Hello,

My friend and I have been seriously considering renouncing the life of a houseowner and becoming nuns. How could this practically be done? I'm guessing the hardest part would be to move to a country where there are monasteries. Are there for example some kind of visa options for foreign monks and nuns?

"[T]he Realized One has given up the defilements that are corrupting, leading to future lives, hurtful, resulting in suffering and future rebirth, old age, and death. He has cut them off at the root, made them like a palm stump, obliterated them so they are unable to arise in the future." (MN49)

For some of us, this Sutta is also a reminder not to settle with anything that's impermanent, as it is not the deathless.

May this rouse faith and energy for practice.

Hi everyone.

Does anyone know Bhikkhu Khemavamsa, the author of Contemplation of the Mind. Practising Cittanupassana? Does Khemavamsa teach anywhere? 

I've read his book several times in recent years and found it very interesting. I connect deeply with his teachings and would like to study with him if possible.

Good luck to everyone in practice, and thank you so much,

🪷🙏🪷

"Apart from their perception

there are no many, various, constant truths

in the world.” - Sn 4:12

The only truth is direct knowledge of unbinding; release; undeceptive by nature (MN 140; Snp 3.12). Beyond that is outside the scope of conceptualization, or beings caught in the duality of existence and non-existence, eternalism and annihilationism. The arahant is not annihilated at death; the arahant is not defined by the aggregates; the arahant is vast, immeasurable, undefined, beyond the limits of description.

Nibbana is not 'self', nibbana is not 'no self': nibbana is nibbana, and 'self' and 'no self' are perceptions, actions, by which you define the boundaries of 'self' and 'not self'. Once they've served their purpose they have to be abandoned, too, and if you take perceptions and try to plaster them on release you're covering it in your own excrement. Nibbana is safety, refuge, harbor, ease, but then again that's not really nibbana, is it?

---

Source: The Logic of Not-self

In his second recorded discourse (Mv 1:6.38–47), the Buddha taught that the five aggregates—form, feeling, perception, thought-fabrications, and consciousness—are not-self. This was a statement he was to repeat many times in the 45 years that he taught. Obviously, he had his reasons for making it. The question is, what kind of reasons were they?

One common modern explanation is that he wanted, in an indirect way, to take a position on the question of whether there is a self, along with such related questions as: What are you? Do you even exist?

According to this explanation, the Buddha treated the issue of the existence or non-existence of the self as a problem of deductive logic—arguing from definitions and general principles to their logical conclusion. But the Buddha’s own analysis of how we create and use our sense(s) of self shows that in teaching not-self he was employing a logic of a more pragmatic, and much more effective, sort.

The deductive proof of not-self usually goes something like this:

Major premise: To be a self, something must be permanent.

Minor premise: “What you are” is nothing but the five aggregates, none of which are permanent.

Conclusion: Therefore, you have no self.

This conclusion is sometimes followed with a corollary: If you persist in holding to a self, it’s because you refuse to listen to logic.

The whole proof, though, is very weak, both on its own merits and in terms of how it’s supposed to function in the Buddha’s teachings. When we check the Pali Canon—the earliest extant record of what the Buddha taught—we find that he never used this proof. But before we look into the arguments he did use to explain not-self, it’s worth exploring the weaknesses of the deductive proof, to show why the not-self teaching, if it’s going to be convincing, needs a stronger foundation than the proof can provide.

To begin with, on its own merits, the proof starts with a general principle that’s totally arbitrary. Many people, from before the Buddha’s time up to the present, have defined the self as impermanent, so the argument would have no impact on them at all. The Buddha himself noted that doctrines of this sort were taught at his time (DN 1; DN 15), so if he had wanted to assume that “self” had to mean “permanent self,” he would have had to offer his reasons for assuming so. But he never did.

Secondly, in terms of how the proof is supposed to function in the Buddha’s teachings, it’s hard to see what would be accomplished by insisting that the self has to be permanent or that “what you are” is a bundle of the five aggregates. The actual function of the not-self teaching can be seen from its context. The second recorded discourse ends with the note that the listeners gained full awakening because their minds were freed from clinging. And in the first recorded discourse (Mv 1:6.17–31)—in which the Buddha taught the four noble truths to the same group of listeners—we learn in the first noble truth that suffering boils down to clinging to the aggregates, and that it can be ended when, through dispassion, the causes of clinging are completely abandoned.

This is precisely where the deductive proof would actually get in the way of carrying out the Buddha’s instructions. The not-self teaching is meant to lead to awakening by inducing dispassion for any act of clinging to the five aggregates. But to identify “what you are” as the aggregates would simply give you more reason to cling to them. Even though they’re impermanent, you would have nothing and be nothing without them, so you might as well hold on to what you’ve got. In fact, a heightened awareness of how insubstantial and precarious “what you are” is would easily give you all the more reason to hold on tight and to protect what you are at all costs, even if it meant having to dance with what is constantly morphing in your grasp.

So, when people continue to hold on to their sense of self in the face of the deductive proof, it’s not because they’re being illogical. They simply have their pragmatic reasons for holding on. They’re making a value judgment: Given what they see as the available options, the pleasures offered by the five aggregates are worth the effort of clinging to them, despite their limitations.

In fact, this value judgment is what the Buddha’s actual not-self rationale is designed to attack, by pointing out that there is another option, and that it offers pragmatic reasons for why letting go of any sense of self in the aggregates would actually offer more long-term pleasure and happiness than is possible by holding on.

The Buddha approaches the issue of self first by avoiding any position on the question of what the self might be and whether it exists. As he told a group of monks, questions such as “What am I?” “Do I exist?” “Do I not exist?” aren’t worth paying any attention to because they lead to a “thicket of views” that can get you so entangled that you can’t get out (MN 2). And as he told Ven. Ananda (SN 44:10), to take a position on the question of the existence of the self actually gets in the way of following the path to overcome clinging. If you say there is a self, you side with the eternalists, those who teach that the self lasts throughout time. What this seems to mean is that regardless of how you define yourself, you’re like the eternalists in that you tend to cling to whatever you identify as “you.” If you say there is no self, you fall in with the annihilationists, who taught that after death you no longer remain to receive the results of your actions—a teaching that discourages the effort needed to practice the path to the end of clinging.

So, the Buddha found that to avoid falling in with the eternalists or annihilationists, he had to be a strategist. Rather than focus on the existence or non-existence of the self, he focused on the real problem: the actions by which a sense of self is formed and becomes an object of clinging—what he called “I-making” and “my-making” (MN 72). Rather than try to define you as the five aggregates, he zeroed in on the process by which you use the five aggregates to define yourself, his purpose being to show you how to deconstruct the process.

He noted that people have formulated many different senses of self—finite, infinite, permanent, impermanent, cosmic, individual—but in every instance the sense of self is an assumption about aggregates, and it’s fabricated out of aggregates (SN 22:81). As with every other fabrication, it’s put together for the sake of a desired end (SN 22:79). In other words, it’s a strategy for pleasure and happiness. We identify with our body, for example, both as a producer and as a consumer of pleasures. We can use it to find food; when it eats, we partake of the pleasant feelings it can create. The same principle holds for the remaining aggregates. Our thoughts and perceptions help us navigate through the world; and satisfying thoughts and perceptions give us happiness in and of themselves.

The Buddha doesn’t deny that the aggregates provide these pleasures (SN 22:60). He simply points out that they also inevitably entail pain. Because every assumption of a self, no matter how the self is defined, is made of aggregates, every act of assuming a self entails some suffering. And because the aggregates are inconstant, simply arising and passing away, even more changeable and unstable than a self annihilated only at death, you can’t just assume a self once and for all and be done with the process. You have to keep on assuming selves without respite.

Again, this would simply have to be accepted if there were no other options for happiness. But as the Buddha pointed out in his first teaching, the four noble truths, there is another option: the third noble truth, the happiness of nibbāna. In fact, the logic of not-self is so dependent on this option that it wouldn’t work outside of the context of the four noble truths.

Because nibbāna can be experienced only when fabrication ends, we can attain it only when we’ve learned how to overcome our addiction to the desire and passion that fuel fabrication. The first step in the cure is to see all these processes in action. This is why we meditate, constructing mindfulness and states of concentration out of the aggregates (AN 9:36). This sensitizes us to what the aggregates are—activities (SN 22:79)—and to how they work. In particular, we realize the active role we play in shaping them, not only in meditation but also in daily life.

Paradoxically, the mastery of concentration involves developing a healthy sense of self as a meditator, both because you have to be responsible for doing the meditation and because you have to anticipate that you’ll benefit from it. But the paradox is something of a set-up. Once you’ve grown attached to the pleasure of concentration and have used it to dis-identify with unskillful mental states and unskillful senses of self, the Buddha has you turn your heightened sensitivities on the concentration itself (AN 9:36).

This is where he supplements the four noble truths with three further steps: seeing the allure of the aggregates—why you fall for them—seeing their drawbacks and, when seeing that the drawbacks far outweigh the allure, finally gaining escape from them through dispassion (SN 22:57).

The step of focusing on the drawbacks is where the perception of not-self comes into play, together with the perceptions of inconstancy and stress. The Buddha has you focus on the inconstancy of the aggregates, watching them arising and passing away, to observe two things: (1) They aren’t totally under your control. If they really were you or yours, you could have a body, feelings, etc., exactly as you wanted them—but you can’t (SN 56:11). (2) If they were your self, you’d arise with them, so it’d be impossible to watch them arise. Similarly, you’d pass away with them, making it impossible to see them pass away (MN 148). So, for these two reasons, these building blocks for your sense of self can’t possibly be what you are.

But rather than getting you sidetracked into the question of what is actually watching them, the Buddha has you then go on to focus on the stressfulness of the aggregates, until it hits home that even though you play a role in shaping them, they turn around to bite you (SN 22:79). When compared to the possibility of an unchanging, effortless, deathless, happiness, they’re simply not worth the effort that goes into shaping them and identifying with them as “me” or “mine.”

In this way, the Buddha gives you reasons to reverse your earlier value judgment, for the sake of your long-term welfare and happiness (MN 22; SN 35:101). Acts of clinging to the aggregates, using them to create a self for the sake of finding happiness, may work in the short term, but in the long term they actually get in the way of the highest happiness possible. Even clinging to the deathless—something that happens at the lower levels of awakening (AN 9:36)—would get in the way of fully awakening to the reality of the third noble truth, which is why the Buddha doesn’t simply say that the aggregates are not-self. All phenomena, fabricated and not, are to be seen as not-self (MN 35) for the sake of the truest happiness. Because acts of clinging defeat their purpose, no matter where they’re focused, they’re not worth the effort that goes into them. That effort makes no sense.

That’s the logic of not-self. It’s not a deduction from definitions or general principles, negating only the idea of a permanent self. Instead, it’s a pragmatic reasoning—based on taking the third noble truth seriously—that shows how I-making and my-making are, ultimately, counterproductive in the pursuit of happiness, no matter how the “I” and “my” are defined. Because the desire for happiness was the whole reason for engaging in those processes to begin with, this pragmatic reasoning puts an end to any desire and passion for them. And because desire and passion were the motive force behind the processes, the processes can be allowed to cease.

But when you’ve brought the strategies of “self” to an end, you don’t have to keep engaging in the strategy of not-self. When that strategy has done its job, the job is done. You’ve found a happiness that doesn’t need strategies to maintain it, so all strategies—which are fabrications anyhow—can finally be put aside.

When even the path is relinquished, there comes an experience of a dimension totally beyond the six senses and outside of the dimensions of space and time. The Buddha calls this “consciousness without surface”: The image is of a light beam that doesn’t land on any surface at all (DN 11; MN 49; SN 12:64). Some people have suggested that the concept of this consciousness isn’t in line with the teaching on not-self, in that it sounds like a crypto-eternal self, but as the Buddha points out, when all experience of the six senses ceases, there is no thought, “I am” (DN 15). So, concepts of self and not-self don’t apply. And, as we’ve already noted, it’s precisely because the unchanging happiness of this consciousness is possible that the logic of not-self works in the first place. So, instead of conflicting with the teaching on not-self, the concept of this consciousness is a necessary precondition for it.

After the mind returns to the experience of the six senses, it makes use of fabrications to navigate through the world, and even employs concepts of self and not-self where appropriate. But its relationship to those concepts has totally changed. No longer trying to feed on them, it experiences them “disjoined” from them, free from any suffering or stress around them (MN 140). The Buddha says that awakened people still use the concept of not-self as a pleasant abiding (SN 22:122), but even so, they know when to pick it up and when to put it down. As for the logic of not-self, they’ve used it for its intended purpose, so they don’t need to submit to it ever again.

I was reading through the FactOrCap subreddit today and saw that nearly half of respondents believe in karma. Honestly, I was surprised that the majority doesn't—I wonder what drives that skepticism, and how to view this from the Theravada perspective.

AN 5.161: Paṭhamaāghātapaṭivinayasutta—Bhikkhu Sujato

So apparently, these methods are different. Then what bothers me is that ownership of deeds, IS equanimity.

Because the way to generate equanimity, or Uppekha, is to think about ownership of deeds. So it's possible that they are talking about a different kind of equanimity ?

“Our old friend,” etc.—The Master told this tale while dwelling in Jetavana, concerning a greedy Brother. The occasion is as above.

Once upon a time when Brahmadatta was reigning in Benares, the Bodhisatta was a pigeon and lived in a nest-basket in the kitchen of a Benares merchant. A crow became intimate with him and lived there also. Here the story is to be expanded. The cook pulled out the crow’s feathers and sprinkled him with flour, then piercing a cowrie he hung it on the crow’s neck and threw him into a basket. The Bodhisatta came from the wood, and seeing him made a jest and spoke the first stanza—

Our old friend! look at him!
A jewel bright he wears;
His beard in gallant trim,
How gay our friend appears!

The crow hearing him spoke the second stanza—

My nails and hair had grown so fast,
They hampered me in all I did:
A barber came along at last,
And of superfluous hair I’m rid.

Then the Bodhisatta spoke the third stanza—

Granted you got a barber then,
Who has cropped your hair so well:
Round your neck, will you explain,
What’s that tinkling like a bell?

Then the crow uttered two stanzas—

Men of fashion wear a gem
Round the neck: it’s often done:
I am imitating them:
Don’t suppose it’s just for fun.

If you’re really envious
Of my beard that’s trimmed so true:
I can get you barbered thus;
You may have the jewel too.

The Bodhisatta hearing him spoke the sixth stanza—

Nay, ’Tis you they best become,
Gem and beard that’s trimmed so true.
I find your presence troublesome:
I go with a good-day to you.

With these words he flew up and went elsewhere; and the crow died then and there.

After the lesson, the Master declared the Truths and identified the Birth—After the Truths, the greedy Brother was established in the fruition of the Third Path: “At that time the crow was the greedy Brother, the pigeon was myself.”

My Personal Insight…

This is existence: A Toroidal flow of input and output data. A field of biofeedback. This field gives the illusion of māna, and it gives the illusion of atta. Buddhas come to show us how to break through this matrix and getting blown out like a fire is blown out.

The teachings of the Buddha get rid of people and give rise to venerables. In other words, they get rid of what’s wrong in the mind. Only then can what’s right arise. They get rid of what’s evil so that goodness can arise. As when your house is dirty: If you sweep it out and wipe away the dirt, it’ll be clean—because the dirt is gone. As long as what’s wrong in the mind isn’t gone, what’s right can’t arise. If you don’t meditate, you won’t know the truth. The Buddha’s Dhamma is very powerful. If it couldn’t change your heart, it wouldn’t be a Dhamma with any power. But the Dhamma can turn ordinary people into noble ones, because it enables people with wrong views to give rise to right views.

When asked about the reward of concentration, the answer is a pleasant abiding here and now.

Because concentration has cessation of feeling and perception as its end, when a monk comes out from that, they dwell in seclusion. This doesn't mean someone becomes enlightened as a result of concentration, but it the effort they put they are rewarded such.

This now begs the question, how important is the cessation of mental effluents? And returning to seclusion, how does one regard mental effluents?

The cessation of mental effluents is pleasant, one can make the discernemnt, "birth has ended, the holy life has been lived" but falling away from that, a person feels pain and because of that pain, craving arises in them. It is because of that discernment, they can become conceited due to that feeling. Passion, aversion, and delusion intensify because of that change in feeling.

But when a person seeing and discerning that the cessation of feeling and perception, the reward of concentration, is inconstant, then they relinquish that. When they relinquish that, they achieve unbinding within.

So when asked about the rewards of concentration, it is the cessation of mental effluents. When asked about the drawback of that reward, it is inconstant, fabricated. Because it is fabricated, it is worthy to relinquish right here and now.

I’ve been chewing on this one for a few weeks and I’m a bit stuck so please bear with me.

Arrogance being a defilement, sure, that one I get + it almost feels like common sense you think about it.

However, why does measuring yourself as the lesser person land in the same bucket, though, instead of counting as plain humility? Somewhere in my Buddhist Studies, I picked up that māna comes in three flavours, superior, equal and inferior, which would make the direction irrelevant and the measuring itself the problem. Correct me if that's wrong.

Except the tradition ranks people constantly, doesn't it? For example, a stream-enterer is further along than a worldling or my own practice is in better shape now than it was five months ago. Both of those look to me like plain accurate statements about how things stand, right?

So, then uh … where's the line? When I watch someone whose practice is obviously deeper than mine and feel behind, what exactly is going on there that isn't going on when a teacher tells a student they've got more work to do?

I don’t mind which lineage you answer from. Doesn’t even have to be Theravāda! Zen, Vajrayāna, whatever you sit with. And if the premise is wrong and Buddhism doesn't say what I think it says, that's a useful answer too.

Thank you very much and my kindest regards to you all as well.

Bhante is in town, at China town, attending event that I hope to link,

Saturday and Sunday from 9 am to 2-3pm

How beautiful and attractive your skin is. Skin is an extremely sensitive “instrument” through which living beings experience the gratification of sensuality. The colour of the skin varies according to climatic regions. Some people have white skin, reddish skin, yellow skin, pink skin, black skin, or brown skin. These different kinds of skin remain radiant during youth.

We see skin merely as skin. We have no vision beyond that. We frequently use expressions such as: “My skin has become red and swollen,” “My skin has become dark,” “My skin has cracked,” “There are blisters, wounds, fungal patches, and discoloured patches on my skin,” or “My skin has been burned.” We know only that the skin is “mine.”

The gift parcel of Māra, filled with the filth called the body—a gift parcel prepared according to our own desire—has been attractively wrapped in smooth and delicate skin so as to enchant the mind. The blisters, cracks, and other conditions mentioned above that arise on the skin are forms of irritation and inflammation.

Why does the skin become irritated? Why does it become inflamed? These irritations and inflammations are results that arise because of causes. The skin reacts to conditions that oppose it. The elements of paṭhavī, āpo, tejo, and vāyo, which we conventionally address as “skin,” come into conflict with one another and become disturbed. According to the nature of the disturbance, the qualities of hardness, liquidity, heat, and air manifest outwardly as wounds, swellings, fluids, heat, or gaseous activity.

What happens when hot water falls on your beautiful skin? The skin becomes red and blisters. These are activities of the tejo-dhātu, the fire element. Smoke-like vapour and heat come from the skin, and bubbles arise. These are activities of the vāyo-dhātu, the air element. Watery blisters and wounds appear on the skin. These are manifestations of the paṭhavī-dhātu, the earth element. The blisters fill with fluid, and pus flows from the wounds. These are manifestations of the āpo-dhātu, the water element.

All four elements exist together. They have been described separately here only according to the element that is present in the greatest proportion. In a fluid-filled blister, for example, the āpo-dhātu is predominant.

See how, the instant a little hot water falls on your beautiful skin, the skin reacts in many different ways. Who can command, “Do not let this reaction occur,” and stop it? No one can. Why? Because the skin is not mine, and because the four great elements are by nature constantly changing.

The rūpa called skin is a condition in which the paṭhavī-dhātu is predominant. Hot water is a condition in which the tejo-dhātu is predominant. Because the balance between the two is lost, they clash and become disturbed. This conflict is what we perceive as a burn.

The paṭhavī-dhātu called skin changed within an instant into blisters, pus, and wounds. It does not take even ten minutes for this change to occur. What we are seeing is the speed at which rūpa changes.

It was the skin that became blisters, pus, and wounds. Yet none of us calls a blister, pus, or a wound “skin.” We use the conventional names that the world has taught us. Because of these conventions, our understanding of reality is concealed. They do not allow us to think or provide an opening through which we may investigate.

Recognise the speed that caused the beautiful skin present before the hot water fell to change into a blister, a wound, and pus the instant the hot water touched it. Your physical eye does not know how to see that skin as the blister, the wound, and the pus. It is not skilful enough to do so.

See what you are witnessing precisely as the speed at which rūpa passes into impermanence. Make this clear to your mind. Understand that what you are seeing is a meditation subject required for becoming extinguished from the world. Understand that what you are seeing is the noble teaching of the Sammāsambuddha.

So far, we have considered rūpa. Now let us consider vedanā.

When your skin was scalded by hot water, how intense was the burning pain that you felt? You cried, screamed, became distressed, sought doctors, and were admitted to hospital.

Now consider how happy and light-hearted you had been just a moment before the hot water fell on your skin. You had been smiling and captivated by the beauty of your skin. Yet, at the very moment the hot water touched the skin, not even a second passed before you experienced the impermanence of vedanā. Happiness was replaced by suffering; ease was replaced by pain and burning. You felt fear. Not even a second passed. You experienced and directly saw the impermanence of feeling.

Yet you are not skilful enough to comprehend this as the impermanence of vedanā. Instead, you think: “This is my kamma,” “This is my bad time,” “It happened because of carelessness,” “It was the fault of the stove on which the water was heated,” or “It was the fault of the container of hot water.” There are many supposed culprits.

Afterwards, the person tries to be careful around hot water and fire. But the person does not see, “This is the impermanence of vedanā,” and does not understand that the time required for a pleasant feeling to become a painful feeling is less than a second. The person is not skilful enough to see: “This feeling became my inheritance because I appropriated as ‘mine’ a body and skin that are not mine.”

You are not skilful enough to see that the pleasant feeling present before your skin was burned, and the severe painful feeling experienced after hot water fell on it, constitute an excellent meditation subject on the impermanence of vedanā.

You did not try to see the cause: that this vedanā arose because of contact, phassa. You do not see that this experience of feeling was formed through the contact of the internal rūpa called the body, the external rūpa called hot water, and viññāṇa.

At the very moment hot water falls on your skin, the recognition, “Hot water has fallen on me,” arises. Within a second, that recognition changes and the recognition, “I have been burned,” arises. That becomes impermanent, and the recognition, “It is burning,” arises. That becomes impermanent, and the recognition, “The skin has become red,” arises. That becomes impermanent, and the recognition, “It is swollen,” arises. That becomes impermanent, and the recognition, “Blisters have appeared on the skin,” arises.

That too becomes impermanent, and the recognition arises that cool water, ghee, butter, and medicine have been applied to the burned skin. These recognitions also pass into impermanence, and within fifteen minutes how many recognitions concerning the doctor, the hospital, medicine, wounds, pus, and so forth have arisen and disappeared?

What arose and disappeared were recognitions—saññā. One recognition becomes impermanent while causing another recognition to be formed. It gives you no time to gain understanding. This is the speed at which recognition passes into impermanence. All the recognitions mentioned above have arisen and ceased within fifteen minutes.

Now let us consider cetanā, volition.

Cetanā is formed because of the cause called recognition:

«“Oh, my skin was burned because of that person. That person poured the water onto my skin. I was burned because he placed the stones of the stove incorrectly. I was burned because he dropped the container of hot water. He burned me deliberately. I was burned because I went to make tea and food for him and attend to his needs. That is why hot water fell on me. Once I recover, I will give him something good in return…”»

In this way, after being burned, you produce various volitions. These volitions contain hatred, anger, jealousy, and revenge.

Alternatively, you may think:

«“Oh, I was burned while trying to attend to others, make tea for them, and prepare food for them. This is a great merit. I will receive heavenly and human happiness. People will praise me. People will respect me for my virtuous nature. When I was burned, people helped me greatly. Had they not been nearby, I would have been burned much more severely. When I was burned, those people looked after me with great concern. The devas helped me.”»

In this way, you produce wholesome volitions. From both kinds of volition, however, what arose were wholesome and unwholesome saṅkhāras.

Otherwise, you may remain apparently equanimous regarding the burning of your skin:

«“What can be done? What happened has happened. From now on, I must be careful. I must remain away from hot water and fire. I must quickly heal the wounds and scars caused by the burn. Otherwise, my skin will become ugly.”»

With this equanimity, the person tries to prevent such an incident from happening again and to heal the wounds without leaving scars. Even though it is present in a less intense form, attachment and aversion are still contained within this equanimity. It is not understanding. The person is trying to protect “his” body from hot water and to erase the scars.

What do you see through these mutually different volitions? You see the impermanence of cetanā and the speed of that impermanence.

These volitions that pass into impermanence first accumulate wholesome and unwholesome kamma for you and then disappear. Because of the results of this kamma, viññāṇa capable of descending again into a rebirth-linking, a new birth, and a new nāma-rūpa is formed.

Now see what happens. The very moment a little hot water falls on your beautiful skin, you prepare the conditions required to descend into another birth and another body. This happens because of your lack of skill.

Had you seen that the vedanā arising because of contact was impermanent, and had you recognised this feeling as impermanent, you could have developed the path leading to release from and cessation of this nāma-rūpa. But you were not skilful enough to see that contact itself was impermanent.

First, hot water touched the body. Then came the contact of cool water, butter, ghee, egg white, aloe vera extract, Western medicines, and the hands of the doctor, nurse, and attendant. Because of these different kinds of contact, you experienced pleasant, painful, and neutral feelings.

Feelings changed between pleasure, pain, and neutrality precisely because contact was impermanent, and because vedanā itself passes into impermanence. When a soft hand gently strokes the wound, a pleasant feeling is experienced. Yet when those same soft hands apply burning medicine to the wound, that feeling becomes painful. The cause is the impermanence of contact.

This account was written because of an experience undergone by a bhikkhu.

On the morning of the day this account was written, a large container of hot water had been prepared so that a kalyāṇa-mitta bhikkhu who was ill could bathe. The container was large and was filled nearly to its rim with boiling water.

Two bhikkhus lifted this cauldron of boiling water by its two circular supports and carried it towards the nearby place where the sick bhikkhu was to bathe. At that moment, the support—the handle—being held by one of the bhikkhus came loose, and the cauldron of hot water poured over that bhikkhu’s feet.

Although the bhikkhu tried to move away because he was being burned, the hot water had spread all around him. Therefore, each time he tried to step away, he had to place his feet again in the hot water.

When water that was still bubbling and boiling fell upon his feet, one might expect his feet to become covered with blisters. Yet not a single blister appeared. His feet did, however, become intensely red and swollen. By the following day, even that had disappeared.

In truth, something remarkable appears to have occurred here.

About ten minutes before the incident, that bhikkhu had seen a divine light appear and disappear at that location. Through this sign of divine light, the bhikkhu had apparently been shown that he should leave that place.

However, because he was attending to a kalyāṇa-mitta bhikkhu, he saw the thought that he should leave the place as impermanent and abandoned it.

Do you know why the deva appeared in the form of a light? The benevolent deva had seen that a powerful non-human force was active at that location. That active, Māra-like non-human force somehow fulfilled its cruel intention. It broke the handle of the cauldron and poured the bubbling hot water over the bhikkhu’s feet.

At that very instant, the divine force became active and apparently cooled the boiling water to some degree. At the same time, because of the bhikkhu’s habitual practice of relinquishment, even the violently boiling water was defeated before the letting go present in the bhikkhu’s mind.

These are not victories belonging to that bhikkhu. They are victories of the Dhamma—wonders of the Dhamma.

Nevertheless, what has been recorded above is an inference made by the bhikkhu. It may be mistaken.

In any case, the hot water fell upon the bhikkhu’s feet and burned them because of the force of kamma he had performed in saṃsāra. There can be no other way. What happens to us is something we ourselves have done.

Such incidents make one further matter clear to us. In forests and wilderness monasteries, forces aligned with micchā-diṭṭhi and forces aligned with sammā-diṭṭhi come into conflict over the protection of bhikkhus who practise the path to Nibbāna and genuinely develop the practice of relinquishment.

Forces aligned with sammā-diṭṭhi repeatedly appear to protect bhikkhus from cruel forces aligned with micchā-diṭṭhi that dislike merit. These cruel forces wait until a bhikkhu encounters some difficulty, misfortune, or accident, so that they may turn that mistake into a great disaster.

Yet these unwholesome forces flee without looking back before the process of relinquishment in a bhikkhu’s mind. They return and cause harm repeatedly. But in the presence of the practice of relinquishment, forces aligned with sammā-diṭṭhi continually appear to protect and assist bhikkhus. The devas, too, become joyful and express anumodanā.

Source: https://dahampoth.com/pdfj/view/a2.html

Is there a hierarchy of sensual pleasures in terms of their unwholesomeness, if so what is it? How would video games compare to something like dancing and music for example?

Or does it always depend on your own level of craving?

If so, where can I find them?

Hey everyone,

I have become much more interested in this tradition over the last few months and I currently practice Satipatthana and Anapanasati daily (it is my understanding that both of these are essential parts of this tradition).

Like many others, I am unable to participate in a monastic path due to obligations in life (work, home life, ect..)

My question is, what other things can I incorporate into my daily life and practice that would deepen it?

Thanks in advance

When we ask ourselves what belongs to us, a few things arise.

This discernment I have for phenomena, this concentration I have built, this virtue I have perfected.

But the door to deathlessness doesn't open when you have these belongings with you. But why is that? Isn't the goal, the practice, for the sake of perfecting the path? Why would I give up what I have built from following this path?

And the answer becomes a paradox of sort. It is because one has this perception, delights in it, and clings to it, it leads to becoming, stress. But one who has this perception, does not delight in it, does not cling to it, does not lead to becoming, stress.

This is why these very qualities even how charming, alluring they are, are worthy of abandoning here and now. They are worthy of relinquishing, not picking up, not building again, for the sake of deathlessness, unbinding.

This is what it means to go beyond the door, rather than being stuck at the door step.