that's great. But just don't make a big deal out of it. Why? Because you're giving it too much importance.

When you give something too much importance, what do you do? It becomes precious. It becomes something that is to the mind rationalizing as worth holding on to. And so one remains holding on to them. And then delight arises. That's interesting. If one seeks delight in them, what do we mean by seeking delight? We find it to be pleasing to the sense of self.

When we're experiencing things and we say, oh, what a beautiful bird that is. Or, oh, what a beautiful fragrance that flower is emanating. Or that symphony is just divine. That's great. Those are all wonderful things that we should all experience in our lives. The more we are able to do that. In fact, when we think about sending out loving kindness, we also want to send out loving kindness for people to experience comfort and joy, music, good sounds, good whatever it is. Because when you have a certain level of comfort, when you're not being an ascetic, when you're not trying to control things in a way that don't need to be controlled, you're trying to get to a point where you have to sit a certain posture, you have to sit on a certain mat, the temperature has to be just right.

And all of these things, what happens? The mind starts to go over those things and forgets about the reality, which is: this is about internalizing, going inward, it's about letting go of the outward. To an extent, a certain level of comfort is required for the body to be at ease, to experience sukha, for the mind to experience a certain level of relaxation, for the mind to start off without being so tense, right? All these things are great. But when we seek delight in them, which means we're identifying with one or more of the sixth sense bases or their objects.

This is pleasing to me, and therefore I seek more of it. This is mine, and therefore I won't let go of it. I give importance to it from that sense of self, and I remain holding on to it. And then the delight arises. What does that mean? The identification with that leads me to either protecting it, defending it, creating boundaries with it. This is mine, and this is mine alone, and no one else can have it. You become like Gollum.

Everything that you identify with becomes precious. And so that desire to hold on, that delight in it, is not the immediate experience of, oh, how pleasant is this? It's now the desire to own, objectify, to make it into something that is mine, that is me. That's delight. And when there is that delight, there is infatuation. So the original word for this really refers to a kind of obsessiveness.

This is what craving is. It's an obsessiveness. It's this desire to control things in a way that is pleasing to the self, the sense of self. So when there is this infatuation, one is bound by it. One has bondage. So this boundedness, this bondage, the mind finds itself in its own self-made, so to speak, maze or labyrinth, where you can't escape from it. And so what are you doing? You're dwelling with a partner. What is that partner?

You're dwelling with craving, a mind full of craving, a mind full of objectifying, making things into something more than they are, making them a big deal. And by objectifying, the mind creates this illusion of reality which is not reality. It's that misperception. The mind looks at it and then from there it has clinging, and now that clinging is rationalizing further why it is that it's so important that I have this or that I get it. The initial sort of beauty of things is one thing, but then the desire to own it, the desire to possess it, the desire to hold on to it is what we have to look at. Can we experience everything fully as it is without clinging to it with a sense of I, a sense of me, myself, and mine?

Can we just see things as they are? That's the seeing things, the knowledge and vision of things as they actually are. Having equanimity towards everything. It's wonderful when you can do this and you have this experience of this pleasant sensation, pleasant emotion, pleasant feeling. And you just realize in that moment that, oh, this is not mine. This is just an experience.

We're all here to have an experience. This is the reason why we all took rebirth is because previously there was something that we didn't learn. Something that we weren't able to let go of. Something that created a karmic imprint that now we have to re-experience. So that we can learn to let go. So that we can learn to understand things with proper wisdom.

What is that proper wisdom? The realization of the signless. The realization of the desirelessness or the undirectedness. The realization of emptiness. This experience is beyond the mundane. This experience is a trifold experience, so to speak, in the sense that there are three distinct things, quote-unquote things, but they are all pointing to the same so-called experience, which is the cessation of suffering.

And the cessation of suffering is nirodha, the cessation of perception and feeling, the cessation of conceptual proliferation, that emptiness which is not a nothingness, that emptiness which is a mind free of all barriers, the mind that is free of all craving, disidentified with all experience, yet fully aware and luminous. And this mind takes nothing as an object. Therefore, it's signless. This mind is not interested in controlling the outcome. Therefore, it's undirected.

And this mind doesn't take itself seriously. It doesn't make it a big deal. And therefore, it's empty of any inherent essence, self. And this is the experience, or the mundane experience of nibbana. You can have this all the time if you see it in this way. And there are times we don't, and there are times when we slip, and that's okay. The question there is, can we notice what happened, using yoniso manasikara, that is, the attention rooted in reality? Yoni means the womb; it's the source. Can we notice what happened there, not out of guilt, not out of shame, not out of any kind of blame, but can we notice where the mind slipped and can we recognize and let go. Make it a point to be more mindful, so to speak, be more

diligent in how we experience things. The more we do this, the more we let go. And the more we let go, the less there is in terms of barriers to experiencing nibbana all the time. And then you don't have to come back. You don't have to deal with whatever it is you're dealing with. Because you've learned the ultimate lesson, which is at the end of all experience, it completely fades away.

It's the remainderless fading away. It is the extinguishment of all expectation. And when we have that, then we can be present with everything as it comes. project a certain kind of outcome to what is experienced we don't need to project a certain kind of identification with what is experienced we just take things as they are. But there's no one taking anything. There's just a process of experience. Consciousness is dependent upon the experience of taking things through identity.

This is through sankhara. This is through our formations. And these formations constitute our intentions. And if we identify with those intentions, then the consciousness that arises is besmirched, is tainted by that kind of identification. The idea here is not to worry about consciousness. Don't make consciousness a thing either. It is its own process, but the consciousness without surface, the anidassanam vinnanam, that is the non-reflective signless mind, is the closest you can get to knowledge. And if you can make that your everyday lived experience, there's nothing much more to do except to go deep in your practice and touch those depths where the nibbana dhatu, the element of nibbana is.

And there you won't be dwelling with a partner because there's no partner and there is no one there. Migala, even though a bhikkhu who dwells thus resorts to forests and groves, to remote lodgings, where there are few sounds with little noise, desolate, hidden from people, appropriate for seclusion, he is still called one dwelling with a partner. For what reason? Because craving is his partner. There you go. And he has not abandoned it. Therefore, he is called one dwelling with a partner. Forms cognizable by the eye that are desirable, lovely, agreeable, pleasing, sensually enticing, tantalizing.

If a bhikkhu does not delight or seek delight in them, does not welcome them, give too much importance or any importance, and does not remain holding on to them, delight ceases. So what does it mean we don't give importance to it? We don't take it seriously. Most of the conflicts in this world are because beings take things way too seriously.

We look at the news and we say, oh, that's really bad. And then the mind proliferates and thinks, how does that affect me? Or how can it affect me? And for some people, it can spiral into anxiety, even panic attacks. Because our mind is not made to have to experience what is happening halfway around the world. Our mind is already quite content, or I should say overloaded, with unnecessary sensory information that causes it to overthink.

This is what separates humans from animals is that we overthink about things. We take things personally. We have that sense of self-awareness that is heightened and possibly fully developed to the extent that we take it as something more than it actually is, which is really a defense mechanism for us to be able to understand what our boundaries are, to protect this body and protect this mind, protect this nervous system. To that extent, that's great. And the transactional everyday life of being with people and relational dynamics.

But beyond that, when we take ourselves seriously, then we are fooling ourselves. That's the ignorance. We have lack of mindfulness. But in this case, as the Buddha says, if he does not seek delight in them, if he does not make them important, does not welcome them, then the delight ceases. When there is no delight, there is no obsession around the control around that objectified experience.

When that is the case, there is no bondage, a lone dweller. So he says the same with the ear, the nose, the tongue, the body, and the mind. And this is the interesting part. He says, Migala, even though a bhikkhu who dwells thus lives in the vicinity of a village associating with bhikkhus and bhikkhunis, with male and female lay followers, with kings and royal ministers, with sectarian teachers and their disciples, he is still called a lone dweller. Because craving is his partner and he has abandoned it.

Therefore, he is a lone dweller. So that's the real test. Can you be in the midst of city life, in the midst of all kinds of activity and still not take things seriously? Can you be in difficult situations and see them for what they are? Of any kind of self-importance, which is ultimately empty of any kind of inherent existence or essence, I should say.

That is to say, lacks any kind of permanent personal self and thereby just letting things flow as they are. Does that mean we let go of our personality and become like robots? Does that mean we have to continue doing this all the time? Maybe to an extent we have to keep practicing until it becomes the new norm. But we don't have to act like robots. We don't have to be emotionalists.

We don't have to be void of any kind of pleasure. Because the pleasant things are just the pleasant things. The issue here is that we have to let go of. So the key is to keep practicing in everyday life when you have a difficult situation and you find yourself becoming agitated. That's the key, and saying to yourself, okay, here is agitation.

I'm getting pissed off. I'm getting upset. I'm getting distraught. This is very upsetting. Is it upsetting? What is it that is making it so upsetting? It's because I am making it way too important than it actually is. This too shall pass. So can I find the refuge of the signless? Can I de-objectify the experience and the person who's maybe the cause of the experience?

Can I let go of my desire to control? Because our desires to control something is always met with some kind of resistance. And that causes restlessness and agitation. Can I see this as not taking it so personally? And can I just let go and flow with the experience in the situation, no matter how difficult it is? Easier said than done.

But if I can continue to practice in this way, I could be in the middle of Times Square. But my mind can still be filled with equanimity. My mind can still take things in the form of whatever sense experiences are arising. It is just an experience. If I can do that, then I'm a lone dweller.

Okay, that's the end of that. Does anybody have any questions? I think there are questions in the chat. I'm reading that. speak about or describe the non-reflective consciousness, how it differs from nibbana dhatu, and how can one dwell in it continuously in daily life? Won't movement and engaging in experience pull us out of the stillness and hence out of the non-reflective consciousness?

How do you dwell in it continuously? By letting go of the desire to dwell in it continuously. By not making it a thing. By just experiencing things as they are. Because when we give so much self-importance to this so-called non-reflective consciousness, the anidassanam vinnanam, sense of self that is trying to make it into something. But there is a sense of when you let go, there is a space where there is no longer any desire.

And the mind doesn't objectify. It doesn't make things into a thing. And there's no center point. It's just an experience. When we're engaging with the world, as you say, when we move around, in the moving, there's only the moving. In the engaging, there's only the engaging. In the speaking, there's only the speaking. In the writing of the email, there's only writing of the email. In the conversing, there's only the conversing.

In the thinking, there's only the thinking. It's like a field in which the mind observes its own actions, without taking them as self. How does it differ from the nibbana dhatu? The nibbana dhatu is always there. It cannot be made conscious. But it is the field, the dimension, the space that is beyond the limits of any kind of awareness. only indirectly experienced nibbana dhatu as a result of making contact with it, which is where we experience the signless, the undirected, the emptiness.

And this is the mundane nibbana. That's the reflection, so to speak, without an image of the mirror that is the nibbana dhatu. Okay, Bill, your question. What do you mean when you say things as they really are, as it really is? Well, we don't really know things as they actually are. They're generally things that we think they are.

And we can never get to the thing as it actually is. We can only get to as close as it actually is. Real objectivity in any kind of experience because there's always this sense of self that is the reference point, the point where we look at things from a certain kind of center. So seeing things as they actually are is as close to objectivity as we can get by letting go of the desire to control how things are, letting go of the processing of conceptualizing what it is. So when you notice the mind seeing something, hearing something, listening to someone, whatever it is, there is in the back of the mind this process that engages with it with, oh, this is what he means by this, this is what he means by this, this is what he means by this.

That is the process of perceiving happening, labeling and so on and learning, being aware, but then below that is this process in which then the mind says, okay, so then if this is the case and this is the case then that must be this and that must be that. So now what we're doing is we're proliferating this process into something more than what it actually is, which is just a sound, which is just words, which are just sentences, which are just emotions, which are just processes.

If we look at things as they actually are, which is essentially just impersonal processes, without objectifying them, without saying that they're impersonal processes, that might help initially. But if we can just notice it as an impersonal process, then there's nothing more for us to do there. It seems dualistic what you're saying there. Of course it is. It's dualistic because you cannot be in a non-dual experience all the time.

There's always some kind of experience and a reflection of that experience until you're able to experience where, okay, it's just an experience. Buddha, where he says, in the seeing, there's only the seeing. In the hearing, there's only the heard. In the cognizing, there's only the cognized. This is an exercise for all of us to do until we experience that non-duality, where the space of the experience here, we find, was always an illusion. It was always an experience.

What happens there is there's a reflection of that. And that's the mind perceiving itself experiencing that. So that's the duality. That's the so-called duality. And does that go away, that reflection? Or is the reflection a non-dual? That will never go away. Because you can say the reflection is non-dual. But even in the suttas it says, and the mind knows it's liberated.

So there's the mind and there's a liberation. But for that moment, there's a duality. Thank you. Another question in the chat. Who is really struggling with craving and obsessive thoughts at this moment in time? I'm finding this to be a block in my practice and would love some advice. Thank you. Struggling with craving and obsessive thoughts.

The very short answer of it is coming back to equanimity, but that's easier said than done when you are in the thicket of obsessive thoughts. So what are obsessive thoughts? What is the experience of a mind that is racing? It feels like it needs to do something, or it feels like it's just bound by something. I think a very practical thing is go for a walk.

Go for a walk. Do something that is physically active, at the same speed, so to speak, as the racing thoughts. And as you do this, the mind gets less infatuated with itself and becomes more present with the body. When we have these obsessive thoughts, it means we're too much in our mind. Come back to the body. Come back to embodying the mind and using the body as a way of becoming more present.

So you could do this as simple as a body scan. Doing some kind of activity like walking will help you come out of the body, out of the mind, and back into a space where you're more present. And ultimately, the things that I say, especially in this talk, are very cerebral for the mind. It's a lot of things to contemplate, a lot of things to seemingly do, but these are more just pointing out certain things to look at, not certain things to create in the mind, but certain things to let go of as a way of recognizing the true nature of the mind. So the thoughts are separate to the mind, right?

The thoughts, I was saying this last week, and I said this in the retreat that I completed before last week, which is that the thoughts are basically just like the green of the trees in the spring and summertime, or the green of the grass, or the taste of the food. You cannot change or control how much greenery there is in terms of whatever is there on the trees, or control the taste that you're in this moment of the salt or the sugar or whatever.

It is just an experience. The only thing you can do is see it, notice your reactions to it. The same way, thoughts are nothing more than the green of the trees, the taste of sweetness or saltiness that you can't change. We're not here to change our thoughts. We're not here to control our thoughts. the more we find ourselves in samsara.

That's what samsara is. Our samsara is defined by our thoughts. The world that we experience is experienced through this filtration process of thinking. You are not actively thinking then. There is just a process of thinking going on. As separate from the experience of the mind, you disengage. You give it space. You give it distance. And then whether they're there or not, it doesn't really affect the mind, because it just sees it as something that can't be controlled. And because it has arisen, it will pass away.

What I am, so-called I am, in control of are my reactions to them. Those thoughts? Can I be from that vantage point of equanimity and just observe them as they come and go? Okay, anyone else? Well, there's a moment here. I'd want to let everybody know that we'll be doing a guided meditation next week. And it's in the middle of our conference. But at the same time, Delson was going to do a new guided meditation around the subject of letting go. And we wanted to invite everybody on the call to come and do it with us. So you'll be with everybody in the conference and Delson will take us through a new meditation. And if you can come in on time, we can then get started.

So next week is a guided meditation, not a sutta discussion. Any other questions, Virgil? Yes, it's less marina sati, Virgil, and it's more of an actual experience. Yeah, you'll see. Yeah, Inez. Hi, Nelson. Thank you for the Dhamma talk. Very much appreciated. I wanted to ask you the same question as the previous one, but when it comes to physical pain, pain in the body, which is intense and continuous. So I had experienced this for a few months, and it was a particularly different experience. Now it's better, but I noticed that it really affected my practice. And it's very difficult to get back to still mind or signless mind with the intensity of the physical pain.

So do you have any, how can we adapt our practice when we encounter physical pain, which is intense and chronic, continuous? I think it's more important to deal with the pain first in whatever way you can, whether it's to treat the pain or see a doctor or whatever it might be regarding the pain. And outside of that, if you're getting treatment for the pain and it still continues and it gets bothersome, then don't do anything. There's no point in trying to struggle and get to this space when you're in constant pain. First, find yourself in a situation which might be not as much through the day, but there might be points

where you can find a space where there's less pain and your mind is more suited to exploring these depths of consciousness. So treat the body, deal with the pain first, and then you can move on to these experiences. And otherwise, don't force practice during those moments. Yeah, no need to. Why would you? You're causing yourself pain. Thank you. May suffering ones be suffering free and the fear struck fearless be. 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. Sadhu, sadhu, sadhu.