Metta Bhavana

Adam Mizner's Dhamma Talk on Metta Bhavana. Adam Mizner has dedicated many years to the in-depth study of Daoism, western Hermetics and the Buddha Dhamma, is initiated into and teaches methods from these traditions. He is a senior lay disciple of Ajahn Jumnien in the Thai Forest tradition of Theravada Buddhism. This deep spiritual background has a large influence on his approach to internal development teaching.

Please note: This track was recorded live and may contain background

Transcript

Maita Bhavanah,

Or the mental cultivation of universal kindness or universal love,

Is an important basis of the practice,

As are all the paramitas,

Perfections that we cultivate,

Mental qualities that we perfect.

Why is Maita so important?

One Maita is a pleasant abiding in the here and now.

When we have ill will,

Aversion,

Anger and aggression,

It's unpleasant for those around us and very unpleasant for us.

Anger burns us more than it burns anybody else.

So,

At the very basic level,

It's a skillful means if we cultivate Maita in our daily life,

Maita in our mind,

Maita in our energy,

Maita in our speech,

And Maita in our actions,

Then it gives us a nice place to hang out.

The Buddha described it as a divine abiding.

This is because it's a divine place to abide.

It's also because if you cultivate it to a deep level,

It leads to rebirth in the heavenly planes,

A divine abiding in the future.

So we're cultivating positive karma in the present,

Positive dwelling in the present,

And positive karma for the future.

This building of the mental state which is skillful acts as a kind of supercharger for our practice.

Many people can read the Buddha's teachings or come to a day or night to hear the teachings of the Buddha,

To hear the Dharma.

And we hear ultimate truth.

We're taught instructions,

High instructions,

How to see anatta,

How to see not-self,

How to see sunnata,

How to see emptiness,

And how to penetrate through to nirvana.

And we try to do the practice but still we can't see,

Because this truth is subtle and difficult to see.

Many people hear the truth.

Truth is readily available even online these days.

But still hearing it doesn't help us.

The mindstream simply can't break through and cannot penetrate through.

The delusion presses us down.

So even though we're told the truth and given instruction on how to realize the truth,

When we try to practice it doesn't bear fruit.

But then there are some people that hear it once,

They hear a talk once,

And instantly enter a stage of enlightenment.

Why are they so talented?

Why can one person practice for their entire life and not get anywhere and another person practice for some short months and attain all kinds of levels of peace?

Our karma separates beings.

Beings are not all equal.

It's karma that separates them,

Karma that divides them.

So we have to build positive karmas.

And one of these positive karmas is mehara,

Love and kindness.

It lifts up our practice.

It supports our practice.

And it gives our practice a genuine and selfless base.

If you find that your meditation isn't working,

That you can't enter samadhi,

That your meditation is shallow,

That the mind is distracted,

When you practice vipassana you can't see the truth.

When you practice vipassana you get caught in the analytical style of meditation and you can't penetrate through to reality.

Then we need to build the perfections,

The paramitas inside the mind and inside our actions.

This purifies our mindstream and purifies our action,

Our karmic stream.

Lifting up our practice,

Pushing our practice towards not self,

Emptiness and nibbana.

In this way,

Mehara is a support for the practice.

In our daily life we interact with our family,

Friends,

Loved ones,

Work colleagues,

Practice partners,

Constantly interact with other beings,

Both human and non-human.

Do we bump into them?

Do we cause aggression?

Do we react with aversion towards them?

Do we treat them with ill will?

Do we treat them with indifference and allow them to generate ill will towards us?

Creating negative karma for ourselves and putting the causes in for other people to create negative karma.

This is the normal way of being.

The kind to those that are especially special to us,

That we love sometimes,

The rest of the time we're not so kind to them.

In fact,

Most of the time we're not that kind to people we love and we're definitely not that kind to people we're indifferent towards and certainly not to those that we dislike.

This is why mehara is to be cultivated and why it's described as universal kindness or universal loving kindness,

Not just kindness or just loving kindness.

Kindness is not special.

We can be kind to our pet but not kind to the dog next door.

There's nothing special about being kind to that which we're fond of.

What makes it a divine quality is that it's universal,

That it's equal,

That it's equal towards all beings.

It's easy to talk about but difficult to cultivate.

After you cultivate it,

It's easy to do but difficult to maintain.

However,

The fruit is powerful.

If you do it even a little bit,

You find peace in the present moment and those around you become inspired.

The positive karma is not something you're going to reap in lifetimes to come.

It happens straight away.

We all know what it's like from life experience when you act in kindness.

Any simple act of giving,

Whether it's giving material,

Giving your time,

Giving service,

Giving kind words,

Even giving a smile,

Well,

It makes them feel better but it makes you feel better straight away.

Just that is enough reason to do it.

We don't need to always have the most high-minded reason for doing things.

I'm only kind because of my universal compassion of a Buddha.

It's more important to be real.

It's good enough to be kind because being kind makes you feel good.

And it does make you feel good.

Being kind makes you healthy.

Being kind protects you.

Kind people have few enemies.

Kind people have less sickness.

If you can cultivate the mehta to the level of perfection,

Kindness can protect you from weapons,

Can protect you from harm,

Protect you from negative influences and beings.

You become protected by the devas.

The power of kindness is profound and magical.

So we need to cultivate it step by step in a realistic fashion.

When we sit down to do the mental cultivation of kindness and we do a shamatha meditation like we just did,

We build a feeling of kindness in our mind and body.

If you're not kind to yourself,

You can't be kind to others.

You can have a fabricated counterfeit kind of kindness towards others but it's not the real thing.

Kindness must come from acceptance and you have to accept that which is immediate.

Accept your body the way it is.

When you have pain in meditation,

Be kind towards it.

Just accept it.

Changing,

Pushing it away,

That's not kindness,

That's aversion.

Accept the way things are.

The enemy of mehta is ill will.

You're an ill will.

What is the root of ill will?

Aversion.

Dislike.

The desire to push something away.

The desire for things to end.

When we try not to have aversion and we start to let go of aversion,

Kindness becomes very easy and natural.

We could be sitting here trying to have our deep meditation and we want to get into a nice spiritual state.

And then the music comes,

Some booty shaking music,

People banging around.

We could have aversion towards that.

These guys wrecking my peaceful meditation.

So we cultivate aversion.

We don't like the way things are.

We have to accept the way things are.

The moment you accept them,

Kindness arises in the heart.

Accepting the imperfections of life,

It's easy to be kind.

But when we want everything to be the way we want it,

We're caught in desire and aversion,

Attraction and aversion,

Being kind becomes nothing but a philosophy and it's very difficult to maintain.

Philosophy does not benefit us.

Action benefits us.

The Buddha said,

What is karma?

Karma is action.

When we have intention and then we carry out action,

That is karma.

So how do we cultivate metta?

Yeah,

We sit down and cultivate it because everything that manifests in the body comes first through the mind,

From mind to energy to body.

But cultivating in body is more powerful and more important.

So when you walk out,

You be kind.

Be kind to each other.

It's not especially profound,

But it's especially rare.

And when we come across people that are kind even in a worldly way,

Not universally kind,

Just normal kindness,

It's moving.

It inspires us to be more kind.

They become somebody we would protect,

Somebody we would stand up for,

Somebody we won't cheat or lie to.

So they're protected by us.

This is the kind of person we want to start off to be.

But then build the kindness to radiate out towards those,

Everyone we interact with,

Every being we interact with.

Cultivate it to a very deep level.

This is not especially difficult.

There are many more difficult practices.

But it's a very special practice.

If you do it a little bit,

It becomes self-supporting because it's so pleasant.

It's not an uphill grind.

It's not swimming against the stream.

It's natural.

Every time you feel kind,

You feel better and it self-perpetuates and you want to be kind again.

You just got to get that ball rolling and then it's a snowball effect.

Just naturally kind.

It doesn't need to be perfect.

Just be kind.

Very simple ways.

You got to have a shower and there's ants in the shower.

What do you do?

Not care and turn the shower on and murder a hundred ants?

You know,

Bang on the shower a little bit,

Try to get them to go?

Pretty simple.

But it changes who you are.

Because we're not a fixed entity.

We're not stuck.

We're not permanent.

We're changing.

We're built by our actions.

In neuroscience they say whatever actions you perform many times,

You build new pathways and that builds a new self,

So to speak.

So every time you be kind,

You're not just being kind,

You're becoming more kind.

It's not just what you do,

It changes who you are.

Because who you are is not a fixed entity.

There's opportunity everywhere.

Helping people in the most simple ways.

Giving for the sake of giving.

Helping for the sake of helping.

But we're stingy.

We always think we don't have anything to give.

But how about me?

He didn't help me.

He doesn't give to me.

That's not universal.

That's not even kindness.

That's tit for tat.

Kindness is easy,

But it's also easy to poison.

Selfishness poisons our kindness and makes it counterfeit,

Not the real thing.

So we give to someone hoping that we get back.

It's okay,

But it's not great.

And there's a big problem with poison.

It pollutes things.

So if we have a lot of pure water,

We can drink it and it's healthy.

It's pure.

This is like kindness.

But you only need a few drops of toxic water in that water and you can no longer drink it.

It has no purity.

It has no purity left at all.

It has selfish motivations in our kindness to destroy our kindness.

So while all kindness is good,

We need to endeavor to make our kindness universal kindness.

Pure kindness.

Kindness that's not defiled by desire.

Kindness that's not defiled by aversion.

Defiled by desire we wish for reward.

Defiled by aversion we choose who we give it to and we don't give it to those that we're averse to.

It's not the real deal.

And it doesn't work.

We don't feel good.

We know deep down.

It can be as simple as giving charity.

We give charity but we want everyone to know.

We quickly put it in the donation box when everybody's looking.

How easy it is to destroy our good karma like a little bit of poison in the water.

So we need to cultivate skillful means.

Skillfully deal with our own minds.

Skillfully deal with our own defilements.

If we do good deeds and we're driven to tell people,

Refrain from telling people and do extra good deeds but keep them secret.

Put money in the donation box when nobody's looking.

Give with no desire for reward.

Practice this close to home.

Practice this with your partner.

Practice this with your work colleagues.

It's easy to be kind in some far off philosophical place or giving to somebody in Africa even.

But it's not as powerful as giving here and now.

How easy we can lose our kindness to the people we hold dearest.

Because we're averse to the way they speak to us,

Averse to something they did.

Because we don't accept,

Because we're control freaks.

Tap easily at our loved ones because we want to control their actions.

But we need to reflect can we control our own actions.

Be honest with ourselves.

Difficult it is to control yourself.

Accepting this truth we know it's difficult for them to control themselves too.

You know how multi-layered your life is and how troubled it is that nobody else really knows all the troubles you have.

Well that's everybody else too.

Accepting accepting that everybody's troubled,

That everybody has stress.

It's easier to accept their imperfections and accept your own.

Accepting imperfection it's easier to be kind.

Demanding profession,

Perfection all the time out of ourselves,

Out of others.

It's very difficult if not impossible to be kind.

We're simply unrealistic and we have aversion to reality.

Aversion is suffering,

Aversion is unpleasant.

When we don't like things it's unpleasant.

You go to see a movie,

Very simple.

Within the first 10 minutes you know you don't like it.

The next hour and 20 minutes pretty miserable,

We're sitting there averse to a movie.

Suffering because we don't like it.

It's not pleasant.

We could have just sat there and just been at ease for an hour and a half,

We could have done that at the couch at home but no that won't do.

We've got to sit there and actually hate it.

Just chilling out and enjoying the seat that's not good enough.

We could just be happy with a boring movie.

It's really not painful.

You sit through boring talks.

Just relax,

Just accept.

Then kindness arises all on its own.

We need to let go.

The base of all the practice is letting go.

The quintessential teachings of the Buddha is to let go.

Let go of aversion and we have kindness.

Let go of our personal objects and we have generosity.

Let go of our desires,

We have renunciation.

All of these things become functions of kindness,

Functions of letting go.

We see the way things are,

We know the way things are.

We let go and kindness becomes a natural function of the mind and body.

We must cultivate this in mind,

Speech and body.

Not to become a divine sage or a deva but because it's pleasant.

Very simple because it's pleasant.

It's a pleasant abiding.

It's a divine abiding.

And who knows if you cultivate it.

If you cultivate it to a higher degree you may become a sage or a deva and it may lift you up towards the path and the fruit,

Towards nirvana.

Do not underestimate kindness.

It is powerful.

The most powerful being I've ever met,

His primary power is metta.

His metta is overwhelming.

I'm far more powerful than any martial artist I've ever met or any sorcerer and I've met my fair share.

Kindness is incredibly powerful.

Imagine the power of being supported by everybody.

When we have beings going against us,

People going against us,

We struggle.

But when everybody's working for you,

We have support,

It uplifts us,

Gives us great power.

And the kind ones have great power and they're supported by thousands,

Hundreds of thousands or even millions of invisible beings.

Incredibly powerful.

This is not perceivable to all,

But those that have the eye can see such things and understand the power of such things.

But we can all feel kindness in a conventional way.

We can all see kindness in a conventional way and nobody can deny its power.

We feel it.

We understand it intuitively.

Why do we love our pet dog?

Because it doesn't have aversion towards us.

It's really that simple.

What is it so special about it?

It's that they're universally loyal to us.

Can you be universal like the dog is to you but to everybody?

Universally kind to everything?

Not easily,

But step by step you can cultivate this power.

And it is a great power.

It empowers you.

It allows you to work for others.

When you work for others,

You can work so much harder.

It's easy to give up on yourself.

Real easy.

In fact,

Just for personal gain,

Who could be bothered working?

Actually I couldn't.

I'd rather just take it easy.

When I was only interested in personal gain,

I didn't work.

Just a bum.

Because personal gain is easy.

Just be at ease.

You don't need that much stuff.

You don't need that much money.

What's it for anyway?

I'd rather just chill.

But when you think of others,

There's a reason to work.

A family member that works to support their family,

And I understand this on a personal level,

But can you expand that out beyond your family?

The more you expand that,

The more empowering it is.

Then you have energy.

Energy supports your practice.

It supports your life.

It allows you to work when you're tired,

Work when you're sick,

Work when you're hurt.

You're supported by the power of kindness.

Being selfish weakens you.

Being bitter weakens you.

Being averse to things weakens you.

Having your will weakens you.

Having hatred breaks you.

Think about how corrupt love can become.

You fall in love,

You live for some years with somebody you love,

Then something changes.

Maybe they don't want to be with us anymore.

Maybe they change the way they are and we become bitter because we don't accept the way things are.

A so-called love turns into hatred sometimes.

One year they love you,

Next year they hate you.

I don't know if I call that love.

I just call that infatuation,

Desire,

Obsession,

Wanting to own,

Wanting to control,

Not accepting.

We can do better than that.

When we feel like that,

We see the way it breaks us,

We become broken and weak.

You see it in people around you.

They become broken and weak because it's not empowering.

It destroys your soul,

So to speak.

It destroys your mind.

It destroys your feelings and it makes you sick.

Your kindness heals the mind,

Heals your energy and heals the body.

Develop kindness in the here and now for the pleasant abiding and for the power,

For the way it lifts your path.

It allows you to have a pleasant life now,

Pleasant people around you.

When you're kind to people,

They're kind to you.

When you're kind to people and they're not kind to you and you're kind to them,

It doesn't matter anyway.

It only matters when we have aversion and aversion and kindness cannot coexist.

One little bit of poison destroys kindness.

So when we're feeling averse kindness disappears,

So just let go of the averse and just be kind.

It's not enough just to turn the other cheek.

You have to smile at them.

Otherwise we can feel trotted on.

But when we smile at them,

We feel empowered and we are empowered.

It's not a delusion because we're supported by the world and we support the world.

There's a natural give and take and energy reaction in life.

So we want to cultivate a positive one.

Starts in the mind towards our self,

Towards our breath.

When we're sitting and breathing,

Doing qigong,

Doing breath meditation,

Sometimes we're not happy with our breath.

Oh,

My breath's too short,

My breath's too coarse.

It's pretty crazy really.

We can get averse towards our breath.

That's how twisted aversion is.

That's how subtle it is.

You can get averse to all kinds of things.

We just accept our breath.

Then there's nothing to make special about our breath.

We don't have to perfect our breath and then the meditation deepens.

The mistake is to try and perfect it.

Just accept the breath.

Then the breath naturally becomes calm because you're being nice to it.

How's it going to become calm when you're hating on it?

Who becomes calm when you're hating on them?

How can you become calm when you're hating on yourself?

So we cultivate this towards everything.

Towards our thoughts,

Towards our perceptions.

We don't need enlightened perception straight away.

Don't be kind towards your aversions.

Don't be averse towards your aversions.

Oh,

The Buddha said we shouldn't have aversion.

Teacher said we shouldn't have aversion.

I've read we shouldn't have aversion.

Damn it!

Averse to aversion.

Piling poison upon poison.

Just have that kind feeling towards your aversion and aversion lessens.

Kindness is the cure towards ill will.

Kindness cures ill will.

Ill will never cures ill will.

Aversion never cures aversion.

Just have kindness towards everything.

Just that.

Nothing else.

Just that gives us sila.

Virtue.

We don't need countless complex precepts and countless vows in order to have virtue.

Just be kind.

Be kind towards yourself and the mind naturally enters meditation.

Many meditators,

Buddhist meditators,

They have a desire for jhana.

They want to develop a skill to enter mental absorption,

Deep samadhi.

The people that enter jhana well are people that have a lot of metta.

People with kind heart enter absorption easily.

People with aversion have trouble entering absorption because they have aversion towards everything.

Aversion towards the meditation object.

Aversion to the thoughts in their meditation.

Just be kind towards the thoughts that come up in your meditation.

Then meditation becomes easy.

When we're sitting,

Developing calm and then we are thinking and we feel restless and the desire to get up and end the meditation ends.

Resistance and anxiety arises.

It's a hindrance to meditation.

So we want to get up.

That's because we're averse towards our meditation.

Just be kind to your thoughts.

Just soften the heart.

Nothing else.

Just feel soft towards them,

Gentle towards them.

And they will end all on their own.

And even if they don't end,

It's not a problem.

We make the problem about our thoughts.

It's not really a problem.

Because we don't accept the way the mind is.

We can't enter deep meditation.

Accept the way the mind is.

Accept that thoughts arise.

Accept your meditation is not perfect.

Accept your breath stutters.

Accept that your breath is short sometimes.

Accept the knee pain,

The back pain,

The neck pain.

You're tired.

You're sleepy.

You're restless.

Accept it.

Just accepting it,

We develop the ability to be kind towards it.

And when we're kind towards it,

We can sit with it.

We can become calm.

We can become calm.

We can become still.

We become still.

We enter absorption.

Without kindness,

None of the other factors of the path work.

This is why the katha,

The mantra we use is metta-putto,

To be kind and awake.

Metta,

Universal kindness,

And buto,

The quality of knowing,

Of being awake.

Buta,

The awakened one,

Buto,

Awakeness.

Metta,

Universal loving kindness.

Metta-putto.

They support each other.

Kindness supports happiness in the present.

Kindness supports your path in the present.

Kindness supports your path in the future.

Kindness lifts up your practice,

Lifts you towards not-self,

Towards emptiness,

Towards nibbana.

Kindness supports others around you.

It lifts them up.

It inspires them.

Kindness is all positive.

Cultivate it now.

Cultivate it step by step,

However you can.

There are no bad versions.

Constantly trying to perfect it.

Trying to take the poison out of it.

Our imperfections be kind towards them and cultivate the perfection of kindness.

Step by step,

Day by day.

Little by little.

Until it empowers us and it becomes easy for us,

And all the work becomes easy because we're empowered by kindness.

Practice in this way and you will be happy.

And that's what we all want.

And others around you will be more happy.

And that's what they want.

And deep down that's what we want too.

Just cultivate kindness.

Meita Bhavanah.

In mind,

Speech and body.

For the benefit of self and the benefit of all beings.

It's very natural if you let it start,

Then it will snowball.

You all want to do it.

Let's start now.

Okay,

Thank you.

Questions?

Merit?

Yep.

Merit is positive karma.

Very simple.

Accumulation of positive karma.

When we give of mind,

Give of energy,

Give of speech,

Give of body.

When we cultivate positive qualities,

Perfections in ourself.

The uplifting power,

Positive karma that lifts us up is merit.

Without merit you can't achieve on the path.

We notice that we're not all equal.

I know that we all like to think we're equal and that that's kind of PC and in fashion.

But look around,

There are no two beings that are equal.

Ultimately we're equal because ultimately we're empty and emptiness is equal.

But that which is manifest is not the same.

It's not equal because our merit is not equal because our negative karma is not equal.

No two of us in here have equal strength,

Equal intelligence,

Equal anything.

This is reality.

So we cultivate things like kindness,

Metta.

We cultivate appreciative joy,

Mudita,

Appreciating others' benefit.

This is another practice,

Another divine abiding.

When other people gain,

Are we bitter and jealous or are we happy for them?

We can analyze this in ourselves.

Just this one quality.

You know from all different subcultures and groups,

People from different countries,

We can learn different things.

From my time in Thailand I've learned many things but the main thing I've learned is mudita.

As a country,

As a culture,

They've developed this ability to have appreciation for everybody.

If you're good at something,

They're ecstatic.

I've never seen this anywhere else.

They are filled with glee because you got something.

So they're happy.

When you win,

They win.

It's not damn I wish I won.

Why didn't I buy my ticket?

I wish I was the number one student.

If you can have appreciation for other people's gain,

Then whoever gains,

You're happy.

Most of us can't even appreciate our own gain.

You must develop appreciation towards yourself.

Appreciate small things,

Appreciate everything in your life and in everybody else's life.

Appreciate other people's gain.

Have joy,

Appreciative joy mudita.

This builds merit.

In Pali and in the Thai forest tradition,

We usually put compassion and metta together.

We say metta kaluna because they're like brother and sister.

When you feel,

Compassion is the feeling of somebody else's pain essentially or identifying somebody else's pain.

The problem with compassion is really only people that have recognized not-self can have genuine compassion.

Everybody else has pity.

And pity is not a skillful quality,

But compassion is.

So we say metta mudita because the function of compassion is to be kind to that person.

It's not enough to feel.

We have to go out and act.

Only those that recognize not-self and emptiness can have genuine compassion,

But we can all develop kindness.

And as we develop kindness,

We start to see a sep.

.

.

We lose the separation between ourself and others.

When we lose that separation,

We start to have genuine compassion.

That's why they say compassion leads to the realization of emptiness.

Because it dissolves separation between self and others.

You can't just jump there.

You need the stepping stance and we need a function.

We need something real and tangible to do.

Being kind is one of those real and tangible things.

When we be kind,

We build merit.

Some people seem like they have no merit,

No luck in life.

Usually they're bitter people.

So what came first?

Some people seem like they always get supported.

They're usually the kind and happy ones.

That's why they get supported.

What came first?

So we build these perfections and the merit happens immediately.

But the merit also becomes a karma or a boon,

The merit.

Something that supports us later.

So the more you do it,

The better your future is and the better your present is.

Cultivating kindness,

Cultivating appreciative joy.

Just those two change your whole life.

Cultivate compassion.

And the fourth divine abiding is equanimity or upekka.

So it doesn't really fit in with the other three.

But it does.

So when I'm kind towards you and then you turn around and stab me in the back,

I have to have equanimity towards that.

Be unmoved.

It's okay.

Otherwise,

Other things will arise in place of upekka,

In place of equanimity.

We have bitterness or will,

Aversion.

And they destroy our appreciation,

They destroy our kindness,

They destroy our metta and they destroy our merit.

So instead of developing merit,

We develop negative karma,

The opposite of merit.

That which suppresses us and pushes us down.

We don't want to be suppressed and pushed down.

We want to be liberated and lifted up.

To be liberated and lifted up,

Liberate and lift up others.

Cultivate positive qualities.

This is merit.

It's very powerful.

In fact,

The amulets that I bring here,

What they're actually blessed with is metta.

Kindness.

That's what they're empowered with.

And the kindness is so powerful that it protects you.

It makes you sleep easily.

It brings peace.

Don't underestimate kindness.

Having joy towards other people's accomplishment is being kind.

Having compassion is being kind.

Having equanimity towards other people's flaws,

When they stab us,

That's being kind too.

Giving is being kind.

Renunciation is being kind.

The whole path is kindness.

All the way up until enlightenment,

Which is the ultimate kindness towards yourself and others.

Developing these skills,

We develop merit.

What is merit in a metaphysical,

Energetic way is not important.

It's what separates beings.

Are we the same as somebody born in Calcutta?

Is our life the same?

Our opportunities the same?

Nobody's opportunities are the same.

We like this philosophy that everyone should have equal opportunity,

But it's not real.

It's not real.

Nobody has equal opportunity.

We all have different IQ,

Different power,

Different blessing,

Different loved ones,

Different finances,

Different looks.

Everything's different.

That's because of merit.

Knowing this,

We can see how important merit is.

It matters now.

It matters in the future.

It matters for everybody.

The theory,

The philosophy of everything being equal doesn't change it.

Doesn't change it.

Today in class I give a teaching.

Does everybody get it equally?

No.

Do any two people get it equally?

No.

Do any two people have the same skill set?

No.

Show me anything that's equal.

The only thing that's equal is nothing.

So equality,

We should treat people universally equally,

Equally with kindness,

But it's not because they're the same.

Nothing is.

So we need to develop an open,

Expansive,

Universal attitude.

That's what needs to be equal.

We don't need to try and pretend the outside world is equal.

It never will be.

That's not acceptance.

That's wanting things to be the way we want them to be.

And when we want things to be a certain way and they're not,

We have aversion.

We have ill will and kindness disappears.

Accept a non-equality of things and then we can treat everything equally.

But when we want everything to be equal and it's not,

Then we don't treat everything equally.

It's funny the way people that sprout all the talk about equality are usually putting somebody else down.

The ones that sprout about love and kindness are always complaining and saying,

You should have kindness.

Philosophy doesn't help.

It poisons us.

Practice helps us.

Cultivating kindness is now.

That's what helps us.

Not ideals.

The ideals makes us self-righteous.

And we all know what self-righteous people are like.

They're not that easy to be kind to.

We need to try to develop it anyway because they're suffering too no matter what they say.

No matter how perfect they are and how equal they think they are to you and everyone else.

Just be kind to them.

Just develop kindness and then you'll be lifted up by merit.

Merit is the result of that which we do which is beneficial and which is good.

And there are some things that some people,

Different theories,

Different philosophies,

There are some separations about what is good.

But kindness isn't one of them.

It's universally accepted as good,

As skillful.

Some people talk about the universal nature of all religions.

Well there are differences,

Great differences among different religions,

Different paths.

But kindness isn't one of them.

It's universally accepted and universally known as positive in all cultures.

By every being,

By every animal,

By every deva,

By every woman,

By every man.

Anything,

Every being,

Even trees,

Everything you come into contact with reacts positively to kindness.

It's a universal truth.

It universally develops merit no matter what you believe.

Thing about merit is you don't have to believe in it.

It happens anyway.

Some people say I don't believe in karma.

It doesn't matter.

Karma doesn't care.

You get it anyway.

Belief doesn't change reality.

Understanding this starts to change the way we see things.

Try to see reality.

The path and the practice is seeing reality,

Not trying to change reality.

We all try to change the world,

Fix it.

I want to fix it.

How can it be the way it is?

That's aversion.

That's not kindness.

That aversion is the birth of hate.

Trying to change things,

We want them to be the way we want to be them.

We want them to be.

That little aversion,

Even wanting to make things perfect.

I want to make this perfect world.

That's aversion.

That's what leads to war.

That's what leads to hate.

If we can accept them,

We can be kind towards everything and that is what ends all forms of hate.

We need to accept ourselves and accept that around us and be kind towards it.

It's the fastest way to be happy.

Fast track to happiness.

We all want happiness.

It makes people around us happy too.

Then we can have joy,

Appreciation of their happiness.

Then we're happier and then we're kinder.

All these things work together.

They lift us up and lift the others up around us,

Making a pool of merit for everybody.

Let ourselves benefit others.

When we benefit others,

It builds our merit and it benefits us.

We're more empowered to benefit others.

Helping others is helping yourself and helping yourself is helping others.

Just be positive.

But being positive doesn't mean painting on a positive view about the world.

That's delusion.

Accept the way it is,

Then we can act positively.

We don't need to paint on like we're wearing rose-colored goggles all the time.

When you wear red goggles,

You see the world as red.

When you wear yellow goggles,

You see the world as yellow.

So if you wear a version of goggles,

You see the world in that way.

It's bitter.

The world's awful.

It's filled with hate.

It's not true.

There's more love in the world than hate.

Most people don't want to accept that.

The mere fact that there are beings is usually a result of some kind of love,

Even if it's just lust.

We don't come from hate.

People don't make hate and make beings.

They make love and make beings.

There's a lot more love out there than you think.

The only flaw with it is that it's not universal.

Just accept the way it is and be universal back at it.

Then we develop powerful merit.

People with powerful merit are powerful beings.

We know when we meet powerful beings,

Because they're kind,

They empower us.

They don't just take,

They empower themselves.

Empowering others empowers themselves.

I can't say enough how powerful kindness is,

But we all know it anyway.

The problem is that we get averse towards things and then we forget to be kind.

We get caught up in aversion.

Yeah,

I don't know about him.

So we're not kind.

Ah,

He's a Muslim.

I'm not going to be kind to him.

He's a Chen stylist.

I'm not going to be kind to him.

Well,

That's allowed.

Be kind to everybody.

It's real easy.

It's much easier than you think.

Just get out there and do it.

Anyone else?

Yeah.

How do you get rid of anger and resentment?

You carry it around for many years.

Well,

It's not easy because we've been carrying it around for more than many years.

We've been carrying it around since beginning was tough.

There are four methods to get rid of things that we don't want.

One is an antidote.

Something arises we don't want,

We apply an antidote.

So what's the antidote to anger and resentment?

Bingo.

Kindness.

But that might not work.

It will help,

But if it doesn't work,

There are other methods.

Contemplate the downfalls of anger and resentment.

Think deeply about it.

When you are angry,

How do you feel?

When you resent things,

How do you feel?

What does anger and resentment do for your life?

Poisons it,

Destroys it,

And the life of others around you.

We don't think like this because we're ignorant to truth.

So you have to contemplate truth,

Analyze truth,

Look at the way it is.

Look at anger and resentment and contemplate the downfalls.

You naturally want to drop it.

When you see some dog shit on the ground,

You don't pick it up and eat it.

It's not attractive.

But neither is anger and resentment,

It's not attractive,

But we still pick it up.

It's because we don't realize its nature.

We already know the nature of dog shit.

So we don't chase it down.

Very simple.

Contemplate the nature of those things and you'll naturally drop them.

The third method is to grit your teeth and resist suppression.

Now in modern psychology,

Suppression is a no-no,

Right,

Because we suppress it and then it bubbles up and it bursts out.

That's not true.

When it's bubbling up and bursting out,

That's because you're not suppressing it.

That is not the failure of suppression.

It's the failure of not suppressing.

When you suppress something long enough,

It dies.

There's a poisonous weed growing up,

Put a brick on it.

Don't let it get any sun or wetter water,

Suppress it.

It dies.

So that's the third method.

Suppress anger and resentment.

Contemplate the downfalls of anger and resentment.

Buy an antidote for anger and resentment.

Those three methods are pretty easy and they work.

But there's a better method,

The ultimate method.

The ultimate method is to see anger and resentment as not belonging to me,

Neither me nor myself,

Just emptiness.

Seeing the truth of it is just nothing,

Just a mental thing,

A thought.

When you grab the thought,

Where's your thought?

They're empty,

They're nothing.

The problem is we make them,

We reify our thoughts into make them something solid when they're not.

Like,

We build it,

We fabricate it,

We make it strong,

We empower our anger and resentment so that we make it something solid.

It's not anything solid,

It's empty.

It's just a thought.

See it as empty,

Let it go.

Contemplate its downfall.

Suppress it.

Apply the antidote.

These four methods,

Every time it comes up,

Apply one of those methods.

Every personality type will react differently to different methods.

Experiment for yourself,

See which one works.

Or at a different time,

A different one will work.

Those four methods are proven,

They work,

But you must apply them.

One thing we can't get away from is our own effort.

We must apply.

Theory doesn't help,

We must apply.

I guarantee if you apply those four methods,

You will defeat anger and resentment.

No matter how bad it is,

No matter how bad it is,

No matter what you feel like is being done to you,

Which is such a great crime towards you.

Or if you realize there's no you,

That all just vanishes on the spot.

But if you can't realize that,

Then at least apply the antidote.

Or at least suppress it,

Starve it,

Starve it out.

There are many skillful means,

Just apply them.

What we do is we become lazy and we let it arise and then we indulge in it,

We identify with it and we actually in a twisted way like being angry and we,

I'm the person that was harmed when I was young and that's why I'm the way I am and now I build a whole self around it,

Identify with it.

That's why I've got an excuse to being an asshole.

That's why I did what I did.

The only reason I commit crime is because I was,

You know,

It was done to me.

We can fabricate all kinds of excuses.

And what that does is empower anger and resentment.

We don't want to empower it,

We want to starve it,

We want to dissolve it,

We want to let it go,

We want to apply an antidote towards it.

So we have to be careful what we identify with.

So know that that anger and resentment is not who you are.

It's just a thought.

It's not always there.

There are moments when it's not there,

Therefore it's not you.

It's just something that arises,

Exists and falls away.

Watch it fall away and know that it's not you.

And then saturate it with kindness.

I'm not saying it's going to happen straight away.

But if you do it regularly,

If you do it consistently,

You will win.

It can be done.

Okay.

Anyone else?

Yeah.

How about fear?

Same.

Same.

Same.

This is that same answer for whatever word you put in there.

However,

Fear needs to be contemplated and understood.

Often we think of fear as like a negative thing,

But we want to keep hope.

Hope is positive,

Fear is negative.

Think about it.

Hope and fear are two sides of the same coin.

If you fear something,

You're hoping for the opposite.

When you hope for something,

You're fearing the opposite.

They coexist.

Only those that abandon all hope are free from fear.

A lot of people don't like this,

But just take it home and think about it.

Think about it.

Duality is the cause of poison.

Only those that are non-dual can be completely free.

As long as we're dual,

We have fear.

Duality is fear.

So coarse fears,

Yeah,

We can work on them in a more simple way,

Applying those four methods.

But ultimately we need to let go of both sides of the coin to be free.

Even being positive isn't good enough.

We need to transcend being positive and negative.

Transcend good or bad.

Let go of everything.

Then there's a piece that can't be shaken,

Can't be knocked down,

Can't be taken,

Can't be harmed because it's not held up by anything else.

This is Nibbana.

This is the enlightenment in the Buddha point swords.

But on the stepping stones towards that,

We'll settle for things like kindness.

Just being kind makes you kind of fearless.

It's very empowering.

Step by step we can defeat fear or any other defilement.

All of them.

One by one,

Just do the work.

Do the work because it's fun.

Do the work because it makes you happy.

Do the work because it makes those around you happy.

We don't need to think of the spiritual path as like some kind of somber duty.

It's not a somber duty.

It's fun.

It's something cool to do.

When you really get into it,

It's the most fun thing on the planet because it makes you filled with joy all the time even when things are bad.

Other things make you filled with joy when things are great but not when they're bad.

But the spiritual work makes you filled with joy all the time.

That's why it's priceless.

Very simple but not easy.

Step by step cultivate.

If your ideals are in conflict to being kind.

Yeah,

Well I hurt people daily.

Right?

I hurt you with kindness.

Sounds like a paradox but it's not.

So when I turn left and strike out,

There's no intention.

All I'm doing is turning left.

When you dance you turn left,

You turn right.

When you do tai chi you turn left,

You turn right.

Function of the mind,

Function of the body.

Intention.

Intention.

Also considering a new career.

Anyone else?

Can you just repeat the four things,

The five methods?

Yep.

Okay,

So one,

Apply an antidote.

Okay.

Apply an antidote.

For you it's kindness,

Right?

If you're talking about anger,

Resentment,

Aversion,

Kindness.

Apply the antidote and apply it thick and heavy.

Two,

Contemplate the downfalls.

Do that while you're feeling it because in retrospect it's not as powerful.

While you're stuck in it.

It's a bit like when you drink and you get really hungover and like,

I'm never going to drink again.

The message is strong and clear but in retrospect it's not so powerful.

So you contemplate the downfalls.

Three,

Suppress it.

Starve it.

Starve it.

You need power to do that so it's not for everybody.

But the other two empower you and help you.

Starve out that weed.

Starve out that poison.

And four,

Recognize the truth.

The ultimate version.

Vipassana.

Seeing that it's not you nor belonging to you.

It's empty and it just dissolves all on its own.

Apply these four methods as you can in accordance with your nature and in accordance with the type.

Trick is to do it when it arises.

The real practice is doing it when it arises.

Not when I'm great,

Everything's cool,

I'm in the hammock and I'm kind.

Anyone can do that.

Do it when they're annoying you.

It's much more powerful.

Do it when the problems arise.

Apply the antidotes.

So you know now,

Now all you've got to do is do it.

Step by step.

Don't be averse towards your failures because we all fail.

Be kind towards your failures and appreciate your success.

And then you'll empower yourself and those around you.

Reviews

Powerful!

Inspiring, thanks!

Just what I needed to hear. Spoken with kindness. Thank you.

Being kind solves everything