Saturday, July 25, 2009

The Four Doctrines of a Spiritual Ascetic

1. Not to hate others despite being the object of their hatred.
2. Not to retaliate in anger, even when angry.
3. Not to injure others, even when injured.
4. Not to beat others, even when one is beaten by them.

~ Gyurme Dorje & Matthew Kapstein, The Nyingma School of Tibetan Buddhism, Vol. 2: Reference Material, Wisdom Publications, 1991

(Thanks to Ogmin for Tweeting this.)

Religious beliefs can coexist

One of my Twitter pals turned me on to an interesting article about the intersection between eastern and western paths and how they can be held together without conflict. The author points out how each can strengthen one's experience of the other. "This path isn’t for everyone. But if Eastern traditions and practices can deepen our Western faith, that seems like something to encourage rather than condemn."

The editor of Tricycle wrote a comment about this article:
I was surprised to find that people do not know that many Christians have taken up Buddhist practice. Meditation is a useful tool for those wishing to look more deeply into their own traditions. Father Robert Kennedy, for instance, earned the Zen honorific "roshi" while remaining a Catholic.

From where I sit, this is obvious, but I live in New York and publish a Buddhist magazine. We've found it illuminating to interview Christians who have an affinity for Buddhist practice, among them scholar Elaine Pagels, sociologist Robert Bellah (UC Berkeley) and Anglican priest Don Cupitt (Cambridge). Not one of them is Buddhist but all are sympathetic to—and some have engaged in—Buddhist meditation. One of our editors, Clark Strand, teaches "koans of the Bible" and has recently written a book called "How to Believe in God." Clark is both a Christian and a Buddhist and this does not appear strange to most of us.

Many thanks again,

James Shaheen
Editor & Publisher
Tricycle: The Buddhist Review
All of this is much in the same flavor as the urge behind Luminous Mind, for people to find benefit to their spiritual experience, no matter what their background affiliation may be. We all have this light inside, whatever we may choose to call it. Let's make it burn brightly.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

DVD Class 2b Notes

Continuing with the emptiness of the skandhas / no-self.

The 4th Skandha: Mental formations

Mental formation relates to movement of mind. For example:
the movement of attached mind
the movement of averse mind
the movement of jealous mind
the movement of virtuous mind

From such movement, we accumulate karma. We engage in karmic actions of positive and negative actions. Positive actions are those that are beneficial to oneself and others. Negative actions are those which are harmful to oneself and others. These actions are called the fourth skandha.

Feeling and Perception, the second and third skandhas, are also mental events. In a detailed analysis, you could refer to a total of 51 mental events. Of these:

There are the 6 root afflictions
20 secondary afflictions
11 virtuous mental events
4 changeable
and so on, there are many of them.

We focus on these as being a self, fixate on them as being an “I.”

For instance, when we have a strong emotion or a virtuous thought, we think of it as “I”. Are these the self of individual? The self of person? Actually, we should examine all these mental formations one by one as they arise. If we have a virtuous thought that arises, we can ask, “Is this virtuous thought the self or is it not the self?” We have a strong fixation on both virtuous and nonvirtuous mental events.

In relative truth, there are virtuous and nonvirtuous actions. But from the ultimate point of reality, the true nature, you don’t find any true, existent self as virtuous or nonvirtous in any of these mental formations.

So we should look and see...
Is this one with the self?
Is it permanent?
Is it singular?
Is it independent?

The aggregate of formations is the accumulation of karma. Due to all of these various movement, we accumulate different sorts of karma, positive and negative.


The 5th Skandha: Consciousness

We have six collections of consciousness:
eye, ear, nose, tongue, body
mental

Which of these is a self? The eye consciousness? The ear consciousness? The mental consciousness?

From the Cittamatra school, they speak of two more:
Seventh consciousness: klesha mana
Eighth: Alaya or all-base consciousness

From the Mahayana point of view, the all-base consciousness is the basic continuum of consciousness. The manifestation of the all-base consciousness is unclarity or vagueness. The essence of the alaya-vijnana is that it is neutral in character, neither virtuous nor non-virtuous.

It is the basis for the implantation of all habitual tendencies. It is the warehouse, the place where we record/store all our habitual seeds. When it meets with the proper conditions in the future, the seeds ripen and manifest out. Then we experience suffering, joy, good, bad, all these worlds.

The 7th consciousness – klesha – afflicted mind -- looks at the 8th consciousness and misperceives that as an I or me. The afflicted mind mistakenly views the all-base consciousness and thinks of it as an I or me.

When we look at the details, the sixth consciousness is the one that plants the seed in alaya. All the five sensory perceptions perceives things, but they are taken by the sixth concsiousness to the alaya and plant the seeds there.

In any case, what we are doing here is to look at the skandha of consciousness. It is quite a large group of consciousnesses coming together. This is a big mental operation.

When you look at all that, you have to ask, “Where is the self?”
We should look into this and ask,
Is the eye consciousness the self? ear, body, nose, etc?

We should also ask whether the aggregate of consciousness is the same thing or different from the self. Are these consciousnesses and the self the same or different?

We should also analyze consciousness from the perspective of the three ignorances.

We have this general sense that consciousness is a stable, permanent thing. Singular and doesn’t depend on other things (autonomous).

So we must analyze and see if any aspect of consciousness actually does possess these qualities.

What has been explained so far is the meditation on the selflessness of persons. When we cling to ourselves as “I” or “self” we are clinging on to the skandhas. So when we take them apart and analyze them, we see there is no solidly existing self there. This is the first stage of meditation on emptiness.

Khenpo Gyamso Rinpoche:
When one does not mistake the skandhas for the self, this is asserted to be the realization of the selflessness of persons.

If you know how to rest and relax in that, this is meditation on the selflessness of persons.

Sometimes in the meditation lineage it is known as the key instructions on searching the mind, asking yourself questions such as, “What is mind? Where is mind?” and so on. So we look at each of the skandhas and look for mind. Mind interchangeable with self in this usage. So we could call it searching for mind or searching for self.

When we don’t look and analyze, the self and mind seem to exist quite well. But when we look into its nature further and penetrate the essence more, we come to this point of finding nothing really existing there.

So how do we meditate on such selfless nature? It is taught by Jamgon Kongtrul in Treasury of Knowledge:
As for the way to meditate, analyze with prajna (knowledge) the reality of selflessness. And after that, rest evenly in freedom from elaborations.

So the meditation on selflessness is first to analyze the meaning of selflessness with one’s discriminating intelligence, and then to rest evenly, in equipoise.

We analyze the self with reasoning and so forth, and after our analysis when we realize the non-existence of self, we rest within that state.

So as was said before, it is important to alternate analytical meditation with resting meditation.

First do the resting with breathing, calm your mind.
Then analyze
and when you get to discursive, come back to resting
then analyze again.

If your analytical mediation becomes too much and makes you disturbed, you should switch to resting. If your mind becomes lethargic or torpid, you should switch to analytical.


Song:

Friends

Friends are empty forms like a water moon
To think of them as being truly real
Will only make your many sufferings increase.

To know they’re empty forms like a water moon
Will make illusion-like samadhi increase
Compassion free of clinging will increase

And non-referential view will also increase
And meditation that’s fixation-free
And conduct free of doer deed increase

Of all the many marvels, this by far the most marvelous
Of all the many wonders, this by far the most wonderful.

--Khenpo Gyamtso Rinpoche

Thursday, July 2, 2009

Harmless Speech Agreement


It's a new month and a good time to assess how we're doing with the Harmless Speech Agreement as we strengthen our commitment to cultivate speech that is true, kind, and helpful, avoiding slander, lying, gossip, and harsh speech.

If you are new to this blog, you can read more about the agreement here, and you're welcome to register your participation by clicking in the poll at the top of the page.

Then scan through the archives or come back from time to time... there are often thoughts and reflections here on cultivating a habit of harmless speech.

Welcome!

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Notes from Friday, June 26, DVD

The Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche

This week's DVD teaching finished up the form skandha by giving tips for off-the-cushion contemplation, then moved ahead to cover the skandhas of feeling and perception. Here are the notes:
........................................

We’ve been working with the skandha of form, trying to discover whether there is a truly existent self in the skandha of form. In this practice, we also work with the mindfulness of body. The actual practice of the mindfulness of body is realizing the selfless, egoless nature of this aggregate, the skandha of form. In order to achieve that realization of egolessness of that skandha, we also use other techniques of meditation during our everyday life, post-meditation states.

One is being mindful of all physical actions. Watching our body and mind together. In order to do such practice, we use various reminders of mindfulness in everyday life. One such reminder can be set with our digital watch. When it goes off, look at your thought and action. A moment of awareness, of mindfulness.

These days, we can set it with many things... cell phone ringing. Even other peoples’ cell phones, they are all around us. When we hear a phone ringing, we can say, “That is a reminder for my mindfulness. We look at our mind, body, and action.

Another mindfulness of body practice is a car horn honk. When someone honks at you, set that as a reminder. But you have to remember your reminder!

These kinds of reminders can help us contemplate throughout the day, which will lead us to realizing the selfless nature of our form.

SKANDHA OF FEELING

This is sensation. We identify feeling skandha as a self, as I or me. When you feel joyous, bright, pleasure, then you say, “Oh, I am feeling happy.” The feeling becomes the “I.” “I” becomes a feeling.

Just as we analyzed the skandha of form, we will analyze feeling.

How does a feeling arise? It arises from contact of consciousness and the object of that consciousness. There are three things: the object, the consciousness, and the contact.

With the example of visible objects, say, a flower coming together with the eye sense faculty produces an eye consciousness. When that comes together, that is contact. When that contact happens, various thoughts happen, such as this is a beautiful flower or this is an ugly flower. And from that we experience pleasant, unpleasant and neutral feelings.

These feelings then become our object of fixation. Clinging onto these things as real, as solid, as existent. Not only that, but based on these feelings, we have fixation on these feelings as a self. “I” arises from that. It becomes a strong ground for fixation onto oneself as “I” or “me.”

There are three feelings at this level:
happiness
suffering
indifference

Once again, you should look at these feelings from the point of view of the three ignorances.
We cling onto them as being permanent.
Then as being singular: good, bad, etc.
We feel that feelings are independent.

The truth is, feelings are impermanent. This may be good or bad news, depending on if you’re having a good or terrible feeling!

Feeling is always changing. Nothing is permanent or solid as we cling onto them.

Our feeling of someone as being a good person, for example... someone who is our ally, a friend. It changes suddenly and that person “becomes a monster.” Feelings are changing, nothing is solid. Not long ago, you felt this guy was the best person in the world. And the next moment our feelings change.

We have many teachings from the Buddhist instructions related to this. Examples are often given such as the cases where enemies in the early part of one’s life become friends later on, and vice versa. So we can see that feelings by their very nature change into something else. If feelings were actually permanent, we would always have to experience the same feeling from the same object. If pleasant feelings arose from contact with an object, then we could never feel anything but pleasure from that object. But that’s not the case, is it?

For instance, when we first fall in love vs. a few weeks or months down the road. Why the difference? It’s a similar object, similar person, etc., but now we’re ready to punch them!

Feelings change all the time, so we can’t find any solid, real self there. No matter how you feel, there is no need to fixate on that feeling. No matter how bad or how pleasurable.

When we don’t see the momentary nature of changing, we create suffering for ourselves. The main suffering is coming from such fixation as clinging onto things as real and solid... clinging onto these feelings as real.

If we can see our feelings as an illusion or a dream, then that feeling will bring us joy, space, wisdom.

One of the main analyses we should do in terms of selflessness is, where is the self in the skandha of feeling?

Is the aggregate of feeling self or not?

The skandha of feeling is not just one.
It has three main parts: happiness, suffering, and indifference.
Which of these three is the self?

We can examine the individual feelings as well. Even within pleasant feelings there are many different varieties. For example, if we took pleasant feelings to be the self, what kind of characteristics would we be looking for? We would want it to be permanent, singular, and independent if it existed.

So if feelings of pleasure were the self, then feelings of suffering would not be the self. So if suffering arose, why would we have a problem with it, because it’s not the self?

And in the same way, if we took feelings of suffering to be the self, then there couldn’t be any pleasant feelings with the self, because the self would be this one thing.

So if we analyze in this way, we cannot find any feeling that is the self.

Is the skandha of feelings self or not?
Is it different or the same?
If we continue analyzing in this way, then feeling does not truly exist.

We cannot find a true entity of feeling that exists as solid, real, as we ordinarily think they are.

Ordinarily, we take many things for granted and don’t analyze and see the details. Things just appear to be real. Suffering appears to be quite scary, so we don’t analyze it. If we analyze it, we don’t find the normal entity that we normally fixate on.

So we have to go by our own pace, in our own timing, trying to find a feeling and whether they exist or not and how they are existing.

This is the second skandha and its meditation on selflessness.


SKANDHA OF DISCRIMINATION
(AKA PERCEPTION or DISCERNMENT)

This skandha is referring to our conceptual mind. Our thoughts that make distinctions, that separates out things from other things, that brings divisions between phenomena. Clean, dirty, good, bad. Mainly a lot of judgmental thoughts. This skandha is referring to a particular object and fixating on it and seeing things as real truly in one way or another.

This is called the aggregate of discrimination. Clinging onto their existence as real becomes very surface level, conceptual level. What is clean, dirty, pure, impure? It’s very conceptual. When you look at that level of skandha, there is no true existence of such nature in reality.

So these latter two skandhas, of feelings and discriminations, are both in the list of 51 mental events that are discussed in the abhidharma of Buddhist psychology. The text: Classifications of mental states, available from Nitartha Institute.

The Buddha taught that these two aggregates are the source of a lot of conflict and disharmony in both a mundane sense and in philosophical debate. Buddha said that the aggregate of feelings is responsible for disharmony between worldly people. The aggregate of discrimination is responsible for disharmony among philosophers.

Skandha of discernment is also analyzed in the way we analyze the earlier skandhas. To see how such a concept exists, such as clean, dirty, pure, impure. Do they have true existence? How do they exist when you analyze them?

And also to analyze the clinging onto self and ask ourselves if this is one with the aggregate of discriminations, or are they two different things?

In the same way as in the other skandhas, we ask whether it is permanent, singular or independent.

Usually we cling onto these concepts very strongly. If you cling onto the view of emptiness or impermanence, what do you have? All these clingings we have to transform. So we contemplate on the skandha of discrimination and discover the selfless nature of such conceptual mind, of fixation onto things as pure or impure.

All of these clingings we have to transform.

If we cling to that which is impure as the self, then that which is pure could not be the self.

This is all being spoken from the perspective of ultimate truth.
From the point of view of mere appearance, yes there is relative clean and dirty.
Water, for instance, if you don’t discriminate that, you get sick.
But when you analyze from the ultimate point of view, there is no such concept.

Meditation on the Skandha of Feeling

First, begin with shamatha (calm abiding meditation). Once you have attained non-distraction, rest evenly in that space.

From within this state of calm mind, give rise to a thought that clearly recalls the feeling of suffering. An unpleasant feeling. You probably won’t have too many problems remembering an unpleasant feeling.

So look into what difference there might be between this feeling of suffering and the self. Is there a difference between this feeling of suffering and the feeling of fixating on a self?

As an antidote to clinging to this feeling as being permanent, contemplate the impermanence of this feeling. The momentariness of this feeling changing from instant to instant.

Through contemplating the momentariness of the feeling, we also transcend the clinging to feelings as being singular. If the feeling is composed of countless instances and moments, then it is impossible for it to be one thing.

As an antidote to our clinging onto the feeling as being independent, we meditate on its being interdependent. In order to feelings to arise, abide, and cease, they need to depend on various causes and conditions.

.......

This Friday we'll review the Feeling and Perception Skandhas, especially using material from the book. Then we're off the following week, July 10.