Recollecting Our Goodness | 27 Dec 2024

Returning to Nature: The purpose of learning Dhamma is to return the heart to its natural state of peace and radiance.

Importance of Samadhi: Concentration (Samadhi) stabilizes the mind against sense impressions, preventing it from being shaken.

Wisdom and Selflessness: Understanding anatta (non-self) helps detach from the belief that experiences are "me" or "mine," reducing suffering.

Forgiveness (Abhayadana): Giving forgiveness is a supreme form of giving, surpassing material donations. It brings coolness to the heart and aids meditation.

Meta (Goodwill): Cultivating goodwill prevents harming others and supports Samadhi. The speaker warns that harming even small animals can have immediate negative karmic results.

Self-Refuge: The Buddha teaches that we must be our own refuge. While the Buddha reveals the path, we must put in the effort to practice, meditate, and build merit ourselves.

Transcript

This year we have been learning dhamma through online zoom sessions from whatmabjjan.

Some have been learning dhamma like this since we have started,

10 years and 6 months ago,

Which is quite a long time.

But if we contemplate in another way,

Then we see that time has passed by very quickly,

And we are learning dhamma so that our spiritual hearts can go back to nature,

Going back to peace,

To the papasara,

The radiance of the heart.

Because when the mind receives sense impressions,

Then it is moved and swayed.

So the Buddha taught us to do samadhi,

To make our mind to be well concentrated and firmly established.

When the mind has samadhi,

It is well concentrated,

And then upon receiving a sense impression,

The mind isn't shaken by it.

But it's normal that all dhamma practitioners,

Whether monastic or lay,

Male or female,

That if we've never practiced and trained before,

Then we won't know this.

We will see everything as being me and mine,

Ever since we were born.

We feel that it's a self,

It's me and mine.

We can notice that in babies newly born,

Their eyes look pure.

Their mental proliferation is little.

Whether they like or dislike something,

It passes.

Because part of their brain is not yet working fully.

But when the brain does work fully,

Then it has good results for one who has wisdom.

Like Lady Vissaka,

Who was just 7 years old when she learnt about dhamma,

And could understand about non-self.

She could have right view that rupa and nama,

Material and mental phenomena,

Has arising,

Persisting and ceasing.

But the quality of delusion was still there in her.

But she wasn't deluded like a patujana,

A common person,

Or a kaliyana chana,

A good and beautiful person.

A patujana is someone with thick defilements,

Who doesn't have sila dhamma,

A basic level of moral conduct.

The kaliyana chana has a mind that is beautiful.

They have sila dhamma.

But the sila dhamma may not be firmly established.

If they experience a sense impression that is severe,

Then the mind can be shaken up and can change.

But to have sila dhamma that is beautiful,

Strong and firm,

Then it needs to have dhamma.

To have sila and to have dhamma.

Having dhamma,

That is,

Seeing that there is nothing that is truly ours.

So though we may have greed,

Anger,

Delusion coming up,

But we can give it up.

Sometimes Venerable Ajahn Chah would teach that a sotapanna,

One who has attained the first level of enlightenment,

Has anger as well,

But doesn't have ill-will,

The wish to harm and hurt.

So the thought to harm is significant in that it makes our mind not be peaceful.

Abhaya dhamma,

To give fearlessness or forgiveness,

Is the supreme giving.

This abhaya dhamma is excellent.

To donate vihara dhamma,

Building an uposatha hall,

Building a vihara,

Building a chedi,

Helping the poor and people in need,

Or building hospitals,

Has lots of resulting benefits.

They say it's more meritorious than giving sangha dhana,

Which has the Buddha at its head.

This the Buddha taught himself.

But bhavana,

Meditation,

Has more benefits than giving dhana.

This means meditation where the mind is peaceful.

Not meditation and the mind doesn't get peaceful.

The meditation where peacefulness arises has greater resulting benefits in that there will be coolness of the heart and the samadhi is firm.

Sometimes it can feel dense and firm in one particular point.

It can be at the tip of the nose,

It can be at the crown of the head.

It will be solid and firm there.

Sometimes we can feel like this in the middle of the chest and there is coolness.

When samadhi gathers together,

It can be like this.

So meditation has lots of benefits.

And when we meditate and gain understanding,

Then it will have even more benefits.

We have understanding that everyone has experienced disliking and aversion.

Ever since we were born,

We bury in our hearts some things that through our lives where people have made us unhappy.

We have anger and ill will,

A desire to harm them.

And this is normal for avijja,

Ignorance,

That covers over our minds.

But when we meditate,

We can forgive them.

We have rapture arising in our hearts.

And it is difficult to do.

But they said that here is the point which will give us a lot of benefit.

So giving dhamma as a dana has a lot of benefit,

But giving forgiveness has a lot more benefit.

So all through our lives and all through the year,

From the 1st January 2024 until the end of the year now,

Which is Friday 27th December 2024,

And is the last Friday of learning dhamma through Zoom online from Wat Marp Chan,

We will set up the intention about what has passed in our life.

That if we are a child,

We have close friends,

People we know,

Or not really know them that well,

Who may have made us feel bad.

And for dhamma practitioners,

Be it monk or lay,

Who live together,

This may also be the case.

Or if we live by ourselves,

The mind thinks of memories from the past,

Of the time when we were a child.

From when we can remember,

We probably have kept some aversion and resentment in the heart,

And we will have anger and ill will come up.

So we are determined that this has passed already,

And we will not have ill will to anyone.

We will forgive.

Every day we will think that we will not get angry at anyone.

We won't have ill will and harmful thoughts to anyone.

Though it is hard to do,

We train in this way.

This is having the quality of metta,

Goodwill,

And having the quality of sila.

A sotapanna has dhamma.

They give fearlessness,

Forgiveness,

As something normal.

Because they have got to the heart of the dhamma.

They see that,

In our life that we are born into,

It is enough suffering already.

So we better not harm each other,

Harming through body,

Speech or mind.

And in the beginning,

We didn't know anything at all.

The eye sees a form and we dislike it,

And we think of physically harming them.

But in the present day world,

It can go straight to harming,

On the level of acting on the thought by way of body and speech.

And when it's worse than that,

It can even be war breaking out.

This is because of a lack of dhamma.

It makes one have suspicions and distrust in others.

If we live in the forest,

Then there are snakes and all sorts of animals.

If we have sila dhamma,

Then we don't harm them.

But if we have no sila dhamma,

We can go harming them.

And there was once a worker who entered the monastery to do some work.

They found a gecko and harmed it.

They didn't ask permission from the monks,

But went ahead and killed it.

If they asked permission from the monks,

Then the monks wouldn't let them.

So they killed the gecko.

And here,

Some karma gives results in the present life,

And some karma gives results in a future life.

It so happened that the worker went back to rest in their house.

And I don't know how,

But it was like there was someone grabbing him and throwing him down the stairs.

The flesh of his body was all bruised and peeled.

It was quite severe.

So doing karma to an animal,

Then one can receive the painful results to this level in this present life.

So don't think to harm,

To hurt,

To be violent,

To even the smallest of animals.

We spread metta,

Goodwill,

In the same way that a mother would nurture the child in her womb.

So may we spread metta to all living beings like that.

Like to a baby in the womb.

So this is contained in the metta chant.

So may we train in this one quality of metta brahmavihara,

The sublime abiding of goodwill.

And this has lots of benefits.

It makes our samadhi to be well concentrated.

And the samadhi that we have already won't degrade.

This is because we have metta.

So Lady Visakha and the wealthy merchant Anattapindika had metta and compassion.

They were well established in sila and in dhamma.

Because their minds were one-pointed.

It is samadhi that is firm.

It is a higher level than a kalyana chana.

But these things,

These dhammas,

They don't arise like miracles,

Where we don't do anything at all.

Can the Buddha make us be a sotapanna?

It's against the foundation of dhamma.

The Buddha taught,

One is one's own refuge.

So we have to take ourself as our refuge.

The Buddha,

The Tathagata,

Is the one who reveals,

Who teaches.

But we have to do it ourselves.

We train ourself.

We do it ourself.

We find the opportunity and time to build goodness,

To give alms,

To make merit,

To chant and meditate,

And to practice dhamma.

We need to do it ourselves.

Like when eating food,

We need to eat it ourselves so that we are full.

The Buddha is the owner of the fruit orchard.

We don't plant it.

We walk into the orchard,

And whichever fruits are ripe,

We can collect them and eat them.

Just doing this much,

And we feel it's difficult and troublesome.

The mental defilements delay and shift us away from it continually.

They make us not willing to do goodness,

Not willing to put in effort.

Can we see it?

But some people have more barami,

Spiritual accumulations,

And they are determined.

They know that the days and nights are passing by,

Passing by,

And our life is passing by as well.

We think back to our grandfather and grandmother,

And they have already passed away.

There is a poem which says,

O child,

Where has your grandfather and grandmother gone to?

In no long time you will need to go as well.

This poem can be felt deep in the heart,

At the time where our heart is chaotic,

And we feel that we have no refuge.

I,

Anumodana Sadhu,

Rejoice in all your goodness that you have built with the Sangha of Wat Marbjan or with other places.

I rejoice with each mind that has made good karma of all sorts in building Dhana,

Sila and Bhavana.

May you all have happiness and prosperity and continue on with your efforts and diligence.

Even when this year will have passed and we enter the new year of 2025,

May you be determined that you will be someone who is putting forth effort and being diligent.

May we add to our already present level of faith.

May we add to our efforts and do more for our minds so that our mind can be peaceful.

This is wisdom arising in our hearts.

We will have strength of mind,

Have strong spiritual faculties,

And ultimately our mind gathers together and it sees the Dhamma,

Which is coming from seeing that material and mental phenomena as being us,

And we simply change our view of it.

So it's not that we abandon this sense of self completely,

But it's just changing our views that,

Oh,

So it's not us.

Why is it that when we don't want this body to be sick and in pain,

So why does it get sick and in pain?

Because there are its causes and conditions,

So then it's like that,

Right?

There are causes for each sickness,

And we don't want it to be that way,

So why does it happen?

Because it's natural for it to be like that.

The four elements of the body are not in balance,

So then sickness arises.

If our mind is peaceful,

Then we understand that there is no self,

And it's natural just like this.

The body which is newly born,

It ultimately decays and ends like this.

May we understand that it is normal like this,

Then we will understand the Dhamma.

We have to make an effort so that we can have mindfulness and wisdom in the way of the world and in the Dhamma.

May you all have good health and be well in your body.

If you have sickness,

May it be cured.

May it reduce and be alleviated.

May you be strong in the body and mind.

May you meet with true happiness,

That is,

The peace of the heart.

May you grow in blessings.

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