Tuesday, November 18, 2008

War ?

Lead me from dreaming to waking.
Lead me from opacity to clarity.
Lead me from the complicated to the simple.
Lead me from the obscure to the obvious.
Lead me from intention to attention.
Lead me from what I'm told I am to what I see I am.
Lead me from confrontation to wide openness.
Lead me to the place I never left,
Where there is peace, and peace
- The Upanishads

*note* war or not?...you choose..
But in the end you kill yourself.
Love yourself,instead,maybe all the people of the globe will be one nation..not based on nation.
Based on unity of nations.
-added by danny-
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Saturday, November 15, 2008

Supramundane Nibbana

*note* this is the most accurate description of the states of the ,,buddhist jhanas,, I found on the net.
I quote,, After this arising phenomenon ends, then one will experience the cessation of the dependent origination, which goes: When old age and death cease then birth ceases, when birth ceases then being ceases, when being ceases clinging ceases, when clinging ceases then craving ceases, when craving ceases feeling ceases, when feeling ceases then contact ceases, when contact ceases the six-fold sense base ceases, when the six-fold sense base ceases then mentality-materiality ceases, when mentality-materiality ceases then consciousness ceases, when consciousness ceases then formations cease, when formations cease then ignorance ceases....The seeing of dependent origination both forwards and backwards leads the mind to the attainment of the 'Supramundane Nibbana'...note that the author insists that the dependent origination( of matter to spirit,and spirit to mind..or whatever you want to call it) must be done ,,forwards and back,, for the process must be complete.
-added by danny-

Being mindful is a term that always had a kind of slippery meaning and it is not what most people think. Its meaning is very simple and precise when it is seen as observing mind, or attention, or alertness of attention. Being truly mindful means to see what the mind is doing at all times, then let go of the things that cause tension to arise in the head, relax and tranquilize both body and mind. It includes observing how this whole process works and allows it to be, without getting involved in the drama of things. Not getting involved with the drama of things means, to not identify with, or take personally this impersonal process or try to control the present moment.

Being mindful means to lovingly open one's mind and let go of all identification with that distraction, then relax the tension in the head and in the mind, so that one can see things clearly and calmly. Whenever one tries to resist or control what is happening in the present moment, they are at that time, fighting with the 'Dhamma' or 'Truth of the Present Moment.'

This fighting with the reality of the moment causes so much unsatisfactoriness and suffering to arise. However, when one is mindful and see clearly that this is just a phenomena arising and passing away, they can open up and accept it, without hardening their mind or resisting in any way. At this time, joyful interest is very important because when the mind has some joy in it there is no anger, jealousy, aversion, fear, or anxiety, etc. Joyful interest helps the meditator to have the proper perspective of seeing what happens in the moment impersonally. When the mind is uplifted, one sees that whatever arises is just part of a continuing process which they can learn from. Joy causes the mind to be uplifted, which is why it is an enlightenment factor and very important to one's practice. Also, when joy is in one's mind, they are pleasant to be around. Remember, the acronym that is very helpful to use is DROPS. It stands for Don't Resist Or Push, SMILE and Soften the mind and accept everything when it occurs, because that is the "Dhamma of the Moment".

When one continues on with their practice, their mind will eventually attain to the higher and more subtle stages of meditations (arupa jhanas). At that time, one's mind experiences the realm of 'nothingness'. This is what is called cessation. It is called this because there is nothing more to watch outside of the mind. When one experiences the realm of 'nothingness', their mind is watching nothing. But the mind is still there and the different enlightenment factors can arise along with the five aggregates which are affected by clinging. Also, some hindrances can still arise and knock one out of that exalted state. Thus, there is nothing for the mind to watch outside of itself, and yet, there is still lots to see. This is how one's mindfulness enlightenment factor is supported by cessation.

When one experiences the realm of neither-perception nor non-perception, and keeps opening and relaxing the mind, eventually they will experience the cessation of perception and feeling (Nirodha-Samapatti). During this occurrence, one will not know this turning off of consciousness because they have no perception or feeling at all! This is the only stage of meditation where this phenomena occurs. This meditation state is still mundane, it is not the Supramundane Nibbana yet. How can one know what is happening without perception or feeling? It is only when the perception and feeling come back, and if the mindfulness is sharp enough, will one sees directly, each and every link of dependent origination forwards, one by one as they occur. Even this is not the Supramundane State of Nibbana. The links are: When ignorance arises then formations arise, when formations arise then consciousness arises, when consciousness arises mentality-materiality arises, when mentality-materiality arises then the six-fold sense base arises, when the six-fold sense base arises contact arises, when contact arises feeling arises, when feeling arises craving arises, when craving arises then clinging arises, when clinging arises then being arises, when being arises birth arises, when birth arises then old age, death arises.

After this arising phenomenon ends, then one will experience the cessation of the dependent origination, which goes: When old age and death cease then birth ceases, when birth ceases then being ceases, when being ceases clinging ceases, when clinging ceases then craving ceases, when craving ceases feeling ceases, when feeling ceases then contact ceases, when contact ceases the six-fold sense base ceases, when the six-fold sense base ceases then mentality-materiality ceases, when mentality-materiality ceases then consciousness ceases, when consciousness ceases then formations cease, when formations cease then ignorance ceases.

The seeing of dependent origination both forwards and backwards leads the mind to the attainment of the 'Supramundane Nibbana'. This is where there is a major change in one's outlook. One's mind at that time, becomes dispassionate about the belief in a permanent everlasting ego or self. They see from first hand experiential knowledge, that this is just an impersonal process and there is no one controlling the way phenomena arise. These arise because conditions are right for them to arise. In Buddhist terms, this is called 'anatta' or not self nature of existence. One also realizes that no one can possibly attain sainthood by the practice of mere chanting words or phrases or suttas, or the practice of having rites and rituals done for them by someone else or by themselves.

Monday, November 10, 2008

Ballroom Blitz

*note* Ballroom Blitz..you must kill the bad guy in this universe to show that you are good..but the guy is you,all the time....you are the good,the bad,and the ugly all the time,and all you try to kill outside ..is something in yourself.. love and kisses..
-added by danny-
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Sunday, November 09, 2008

The boddhi light

*note*..true kundalini awakening looks like this boddhi image...it is a radiant power...full of joy as one is also fully aware of whom one is.There are no words to describe it.It is God knowing itself,when it's shadows become enlightened..love to all,and kisses.However,it is not a person,nore a thing,nore anything your mind could ponder.It is the source of those.It is NOT also the witness,but the witnessing.
-added by danny-
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Saturday, November 08, 2008

Stand by me

*note* no comments..stand By me,, " is the title of a song performed by Ben E. King and written by Ben E. King, Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller. Since its release, there have been many cover versions of the song, though none have achieved the fame of the original....however,this clip is made of pics from the movie ,Stand by Me(1986)..where this song was used as a soundtrack.
-added by danny-

How will you handle the 11th Army of Mara ?

*note* this guy speaks the truth..really. I quote from him"adults who do not even have the capacity for formal abstract thinking will likely consider you very crazy, intimidating, or at best something to be avoided".. Marvelous and so true,it hurts..it hurts them of course,because they do not introspect.
-added by danny-
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How will we handle the 11th Army of Mara ?

In the Introduction to the Jataka, or "birth stories" of the Buddha, it says that the Buddha sat under the Bodhi Tree in powerful, one-pointed meditation, resisted the 10 armies of Mara, perceived the truth of things, and attained to full and un-excelled awakening. For those of you not familiar with standard Buddhist icons, Mara is the personification of the temptation of the world, the lord of all that is impermanent, simultaneously a satanic and trickster figure who does his very best to thwart those who would escape from his dominion and go beyond birth and death. During the heroic struggle of the Buddha on that day, he transforms and overcomes a great number of assaults by Mara and his armies through his steadiness on the Ten Perfections. The Ten Perfections can be translated a number of ways, and I list them as generosity, morality, renunciation, wisdom, energy, patience, truthfulness, resolute determination, loving-kindness, and equanimity.

These assaults by the Armies of Mara in the story are relatively fantastic, and while quite a mythologized and anthropomorphized bit of work still makes for fun reading. They consist of a whirlwind, a great rain-storm, showers of flaming rocks, weapons and hot ashes, sand, and mud, profound darkness, and a great discus hurled from a huge elephant. The Buddha was steady in his contemplation, deeply rooted in the Ten Perfections, having perfected his karma and mind for countless lifetimes before. Through the power of his actions and abilities, these assaults were transformed into flowers, celestial ointment, and the like.

Later on, the Ten Armies of Mara came to be listed as: 1) sensual pleasures, 2) discontent, 3) hunger and thirst, 4) craving, 5) sloth and torpor, 6) fear, 7) doubt, 8) conceit and ingratitude, 9) gain, renown, honor and falsely received fame, 10) self-exaltation and dispararaging others. These are now useful guidelines for difficulties that must be avoided when possible and seen as they are for meditators to progress on the path of wisdom. They tend to occur in roughly that order, cycling as does everything else. No eleventh army is listed.

However, it says in Sutta #26 of the Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha that soon after the Buddha's enlightenment, it occurred to him that there was no one else that could understand what he had understood. He thought to himself that this dharma was too profound, too subtle, too against the worldly tide, and too difficult. Teaching it would only cause him trouble, as it would be to a generation obsessed with lust and hate, mired in worldliness, incapable of understanding it. And so he decided to keep quiet.

There are other texts that say that it was Mara who came to the Buddha and said to him basically, "Alright, you win. You have gone beyond birth, death, and my realm. Who will understand what you have to teach? Who else can do this? Who will believe you? Nobody." The Buddha, as we have said, agreed without qualification. This I call the 11th Army of Mara, Mara's last temptation, the temptation to keep quiet. The 11th Army of Mara consists of the vast and profound difficulties those who are realized face in describing, explaining, and promoting real liberating insights.

The story continues in its typical style. The great Brahma Sahampati, a relatively high god, understood through his powerful mind that the Buddha had attained to full awakening and yet chosen silence and inaction. This was surprising considering that the Buddha had vowed to attain to that which was beyond birth and death so as to liberate all beings. The Brahma Sahampati appeared to the Buddha and begged him to teach the dharma so that those with little dust in their eyes might see. The story goes that he asked the Buddha to look at the world and see that there were in fact a few who would understand what he had to teach. The Buddha used his psychic powers to survey the world, and indeed he saw that he had been wrong, that there were a few who would understand, whose faculties were keen, whose eyes were only barely clouded. So, he wandered off in search of them and he found some of them. He taught them, they understood, and those teachings have been passed down in a direct line of practitioners that has lasted over 2,500 years.

While the ancient and modern commentators go to great lengths to rationalize why this was all part of the plan, that the Buddha just pretended to not want to teach for various reasons, I take a different, perhaps more cautious and probably realistic view. If we look at what happened as the Buddha tried to go and teach the dharma, we must admit that it was a long, difficult road. He had profound family problems, logistical problems, ran into bandits, had numerous conflicts with opposing sects as well as within his own order. People tried to kill him, his own order fractured at points because of extreme sects and views, people made power plays to take over the order, and so on and so forth. At one point he got so frustrated with his monks that he left them on their own for the whole three month rains retreat and went to be in the forest by himself.

Due to the continued bad and foolish behavior of his monks and nuns in the last 25 years of his teaching, he laid down the kind of restrictive rules usually reserved for vile dictatorships run by raving nut-cases. Clearly he did so reluctantly, as there were no such rules for the first 20 years of the order. The point here being that even for the Buddha, whose teaching ability was clearly of the rarest variety and who had an unduplicated knack for helpful and precise conceptual frameworks, there was nothing easy at all about spreading the dharma.

It is worth remembering that that however mythologized we feel the Buddha was, clearly he as a completely astounding person. He met his struggles with spectacular reserves of intellect, wisdom, stamina and determination. Few of us are so blessed, and the difficulties we face are largely the same as those faced by the Buddha.

I will now begin a short list of basic difficulties faced in trying to spread the dharma by those who know it for themselves. I list them in no particular order. The downside is that I have no great solutions to these problems, but as the AA kids say, admitting you have a problem is the first step.

One of the most profound difficulties in supporting liberating insights is the difficulty in language. It simply cannot explain realization, though it can point to techniques that make it much more likely. Real insight goes beyond the conceptual frameworks of the dualistic mind. Anything you say about it is only partly true at best. The smarter the practitioner, the more frustrating they may find dharma language. The approximately 50% of adults who do not even have the capacity for formal abstract thinking will likely consider you very crazy, intimidating, or at best something to be avoided.

On a related note, if you actually are enlightened, then what is so glaringly obvious to you simply isn't to everybody else, and the longer you have seen it, the stranger it becomes that everyone else doesn't see it also. It can become harder and harder to remember what it was like to sit down on a cushion and not even be able to attain the first jhana, much less cycle effortlessly from the 4th to 16th ñanas. For those who have attained arahatship, the luminosity and centerlessness of perspective becomes such a natural part of one's perception that is seems incredible that it was ever otherwise.

On the flip side of the same coin, one may remember the profound struggles, the thousands of hours of back and knee pain, the extreme subtlety of perception needed, the endless stretching of one's perceptual thresholds, and the relentless determination and tolerance for pain and one's own humanity that was required to finally see it. We may remember the spent vacation time, financial difficulties, relationship issues, logistical complexities and difficulties with teachers and fellow meditators that are often necessary to endure for long retreats and extended daily practice. We may marvel that we were able to do it at all, much less imagine anyone else actually giving up all that they might have to give up and face all that they might have to face to do it. Are we really going to go around shaking people out of their cozy little lives for something we can't even explain?

That brings me to the question of audience. At any given time and place, there are only a handful at best that are ready to hear deep dharma and then convert that knowledge into liberating practice. This was true in the time of the Buddha and continues to be true today. Even among monks and nuns, you will not find many that are enlightened or even aspire to actually be enlightened in this lifetime.

Your best shot is those who have already crossed the Arising and Passing Away, though the complexities of the Dark Night can give them such a complex love-hate relationship to practice and dharma that you may not be able to reach them at all, or perhaps not until they have seasoned in it for years. You may never reach them, as they may not resonate with your personality, teaching style, or your own conceptual and linguistic baggage. You may not even be able to find them, though if you hang out some sort of shingle you will likely cross paths with at least a couple.

Meditation groups are flourishing around the country. You can find them in any mid-sized to larger city, and occasionally in more rural areas in more liberal parts of the country. And yet, very few of these people will actually take the time to get serious about meditation. In truth, few are interested in this at all. Most of these groups function essentially as sectarian churches, venues of social support with a unifying dogma and nice moral lessons, inspiring readings, sharing time, comfortable and satisfying rituals, a little meditation, and often overt or subtle worship and deification of Thich Nhat Hanh, Trungpa, the Dali Lama, Lama Zopa, or some other figure purported to have done it.

Very few will aspire to real mastery themselves. Very few will take the time to learn even the basics of meditation theory. Even fewer will actually go on retreats. Of those that do, only a handful will get their concentration strong enough to attain to basic jhanas or ñanas. Of these, only a couple will be able to cross the A&P, handle and investigate the Dark Night, attain to Equanimity and get Stream Entry. Of those who attain to Stream Entry, a reasonable number will progress to the middle paths, but not many will attain to Arahatship. Call me cynical, but this was true in the Buddha's time and it is true now.

You might think that you could approach these groups and say, "Hey, I know how it's done. Why read the dead books of some guy far away who you are unlikely to have any real contact with when there is someone right here who can help you understand it for yourself? Sure, you might have to bust your butt, but this is what you are all shootin' for, isn't it?"

Unfortunately, likely reactions include: complete disbelief, profound skepticism, confusion, alienation, intimidation, jealousy, anger, territoriality, competitiveness, and the lingering doubts created by having to face the fact that actually doing it is not what they are into at all. People hate feeling these things, and are more likely to blow you off than deal with these feelings. The chances of group or even an individual saying, "Great, I've been looking for a real friend in the dharma for years, and now there is one right here. Tell me how it's done and I'll go do it!" are essentially next to nothing. That said, miracles do occur, and occasionally we do actually run into the few who have little dust in their eyes.

If you are really into finding them, you are likely going to have to meet a lot of people who are not ready yet, even if you are lucky enough to teach at a major retreat center. This can be frustrating. If we look at the life of the Buddha, after the first dozen or so people he taught, he had to walk long distances to even find one person who might get what he was saying. Luckily, he was willing to do this.

How will we handle the 11th Army of Mara? Hopefully the Buddha's story will continue to inspire us to try harder.

MONTUGA - Sofia

*note* nice song from Montuga ..lol
-added by danny-
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The Arising and Passing Away, Some Tales from the Path

*note* Daniel Ingram(buddhist tradition) talks about rising and passing away(of thoughts and phenomenas) ....he also wrote a very nice online book,the links are below.
-added by danny-
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The Arising and Passing Away, Some Tales from the Path(from Daniel Ingram)

I tend to get a lot of questions about a stage of practice called The Arising and Passing Away (A&P), which I cover extensively in my blook and book. However, people keep asking about what it is like, so I have included a few descriptions of my experiences to illustrate a few points.

The first point is that the content of the event can vary widely, meaning that it can look like all sorts of things in its particulars, though the key elements of the pattern tend to be relatively consistent. The second point is that the context of the event can vary widely, meaning that it can occur on or off retreat, with or without meditative training, at all sorts of ages, and often without warning or the person's knowledge of what happened. The third point is that the Dark Night follows the A&P like thunder follows lightening. Thus, each A&P event is followed by a brief description of the relatively dramatic life changes that I made shortly after crossing it. The pattern was not obvious at the time, but on retrospect is glaring. Were these maps part of standard elementary school education, as I wish they were, I think I would have had a much easier time.

My first time crossing it was around age 15. I was and still am a big fan of flying dreams, and so quite without instruction or guidance, I decided that I would practice flying before going to sleep so as to maximize the chances of me having them. I began to try to visualize planets of various colors, which ended up being like 50 foot wide billiard balls in space, some black, some red, some ivory, and in trying to do this I began to notice all sorts of things. I began to notice that there was a delay between the intention to visualize and the image arising. I noticed that it was very difficult to sustain any image, as it would arise and vanish. I began to notice it was nearly impossible to give attention to a sphere without going toward it. I noticed that the delay, the constant effort, the arising and vanishing of the images, and some other strained aspect of the process were strangely irritating. In short, I realized the first three stages of insight practice, but had no idea that these were stock, standard, expected, predictable, and had been mapped by some traditions for over 2,500 years, nor did I know what to expect next.

I can't remember the exact timing, but I know that it was not that many nights of this sort of practice later that I had the following dream. I was standing on a long, straight, dusty, country road with tall wild rose bushes lining either side as far as the eye could see. I was about three feet tall, dressed in a silver space-suit, holding a ray-gun, and beside me were two similarly dressed people of similar height. We were all staring down the road, waiting for something to happen. The sunlight was so bright that it was difficult to see, and its brilliance washed out the color of everything to some pale shade of yellow, green or white. Suddenly a dust cloud appeared far down the road, and out of it emerged a huge witch dressed in black riding a charging black horse. We stood our ground. The witch pointed her wand at us, a brilliant flash of light shot from its tip and engulfed us, and suddenly my world exploded, so that my body seemed like fireworks, flying all over space in sizzling flashes, and I suddenly transitioned from dreaming to waking. However, it took several seconds for my consciousness and sensate reality to reassemble itself into something coherent, and then I was buzzing all over and extremely alert. It would be 10 years before I would have any idea of what that was or what it meant. It is hard from this distant vantage point to get a grasp of exactly how this first event changed my life, as my mid-teens were a complex time in general.

The next time I remember crossing it was the summer after my junior year in college. I had been philosophizing heavily, hanging out with my friend who had also crossed the A&P and didn't know what it was, and we had been discussing the question of the observer or Watcher and how this this related to the question of non-duality. So, one day I was just sitting on the couch, when I decided to take on the watcher directly. I began trying to catch it, second after second, really going after the visceral, perceptual experience of what was observing, and before I knew it, got into this rapid-fire back and forth, super-concentrated state of everything vibrating in my head, and the whole thing zapped back through my skull at very high speed into some black space, and it was done. I broke up with my girlfriend, moved into an appartment alone, and was pretty dark for a while.

The third time I remember occurred during the year after graduation from college. I was dancing in a club, and I began spinning around and got into some sort of very altered state, dancing wildly, with tremendous energy, feeling some kind of long-sought freedom, like something I had forgotten, and up through my being welled this amazing bliss and sense of power, taking over the dancing, moving me effortlessly but with this core of raw power in the center around which the world and my body were spinning and moving quite on thier own, and then it peaked in joy and intensity and was done. After that I began to have to meditate to feel normal. I would go outside before work and lay down on the ground and breathe really slowly and somehow it would help a little. Shortly thereafter I quit the band I was running sound for and moved to California for a while.

The next time I don't remember, but I know the effect it had: I suddenly needed to go on retreats, so I did. I had done really no formal meditaion practice, knew little of Buddhism, but on the advice of a friend I went on a 9-day intensive insight meditation retreat at the Insight Meditation Society. About 6 days into it, after all sorts of back, neck and jaw pain, I was just stiting there, and all of a sudden I noticed that my body was not solid, but instead made of zillions of little particles of energy, all moving around, zipping in and out of reality, and my body exploded, everything flashed black and white, and I felt as if I had been dropped back onto my cushion from space. After that I was hyper-energetic, hyper-philosophical and yet convinced that philosophy held no further answers, but I had no idea what to do next. No one told me what had happened or what it could do to you, and shortly thereafter I quit my electrical engineering program and went to India.

The next time was about 6 months after the previous one, on retreat in India during a 17-day course at the Thai Monastery in Bodh Gaya. I don't really remember much about it, except that it left me feeling very inspired about practice and very dark about the world. I lasted 5 months doing volunteer service in Calcutta before I had to go on retreat again, so I went to Malaysia and sat in the Malaysian Buddhist Meditation Centre, and that is when I really learned to practice. It was 10 years from the first time I had crossed the A&P, and I was about to learn what the Arising and Passing Away was, which seems a bit late, but that's the world we live in, isn't it?

I was practicing very strict noting technique, and very shortly my breath began to move with the noting. I would note "rising" or "falling" and the breath would rise or fall in nearly perfect synchrony with the duration of the note and then stop, so each stuttering breath took many notes, otherwise it would just stop. The rapidity of this got faster and more powerful, so that I shook, sniffed, sweated and noted for days, and in between bouts I would plunge down with the breath as it went down and down and down into a realm of extremely slowed perception and time, like reality was moving through thick, narcotic syrup, and then the energy would come back, the rapid noting, sniffing, and now powerful vibratory energy would return, and it would cycle like this again and again. I was sitting for 2-3 hours at a time with amazing posture, barely sleeping 2 hours per night, and finally the whole thing died down. I was hungry for sex and chocolate, felt exhausted and sluggish, within a day I could barely sit for 5 minutes, and my mind felt like a hive of angry bees.

That night the abbot played an old, scratchy tape of a Burmesse monk describing the stages of insight, and suddenly all was clear. I knew what had happened, knew where I was, and knew what to do about it. You can read about the rest in my book if you wish, but the summary points are these: 1) the maps helped me practice in the face of the Dark Night so that I got to Equanimity, 2) the tape failed to mention the post-retreat/real-world implications of crossing the A&P and entering the Dark Night (they call them "Dukkha Ñanas"), and at that point, despite having crossed the thing many times already, I was unprepared for what would happen next. Shortly thereafter, I canceled all of my medical school interviews so that I could go on a 1-year retreat.

I tell the rest of the story in my book, but hopefully these added shorts will give some idea of the basic points I wanted to illustrate, those being that the context and content can vary widely, but there are relatively predictable and identifiable key elements to the way it happens and what is likely to follow.

A few more brief stories from other points on my path...

I was meditating in my living room and suddenly could see thorugh my closed eyelids. The room looked largely the same, except the color and light were somewhat different. This didn't last long, and in a sit shortly thereafter my body exploded again, very much as it had done before. By this time I knew what it was, and so I was prepared for what came next. I didn't quit my job or end a relationship. Instead I practiced well and shortly thereafter attained to second path in the break room at work during a training lecture.

I was taking a yoga class and had been strangely stiff and tense during it. Every movement was much more difficult than usual, my awareness of the pain in my body more acute. This faded towards the end of the 2-hour class, and then suddenly while bending back into a camel pose, this massive and very startling bolt of energy shot up my spine, causing me to flip suddenly forwards out of the pose. Shortly thereafter I decided to go on retreat during the coming summer in England.

I hope this additional information will help people realize what may have happened to them and/or recognize it when it does happen, and thus be more able to do something useful with their own experiences of these stages and avoid being blindsided by the emotional effects that can result from them.

Practice well.

Friday, November 07, 2008

Stand firm in that which you are

*note* beautiful poems from Kabir...from The Kabir Book : Forty-Four of the Ecstatic Poems of Kabir
by Robert Bly (Editor)
-added by danny-
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Are you looking for me? I am in the next seat.
My shoulder is against yours.
you will not find me in the stupas, not in Indian shrine

rooms, nor in synagogues, nor in cathedrals:
not in masses, nor kirtans, not in legs winding
around your own neck, nor in eating nothing but
vegetables.
When you really look for me, you will see me
instantly --
you will find me in the tiniest house of time.
Kabir says: Student, tell me, what is God?
He is the breath inside the breath.
..............................................................

to Kabir Main Page
to Indra's Prose, Poetry & Haiku

I said to the wanting-creature inside me:
What is this river you want to cross?
There are no travelers on the river-road, and no road.
Do you see anyone moving about on that bank, or

nesting?
There is no river at all, and no boat, and no boatman.
There is no tow rope either, and no one to pull it.
There is no ground, no sky, no time, no bank, no

ford!

And there is no body, and no mind!
Do you believe there is some place that will make the

soul less thirsty?
In that great absence you will find nothing.

Be strong then, and enter into your own body;
there you have a sold place for your feet.
Think about it carefully!
Don't go off somewhere else!

Kabir says this: just throw away all thoughts of

imaginary things,
and stand firm in that which you are.

.................................................................................................

There's a moon in my body, but I can't see it!
A moon and a sun.
A drum never touched by hands, beating, and I can't hear it!

As long as a human being worries about when he will die,

and what he has that is his,
all of his works are zero.
When affection for the I-creature and what it owns is dead,
then the work of the Teacher is over.

The purpose of labor is to learn;
when you know it, the labor is over.
The apple blossom exists to create fruit; when that

comes, the petal falls.

The musk is inside the deer, but the deer does not

look for it:
it wander around looking for grass.

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Friend, hope for the Guest while you are alive.
Jump into experience while you are alive!
Think...and think... while you are alive.

If you don't break your ropes while you're alive,
do you think
ghosts will do it after?

The idea that the soul will join with the ecstatic
just because the body is rotten --
that is all fantasy.
What is found now is found then.
If you find nothing now,
you will simply end up with an apartment in the City

of Death.
If you make love with the divine now, in the next life

you will have the face of satisfied desire.

So plunge into the truth, find out who the Teacher is,

Believe in the Great Sound!

Kabir says this: When the Guest is being searched for,

it is the intensity of the longing for the Guest that

does all the work.
Look at me, and you will see a slave of that intensity.

................................................................................

Monday, November 03, 2008

What Is Chan ?

*note* Master Sheng-yen explains what Chan is..I quote"This method was transmitted from India to China, and then to Japan. In India it was called dhyana, which is pronounced "Chan" in Chinese, and "Zen" in Japanese. Actually, all three are identical."
However,I propose you this koan ,,If Chen Chan was doing Zen,is Chen Chan's Chan... Chan or Zen?,,??...eghh?...now let's do Chan and be happy.
-added by danny-
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I wish to start by telling you that Chan is not the same as knowledge, yet knowledge is not completely apart from Chan. Chan is not just religion, yet the achievements of religion can be reached through Chan. Chan is not philosophy, yet philosophy can in no way exceed the scope of Chan. Chan is not science, yet the spirit of emphasising reality and experience is also required in Chan. Therefore, please do not try to explore the content of Chan motivated by mere curiosity, for Chan is not something new brought here [to the USA] by Orientals; Chan is present everywhere, in space without limit and time without end. However before the Buddhism of the East was propagated in the western world, the people of the West never knew of the existence of Chan. The Chan taught by Orientals in the West is not, in fact, the real Chan. It is the method to realise Chan. Chan was first discovered by a prince named Siddhartha Gautama (called Shakyamuni after his enlightenment), who was born in India about 2500 years ago. After he became enlightened and was called a Buddha, he taught us the method to know Chan. This method was transmitted from India to China, and then to Japan. In India it was called dhyana, which is pronounced "Chan" in Chinese, and "Zen" in Japanese. Actually, all three are identical.

Chan has universal and eternal existence. It has no need of any teacher to transmit it; what is transmitted by teachers is just the method by which one can personally experience this Chan.

Some people mistakenly understand Chan to be some kind of mysterious experience; others think that one can attain supernatural powers through the experience of Chan. Of course, the process of practising Chan meditation may cause various kinds of strange occurrences on the level of mental and physical sensation; and also, through the practice of unifying body and mind, one may be able to attain the mental power to control or alter external things. But such phenomena, which are looked upon as mysteries of religion, are not the aim of Chan practice, because they can only satisfy one's curiosity or megalomania, and cannot solve the actual problems of peoples lives.

Chan starts from the root of the problem. It does not start with the idea of conquering the external social and material environments, but starts with gaining thorough knowledge of one's own self. The moment you know what your self is, this "I" that you now take to be yourself will simultaneously disappear. We call this new knowledge of the notion of self "enlightenment" or "seeing ones basic nature". This is the beginning of helping you to thoroughly solve real problems. In the end, you will discover that you the individual, together with the whole of existence, are but one totality which cannot be divided.

Because you yourself have imperfections, you therefore feel the environment is imperfect. It is like a mirror with an uneven surface, the images reflected in it are also distorted. Or, it is like the surface of water disturbed by ripples, the moon reflected in it is irregular and unsettled. If the surface of the mirror is clear and smooth, or if the air on the surface of the water is still and the ripples calmed, then the reflection in the mirror and the moon in the water will be clear and exact. Therefore, from the point of view of Chan, the major cause of the pain and misfortune suffered by humanity is not the treacherous environment of the world in which we live, nor the dreadful society of humankind, but the fact that we have never been able to recognise our basic nature. So the method of Chan is not to direct us to evade reality, nor to shut our eyes like the African ostrich when enemies come, and bury our heads in the sand, thinking all problems are solved. Chan is not a self-hypnotising idealism.

By the practise of Chan one can eliminate the "I"; not only the selfish, small "I", but also the large "I", which in philosophy is called "Truth" or "the Essence". Only then is there absolute freedom. Thus an accomplished Chan practitioner never feels that any responsibility is a burden, nor does he feel the pressure that the conditions of life exert on people. He only feels that he is perpetually bringing the vitality of life into full activity. This is the expression of absolute freedom. Therefore the life of Chan is inevitably normal and positive, happy and open. The reason for this is that the practise of Chan will continually provide you with a means to excavate your precious mine of wisdom. The deeper the excavation, the higher the wisdom that is attained, until eventually you obtain all the wisdom of the entire universe. At that time, there is not a single thing in all of time and space that is not contained within the scope of your wisdom. At that stage wisdom becomes absolute; and since it is absolute, the term wisdom serves no further purpose. To be sure, at that stage the "I" that motivated you to pursue such things as fame, wealth and power, or to escape from suffering and danger, has completely disappeared. What is more, even the wisdom which eliminated your "I" becomes an unnecessary concept to you.

Of course, from the viewpoint of sudden enlightenment it is very easy for a Chan practitioner to reach this stage; nevertheless before reaching the gate of sudden enlightenment one must exert a great deal of effort on the journey. Otherwise the methods of Chan would be useless.

The Three Stages of Chan Meditation

At present, the methods of meditation that I am teaching in the United States are divided into three stages.

Stage 1: To balance the development of body and mind in order to attain mental and physical health

With regard to the body, we stress the demonstration and correction of the postures of walking, standing, sitting and reclining. At the same time we teach various methods of physical exercise for walking, standing, sitting and reclining. They are unique exercise methods combining Indian Hatha Yoga and Chinese Tao-yin, and can bring physical health as well as results in meditation. Thus, one who practises Chan and has obtained good results will definitely have a strong body capable of enduring hardship. For the mind we emphasise the elimination of impatience, suspicion, anxiety, fear and frustration, so as to establish a state of self-confidence, determination, optimism, peace and stability.

A good student, after five or ten lessons here, will reach the first stage and be able to obtain results in the above two areas. One of our student's reports stated: ≥This kind of Chan class is especially good for someone like myself who, by profession or habit, has been used to having the brain functioning just about every minute of the day. I often find this Chan sitting very helpful as rest or relief. So even for no greater purpose, this Chan class has been very useful and should be highly recommended.≤ [from Chan Magazine Vol.1; No.1]

In the first lesson of each class, I always ask each of the students individually his or her purpose in learning Chan whether he or she hoped to benefit the body, or sought help for the mind. The answers show that the latter were in the majority. This indicates that people living in American society today, under the strain and pressure of the present environment, suffer excessive tension, and many have lost their mental balance. Some are so severely tense that they have to consult a psychiatrist. Among those who come to learn Chan, I have one woman student, an outstanding lecturer in a well-known university, who asked me at the first meeting if I could help to relieve her from tense and uneasy moods. I told her that for a Chan practitioner this is a very simple matter. After five lessons she felt that Chan was a great blessing to her life.

The method of the first stage is very simple. Mainly it requires you to relax all the muscles and nerves of your entire body, and concentrate your attention on the method you have just learned. Because the tension of your muscles and nerves affects the activity of the brain, the key is therefore to reduce the burden on your brain. When your wandering thoughts and illusions decrease, your brain will gradually get a little rest. As its need of blood is reduced, more blood will circulate through the entire body. Meanwhile, because of the relaxation of the brain, all the muscles also relax; thus your blood vessels expand, you feel comfortable all over, your spirit feels fresh and alert, and your mental responses are naturally lighter and more lively.

If one's object of study is just to acquire physical and mental balance, and not to study meditation proper, then one will probably feel that the completion of the first stage is enough; but many students are not content with this, and indeed, some from the outset are looking for the goal of the second stage.

Stage 2: From the sense of the small "I"

The first stage only helps to bring concentration to your confused mind; but when you practise concentration, other scattered thoughts continue to appear in your mind - sometimes many, sometimes a few. The concept of your purpose in practising Chan is for mental and physical benefits. This is a stage where your concept is purely self-centred. There is no mention of philosophical ideals or religious experience. When you reach the second stage, it will enable you to liberate yourself from the narrow view of the "I". In the second stage you begin to enter the stage of meditation. When you practise the method of cultivation taught by your teacher, you will enlarge the sphere of the outlook of the small "I" until it coincides with time and space. The small "I" merges into the entire universe, forming a unity. When you look inward, the depth is limitless; when you look outward, the breadth is limitless. Since you have joined and become one with universe, the world of your own body and mind no longer exists. What exists is the universe, which is infinite in depth and breadth. You yourself are not only a part of the universe, but also the totality of it.

When you achieve this experience in your Chan sitting, you will then understand what is meant in philosophy by principle or basic substance, and also what phenomenal existence is. All phenomena are the floating surface or perceptible layer of basic substance. From the shallow point of view, the phenomena have innumerable distinctions and each has different characteristics; in reality, the differences between the phenomena do not impair the totality of basic substance. For instance, on the planet on which we live, there are countless kinds of animals, plants, minerals, vapours, liquids and solids which incessantly arise, change and perish, constituting the phenomena of the earth. However, seen from another planet, the earth is just one body. When we have the opportunity to free ourselves from the bonds of self or subjective views, to assume the objective standpoint of the whole and observe all phenomena together, we can eliminate opposing and contradictory views. Take a tree as an example. From the standpoint of the individual leaves and branches, they are all distinct from one another, and can also be perceived to rub against one another. However, from the standpoint of the trunk and roots, all parts without exception are of one unified whole.

In the course of this second stage, you have realised that you not only have an independent individual existence, but you also have a universal existence together with this limitlessly deep and wide cosmos, and therefore the confrontation between you and the surrounding environment exists no more. Discontent, hatred, love, desire - in other words dispositions of rejecting and grasping disappear naturally, and you sense a feeling of peace and satisfaction. Because you have eliminated the selfish small "I", you are able to look upon all people and all things as if they were phenomena produced from your own substance, and so you will love all people and all things in the same way you loved and watched over your small "I". This is the mind of a great philosopher.

Naturally, all great religious figures must have gone through the experiences of this second stage, where they free themselves from the confines of the small "I", and discover that their own basic substance is none other than the existence of the entire universe, and that there is no difference between themselves and everything in the universe. All phenomena are manifestations of their own nature. They have the duty to love and watch over all things, and also have the right to manage them; just as we have the duty to love our own children and the right to manage the property that belongs to us. This is the formation of the relationship between the deity and the multitude of things he created. Such people personify the basic substance of the universe which they experience through meditation, and create the belief in God. They substantiate this idea of a large "I" the self-love of God and formulate the mission of being a saviour of the world or an emissary of God. They unify all phenomena and look upon them as objects that were created and are to be saved. Consequently, some religious figures think that the basic nature of their souls is the same as that of the deity, and that they are human incarnations of the deity. In this way, they consider themselves to be saviours of the world. Others think that although the basic nature of their souls is not identical to and inseparable from that of the deity, the phenomenon of their incarnation shows that they were sent to this world by God as messengers to promulgate God's intention.

Generally, when philosophers or religious figures reach the height of the second stage, they feel that their wisdom is unlimited, their power is infinite, and their lives are eternal. When the scope of the "I" enlarges, self-confidence accordingly gets stronger, but this stronger self-confidence is in fact merely the unlimited escalation of a sense of superiority and pride. It is therefore termed large "I", and does not mean that absolute freedom from vexations has been achieved.

Stage 3: From the large "I" to no "I"

When one reaches the height of the second stage, he realises that the concept of the "I" does not exist. But he has only abandoned the small "I" and has not negated the concept of basic substance or the existence of God; you may call it Truth, the one and only God, the Almighty, the Unchanging Principle, or even the Buddha of Buddhism. If you think that it is real, then you are still in the realm of the big "I" and have not left the sphere of philosophy and religion.

I must emphasise that the content of Chan does not appear until the third stage. Chan is unimaginable. It is neither a concept nor a feeling. It is impossible to describe it in any terms abstract or concrete. Though meditation is ordinarily the proper path leading to Chan, once you have arrived at the door of Chan, even the method of meditation is rendered useless. It is like using various means of transportation on a long journey. When you reach the final destination, you find a steep cliff standing right in front of you. It is so high you cannot see its top, and so wide that its side cannot be found. At this time a person who has been to the other side of the cliff comes to tell you that on the other side lies the world of Chan. When you scale it you will enter Chan. And yet, he tells you not to depend on any means of transportation to fly over, bypass, or penetrate through it, because it is infinity itself, and there is no way to scale it.

Even an outstanding Chan master able to bring his student to this place will find himself unable to help any more. Although he has been to the other side, he cannot take you there with him, just as a mother's own eating and drinking cannot take the hunger away from the child who refuses to eat or drink. At that time, the only help he can give you is to tell you to discard all your experiences, your knowledge, and all the things and ideas that you think are the most reliable, most magnificent, and most real, even including your hope to get to the world of Chan. It is as if you were entering a sacred building. Before you do so, the guard tells you that you must not carry any weapon, that you must take off all your clothes, and that not only must you be completely naked you also have to leave your body and soul behind. Then you can enter.

Because Chan is a world where there is no self, if there is still any attachment at all in your mind, there is no way you can harmonise with Chan. Therefore, Chan is the territory of the wise, and the territory of the brave. Not being wise, one would not believe that after he has abandoned all attachments another world could appear before him. Not being brave, one would find it very hard to discard everything he has accumulated in this life - ideals and knowledge, spiritual and material things.

You may ask what benefit we would get after making such great sacrifices to enter the world of Chan. Let me tell you that you cannot enter the world of Chan while this question is still with you. Looking for benefit, either for self or for others, is in the "I"-oriented stage. The sixth patriarch of the Chan sect in China taught people that the way to enter the enlightenment of the realm of Chan is: "Neither think of good, nor think of evil." That is, you eliminate such opposing views as self and other, inner and outer, being and non-being, large and small, good and bad, vexation and Bodhi, illusion and enlightenment, false and true, or suffering of birth and death and joy of emancipation. Only then can the realm of Chan or enlightenment appear and bring you a new life.

This new life you have had all along, and yet you have never discovered it. In the Chan sect we call it your original face before you were born. This is not the small "I" of body and mind, nor the large "I" of the world and universe. This is absolute freedom, free from the misery of all vexations and bonds. To enter Chan as described above is not easy. Many people have studied and meditated for decades, and still have never gained entrance to the door of Chan. It will not be difficult, however, when your causes and conditions are mature, or if you happen to have a good Chan master who guides you with full attention. This Master may adopt various attitudes, actions and verbal expressions which may seem ridiculous to you, as indirect means of assisting you to achieve your goal speedily. And when the Master tells you that you have now entered the gate, you will suddenly realise that there is no gate to Chan. Before entering, you cannot see where the gate is, and after entering you find the gate non-existent. Otherwise there will be the distinction between inside and outside, the enlightened and the ignorant; and if there are such distinctions, then it is still not Chan.

When you are in the second stage, although you feel that the "I" does not exist, the basic substance of the universe, or the Supreme Truth, still exists. Although you recognise that all the different phenomena are the extension of this basic substance or Supreme Truth, yet there still exists the opposition of basic substance versus external phenomena. Not until the distinctions of all phenomena disappear, and everything goes back to truth or Heaven, will you have absolute peace and unity. As long as the world of phenomena is still active, you cannot do away with conflict, calamity, suffering and crime. Therefore, although philosophers and religious figures perceive the peace of the original substance, they still have no way to get rid of the confusion of phenomena.

One who has entered Chan does not see basic substance and phenomena as two things standing in opposition to each other. They cannot even be illustrated as being the back and palm of a hand. This is because phenomena themselves are basic substance, and apart from phenomena there is no basic substance to be found. The reality of basic substance exists right in the unreality of phenomena, which change ceaselessly and have no constant form. This is the Truth. When you experience that phenomena are unreal, you will then be free from the concept of self and other, right and wrong, and free from the vexations of greed, hatred, worry and pride. You will not need to search for peace and purity, and you will not need to detest evil vexations and impurity. Although you live in the world of phenomenal reality, to you, any environment is a Buddha's Pure Land. To an unenlightened person, you are but an ordinary person. To you, all ordinary people are identical with Buddha. You will feel that your own self-nature is the same as that of all Buddhas, and the self-nature of Buddhas is universal throughout time and space. You will spontaneously apply your wisdom and wealth, giving to all sentient beings everywhere, throughout all time and space.

What I have said reveals a small part of the feeling of one who has entered the enlightened realm of Chan, and is also the course which one follows in order to depart from the small "I" and arrive at the stage of no "I". Nevertheless, a newly enlightened person who has just entered the realm of Chan is still at the starting section of the entire passage of Chan. He is like one who has just had his first sip of port. He knows its taste now, but the wine will not remain in his mouth forever. The purpose of Chan is not just to let you take one sip, but to have your entire life merge with and dissolve in the wine, even, to the point that you forget the existence of yourself and the wine. After tasting the first sip of egolessness, how much farther must one travel?

What kinds of things remain to be seen?

I will tell you when I have the chance!

Sunday, November 02, 2008

The solution to problems is not "out there"

*note* nice commentaries from Myrko Thum about Confucius...lovely,,The solution to problems is not "out there". It is the Inside-Out approach: success and happiness can only be found by working on ourselves. It also entails the spiritual message to look inside and to discover ourselves fully.''
-added by danny-
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Confucius is one of the most quoted personalities ever. He is so popular that there is a special "Confucius says …" joke-selection, I mean who can say to have this kind of achievement ;)

Confucius, whose name literally means "Master Kong", lived 551-479 BCE. He was a Chinese thinker and philosopher, whose teachings have deeply influenced not only Asian thought and life. He presented himself as a "transmitter who invented nothing" and he really pointed out the importance of learning, which is one reason he is seen by Chinese people as "The Greatest Master".

One of the best known sources of Confucius are The Analects, a collection of his teachings, which was compiled many years after his death. A fountain of extremely mindful quotes springs from these ancient descriptions.

Many of them are universal and timeless in their beautiful and simple truth and they are as valid today as on the day they left Confucius’ mouth. Here we take a look at 10 of the most inspiring quotes by Confucius.

Confucius says …

1. "Never impose on others what you would not choose for yourself."

It’s the "Golden Rule" and the essence of real compassion . Not compassion as in looking down on someone and have pity for another, this is no real compassion. Compassion means seeing another person 100% equal to yourself (in value, not in differentials on the surface which ultimately do not matter). In fact it is seeing yourself in every other person. And therefore you cannot harm anyone without also harming yourself.

It doesn’t mean to lose individuality or self-worth, on the contrary – but the other person earns the same gift.

2. "Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance."

That’s my personal favorite quote since it expresses something very profound which also is very useful to know: Ignorance is a willful neglect or refusal to acquire knowledge. It is not widen one’s own perspective in order to see a broader truth. As an example it would be to have racist thoughts and not realizing that all men are equal.

The ultimate truth therefore is where there is absolutely no ignorance, meaning where the perspective or consciousness has become one with all that there is. In Buddhism ignorance (Avidyā) is seen as the primary cause of suffering. Liberation is Enlightenment. Another quote by Confucius here is "Ignorance is the night of the mind, but a night without moon and star."

3. "I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand."

Those quotes are just perfect. What he is expressing here is that we have to experience something ourselves in order to really understand it. If we are hearing something it might be interesting. If we are seeing something it might be beautiful. But only if we feel in happening to ourselves we can really know how it is.

Picture something nice as winning an Olympic gold medal or picture something terrifying as the loss of a loved one. Can you know this by hearing it or by seeing it? Or do you have to do it and experience it yourself to really know it?

Along with this realization comes the awareness that you cannot understand someone or his actions from hearing or seeing it from the outside. You have to feel empathic compassion for him to really know what it is like. To know and not to do is really not to know. Only by applying our knowledge we can validate it’s harmony with reality, it’s truth.

4. "Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it."

Amazing. It calls for dropping the inner mask through which we constantly see and evaluate the world, distorted by our wants and belief-systems. Here we have to look at things as they are. Just like a newborn child would look at things. Then we are able to really see again, without instant labeling of what we see and therefore only really seeing our label. If we become able to do this – just for a second without judgment, we can see that everything in nature is as it should be. And in this natural perfection lies beauty.

5. "The Superior Man is aware of Righteousness, the inferior man is aware of advantage."

Another quote is "The object of the superior man is truth." It is the value of integrity: Do we act to our best knowledge of truth or do we bend ourselves and violate our integrity in order to gain an advantage? Do we play fair game or use perfidious tactics?

To be truthful to ourselves is also important to the development of (good) character. And it is the only straight way to liberation.

6. "Wheresoever you go, go with all your heart."

Whatever you do and whatever you commit to, do it fully, give your all – one hundred percent. It is the essence of Carpe Diem – Seizing the day and it’s surely the best way to be satisfied with what we do and get the best results.

7. "Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in getting up every time we do."

There is no failure, there are only valuable learning experiences. Or as Thomas Edison about inventing the light bulb said: "I have not failed, I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work." The important thing is not giving up, but learning and then improving by using this feedback to get better and ultimately succeed.

A quote expressing the same principle is "A man who has committed a mistake and doesn’t correct it, is committing another mistake."

8. "He who learns but does not think, is lost. He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger."

Confucius explains the connection of learning and reflection. Reflection of that what we learned by thinking or of the results we get by applying the knowledge. "Study without reflection is a waste of time; reflection without study is dangerous" is a similar quote by Confucius. Learning is only useful if we connect the learning within our own minds, with what we already know and what is useful for us. This reflection of any knowledge also saves us from blindly following any knowledge without checking its truthfulness and validity to us.

I think everybody experienced learning when we really want this knowledge and interweave it with what we already know. If there is a need or problem we want to solve, the consume knowledge much more effective than it happens for students in many universities.

9. "He that would perfect his work must first sharpen his tools."

This quote calls for planning and preparation. This includes getting and improving the personal skills we need to be successful. If we want to hold speeches we have to become good with communication skills. If we want to win a race we have to train for it. If we want to do a big project we need knowledge in project management. Steven Covey calls it Sharpening the saw, read about it here .

10. "If you look into your own heart, and you find nothing wrong there, what is there to worry about? What is there to fear?"

It shows that our primary work lies within ourselves: to work on ourselves and improve will automatically take care of the outside world if we use our abilities then. "When we see men of a contrary character, we should turn inwards and examine ourselves." The solution to problems is not "out there". It is the Inside-Out approach: success and happiness can only be found by working on ourselves. It also entails the spiritual message to look inside and to discover ourselves fully.

Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Nan Huai-Chin speaks

*note* worthy of reading the comments of Nan Huai-Chin about buddhism and meditation practice...this guy was born in 1918 and so far he is still alive and kicking....plus,while his hair is white,his eyebrows are black..marvelous...kisses to him!
*update*.. Nan died at the age of 95 on Sept. 29th, 2012 in Suzhou, China.. from
-added by danny- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nan_Huai-Chin
Nan Huai-Chin (simplified Chinese: 南怀瑾; traditional Chinese: 南懷瑾; pinyin: Nán Huáijǐn) (March 18, 1918 – September 29, 2012) was a spiritual teacher of contemporary China. He was the student of renowned lay Chán Buddhist teacher Yuan Huan-Xian (袁煥仙; 1887–1966), and has received confirmation of his enlightenment by various masters of the Buddhist traditions.^[1] He is considered by many to be a major force in the revival of Chinese Buddhism.^[2] While Nan is regarded by many in China as one of the most influential Chán Buddhist teachers, he is little known outside the Chinese cultural sphere.^[3] Nan died at the age of 95 on Sept. 29th, 2012 in Suzhou, China.^[4]
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THE PATH OF CULTIVATING ENLIGHTENMENT
There is a story behind this book. An old friend, Mr. Xiao, came to see me. As he was about to leave, he asked me a question: "Shakyamuni Buddha left home when he was 18,[1] and finally--much later, after years of effort--lifted his head, saw a bright star, and was enlightened. What was it that he was enlightened to?"
If it had been someone else who had asked this question, it would not have had any great importance. But Mr. Xiao has been studying Buddhism for many years, so when he raised this question, it was no ordinary matter.
According to what is recorded in the scriptures and the traditional accounts, as soon as Shakyamuni Buddha was born, he was already equipped with an extraordinary natural endowment. Because he had cultivated enlightenment practices through past lifetimes over many eons, as soon as he was born in this life, various kinds of auspicious things happened. He renounced his princely position and left home, and for twelve years he sought enlightenment. Everyone should pay attention to these twelve years, because it is very easy to pass over them lightly.
At the moment we will emphasize the twelve years when Shakyamuni Buddha cultivated various religious practices. At that time there were many Indian religious sects that had been in existence for quite a while, each with its own methods of cultivating practice. Shakyamuni Buddha fully studied the various kinds of ascetic practices and used various methods to cultivate and refine himself. He was not like present-day students who study Buddhism and who vacillate back and forth, paying homage to one teacher after another, going from one conventional formulation to the next. Every time Shakyamuni took up a method of practice, he would study with complete sincerity and dedication, and do the necessary work.
After Shakyamuni worked his way through all of them, he recognized that none of these methods was the true, ultimate way to enlightenment.At this point, he went into the freezing snow-covered mountains and practiced austerities. After six years, he also recognized that austerities were not the path to enlightenment and that it would be best to leave them behind. After this, he sat in meditation under the bodhi tree on the banks of the Ganges River and made a vow he would not arise unless he achieved supreme perfect enlightenment; if not, he would stay there until he died. After all these efforts, he one day looked up to see a bright star and awakened to enlightenment.
Certainly everyone knows this story. I have told it again because I want to focus everyone's attention on it: I want everyone to know what Shakyamuni Buddha did during those twelve years, and how he cultivated practice. When we read his biography, we read only that he studied avrha-samadhi,"concentration without thought" for three years, and in the end, "realized it was wrong and abandoned it." We always overlook the fact that during these twelve years he earnestly cultivated practice.
. . .
Readers should note that Shakyamuni Buddha recognized that these are not the path to enlightenment and at the time he could not find an enlightened teacher, so all he could do was go by himself into the mountains to practice austerities. Every day he ate only a piece of dried fruit, so naturally he became emaciated, to the point that he barely looked human any more. By practicing like this, Shakyamuni wanted to find the real truth. But after six years he realized that austerities are not the path to enlightenment either, so he came down out of the mountains. When Shakyamuni Buddha reached the banks of the Ganges River, a shepherd girl offered him some fine milk curds. Because he accepted them, the five attendants sent by his father abandoned him. They left because they thought that Buddha had abandoned his will to cultivate practice. Later on, these five men were the first to be delivered by Buddha at the Deer Park,and became his first great disciples.
When Shakyamuni accepted the milk curds from the shepherd girl, everyone thought he had retreated from the path--that he had backed out. The men following him withdrew, because at that time in India everyone thought that one who left home to cultivate the path must practice austerities.
There is one point that we must pay attention to! Buddha saw the bright star and awakened to enlightenment only after he had accepted nourishment and recovered his physical strength. This is why I always alert the people around me to pay particular attention to their physical health and nourishment. Without a healthy body, there is no way to cultivate the path and realize enlightenment-this is a fact. We must investigate, step-by-step, the relationship between physical health, nourishment, and the cultivation of the path to enlightenment.
Only after Buddha accepted nourishment and recovered his physical abilities did he cross Ganges River and arrive under the bodhi tree. At that time, he had no way to find an enlightened teacher able to guide him: all he could do was rely on himself, sit in meditation under the bodhi tree, and make his vow.
The few simple words of Shakyamuni's vow are easy to ignore. When we read them, it seems we have understood their meaning, but we have not entered into them deeply or comprehended them fully. The vow that Buddha made at that time dispensed with religion, and dispensed with grand phraseology. It was like making an oath or making a bet: "If I do not achieve enlightenment this time, then I will die right here, and that's all there is to it. I will not get up from this seat." With these sentences, he expressed how intent he was on seeking enlightenment.
. . .
Shakyamuni raised his head at that moment and was enlightened. Tell me, after he was enlightened, was all the cultivation he had done before wasted, were those twelve years of effort all in vain? In other words, when. he awakened to enlightenment, he was about 30 years old, and when he began to spread the Dharma, he was no more than 32. His disciples were all much older. All the instruction he received. from childhood on, and all the various forms of cultivation and austerities he practiced after he left home--were these all done in vain or not?
At the time I answered my old friend Mr. Xiao by saying, "What he was enlightened to was interdependent causation and inherent emptiness." Mr. Xiao said, "Oh ... right" pushed the door open, and left.
I don't know whether everyone has taken note of this or not. This is a very serious question. After he left, a thought came to me: Mr. Xiao has studied Buddhism for many years. If someone else asked this question, it wouldn't matter much, but since he was asking this question, it was very serious. In other words, when he asked this question, it had extraordinary depth.
In truth, Shakyamuni Buddha awakened to inherently empty interdependent origination.Interdependent origination is inherently empty: this truth is very simple, so at the time, why was it so difficult for Shakyamuni to awaken to it? What was the difficulty? Buddha left home and cultivated practice for many years, and only then was able to understand this truth. But now all of us understand it, everyone who reads a Buddhist scripture understands it right? What is so special about this? If he was enlightened to the inherent emptiness of interdependent origination, then he penetrated everything with this one principle, he comprehended everything. So what truth is this? Assuming that he awakened to this truth correctly, then what do we say about his previous efforts? How can we account for them?
The second question is this. Right now we are studying Buddhism. Having read the Buddha Dharma, we then understand that inherent identity is fundamentally empty, we understand inherent emptiness and interdependent causation. Though we understand these truths clearly, why then do we still have to cultivate practice for such a long time? Moreover, we ourselves have been unable to become even first stage arhats of the lesser vehicle,let alone bodhisattvas. How it makes us lament, that in this present age, we have not seen anyone who has been able to realize even half of the fruit of enlightenment.
Thus, after Mr. Xiao had left me, a certain thought made my mind uneasy. I lamented that in the civilization of the present-day world, where religious activities and spiritual studies of various kinds and styles are all so extraordinarily well-developed both at home and abroad, society is getting more and more chaotic, cultured thinking is getting more and more confused, and the general mood is getting worse and worse. Everywhere there is confusion and chaos. Alas! It is true that everything and everyone is in chaos: this is what is called a world in chaos.
This question of Mr. Xiao's--where does the question lie? Take note! All of us who study Buddhism are to some extent inverting cause and effect. What do I mean by this? "Inverting cause and effect" means that we are reversing cause and effect, basis and results, and taking the cause for the effect.
We all understand that inherent nature is fundamentally empty; we all understand that everything is a product of interdependent causation and so on. But these principles, these truths, are not truths that we have discovered on our own. They are the answers that Shakyamuni Buddha gave to his disciples after he spent so many years practicing austerities. After other people took these answers and recorded them, and we read them, we understand them. In fact it is not that we have understood them ourselves. It is only that with the aid of the Buddhist scriptures, we have accepted the results achieved by the Buddha and appropriated them for ourselves.
So what should we do? The answer is that we ourselves must travel the road of cultivating practice. We must imitate Shakyamuni Buddha and travel the road of meditative concentration. We must seek realization on the road of true, correct practice. We ourselves must realize and witness interdependent origination and inherent emptiness.
After we have understood these truths, we often mistakenly assume that they are results we ourselves have achieved. In recent years, those who lecture on sitting meditation all understand Taoism, and understand Esoteric Buddhism, and are full of things to say. But when we take a look to see how they really are, it doesn't seem that way at all. As for whether they have achieved anything or not, whether they have found realization or not one glance and it is obvious that they have not. As the Sung dynasty Zen master Ta-hui Tsung kao said, "I know whether or not you are enlightened when you just stand there: what need is there to wait for you to speak?"
But people nowadays have many theories, especially theories of the special meridians and eight ch'i channels. They open this one and that one and they get very excited. I say to them, "You shouldn't get your bodies into total chaos."
All of this happens because we have learned a bit of knowledge from the Buddhist scriptures and have appropriated the results achieved through the practice of the people before us. We have reversed cause and effect, taking the effect as the cause and the cause as the effect.
This great canon of teaching by Shakyamuni Buddha is truth, sure enough, and it is also experience. He had doubts about the question of birth and death, and about the question of life. What Shakyamuni pursued was how to completely comprehend human life. It is very easy to use the experience of people who have gone before, adopt the insights that they have accumulated, appropriate these insights for ourselves--thus inverting cause and effect--and make this the study of Buddhism. The result is that we remain ourselves, and the study of Buddhism remains the study of Buddhism: the two are placed in opposition, and it is useless for cultivafing practice. Therefore I always say that the Buddha Dharma--which is one method of cultivating practice and the merely conceptual study of Buddhism, have totally different implications. Right now we follow the road of preparing to learn to be buddhas. This is the reason for this book.

Notes from the editor of the web edition
[1] There are two accounts of the age of the Buddha when he left home to practice asceticism. The more popular account is that he left home at the age of 29 and attained enlightenment at the age of 35. Master Nan portrayed the second account here.
CARRYING OUT VOWS
The basic principles of this series have been seeing truth, cultivating realization, and carrying out vows, and the main emphasis has been on the aspect of cultivating realization and doing meditation work. Until now, I have only said a few words about carrying out vows.
In fact, when all of us study Buddhism and cultivate the Path, we all want to experience the fruit of enlightenment. But why is it that so many people study Buddhism, and so rarely do we see people who are truly able to realize the fruit of enlightenment? The main reason is that most people do not carry out their vows sufficiently, not that their meditation work is inadequate.
If you do not carry out vows, then your perception of truth cannot be thorough and complete. Without the genuine carrying out of vows, your work of cultivating realization cannot progress. But it is this aspect of carrying out vows that is so easy for us to neglect. This is why all of you try hard but feel you are not getting on the right track.
Now let me explain by unifying the three aspects of seeing truth, cultivating realization, and carrying out vows. For example, there is a psychological question that is very obvious. Why do so many people in the world want to study the Buddhist Path? Even if they don't follow the road of studying Buddhism and seeking the Path, they still look for some other religious belief. Those people who do not seek religious belief search elsewhere for something to rely on. Fundamentally speaking, subconsciously, they all have something they are seeking. It is like doing business, and looking for the greatest result for the lowest price.
It is the same way with people who seek the supernatural protection of bodhisattvas. They spend a few dollars on bananas, and a few dollars on cakes, and a few dollars on incense, they spend at least a hundred dollars altogether on offerings. When they go to a temple, they burn incense, and bow their heads to the floor, and prostrate themselves. They ask for their husbands to be well, and their children to be healthy. Or they ask for promotions, or for wealth. After they have finished asking for everything, they burn incense, and at the end they take their bananas home with them, and slowly eat them themselves.
How terrible this mentality of praying for gain is! It's the same way when a person who has made a mistake kneels there praying, and makes his confession. What kind of mentality is this? We must think this over for ourselves.
As for those of us who cultivate practice, in our minds we will surely be thinking: "I certainly do not have this kind of mentality." But the way I see it is all the same: it is only a different style. Though we do not have this mentality of praying for gain, nevertheless, we think that by sitting in meditation we will be able to attain enlightenment. Though we are not seeking with bananas, we are seeking with our crossed legs.
Everyone sits in meditation wanting to illuminate mind and see true nature, to achieve buddhahood and consummate the Path. What people like the most is meditation work and experiential states. All you have to do is hear that someone has the Path and has meditative accomplishments, and no matter what, you feel curious and go off to find him. You are not clear about what the Path and what meditation work ultimately mean: this means your perception of the truth is not pure. Why isn't your perception of truth pure? If we pursue this matter rigorously, it is because you do not correctly carry out your vows.
The foundation of the Buddha Dharma is built on the six planes of cyclical existence, on past, present, and future cause and effect. But based on what I know from several decades of experience, very few of the people who study the Buddhist Path really believe in the six planes of cyclical existence, and even fewer believe in past, present, and future cause and effect. Or at least they do not believe absolutely in these basic Buddhist teachings. These are not superstitious beliefs. No one understands it clearly in principle, and even fewer people seek and find realization of it in actual fact. All of you ought to reflect back within yourselves on these points.
Because you do not believe in the six planes of cyclical existence, and you do not believe in past present, and future cause and effect, no matter whether you study Zen, or Esoteric Buddhism, or Pure Land, your basic foundation is wrong. It is like wanting to build a house on sand: it is impossible. But our mental activities are always going in this direction.
. . .
Another example are the spiritual powers. What are spiritual powers like? What is the power to know things in advance like? So many people who claim to have spiritual powers die of high blood pressure and diabetes. So what about an even bigger question? Have we given careful thought to what studying Buddhism and cultivating practice are ultimately for? We always indulge in high-flown talk, but it is not realistic.
In genuine cultivation of practice, in the end there is just one road: carrying out vows. So what does it mean to carry out vows? It means to correct your own mental conduct. Our thinking, the process of arousing mind and setting thoughts in motion: this is behavior that has not yet come forth. All conduct is the active expression of thoughts. When we want to seek emptiness, this is a matter of seeking a metaphysical issue, seeking the root source that can give birth to thinking. To really reach emptiness at the behavioral level and at the level of thinking is almost impossible. If someone manages to have his or her thinking entirely empty, and has become unknowing, then why would he or she have to cultivate the Path? Thus the principle of emptiness is not like this.
. . .
When we work at sitting meditation, why can't we make progress? All of you are sure to think that it is because our method is incorrect, and do all you can to find an enlightened teacher to ask about methods. This is not it! Don't deceive yourselves. Why can't you advance in your meditation work? Why can't you attain samadhi. It is because your mental activity has not been transformed. If you have not changed your mental activity at all, your meditation work cannot progress, and your perception of truth cannot be complete. In Chinese civilization, no matter whether Confucian or Taoist, all teachings are united on this point, all agree on this view.
. . .
What are virtuous practices? By Taoist standards, to rescue someone who is in imminent danger, and on the brink of death, and save his life, is just one virtuous practice. Using this as the standard, you must complete three thousand virtuous practices and accumulate several thousand merits, and only then will it be enough to cultivate and attain the station of the heavenly immortals. It is the same for Confucianism and for Buddhism.
Buddhism requires us to transform completely the way we give rise to mind and set our thoughts in motion, our internal thinking and behavior. But based on what I know, not one of you has budged at all in your mental activity. This is very frightening. Why can't you realize the fruit of enlightenment? Because you have not untied your mental bonds. The bonds of the eighty-eight compulsions are strong and deeply rooted.
People who study Buddhism have one basic defect. All of you should reflect on this. First of all, because you study Buddhism, you look upon the human world as empty. Therefore you seek to leave it behind, to leap beyond it and pay no attention to it. Because you leap beyond it and pay no attention to it you are incapable of compassion. We constantly speak of compassion. You should check into your own mental state and see how much compassion you are capable of. This is a very serious question. The second thing is this: to what extent have we eliminated greed, anger, ignorance, arrogance, and doubt?
Here is an example. The better all of us cultivate practice, the more quick-tempered we become. why is this? You sit in meditation and are sitting very comfortably. If someone comes and bothers you, don't you get angry? Isn't this sort of mental functioning the opposite of compassion?
. . .
To my knowledge, generally people who have studied Buddhism or people who believe in any other religion are more arrogant than anyone in the world. They think that other people are devils who have no faith, and they think they themselves are sages. We who study Buddhism make the same mistake, only we call it by another name. When we see someone outside the Path we feel: "Alas! How pitiful! These are the seeds of hell!" The same principle is involved here: we are unwilling to be humble.
. . .
This is especially true of people who have done a bit of meditation work. All they have to do is study Buddhism and do sitting meditation for three days, and already the attitude that "In heaven and on earth, I alone am the honored one" arises. They think that other people's meditation does not work. They specialize in measuring other people by the standards of a sage, but they themselves have arbitrarily set this standard: things are the size they say they are. Of course when they measure other people, none of them are sages. But they never measure themselves to see how long they are or how big they are. They never reflect back on themselves: this is what's most terrible.
What can be done about such mental behavior? Why can't they realize the fruit of enlightenment? Why can't they attain samadhi? Because they have not transformed this mental behavior one little bit, they have not transformed greed, anger, ignorance, arrogance, and doubt at all. This is very frightening. When we reflect on it, it is very serious.
I emphasize over and over again to everyone that if you cultivate the Path without realizing the fruit of enlightenment and you are unable to experience emptiness, this is because you have not been able to transform your mental activity. Thus, when you sit and meditate, you are only holding onto a bit of emptiness created by the realm of consciousness, and you think that is the Path.
. . .
So I always tell students that among the sixty-four hexagrams of the I Ching, there is not one that is entirely good, and not one that is entirely bad. There is bad in the good and good in the bad. There is only one hexagram which may be reckoned to have all its lines auspicious, and that is the hexagram "Humility." So when Buddhism tells us to study emptiness, the first precept is that we must be humble. How many people can do this? Reflect back yourselves: who is humble?
Only if you can truly achieve humility will you be capable of the compassion of the bodhisattvas. The Taoist Lao-tzu said: "I have three treasures: humility, frugality, and not presuming to take precedence in the world." Not presuming to take precedence in the world is humility. It's the same way in Buddhism. To what extent does Buddhism take humility? It extends humility to selflessness. when humility reaches its ultimate point this is selflessness.
Therefore, if we only want to sit in meditation and reach emptiness, and we cannot achieve selflessness at the level of mental activity, then we cannot become empty. This is because as we sit there preserving emptiness, it is the self that is trying to preserve emptiness, and we have not achieved selfless emptiness. If there is no self, what's the need to seek emptiness? Selflessness is already empty.
. . .
Now the foregoing refers to practice, but what about vows? That is even harder to talk about. If you cannot carry out your vows, you cannot manage to see truth. To put it another way, if you cannot carry out your vows, then you cannot succeed in the work of cultivating realization. What's the use of sitting well? You may say: When I sit in meditation, I can sit for three hours, and my mind becomes very pure." But really you are sitting there being lazy. This can be called a form of what is described in the play on words in classical Chinese: "The Tao means stealing [tao]." The meaning of this saying from The Yin Convergence Scripture is that people make use of the essence of heaven and earth, and borrow the original capacity of life, in order to be able to cultivate themselves and achieve the Path. Once people are born, they steal food and air from heaven and earth. They sit in meditation at all hours of the day and night wanting to imbibe the correct energy of heaven and earth, and the refined essence of the sun and moon. How terrible this thievery is! But The Yin Convergence Scripture is encouraging us to be thieves. If we really steal certain things from the universe, then our lives will be perfected: our lives will be the universe. After you do this, then you can let other people steal from you. This is the Taoist viewpoint.
The thought of the classical Chinese philosopher Mo-tzu [fl. fourth century B.C.] came out of Taoism. Mo-tzu demanded that we "sacrifice ourselves to benefit the whole world." This is equivalent to the Buddhist spirit of great mercy and compassion. Self-sacrifice is the philosophy of Mo-tzu. Mo-tzu is a figure in the Taoist classic Biographies of the Spirit Immortals, where it says that Mo-tzu was still in the world during the time of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty [who reigned 140-87 B.C.). But who still saw him then?
Yang Zhu [c. fourth century B.C.], another classical Chinese philosopher, advocated the primacy of absolute individualism and self interest. His philosophy, which resembles classical 19th century liberalism, also came out of Taoism.
Now let us return to the main topic. We who study Buddhism are there sitting in meditation stealing, while at the same time, out in society so many people are busy on our behalf. For this reason the Buddhists have a saying which is very special, a saying that is recited every morning and evening: "To those above we repay the four major forms of benevolence. Below we help those beings suffering in the three mires." This is a vow. Every day it alerts us to do meritorious deeds. We who study Buddhism must examine ourselves at all times wherever we are to see if we are fulfilling this vow. Every day we must repay the four major forms of benevolence. We are indebted to all four forms of benevolence: the benevolence of the buddhas, the benevolence of our parents, the benevolence of the nation, and the benevolence of sentient beings.
What is the benevolence that sentient beings show toward us? A person lives in the world, and depends on the fruits of the labor of many people. This is why we must repay the four forms of benevolence. To live for one day, we must trouble many people to provide us with the necessities of life. This is really the way it is.
"Below we help those beings suffering in the three mires," means that at the same time we must be mindful of the sufferings of those in the three lower planes of existence: animals, those in hell, and hungry ghosts. In other words, we must be mindful at all times of the sufferings of those who are not like us humans, and we must think of ways to help them. But do we do this or not? We who study Buddhism only think of how to find for ourselves companions who have the wealth of the Dharma, so they can help us achieve the Path. This kind of motivation is the basis of selfishness. Why don't you first help someone else achieve the Path? So first I spoke of practice, and then I spoke of vows. Have you really taken vows or not? Think it over.
Consider the classic Mahayana vows: "I vow to deliver infinite numbers of sentient beings. I vow to cut off endless afflictions. I vow to study innumerable Dharma Gates. I vow to achieve the supreme Path of the buddhas." In reality, while we are chanting sutras, we chant through these vows, and that's the end of it. There are actually no such things in our minds. The first vow is to save infinite numbers of sentient beings, but all we want to do is save ourselves. The second vow is to cut off endless afflictions, but we think: "It would be best if you helped me cut them off." The third vow is to study innumerable Dharma Gates, but we think: "You teach me, and it will be fine." The fourth vow is to achieve the supreme Path of the buddhas, but we think: "One day in the future I may succeed." Usually this is the way we interpret these four vows. Just reflect back, and you will see how serious this is. This is why it is said that the gate of practice is very hard.
The whole Buddhist canon tells us about the practice of carrying out vows. Practice means the thirty-seven components of the Path and the myriad practices of the six perfections. The foundation for studying Buddhism is here. When you understand past present, and future cause and effect and the six planes of cyclical existence, and you improve yourself at the level of mental activity, gradually you will naturally advance in your meditation work and your perception of truth. In saying this I am not just repeating the Buddhist teaching: this has been my personal experience. If you do not start your work from here, it is an insoluble problem, and you will not be able to realize the fruit of enlightenment. Changing your mental activity is much more important than sitting in meditation or cultivating realization. All you have to do is correct your mental activity for one day, and your samadhi power and your sitting meditation will improve along with it for that day.
. . .
To summarize what's been said, you need three things to succeed on the Path: to see the Path, to practice the Path, and to always be correcting yourself, to rid your conduct and behavior of defilements. Now in this entire series of lectures, we've given enough for you to be able to find the Path, and we've presented enough indications for you to be able to practice meditation and achieve samadhi. We've discussed what is and what isn't samadhi as well as the various semblance Dharmas that tend to mislead people. We've explained the use of anapana and contemplations on provisional existence for achieving concentration and insight, the genuine basis behind any of the methods for attainment. So what's left is for you to put energy into the effort and actually get to it. If you put your energy into cultivation work, and into the effort to correct your faults and shortcomings, you will develop enough merit to surely succeed. In this way you can become the savior of self and others.
On the Path of cultivation, you must know that everything starts with and ends with behavior. The whole Path has to do with conduct and behavior, the carrying out of vows. This is the highest truth and also the simplest truth: like a great circle, to do good and refrain from evil, is the very beginning and end of the path. Enlightenment has little to do with supernormal powers and supernatural feats, but rather with accessing our great transcendental wisdom awareness and employing our potential for great functioning in order to help others. You now know that reaching this stage requires that we both accumulate merit and work hard at meditation so as to rid ourselves of defilements. But after they're gone, what's left is to exercise our clear functioning capacity in compassionate behavior for the welfare of others. This is carrying out vows.
So strive hard with your efforts and don't settle for simply building an intellectual edifice of cultivation, like some university professors or academicians do with Zen. Without attainment, such efforts are quite useless. Rather, throw yourself into the cultivation of realization in order to gain attainment. Seeing the Path is one thing, but you will gain power in the Path only through the cultivation of practice. The buddhas and ancients have given us all we need to know, so it's left up to you to make the effort. Don't wait until it's too late. Start now and the blessings of the Path are sure to reach you. Cultivate with your entire mind and body. Settle for no less. This is the way to succeed.

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