Transcribed talks by Ratnaghosa

Talk six of six on patience or kshanti

 

 

I began the first talk in this series of talks on Kshanti with a quote from the novel Kim, by Rudyard Kipling. The quote was a description of the Tibetan Wheel of Life. The Tibetan Wheel of Life is as you know a visual depiction of the cycle of mundane existence. As the centre of the wheel of life are a cock a snake and a pig biting each others tails. They represent greed, hatred and spiritual ignorance, the basic mental poisons which keep the whole cyclic process going. T

he second circle of the wheel shows people descending and ascending, which indicates that within the round of mundane existence it is possible to go downwards into more negative mental states or upwards into more positive mental states. The third circle of the Wheel shows six realms of conditioned existence into which we can be reborn. They are the god realm, the realm of the titans, the hungry ghost realm, the hell realm, the animal realm and the human realm. These can also be seen to represent mental states that we inhabit from day to day or even from minute to minute.

The outermost circle of the Wheel is a pictorial representation of the twelve links in the realm of cyclic conditionality which describe how the whole process of mundane existence goes round and round, lifetime after lifetime. In that first talk I said that Kshanti was the antidote to the snakebite of anger and hatred. In the second talk on Patience I said that patience created a gap between feeling and the response to feeling.

This corresponds to the point on the outer circle of the Wheel of Life between feeling and craving. This is the point where it is possible to break free of the reactive round of cyclic conditionality and move on to the creative spiral of accumulative conditionality. In the third talk I said that forgiveness was the creative response that broke the cycle of negativity, forgiveness being a letting go of any desire for revenge or retaliation.

Tolerance is a maintaining of the positive emotion and clarity of mind that assures progress on the spiral path and Receptivity to the sublime Truth of the Dharma is what eventually allows us to have knowledge and vision of things as they really are. This point of Insight is the point of no return. From this point we are assured of gaining Enlightenment.

The state of Enlightenment is described in various ways. It is described as Nirvana, Knowledge of the destruction of the mental poisons, an unconditioned way of seeing the conditioned, realisation of the One Mind and so on. None of the concepts is adequate. Language is necessarily dualistic and therefore incapable of encompassing experience beyond the dualism of subject and object.

The experience of Enlightenment can be hinted at in poetry and metaphor, but not really described. Another approach to communicating the experience of Enlightenment is through the language of images and symbols. One of the most important sets of images and symbols is what is known as the Mandala of the Five Jinas or Five Buddhas. The mandala is a symbol that occurs all over the world and it indicates a state of wholeness or completeness. The Mandala of the Five Jinas indicates the richness and abundance of the Enlightened Mind by depicting five Buddhas, each of which represents Enlightenment in its totality and each of which emphasises a particular aspect of Enlightenment.

Traditionally, you enter the Mandala in the East, which, strangely enough is at the bottom of the picture. The Buddha in the East is Akshobya, the Imperturbable. Then you move around to the South on the left hand side of the picture and here you find Ratnasambhava, the Buddha of Beauty and Generosity. In the West, at the top of the picture, you met Amitabha, The Buddha of Love and Compassion. The Buddha of the North is Amoghasiddhi, the Buddha of Action and Fearlessness. At the Centre of the Mandala is Vairocana, the Illuminator.

Each of the Five Buddhas is associated with a particular colour, hand gesture, animal and emblem. All of this amounts to an extraordinarily rich symbolism. Each of the Buddhas is also associated with a particular mental poison. The five poisons are greed, hatred, spiritual ignorance, pride and envy. It is as if the Buddhas represent the complete transformation of a particular poison into something totally positive.

The poison of hatred, anger or ill-will is associated with Akshobya. Kshanti is the method by which hatred and anger is to be transformed and Akshobya is the end result of the complete transformation of hatred. This is the main connection between Ksanti-Paramita and the Buddha Akshobya. In the course of this talk I will draw out some more connections between the symbolism and attributes of Akshobya and the different aspects of Kshanti.

The Sanskrit word ‘akshobya’ means unshakeable. The Buddha Akshobya received the name because he took a vow in a previous lifetime never to give way to anger or malice, never to be unethical and many other things. Over lifetimes he was unshakeable in holding to his vow and thus became eventually the Buddha Akshobya, the unshakeable or imperturbable. Unshakeable means unwavering or firm and imperturbable means calm.

This aspect of Akshobya the represents the dedication which is unwavering and calm, not easily disrupted. It is the patient, persistent and consistent effort we met earlier in relation to the topic of patience. What the unshakeability and imperturbability of Akshobya is teaching us is that we must be determined and steadfast in our practice of the Dharma and not allow ourselves to be put off or dispirited by minor setbacks or upsets.

All too often we are lacking in stamina. We don’t perhaps have sufficient motivation or vision to rouse us to heroic effort. Politicians for instance seem to have tremendous stamina although they may not put it to very skilful use. People in theatre or pop stars have stamina.

In the world of business people exert themselves strenuously. It seems that when people are motivated enough they can perform great feats of energetic striving. Often the motivation is quite selfish in character. In the spiritual life we need that kind of stamina too. Wee need it in order to make the consistent effort that personal development demands and we need it if we are to be of help to others. Sangharakshita commented on this in a study seminar he [held / lead] in 1980.

He said, “We are so effete in the spiritual life, more often than not. We cant stand any sort of strain; after any bit of extra effort we have to go away and rest, have a little holiday, sit down for a while, play a record and take things easy. Its pathetic! (Laughter.) Here you are, aspiring to gain Enlightenment, which is after all the most difficult thing you can possibly propose to yourself, and look how easily one usually takes it – what an easy time one gives oneself. And there, [[on the other hand]] are people aiming at the very inferior, trivial, easily attained things like the Presidency of the United States.

Just look at the massive effort they are putting in – it puts us to shame! Perhaps you think he is exaggerating for effect. I don’t think so. I think he is probably even sugaring the pill. If you read the life of Sangharakshita or of other great Buddhists ore remarkable practitioners from other religious traditions, you will find they all had great stamina and the ability and willingness to make consistent effort in pursuit of their goals.

How can we develop stamina? The answer is with practice. We touched on this earlier in the talk on patience when Shantideva was quoted as saying, “There is nothing which remains difficult if it is practised. So, through practice with minor discomforts, even major discomfort becomes bearable” [ KS Verse 14] If we are to develop stamina we need to learn how to endure discomfort, whether it is physical discomfort or emotional discomfort.

Endurance is an aspect of Kshanti that I haven’t said much about. In the Dhammapada there are some verses that use the image of an elephant in connection with endurance. Verse 320 says: “I will endure words that hurt in silent peace as the strong elephant endures in battle arrows sent by the bow, for many people lack self-control.” And verse 327 says: “Find joy in watchfulness: guard well your mind. Uplift yourself from your lower self, even as an elephant draws himself out of a muddy swamp.” Verse 325 warns us against too much comfort-seeking and distraction. “The man who is lazy and a glutton, who eats large meals and rolls in his sleep, who is like a pig which is fed in the sty, this fool is reborn to a life of death.” The elephants who bear the throne of Akshobya on their back can serve to remind us of the need for endurance.

The elephants, because they are beneath the lotus, which symbolises the Transcendental, are here to represent the highest reaches of the mundane. They symbolise the unshakeable, imperturbable qualities that were perfected by Akshobya before he gained Enlightenment. They are the steadfast, calm, fearless foundation for the ego-shattering experience of Insight. They represent the ability to endure the ultimate discomfort of having no place to hide from the fierce light of Reality. The quality of endurance is probably not very popular these days.

Comfort and instant gratification are the hallmarks of our society. Endurance and the ability to postpone gratification of desires are hallmarks of the spiritual life. In his latest book “The Sibling Society”, Robert Bly argues that people no longer want to grow up and face the difficulties of adulthood. Instead we are creating what he calls a sibling society, a society of adolescents which demands little in the way of responsibility and difficult work. He says; “When enough people have slid backward into a sibling state of mind, society can no longer demand difficult and subtle work from its people – because the standards are no longer visible. Without the labour of artists, for example, to incorporate past achievements – in brushwork, in treatment of light, in depth of emotion, in mythological intensity – people with some talent can pretend to be genuine artists.

Their choices seem to be to cannibalise ancient art, or to create absurdly ugly art that “makes a statement”. They don’t ask themselves or each other for depth or intensity, and most contemporary critics pretend not to miss them. Bly goes on to define an adult as “a person not governed by the demands for immediate pleasure, comfort and excitement.” And in confessional tone he says “The adult quality that has been hardest for me, as a greedy person, to understand is renunciation. The older I get, the more beautiful the word renunciation seems to me.” If Bly is right and I suspect he has a point, then we have the task of not only counteracting our own tendencies to shy away from the uncomfortable, but also the task of going against a strong trend in the society around us.

We need to be on out mettle. Nothing worthwhile is achieved without dedicated effort and willingness to endure whatever privations occur along the way. If we want to achieve anything worthwhile with our lives we need to learn to endure and thereby build stamina. Sangharakshita touches on this when he says: “Perhaps our daily routine should be such that we are strengthened rather than weakened.

Not too many mornings lying in bed; not taking things too easily; not too many holidays; not too many visits to the cinema. Quite apart from the question of distraction, all this can be very weakening. Under modern conditions we can end up rather weak creatures if were not careful. We very rarely have to work hard day after day, week after week, month after month, as many people in the world still have to do just to survive. We very rarely work for the Dharma with that sort of vigour and indifference to hardship and discomfort.” So this is the Elephant – the elephant of endurance is not disturbed or perturbed or put off by a few criticisms or by people being difficult. Endurance depends on a higher vision which sustains us through the discomforts of spiritual development. In the palm of his left hand Akshobya holds a vajra. The vajra symbolises a union of opposites.

One end of the vajra represents the mental poisons and the other end the five Wisdoms. The vajra is also a symbol of great energy directed toward breaking through to Enlightenment. The negative quality associated with Akshobya is anger or hatred. So the vajra here is a representation of the transformation of hatred into wisdom and of the enormous energy that is released by that transformation. As Vessantara puts it in “Meeting the Buddhas” : [] hatred can be redirected and used to further our development. When we are experiencing it there is often a kind of clear, cold precision to the way in which we see the faults of things.

It is a state completely devoid of sentimentality or vagueness. We just have to see what the real enemy is. Once we hate suffering in ignorance, and are hell-bent on destroying them, that energy leads us to Akshobyas Pure Land rather than into the hells of violence and despair. We transform our anger through the practices of patience and forgiveness, thus releasing energy for further spiritual development. Our anger and hatred is often born out of our fear and insecurity.

It is a defence against all that threatens our egotism. By letting go of anger we allow ourselves to feel the fear and also paradoxically gain confidence in ourselves as spiritual beings. We can re-direct the energy of our anger into taking those small risks that enable us to go beyond our current limitations. In this way we can become more confident and secure in our individuality and less prone to taking offence or holding on to grudges. The vajra is a profoundly optimistic symbol, indicating not only that all negative emotions can be transformed in Transcendent Wisdom, but that the seeds of Wisdom lie in those very negative emotions. A similar idea is expressed by the fact that the lotus, symbolising transcendental attainment has its roots in the mud of mundane concerns.

The right hand of Akshobya touches the earth. We encountered the earth- touching mudra (bhumisparsa-mudra) in the previous talk on receptivity. There we saw that at the time of the Buddhas Enlightenment he was challenged by Mara to produce a witness to testify to his right to sit on the Vajrasana, the spot where all the Buddhas of the past had gained Enlightenment.

In response, the Buddha touched the earth and the Earth Goddess arose and testified that he had practised the Perfections in hundreds of previous lives and was therefore entitled to sit on the Vajrasana. In more conceptual terms we are told elsewhere that at the time of his Enlightenment the Buddha was able to remember all his previous lives. So this episode refers to an overcoming of all vestiges of doubt by referring back to the experience of practising virtuous conduct over many lifetimes. This is also a reference to the law of Karma which states that skilful activity has beneficial consequences for us.

If we behave skilfully we can expect to experience the fruits of that activity at some time. At the time of his Enlightenment the Buddha was experiencing the fruition of his skilfulness over many lifetimes. We can be confident that if we want to achieve spiritual progress and happiness, the law of Karma guarantees our success so long as we make the effort. If we get into a mood of doubting or despondency, we can look back at whatever is positive in our lives and feel assured that it is not lost or wasted. We can use that as a new starting point to stabilise us.

To touch the earth of our skilful actions is to gain confidence and stability. Perhaps sometimes we should literally touch the earth in a ritual manner to feel for ourselves the stabilising effect of the bhumisparsa-mudra and all that it symbolises. Try it sometime when you’re sitting in meditation posture. In terms of Kshanti, we saw earlier that this is an aspect of receptivity. We could say it is receptivity to the immutable law of Karma. The next aspect of Akshobya Id like to look at is the most important quality of all – the Mirror-like Wisdom.

It is the Wisdom of a Buddha which is the essential quality and when we contemplate or meditate on an archetypal Buddha we are trying to open up to that Wisdom and allow it to permeate our whole being to the point where we become the Wisdom/ When we contemplate Akshobya we are trying to make ourselves receptive to his essence, which is the Mirror-like wisdom. The Mirror-like Wisdom reflects absolutely faithfully everything that comes into contact with it. It sees everything just as it is, with no preferences, no judgments, no ideas added on.

The mind which is suffused with the Mirror-like Wisdom is completely impartial. It feels no need to choose one thing above another, it is not affected by one thing more than another, just as a mirror reflects faithfully what ever is put in front of it and doesn’t retain some reflections and reject others. The mind which has attained to the Mirror-like Wisdom has of course transcended all duality of subject and object. It has seen through the illusory nature of conditioned existence and is beyond all distinctions, event the distinction between Samsara and Nirvana.

Has this any relevance for us on our comparatively low level of spiritual insight? Is there any lesson we can take from the Wisdom of Akshobya and apply it to our lives right now? And how does this relate to Kshanti? There are two connections I would like to make which I think are relevant to us here and now. These are to do with the areas of clear thinking and objectivity. The Mirror-like Wisdom, in particular, puts me in mind of clarity of thought. It seems to emphasise the absence of vagueness or confusion. In one of the sets of fifteen points for Order Members which Sangharakshita outlined some time ago, there is an exhortation to think clearly. He even suggested that Order Members should study logic, to help them to think more clearly.

The opposite of clear thinking is of course vague or woolly thinking, which isn’t really thinking at all. Usually we just let our minds wander around, like slightly demented characters, picking up pits and pieces here and there. Then we construct all sorts of views and opinions out of these bits and pieces and imagine that we’ve had some ideas. Most of our ideas are not our own, but simply an amalgam of various things we’ve heard or read, put together by our conditioned prejudices, to create a world view that keeps us reasonably sane. One of the first things we need to do if we are to develop clear thinking is to become aware of the extent to which all out thinking is influenced by the conditions which have surrounded us since birth.

Although we may like to think of ourselves as independently minded and wise to the world, we are more likely to be completely immersed in views and ideas that we simply ingested from the world around us in the same way that we learnt to speak. In fact the analogy with learning to speak is not just an analogy, because the very language carries meaning and ideas in it which we accept unquestioningly until something erupts in our experience that makes us sit up and take notice. In Buddhist terms it is not sufficient however for us to analyse of deconstruct language.

What we really need to do is develop greater mindfulness and try to filter all our thinking through the purifying insights of Right View. To do that we need to have Right View or at least know what Right View is. There can be no real or fruitful communication in the Sangha if we are starting from different or even opposing world views.

For instance, to give an absurd example, if your basic world view is that suffering will be brought to an end by the demise of Capitalism and the dictatorship of the proletariat and my basic world view is that the extinction of suffering depends on the individual making the effort to develop spiritually in co-operation with other like-minded individuals, then although we may seem to speaking the same language and even in broad agreement at times, in fact we will be worlds apart and not communicating at all. In the Sangha we want to foster genuine communication and therefore we need to establish the basis of Right View and carry on our discussions in terms of Right View. To do this we have to make an attempt to weed out the wrong views that inevitably could our minds, because the world we live in is awash with them. Just before Sangharakshita encouraged clear thinking he exhorted Order Members to reduce input.

There is a direct connection between reducing input and clear thinking. What we feed into our minds is what comes out as views and opinions If we feed our minds on a daily dose of newspapers and television, that is what will have the biggest influence on our thinking. If we feast our minds on a daily repast of Buddhist scriptures and commentaries then they will begin to form the basis for our thinking and as Buddhists that would be an altogether healthier diet for us. It is not just the content of what we read that affects out thinking but also the style.

If we read books that are written by people who can think clearly and express themselves clearly, that will help us to think clearly ourselves. I think Sangharakshita is a supreme example of someone who thinks and expresses himself and therefore reading his books can be of great help in training ourselves to think clearly. The topic of clear thinking is not unrelated to the topic of objectivity. To be objective we need to be able to distinguish opinions from facts.

This is not necessarily very common. A simple example that is given is the way people say something like its a terrible day when what they mean is its raining. The terrible day is a value judgment and a matter of opinion. The rain is a fact. So in order to be objective and therefore truthful we need to be able to tell what is a value judgment or opinion and what is a fact. So for instance when we use terms like always and ever as in “I’m always last to know what’s going on” or “Nobody ever listens to me” we are probably being poetic rather than factual.

But its important for us to realise that, otherwise we start to believe ourselves on an emotional level and that can have significant consequences. I’m not suggesting that we should never use idiomatic speech, but rather that we should try to be clear about what is subjective and what is objective in our communication. Often we hold very strongly to our views and this is for very subjective, emotional reasons and one way of beginning to loosen our attachment to views is to start to see the element of subjectivity and emotionality and try to distinguish that from what is objective and factual.

The basic wrong view that we all suffer under is the view that we are a separate self or ego-identity and this conditions most of out other views. This sense of separate selfhood, as I said in the first talk in this series, is the fundamental prejudice from which all others flow. To begin to undermine or attenuate this view we need to approach it from many angles. We need to cultivate self-metta, we need to practise generosity, we need to immerse ourselves in

Buddhist study, we need to experience solitude and we need to make an effort to distinguish what is objective from what is subjective in our thoughts and words.If we achieve greater clarity we will be able to practise greater tolerance towards those who are different from us and those we disagree with, without being vague or woolly or compromising our real beliefs. The Mirror-like Wisdom of Akshobya is neither subjective nor objective.

It is Transcendental and therefore beyond views altogether. Here Reality is experience, experience is Reality. As Vessantara puts it in Meeting the Buddhas – when we enter the mandala “we see the deep blue figure of the Immutable Buddha, holding the thunderbolt sceptre of Reality which smashes through all our ideas and concepts about it.

At the same time the dark blue fingertips of his right hand touch the earth, the earth of direct experience, which is the only thing upon which any of us can finally rely.” Now we are coming to the end of this series of talks on Kshanti and to the end of this talk on Akshobya. I hope that you have found something to interest you, perhaps challenge you or even inspire you, in some of what has been said.

he subject of Kshanti hasn’t been exhausted by any means. For instance I have deliberately not mentioned anutpattika-dharma Kshanti, because that is the highest practice of Kshanti. It is the patient acceptance of the non-arising of dharmas, or in other words the patient acceptance that all phenomena are ultimately not real even though they are perceived and therefore exist to the extent that they are perceived.

So to finish off this series of talks on Kshanti I will just leave on the mountain peak of the Diamond Sutra with its description of this highest level of Ksanti-Paramita. This is what it says, “Moreover, Subhuti, the Tathagatas perfection of patience is really no perfection. And why? Because, Subhuti, when the king of Kalinga cut my flesh from every limb, at that time I had no perception of a self, of a being, of a soul, or a person/ And why?

If, Subhuti, at that time I had a perception of a self, I would also have had a perception of ill-will at that time. And so, if I had had a perception of a being, of a soul, or of a person. With my superknowledge I recall that in the past I have for five hundred births led the life of a sage devoted to patience. Then also have I had no perception of a self, a being, a soul, or a person.”

 

Source: http://ratnaghosa.fwbo.net

Transcribed talks by Ratnaghosa
Talk five of six on patience or kshanti

 

At the beginning of this series of talks I was keen to point out that Kshanti is not a passive virtue. To practise Kshanti requires energy. You need to make an effort in order to be patient, or to practise forgiveness or tolerance. I have chosen the title “creative listening” to indicate that the topic of this talk, receptivity, also requires energy and effort. It is perhaps understandable that receptivity should be thought of as passive.

You don’t have to make an effort to receive. Or so we think, at least. But what about receiving criticism or praise, don’t we have to make an effort to listen to what is being said and remain open to it? Receptivity as an aspect of Kshanti is receptivity to the Dharma. To be receptive to the Dharma means to hear the Dharma, to listen to the Dharma and to allow oneself to be affected by it. Listening includes reading by the way.

Creative listening or creative reading is listening or reading in a way that is not passive. It means actively engaging with whatever is being heard or read, asking oneself how does it apply to me, how is it related to the actual practice of the spiritual life.

Receptivity presupposes something worth receiving and somebody capable of expounding it. To be receptive therefore we need to have faith in the Dharma, faith that it does emanate from a higher state of consciousness or a higher realm, and also faith in spiritual hierarchy, faith that there are those who are more spiritually developed than we are, who have understood and experienced the Dharma more deeply. Faith or Sraddha is, as we know, based on intuition, reason, and experience.

Our initial intuition is later confirmed by our reason and experience and this gives rise to even greater faith. Our faith in the Dharma then is initially an intuition, there is a response in us, something resonates with our experience, it feels true. Later, after some practice we know that it works from our own experience. And reasoning from this we can deduce that even more is possible.

The Dharma is not just words or concepts however. It is a living thing. It manifests in the lives of individuals. Our faith is also based on seeing that there are some individuals, who as a result of practising the Dharma are more aware and more friendly what we are.

Or it may be that we feel there is something about people who practise the Dharma which we like, even though we don’t quite know what it is. And we want to discover more. We want to experience for ourselves the benefits of the Dharma.

So we listen, we learn, we practise. We try to be receptive to what we read and to what we hear from those we respect and look up to. We acknowledge that we have something to learn and that there are people who can teach us both by their words and by their behaviour. We acknowledge the existence of a spiritual hierarchy, a hierarchy of spiritual development. Spiritual hierarchy is not a matter of titles or status. That is ecclesiastical hierarchy.

It is not that an Order Member is automatically more spiritually developed that a Mitra or Friend, or that an Order Member practising celibacy is more spiritually developed than other Order Members. Until Insight is attained it is possible for people to fall back to a lower level.

It is quite difficult to see spiritual hierarchy. Spiritual hierarchy manifests in how someone behaves and how they are. It is not about what people say necessarily, although what people say and how they say it may give some indication of their spiritual development. However it is not easy to judge whether someone is compassionate, aware and earnestly striving unless we know them very well.

And even then, unless we ourselves are on the same level of spiritual development or a higher level we may not be able to really know how developed someone is. This is why it is sometimes said in traditional Buddhism, that the disciple doesn’t choose the guru, but rather the guru chooses the disciple, by which is meant that the disciple is in no position to recognise the guru.

However we do have our intuition and in the FWBO at least we have the opportunity to observe Order Members in all sorts of situation, so we can build up some sort of experience of them. And we don’t need to be in contact with someone who is vastly more spiritually developed in order to make progress. We just need someone who is a little bit more experienced than us, who can give us a helping hand. But we do need to have someone to look up to, someone we consider more spiritually developed, otherwise the Dharma is dead.

So if we have faith in the Dharma and faith in spiritual hierarchy, we can practise receptivity. Of course we can be receptive in a more ordinary sense to our friends who are on the same level as us, spiritually speaking. Sometimes an ordinary friend can point things out to us or give us a different perspective, especially when we are in a mood. We can learn from all sorts of people and situations if we are receptive enough, if our responses are creative enough.

There are lessons about impermanence and suffering confronting us all the time, if we care to look. What can you learn by observing your parents? What can you learn by observing your children? What can you learn from your responses to various stimuli as you walk down the street? What can you learn about yourself from your attitudes to food, money, sex, clothing and so on? If you are listening creatively, the world is all the time teaching its lessons.

We can also be receptive to ourselves in the sense of acknowledging and reflecting on our experience and achievements. This is a good way to build confidence and self-metta. At the time of the Buddhas Enlightenment it is said that he was attacked by Mara and tempted by Mara (the personification of evil) and when this failed to disrupt or disturb him, Mara tried a different tack. He said, What right have you to sit here on the spot where Buddhas of the past have sat, who do you think you are?

The Buddhas response was to touch the earth and when he touched the earth, the Earth Goddess arose and she testified that the Buddha had practised the perfections for many lifetimes and was therefore ready to sit in the vajrasana, the throne of Enlightenment. We could understand this attack by Mara to mean that at the time of Enlightenment there arose in the Buddhas mind thoughts of hatred, craving and doubt and he dealt with them by suffusing them with awareness. He overcame the doubt by referring back to his experience and achievements.

We can do this too. We can look back on our experience and achievements and gain confidence from them. In this way we can be receptive to ourselves and make creative use of our lives. There are many different elements to receptivity. There is entreaty and supplication, as in the Sevenfold Puja. The is listening, reflecting and meditating, sutta-maya prajna, cinta-maya prajna and bhavana-maya prajna. The three kinds of wisdom.

There is self-examination and self- questioning. There is scepticism as opposed to cynicism. And there is humiliation through contact with Reality. In the Entreaty and Supplication section of the puja, what we are doing in effect is asking for a teaching. We are declaring our receptivity to the Dharma.

Of course it is not enough to say we are receptive, we have to actually be receptive. Sometimes we ask questions as a way of avoiding the truth rather than penetrating deeper into it. Being receptive to the Dharma is not simply a matter of acquiring more knowledge, it is more a case of being willing to change as a result of the new insights we gain from hearing the Dharma. It is not easy to have an open mind and an open heart.

Our fear and insecurity urges us to put up defences and be closed to whatever disturbs the status quo. Our intellectual arrogance leads us to think we have understood the Dharma before we have allowed the meaning to touch us. It is easy to understand the words but miss the point. So when we are asking to hear the Dharma, whether at the Entreaty and Supplication stage of the puja of in a study group, we should [need] to be genuinely open to the message of the Dharma, which means recognising the fears, insecurity and arrogance that keep us closed and suspending our prejudices for a while.

There is a story from the Zen tradition about a professor who visits a Zen master to ask some question. After they’ve spoken a little the Zen master offers him some tea, which the professor gladly accepts. The Zen master begins to pour the tea and he keeps pouring and the tea rises to the rim of the cup and over the rim and he keeps pouring. The professor is astonished at this and he watches the tea come up over the rim of the saucer and start to flow onto the table. Eventually, unable to hold himself back, he says rather loudly, My cup is full, you cant get any more in.

And the Zen master looked straight at him, the way Zen masters always do in these stories and said, Yes, exactly, your cup is full, come back when you are ready to receive the answers to your questions. So obviously the point of the story is that although the professor was asking for instruction, he was not actually receptive enough to really take it in. The three levels of wisdom, sutta-maya prajna or listening, cinta-maya prajna or reflecting and bhavana-maya prajna or meditating, give us an idea of how to be really receptive.

First of all listening, sutta-maya prajna, which includes reading, is concerned with gaining knowledge of the Dharma in a fairly ordinary sense. This means learning about the Four Noble Truths, The Noble Eightfold Path, the law of conditionality, the five precepts and so on. We need to have a knowledge of these basic teachings, so that when we manage to concentrate our minds and want to use that concentration to penetrate deeper into the Truth, we will have something to work with.

Otherwise as Sangharakshita puts it, our concentration will be of no more use to us than a sharpened pencil to a man who cannot read or write (P 194 Survey). (meditation experiences not ends in themselves) Also in order to Go For Refuge to the Dharma we need to have a clear idea of what the teachings are. The second level of wisdom, cinta-maya prajna or reflecting corresponds more to what I have called creative listening.

At this point we are turning over in our minds what we have heard or read and making it our own, so to speak. We are going deeper into the meaning of what we have received and allowing it to affect our lives. This stage of reflection is, you could say, the stage of mundane receptivity and it paves the way for bhavana-maya prajna or meditation, which in this context if the stage of Transcendental Insight, At this point, bhavana-maya prajna, one is not reflecting on the Truth, but one has to some extent become the Truth.

This is the stage of the Perfection of Receptivity, when the Dharma has permeated ones whole being and one is utterly changed by it. Another feature of receptivity which could be seen as a part of cinta- maya prajna, reflecting, is the aspect of self-examination and questioning oneself. Self-examination in the sense of trying to be honest with oneself about what one does or does not understand and being honest with oneself about just how receptive or not one is.

It is better to be clear that we honestly don’t like a particular teaching and don’t want to practise it than to just avoid it or pretend that we accept it. For instance, for a number of years I didn’t like the teaching about the four dhyanas, the four levels of meditative concentration. I used to find it depressing and just avoided it. It took me some time to realise that it was meant as a helpful guide to recognising and understanding meditative states rather than as a judgment on my poor attempts at concentration.

Recognising that I simply didn’t like the teaching was a starting point from which I could understand what was really going on I just felt bad about my ability as a meditator, and that my lack of confidence in my abilities was nothing to do with the teaching of the four dhyanas. ( Also overestimating the importance of the four dhyanas – only access concentration indispensable to Insight) So self-examination in this way can help us to become more self-aware. By questioning oneself I mean asking oneself how a particular teaching or particular aspect of the Dharma applies to ones life. How is it going to help me to progress spiritually? What should I do as a result of this?

Does this teaching have any practical application in my life? How does it connect with other things I have heard or read? For instance, does this talk on receptivity have any application to my life? Do I want to change anything in my life as a result of hearing this? How does receptivity connect with ethics or generosity of the Mindfulness of Breathing? And so on, you can see the point I’m making. Listen or read with a questioning mind and try to see the relevance of the Dharma to your own life. This questioning attitude can also be related to scepticism. It is reasonable to be sceptical with regard to what you read or hear.

To be sceptical is to question or to accept things provisionally. This is better than being gullible. However we need to be careful that our scepticism doesn’t become cynicism. Cynicism is a negative mental state that tends to undermine everything of value and seeks to drag everything down to a low level. Cynicism is a form of ill-will or hatred. Scepticism on the other hand is a reasonable questioning, a suspension of judgment and it can be very positively motivated.

At its best, scepticism is an attitude of seeking the truth and not settling for less. In this way scepticism is related to receptivity. Blind faith is not necessary in Buddhism. All teachings are meant to be put to the test and accepted or rejected according to whether they conduce to spiritual development or hinder it. We must be careful though that we do test the teachings rigorously, whether in our thinking or practice and not reject what we merely dislike.

Spiritual intelligence is something quite different from intellectual ability in the ordinary sense. Spiritual intelligence is an intuitive knowing of the truths of impermanence and conditionality that goes far beyond and mere understanding of the concepts. So when we subject the Dharma to sceptical questioning, intuition and experience should come into play as much as intellectual examination. Also traditionally it is recommended that we have recourse to those whom we consider to be wise and not rely totally on our own ability to perceive the truth. We may simply not have the capacity as yet.

This point is illustrated in the Kalama Sutta. The Kalamas of Kesaputta were confused by all the different teachings they heard about how to attain the Transcendental and they asked the Buddha how they could tell what was correct and what wasn’t. The Buddha said, Now Kalamas, do not ye go by hearsay, nor by what is handed down by others, nor by what is handed down by others, nor by what people say, nor by what is stated on the authority of your traditional teachings. Do not go by reasoning, nor by inferring, nor by argument as to method, nor from reflection on and approval of an opinion, nor out of respect, thinking a recluse must be deferred to.

But, Kalamas, when you know, of yourselves: “These teachings are not good; they are blameworthy; they are condemned by the wise: these teachings, when followed out and put in practice, conduce to loss and suffering” – then reject them. There are three things to note about this. Firstly, the questioning is about methods of attaining the Transcendental, not about the existence of a transcendental state or the possibility of attaining it.

The existence of a transcendental state is by its very nature not susceptible to sceptical reasoning. Secondly, the teachings are to be tested by the results achieved from practising them. In other words, experience is the real touchstone. Thirdly, the testimony of the Wise needs to be listened to carefully. So, in being receptive to what we hear and read there is no need for us to be gullible, but to really know for ourselves what is true we have to practise the teachings and consider the views of those further on in the spiritual hierarchy. If we are truly receptive to the Dharma we will be humiliated by it.

As the Diamond Sutra says, “those sons of good family, who will tale up these very Sutras, and will bear them in mind, recite and study them, they will be humbled, well humbled will they be!” (Wisdom Beyond Words p.157) The Dharma undermines our ego-identity and although we may think this is a very good thing and nod approvingly when we hear about it, when it actually starts to happen to us we may feel very distressed indeed.

We may even think that the Dharma is not really working properly, because we intended to gain happiness and well-being and instead we are feeling miserable. The spiritual life is a happy life but it is not an easy life and as we become more aware we will discover unpleasant truths about ourselves, This means that the Dharma is working. A process of purification is underway and we need to recognise this. We may feel humiliated because we are not the person we thought we were or wanted others to think we were, but there is no need to be despondent. As the process of gaining greater self-knowledge and purifying ourselves carries on we will gradually emerge happier and brighter. Spiritual rebirth often involves a humiliating journey through the dark night of the soul.

This is what having our ego-identity undermined involves. We have to be transformed, broken down and re-assembled, not simply re- decorated with a new label such as Buddhist or Mitra or Order Member. My strongest personal experience of this was in 1986 when I was invited on an Ordination retreat in Tuscany. I was invited in March and by May I had started to experience all the parts of my psyche that didn’t want to have anything to do with Ordination or spiritual life. I went to Tuscany but Bhante felt he couldn’t ordain me because of the emotionally unstable state I was in.

This was a shock. I was devastated. My pride was squashed. My ego-sense was disoriented and I entered a dark night of the soul, depression, anger, doubt, isolation, fear – But it was impermanent thankfully and here I am, testimony to the fact that humiliation is not fatal. Traditionally, the disciple was humiliated by the guru in order that the ego got a good bashing. But really there is probably no need for anyone to humiliate us in this way.

If we practise the Dharma, if we meditate and enter into communication with others, if we develop ethical sensitivity and if we study the teachings, we will find ourselves humbled often enough by our own selfishness and the sublimity of the Ideal. To be humiliated by the Dharma is one thing, to practise humility another. Humility as it is usually understood is not necessarily a positive thing and may often be simply a form of inverted pride.

It may even be a way of avoiding humiliation. As James Boswell puts it in “The Life of Samuel Johnson” – “Sometimes [humility] may proceed from a mans strong consciousness of his faults being observed. He knows that others would throw him down, and therefore he had better lie down softly of his own accord.”

So it is not enough to be humble. In “Wisdom Beyond Words” Bhante puts it like this “You need to take risks. If you don’t ever face the possibility of failure, then you don’t ever face the possibility of humiliation, and therefore of growth. Failure will only have meaning for you if you have made a tremendous effort to succeed. The terrible temptation is to venture nothing. But in fact, the less you risk, the greater your fear of failure, and the greater the potential humiliation.

So much becomes invested in the imperative of success that you cannot even give a lecture in case it should not be an astounding success. You become paralysed. You haven’t gone beyond success and failure; you Are beneath them. If you’re not careful, you become someone with a great future behind them.”

By taking risks we can be humiliated. We need to learn to make the most of humiliation. It is an opportunity to loosen our grip on our ego- identity, an opportunity to become a little less attached to our fixed self view and therefore an opportunity for spiritual insight. These are all sorts of ordinary situations which we might find humiliating, travelling in a foreign country where we don’t speak the language could be humiliating. Being ill and losing our control over our body can be humiliating. Growing old and being patronised by younger people could be humiliating.

Giving a public talk and making a mess of it could be humiliating. Trying to be friendly to someone and getting rejected can be humiliating [examples taken from Wisdom Beyond Words]. I’m sure there are plenty of other examples. Probably everyone has their own particular fear of failure, which could involve the risk of humiliation. So there are plenty of opportunities on a fairly mundane level for us to have an experience of undermining our ego identity.

But receptivity to the Dharma will enable us to do a much more systematic and thorough job. Receptivity to the Dharma will turn us inside out and upside down as it were. It will transform us. As Bhante puts it, “Receptivity means that one should be prepared for a radical change in ones whole mode of being, ones whole way of life, ones whole way of looking at things. “Often we are not prepared for such radical change and so we resist. We don’t really want to see things differently. We don’t really want to see the truth although it may be staring us in the face.

For instance, the fact of death is extremely difficult to really grasp, to really feel with our whole being. We can see it all around us if we look, but we don’t really take it in, we don’t really let it affect us to the core of our being. It takes much reflection and practice before we can really face the fact of death and especially the fact of our own death. There is a story in the Pali Canon which illustrates this point. It also illustrates the virtues of patience and receptivity. So it is a good story to bring in at this point in our series of talks on Kshanti. The story in question is one you’ve probably heard before. I

t is the story of Kisa Gotami. The version is from Footprints of the Buddha p96/97 But at that this moment there came up a young girl carrying a dead baby on her hip. I had seen her when I was last in Savatthi. Her name was Kisa Gotami. She was thin of body and plain of feature, and born of a poor family. She had been treated disdainfully by all, especially by her husbands family. Then she had borne a son, and people no longer saw her ugly features, but respected her for he boy-child. That was when I had last seen her. Now the child lay dead upon her hip and she was distraught with grief.

She told the Master that she had gone from door to door pleading with folk to give her medicine to restore her child to life, but they had all laughed at her. Then one kinder than the others had told her of the Master, saying that he could give her medicine for her child. And that was why she now came. She held forth the child to the Master, and the depth of agony in her eyes made her seem crazed. He looked upon her with deep tenderness and said: Sister, go enter the town and bring back a mustard seed; but – it must come from a house where no one yet has died.’ The young girl took the dust from his feet and departed with great hope and joy.

That evening she returned. Gotami, have you found the little mustard seed? he asked. The work of the little mustard seed has been done, she answered, and went on to tell him what had happened. She had inquired of the first house for a little mustard seed, which the great Buddha had said would cure her child. The folk there were glad to give her mustard seed, for they felt pity for her. Then she added:

But the mustard seed must be from a house where none has yet died. Then they of that house said softly: Who shall say how many have died here? Last week the house-mother died here. The dead are many; the living are few. Such mustard seed will then have no virtue, she said, and departed sorrowfully to a second house, where she was told the same thing, and then to a third, but always they of the house replied: The dead are many; the living are few, By evening she knew her quest would have no ending, and the dead child grew heavy on her hip.

Suddenly it came to her that it was out of his great compassion the Master had sent her upon this quest that she might find out for herself the first great truth that all must suffer. Her eyes filled with tears that the World Honoured One should seek to help her, even her, the despised and ugly one. She took the dead child and laid him in a charnel field, for she was poor and had no money for cremation. It was late at night when the Master finished teaching Kisa Gotami. He looked across to the city where the lights flickered and were extinguished, as one by one the folk lay down to sleep.

Even so, he concluded, as little lights are the lives of men. They flicker for an instant and are gone. The Buddha was patient with Kisa Gotami but he didn’t try to protect her from the truth. He set her up to receive the teaching gradually. She was receptive to the truth and seeing the implications, sought out further teaching. Her openness to the truth brought about a radical transformation. I will conclude now with a brief summary of the points made about receptivity and then end with a quite from Robert Thurman. We have seen that receptivity does not mean passivity and that it involves effort and energy.

Receptivity also requires faith in the Dharma and in the spiritual hierarchy. It is also possible to learn valuable lessons by being receptive to friends and to what we experience in the world around us. We can be receptive to ourselves, by reflecting on and valuing our experience so far. Receptivity involves asking for teaching as in the Entreaty and Supplication section of the [Sevenfold] Puja. When we ask, we should be open to receiving.

f our cup is full we will go away empty-handed [mixed metaphors deliberate?] Receptivity can also be seen in terms of the three levels of wisdom; listening, reflecting and meditating. As part of being receptive we should engage in self-examination in the sense of being honest with ourselves about just how receptive we are. We should also learn to question ourselves about the relevance of any particular teaching to our lives today.

And we should bring a questioning attitude to everything we read and hear, while at the same time being willing to be guided by those wiser than ourselves. When we are truly receptive to the Dharma we can be humiliated by its sublimity in contrast to our own selfishness. Humiliation, whether by the Transcendental truths of the Dharma or by more ordinary situations, can be helpful to us, if we respond with an attitude of receptivity.

Receptivity means being prepared for radical and total transformation, because our conditioned mind cannot grasp the Dharma. Only when our consciousness expands beyond all dualistic frameworks and encompasses that which is incomprehensible, will we be freed enough to receive the Dharma, but then we will not have a subjective experience of receptivity to an objective Dharma. There will be no distinction.

As Robert Thurman puts it, “In the face of the incomprehensibility of things, ordinary knowledge and especially convictions are utterly lost; this is because the mind loses its capacity to objectify anything and has nothing to grasp onto. The mind reaches a stage where it can bear its lack of bearings, as it were, can endure this kind of extreme openness.” May we all be open to the sublime teachings of the Buddha.
Source: http://ratnaghosa.fwbo.net

We worry about what a child will become tomorrow, yet we forget that he is someone today.
~Stacia Tauscher quotes

 

Before you put on a frown, make absolutely sure there are no smiles available. ~Jim Beggs

 

Before I was a Mom –
I slept as late as I wanted and never worried about how late I got into bed.
I brushed my hair and my teeth everyday.

Before I was a Mom –
I cleaned my house each day. I never tripped over toys or forgot words to a lullaby.
I didn’t worry whether or not my plants were poisonous.
I never thought about immunizations.

Before I was a Mom –
I had never been puked on – Pooped on – Spit on – Chewed on, or Peed on.
I had complete control of my mind and My thoughts. I slept all night.

Before I was a Mom –
I never held down a screaming child so that doctors could do tests…or give shots.
I never looked into teary eyes and cried. I never got gloriously happy over a simple grin.
I never sat up late hours at night watching a baby sleep.

Before I was a Mom –
I never held a sleeping baby just because I didn’t want to put it down.
I never felt my heart break into a million pieces when I couldn’t stop the hurt.
I never knew that something so small could affect my life
so much. I never knew that I could love someone so much.
I never knew I would love being a Mom.

Before I was a Mom –
I didn’t know the feeling of having my heart outside my body.
I didn’t know how special it could feel to feed a hungry baby.
I didn’t know that bond between a mother and her child.
I didn’t know that something so small could make me feel so important.

Before I was a Mom –
I had never gotten up in the middle of the night every 10 minutes to make sure all was okay.
I had never known The warmth, The joy, The love, The heartache,
The wonderment or the satisfaction of being a Mom.
I didn’t know I was capable of feeling so much before I was a Mom.

~Author Unknown

People seldom notice old clothes if you wear a big smile. ~Lee Mildon

 

An Official Unveiling of the Statue of the Meditation Buddha Ceremony at Wat Dhammagosanaram in Cranston, Rhode Island United States of America on Sunday August 12, 2012.