Inclining To Nibbana

In inclining towards nibbana we use the experience of the day from the moment of waking up. Training ourselves to use the retreat schedule as a skillful means. Noticing and using effort to brighten the mind rather than doing things perfunctorily. Seeing what arises as the way it is, without labeling it as good or bad or the way you’d like it to be. Using the conditions around us to reflect on the way it is rather than being caught up in identifying things as liked or disliked . Noting doubt and the misery it creates. Using the 3 refuges. The Buddha said nibbana is to be realized now, in this lifetime, not postponed to some future life or even the next moment. Make that your clear intention and watch how the mind reacts.

Transcript

This is the beginning of the day,

The beginning of our monastic day,

The beginning of a retreat.

You make this fully conscious beginning.

Sometimes we just slip through life never noticing anything,

Just going through emotions and only the kind of extreme peaks or depressions of life we ever really become conscious in our mind.

Most of our life is just a shadow of just going through the emotions in a perfunctory passive way.

Then you can come up here to the shrine room,

Sit down,

Be completely oblivious to anything that happens,

And stick hot in your own feelings,

Moods of the moment without reflecting,

Without recognizing the most obvious.

What's nearest and what's close,

What is obvious we don't,

Sometimes we pay no attention to.

Meditation we are reflecting on.

This is the beginning of the day,

It's the end of it,

We reflect on the end of it,

In the middle of it,

The middle of it.

Reflecting on this is the beginning of a retreat,

Meditation retreat,

Which is another perception of the mind,

Isn't it?

What does a retreat mean?

What do you expect?

Having that perception of what does that do to the mind?

Beginning of a retreat,

What is your reaction to going on retreat?

Make all kinds of plans to do this or that,

Or attainments,

Or maybe you're dreading it,

Fearing it,

Or expecting.

That you can observe.

Beginning of a retreat,

That's the end of it,

Of what we call a retreat,

A span of time designated for a certain way of doing something.

When you get up in the morning,

When the bell rings at four o'clock,

To avow on your mind to get up immediately,

Rather than just laying there thinking about getting up.

Train the body to move like that,

It's skillful.

It's conditioning,

But otherwise the mental conditions,

We become just passive,

Putting off things,

Procrastinating,

Laying in bed because we don't feel like getting up.

Because getting up takes effort,

Doesn't it?

When you wake up,

You don't have a lot of energy,

A lot of effort going.

It's easier just to lay passively in a warm bed than to put forth the effort in getting up.

And in our practice now,

You need to put forth that kind of effort of getting up,

Of doing something,

Rather than just passively slipping into that,

What's easiest,

What's most comfortable.

So during this retreat,

Avow on your mind to,

Even before the bell rings,

If you can set your mind to get up five minutes before the bell rings at four o'clock in the morning.

Good training.

Or get up at three o'clock in the morning.

If you can get up at three o'clock in the morning,

Rather than just being one who waits for everything to just happen and then you just follow it.

If you can train yourself to move around the schedule rather than just,

We can help kind of a conditioned creature of the schedule,

Use the schedule as a skillful means,

A kind of reflection and a guide rather than just being a slave to it.

It's easier to sleep or stay in bed five minutes after the bell,

More than to put forth the effort of arising five minutes before the bell,

Isn't it?

Or do you take what's easiest?

Do you do what is the easiest thing to do?

It's the least amount of effort because effort is,

What?

Not all that pleasant have to exert effort and situation.

Especially when you're feeling passive or comfortable or just waking up.

One habit is to just drift,

Fall,

Indulge into that passive state of the easiest,

Most comfortable thing to do.

But it's somehow now you're training.

It's a training process.

Very important to train like the way to practice.

Otherwise your life,

You get all of you just sink into senility and passivity and fear.

You can see many people that come here whose minds and they get older,

Just are,

There's nothing much they can do because they have not developed,

Practiced while they're young.

So they just sink into depression and fear and wrong views because that's the easiest thing to do.

It takes effort not to be caught in the mood,

Doesn't it?

Caught up in the easiest thing to do,

Just follow every mood that comes into your mind.

That doesn't take any effort,

Does it?

Just whatever you feel like you do that.

Whenever you feel guilty then you do the things you're supposed to do out of guilt and fear,

Not out of real effort.

Or you do things because you think,

I'm going to get on your back if you don't or one of the monks is going to chastise you for not doing it.

Or you'll be looked down on by other people.

Those kind of things motivate us.

But that's the kind of actions we do out of just stupidity,

Isn't it?

When we don't really put the effort,

The clear,

Bright effort into what we're doing.

We just depend on getting things done out of fear,

Habit,

Worrying about what others will think of us or what somebody will criticise if we don't do it.

That's the kind of,

We go through life just passively doing things out of just fear or guilt.

And the result,

Notice the result of people's lives who've lived on that level is not very admirable,

Not very beautiful to see.

And this life is not military camp as I've stated before.

So it's not,

We're not going to go around beating you or saying anything really.

If you want to just follow each mood,

If you're determined to be miserable and not be enlightened,

Then that's your decision in this life.

But the encouragement and the movement is toward,

Realization,

Toward enlightenment.

If you have no interest in that,

Then it's best not to be here.

It's better to go somewhere else.

Because it's a waste of our time,

The communities,

The arms offered.

If you're not serious and sincere in the intention toward realization,

Towards enlightenment,

If that's not your sincere intention,

Then best to leave.

Go someplace where what you want to do is you can do it with people like yourself.

And coming together here in this meditation hall through the morning chanting,

How much effort do you put into the chanting?

It takes effort,

Doesn't it?

Concentrate the mind to do the chanting properly.

One can just do it like one of these parrots and it goes through the motion.

But this also is something to put effort into and make bright in the mind.

Offering for the day,

Reflection for the day,

Candles,

Incense,

Flowers.

Offering from your mind,

Putting force out,

Sending out that which is wise,

Truthful,

Vowing to live in a virtuous way today,

A considerate,

Kindly way.

Then we reflect on the Buddha,

Dhamma,

Sangha.

There are always important reflections for our life.

The Buddha,

The awakened one,

That which is awake,

That which is alert,

That which knows.

Gautama the Buddha,

The sage who established this traditional form that we're using now.

We're using the form,

The Dhamma teaching of a tradition established by Gautama the Buddha in India 2527 years ago.

This is the teaching,

This is the tool that we're using.

Not believing in,

Not we believe in what Gautama the Buddha taught,

But we're using it.

Or how are we using it?

By reflecting on it,

Using it to observe the way things are,

Like right now,

The way it is right now.

This ability to reflect on the way it is right now,

As it's in your consciousness.

So that's taking refuge in Buddha,

In the awakened,

In that which is awake.

Buddha is not a personal possession.

My Buddha is in contrast to yours.

Not one person has more Buddha than the other,

But our refuge is in the Buddha,

In wisdom,

In being awake.

This is what we can all be,

Rather than become.

In our practice now,

The practice of being awake,

Alert to the way things are,

Reflecting on them,

On the Dhamma,

The truth,

The way it is,

How all that arises passes away,

How everything that is born dies.

This is awake.

The whole sense you will experience is,

If you observe it,

You're observing this.

You're saying,

This is not a judgment,

You're not saying,

Arising is,

This is good,

Or this is beautiful,

Or perfect.

This is just the way it is,

Isn't it?

If you observe,

If you're one who really watches and reflects on things,

You see that any mental condition or physical one arises and passes,

Begins and ends.

So you're contemplating Dhamma,

You're reflecting on the way it is,

Rather than the way you believe,

Or the way you wish it were,

Or would like things to be.

Wouldn't it be nice if everybody were good,

And everybody were kind,

And there was no cruelty,

And there was no death,

And there was no sickness?

Wouldn't it be nice if everybody could get along and help each other and love each other?

Wouldn't it be wonderful if we never had to get old and always stay beautiful and attractive?

Wouldn't it be wonderful if there were no wars,

And if all the lions and lambs would be friends?

Wouldn't it be sweet?

Wouldn't it be wonderful if everything were the way I would like it to be,

So I wouldn't have to be frightened or upset by life?

Wouldn't it be wonderful if life could take the form of my fantasies,

Where I could feel safe and secure and protected,

And only good and pretty and nice things would ever happen to me,

And I'd never have to experience any of the pain or misery or sorrow or anguish of existence,

If I could just stay away from that forever?

And all of us here,

All beings,

Live happily forevermore in the state of permanent bliss.

Wouldn't that be lovely?

That's what a lot of people,

They may not say that in so many words,

But that's the way many people really operate in life.

Wouldn't it be nice if everything were nice?

Profound.

We should all love each other.

This is true,

It would be nice if everything was nice.

There's no question of that.

You know,

It would be good if everybody loved each other,

And if there was no war and the lambs and lions could be friends.

I'm not being cynical.

I'm just pointing out,

Kind of,

Assumptions and wishes are that way,

But how are things?

What is the way things really operate in life,

In the sensory world?

What is the nature of the sensory world?

What is it to oneself,

And what do we have to learn from it?

What do we have to learn from the pain of our existence and the sorrow and anguish of it,

As well as from the beauty and the goodness of it?

This is a wise reflection,

Not just wishful thinking and pretty thoughts.

This is the Buddha,

That which is awake,

Observing the way things are observing,

Knowing the Dhamma,

That what arises passes.

That birth conditions death.

Why does somebody have to die?

Why does somebody have to die,

A little child?

Why did Hannah have to die so young?

Why do people have to have cancer?

Why do these terrible things go on?

Because of birth.

All of us are subject to instant,

Immediate pain or sorrow or despair because of having been born.

Everything that we love and feel secure with can be taken away from us immediately.

You recognize that.

It's an ever-present possibility for any one of us that everything we are very attached or depend on could be just snatched away from us in the next moment.

That's a possibility.

That's not being pessimistic or negative,

But recognize that that is very,

That's a possibility for all of us.

So that our lives as human beings,

As sensual beings,

Is a very insecure one.

And its nature is that way,

It's insecure,

It's dukkha,

It's not a safe place to identify,

To seek security with it because its nature is insecure anyway.

So that this way of reflecting is a way of a Buddha,

Observing the way things are,

That what arises,

Passes.

Birth takes you to death.

When you're born into a sensory,

Earthbound body such as this one,

You must learn to endure and experience old age,

Sickness,

Your senses,

Sensory,

Your vision,

Ears and all that.

The deteriorating as you get older,

Body stiffening,

The beauty of youth going away,

And then the ossifying old age,

And then the death from having been born.

It's like it's winter time now.

If there were no spring,

There wouldn't be any winter.

Spring,

Summer,

Autumn,

Winter,

And then spring again with cycle.

Now what we're moving to is deathless,

The realization of deathlessness rather than trying to crop up pleasant conditions for a lifetime,

Pleasant mortal conditions.

We're not here to try to create a beautiful environment to kind of contain us and depend on it for a lifetime.

We're not here to use the conditions around us for this kind of reflection.

We're not here to try to live a happy life as a community in a kind of fool's paradise.

We create a pretty lifestyle where we can laugh and sing and pretend everything is pretty and nice.

But using the conditions around us for reflection,

Observing,

That even on the best times here,

Sunny summer days in the beautiful part of England,

Where people are the kind of people we live with are pretty high quality,

Everything is quite pleasant,

And yet we can still be utterly miserable.

I've seen some of you on some of the most fortunate kind of beautiful days I've ever experienced look absolutely wretched,

Not because of anything wrong,

But because of your doubts or anger or worry,

The things you produce out of your mind towards yourself or others.

Is it something wrong?

Are we doing something?

No.

It's just the misery you create around the existing conditions.

You project that out.

If you reflect rather than just do that,

You begin to see what you're doing,

How we create the misery for ourselves.

Even when life is very pleasant,

Very good to us,

When we're very fortunate,

Not to mention when life can be very unpleasant sometimes.

Sometimes it's cold and damp and unpleasant things happen,

Sicknesses,

Disappointments and all this.

Life can be pretty miserable.

And then we create,

We indulge in,

We become lost in depression because we don't like that.

We want it to be pleasant again.

But even when life is pleasant,

We create misery.

When it's unpleasant,

We create misery.

But we're looking at that which we create around the existing conditions.

To know that,

You have to be really,

Wisely look at the way things are.

Like right now,

At this moment,

When you're sitting here in this shrine room,

What is it?

Is anything really terribly wrong?

It's not terribly pleasant temperature,

Please forgive me,

Not too hot,

Too cold?

There's no kind of wild tigers lurking around,

Waiting to,

There's no kind of communist guerrillas taking shots at us.

There's no immediate threats,

Nothing to really do except be here.

So then you have a way of looking at what is truly miserable,

What might be miserable,

Like if there were,

If it was too cold or you're feeling really ill or sick or this,

And you can recognize that and begin to reflect on that,

On the feelings of being cold or not feeling well or feeling sleepy or dull.

These mornings,

Counts,

Reflections,

It's bringing forth this ability,

Using this ability to observe,

Reflect on the way things are.

The sangha now,

The refuging sangha,

The one who practices,

Who does it,

Supatipanno,

Who is sincere,

A kind of being who is actually practicing and not just talking about it or believing in it,

But actually does it,

Practices the teaching of Buddha,

What I've been describing,

Actually awakening,

Watching,

Being alert to the way things are,

With a miserable moment to really observe it and reflect off it rather than just eradicate it or endow it.

And the Ujjupatipanno is a straight,

One who's direct,

It's not a roundabout teaching,

A very direct kind of teaching.

You develop this to get there and then when you get to this stage then you go on to the next stage and then you have to develop this one first and then that and onward and maybe the next lifetime,

If you're very fortunate,

Or maybe you're so hopeless that the next ten lifetimes you just have to develop,

Patient endure it.

Or maybe some of you I hear are aiming for Brahma realms because you might not make nirvana in this lifetime.

Don't be stupid.

I think I'll just try to get jhanas and go and become born in the Brahma realms because I'm not really,

Don't think I can make it to nirvana.

I think Buddha was teaching that.

You're not a Buddhist really if that's what you're,

If that's your intention for this life.

You don't understand.

Maybe the next lifetime I'll be born in a,

You know,

I'll have more Barami and be born a little better so then I can really practice.

Don't believe that.

That's just ignorance from your own mind when you're creating that kind of vision.

Nirvana is to be realized here and now.

It's not the next lifetime.

If you believe in nirvana you have to wait for the next lifetime and you don't really understand anything the Buddha taught.

Hope was case.

But when you're like the nirvana,

The goal of a Buddhist is a realization of deathlessness now is not even next,

Tomorrow.

Not even the next moment now is an immediate one.

It's uchu padipa no,

Straight,

Direct.

And if you notice the Buddha never really praised anyone for being reborn in the Brahma realms.

Going to the heavenly realms,

Seeking all that.

Put it down as not very clever of anyone to put that as the goal for one's life.

Our goal is nirvana.

Whatever you think of that you can observe but make that your clear intention,

The realization of truth,

Realization of deathlessness now.

Not to believe in it but as you begin to free the mind from its obsessions with mortal conditions and then you realize that.

Know it.

Know the bliss of non-attachment.

Reviews

Thank you.

Sadhu Sadhu Sadhu 🙏

Yes! Right effort is described and the goal of realizing right now what is.

This was so much more than i had anticipated. So much amazing wisdom, I found your voice and words to be extremely compelling. Thank you for sharing these teachings in a way that everyone can understand them.

Thank you for the teaching.

🙏Thank you Ajahn Sumedho for this essential and helpful reminder. 🙏