Exploring Potential (Meditative) States For Right Effort

In this Feb 14, 2025, live event I list quite a bit of (meditative) states both "positive", "negative" and otherwise -- along with a broader (perhaps at times experimental) exploration of the right effort to help dig into some more specifics on eradicating and preventing unskillful, unwholesome, unhelpful states while maintaining and creating skillful, wholesome, and helpful states

Transcript

Hey Wholeness,

Welcome.

Josh Dippold here and before we get started with today's event,

I just invite you all to,

If you're in a comfortable position already,

That's great.

If not,

Just spend a moment and let's take the three breath highway.

So this is just being fully present for three breaths,

Every moment of the inhale,

Every moment of the pause,

Every moment of the exhale and the pause.

Being with the breath,

Knowing the breath every moment,

Vividly,

Distinctly,

Penetratively knowing the breath.

Okay,

When you're ready,

Open your eyes.

And today's event I have titled,

And thank you for the hearts,

Today's event I've entitled Exploring Potential Meditative States for Right Effort.

I plan to list quite a bit of meditative states,

Both quote positive,

Quote negative and otherwise,

Along with a broader,

Perhaps at times experimental exploration of right effort to help dig into some more specifics on eradicating and preventing unskillful,

Unwholesome,

Unhelpful states while maintaining and creating skillful,

Wholesome and helpful states.

So that's what this is.

So for those of you who are not familiar with the Buddhist notion of right effort,

On the Eightfold Path for meditation,

There's right effort or whole effort or wise effort and then whatever you want to use for the word right.

Right effort and then right mindfulness,

Right concentration or right samadhi.

And we hear a lot about mindfulness these days and even starting to get more about samadhi and jhana and things like this and concentration.

But effort,

You know.

So I want to do a disclaimer here before we start.

So this is going to be,

Oh and by the way,

I've got my notes here.

So I made these on retreat when I was offline and had a lot of time.

So I get to use my notes today.

So please don't let that distract you visually from what I'm about to say.

Also,

This is going to be really information dense.

So those of you who don't like that,

Sorry about this one,

Do more maybe heart-based stuff later.

So even though this is going to be really a blast probably of information,

You can come back to it on the recording anytime and slow it down and revisit it if it's just too much.

So that's the nice thing about recording.

So this is going to be an experiment,

Experimented exploration to maybe push what's accepted and known of this.

So please use discernment as ever with anything.

And some of these may or may not be skillful depending on the situation and ideally emerge from or with wisdom.

So hopefully you'll both use wisdom to have these things emerge,

These qualities,

And hopefully some of these qualities will aid in wisdom emerging too.

So then please use your own wisdom for discernment around these as well.

So before I get into listing a bunch of stuff and the classic images for,

Well even before I get into the classic images for what is Right Effort,

I always wondered,

Not always,

But you know,

Why is the Buddha kind of not giving specifics on this,

You know,

From what I understand.

Right Effort,

It's great though,

This is probably all we need.

And I won't speculate,

But I will,

You know,

Like I said in the description,

We want to eradicate akusala is the Pali word.

So that's like unwholesome,

Unskillful,

Unhelpful states.

So eradicate those.

That's really,

I mean,

That's my interpretation of that.

But that's pretty strong language.

Get rid of them,

You know.

How do we cut those out?

And I'm not talking about being adverse to things and not being adverse.

I'm saying,

Okay this is not helpful,

Get rid of it.

How do I,

How do I,

It's here,

What do I do with it?

How do I,

How do I not have it here?

Because it's not,

It's not helping anything,

It's not helping me,

Not helping anyone else,

Especially in the long term.

And then preventing unhelpful,

Unskillful,

Unwholesome states from re-arising or being there to begin with.

And then we've got the positive side.

So we've got the ones that are ready here,

The helpful states,

The skillful states.

How do we maintain those and then develop those?

And then also,

How do we generate new helpful,

Skillful states?

And while this is in a context,

A meditative context,

I think this applies to our everyday life as well,

Of course.

So,

But that doesn't give us specifics on what those are or how to go about them.

And I would love to speculate on why the,

Why it's kind of vague like that.

But I'll spare you my speculations on that because I don't know if it's helpful now.

So the two similes that are given that I find really beautiful and helpful,

And instead of giving a long detailed verbal explanation,

This image of a quail,

Okay.

So if you,

A quail is a bird that would probably fit in your hand,

Depending on the size and where you are in the world.

And if you hold it too tight,

You will crush and kill it.

But if you hold it too loose,

It will fly away.

So in the same way,

Effort in meditation,

If we're too tight,

It will crush and not be helpful.

If it's too loose,

Then the attention and meditation can go anywhere.

That's probably not all that helpful.

So the other one is the famous lute,

Which is a stringed instrument where you can just say,

I don't even know if it's a lute,

Whatever.

But it works for most stringed instruments I can imagine.

So if you tune it too tight,

We all know how that sounds.

If you tune it too loose,

It sounds the opposite.

But when you tune it just right,

Well then you can play music on it.

So these are the common things.

Okay,

Now determination.

So this is a thing I think that comes into effort too.

Like having a healthy,

Useful determination can be very helpful,

I think.

And sticking to that determination and not just straying from it.

So it's important though to set the right determination.

It can be as simple and straightforward and pretty much acknowledged is the breath.

If you're doing breath meditation,

You stay with the breath.

You're with the breath.

You know the breath.

You penetrate into the breath.

You know the breath distinctively.

So this is fairly straightforward,

Clear determination that goes right along with the meditation.

So other people can have other determinations,

Like may I realize full awakening and be free.

You know,

That's a very beautiful,

High-minded determination.

And there's different strategies for sticking with that.

Just make sure your determination is for your own benefit and ideally for others benefit too.

Everyone's,

And especially in the long term,

That would be a suggestion.

Okay,

Now on to the unhelpful,

Unpleasant states.

Actually,

There's a category.

Okay,

There's four different ways of being helpful and pleasant and unhelpful.

So we want to get states that are helpful and pleasant.

Everybody will agree with that.

Everybody wants a helpful state as long as it's pleasant.

So there's no contention on that.

But the other beneficial one is something that's unpleasant,

Yet it's helpful.

Now these are the ones that we normally wouldn't prefer.

But because they're helpful,

It makes sense to be okay with the unpleasantness and not try to do something unhelpful to get away from the unpleasantness,

Right?

And then,

Of course,

We don't want the unhelpful,

Pleasant states either,

Even though they might be pleasant.

They're not helpful,

So this isn't going to benefit us or anyone else really in the long term.

And then,

Of course,

The bottom of the barrel that we can agree to,

That we don't want unhelpful,

Unpleasant.

All right,

And I guess says,

Hello Josh and friends.

Hello Iga,

If I'm saying that right.

All right,

So now what I'm calling negative here,

These are states that may or may not be helpful depending on the situation.

They're just,

I put air quotes here for negative because that's normally how we perceive these.

But maybe some of these could actually be more positive depending on,

You know,

What kind of situation we're in.

So okay,

But maybe not,

Especially with these first ones.

The five hindrances,

You know,

The taints and the cankers,

Greed,

Ill will,

And ignorance.

These are the hugest ones to eradicate by far,

And I think all that's wrong and not helpful with existence,

Society,

Myself,

Others,

Whatever,

You know.

But how do we go about eradicating these in the most helpful,

Optimal ways?

So greed,

You know,

Can be countered with generosity,

You know.

That is the classic antidote to greed.

Ill will,

Actually wishing harm upon another or having that thought or inclination arise and then actually seeing it and instead of disapproving of it,

Approving of it and saying it's okay,

It's okay for me to hate this person or want to wish them harm.

That's ill will and that is a poison and it's an unwholesome root and it needs to be eradicated.

So one way it can be eradicated is actually use the same energy to turn it back on itself.

So slaying ill will,

It's said to slay ill will.

So instead of kind of suppress that energy,

Can turn it back to cancel it out.

But the more common classic one against to remedy ill will,

Hatred,

And even lots of forms of anger,

I'd say,

Is loving kindness,

You know.

And we'll see how things come up in loving kindness that are actually the opposite,

But they're just seen,

They're there to come up to be seen and known and purified,

If I may use that word,

You know.

Loving kindness,

Well-wishing,

Unstoppable friendliness,

Just the absence or we can just say the absence of ill will,

Non ill will.

And then of course,

Delusion and ignorance,

Delusion not in the psychological diagnosis of delusion,

But in just ignorant,

Not knowing what we don't know,

Having the wrong view,

These type of things.

And of course,

Wisdom counteracts and is the classic remedy to ignorance and delusion.

So there's three conceits,

You know.

There's this I'm better than you,

I'm not as good as you,

That's superior conceit and inferior conceit.

We don't normally think of inferior conceit as conceit,

But me wallowing and think I'm not as good as this person or another,

That's that's conceit too.

And then there's comparison conceit or just thinking I'm just as good as that guy,

I'm just as good as that gal,

You know.

They're no,

Yeah,

I'm just as good as they are,

But we're all,

We all have our unique things to bring to the table and we know that comparison with certain things in a certain way,

Especially when we're comparing ourselves to others,

It's probably not the best use of our just,

You know,

Pattern recognition and discernment skills,

I would say.

That's a whole nother talk on itself.

I talked a little bit about conceit before.

And then we have these defilements,

Craving and sensuality and craving for sense pleasures,

You know.

I mean,

We're all going to experience sense pleasures,

Really,

Whether we want to or not.

I mean,

That's just part of being human.

But to go out of my way to just,

That's all I do with my whole life,

Is just where am I going to get the next beautiful sight,

Delicious taste,

Smell,

And I just want that all the time.

And,

You know,

In and of itself,

I think it's not all that harmful.

But,

You know,

How,

What is the best use of our time?

Is it just chasing sense pleasures and constantly craving those and wanting that and thinking,

And the really bad part is thinking that's going to lead to some long-lasting satisfaction and happiness.

It's just a quick fix.

You know,

There's some that are more socially acceptable and other ones that aren't so much.

But at the end of the day,

Do we want to,

Where,

Where is the higher happiness here,

Right?

If you could forgo a lower happiness for a higher happiness,

Would you do it?

Okay,

And then becoming,

This is the one that's kind of confusing,

I think.

It's me just thinking about what I want to become in the future,

You know.

I just want to be this.

I want to become this and,

You know,

Turn into this.

And this is not to be confused with aspirations,

Right?

So we,

There can be a healthy aspiration to be a benefit to myself and others,

You know.

And becoming,

I feel,

In a way,

If I'm getting this right,

It has more to do with me and my ego and self gratification and service to self.

A lot of times,

Probably not saying that the best way,

But that's one way to look at it.

And I've already said ignorance.

Okay,

Here comes rapid fire then.

We've got pain,

Sorrow,

Grief,

Lamentation,

Despair,

Desperation,

Deception,

Deceit.

I wonder if duplicity's in there.

Delusion,

I've said.

Dumb or dumbness,

Dumbing down.

Deafness,

Defeat,

Denial.

A lot of D's,

Right?

Dismal,

Dismalness,

Darkness,

Dimness,

Dullness.

That goes along with sloth and torpor of the five hindrances,

Which I'll go back to.

Disrespect,

Big one for guys,

Right?

Disrespect.

Depression,

Prolonged depression,

Right?

Especially if there's a choice,

I think.

Unhelpful,

Shame,

Blame,

And guilt,

The ones that are unhelpful.

Judgmentalism and unhelpful worldly ways.

And you know,

This notion of,

There's a,

This restlessness is,

Is one of the hindrances and sloth and torpor,

Which is fancy words,

Old antiquated words for dullness,

Lethargy,

Laziness.

And then I've already mentioned greed and ill will.

And then the last one is doubt.

So doubt can be a huge hindrance.

And that's a whole nother topic on its own.

And we're not talking about the doubt that can least questioning things in order to lead to wisdom,

But doubt that doesn't have any value,

That it's not legitimate.

These things like this without just writing it off without any investigation,

Right?

Or our faith,

You know,

Faith is also needed to,

To balance wisdom too,

Because there,

There are some things that are so inspiring,

Can be so helpful,

Even though we don't have direct knowledge of something yet,

We can,

We can be inspired and have faith that something better and more wholesome and skillful as possible.

And we can,

We can look out to our friends and teachers to inspire faith or historical figures,

Maybe ancestors,

Whatever we do to inspire faith for skillfulness.

This notion of the I am conceit,

And this is an interesting one,

Because this flies in the face kind of of brahminical teachings.

And I know there's some spiritual teachings with the I am,

But the Buddha was kind of an iconoclast and saying,

The I am is the greatest conceit.

And my take,

Meaning this is just this,

You know,

I am this,

I am that,

You know,

It's almost like a God complex in a way,

You know,

I can see it's,

It's,

It's helpfulness sometimes,

But what about others,

You know,

What about the wellbeing of all,

You know,

And yes,

We could say my heart beats in the heart of all,

You know,

I am everything,

But I'm also nothing.

So one is love,

One is wisdom.

But does it have to involve this huge I am this,

You know,

Why can't it just be,

You know,

The qualities that we,

That the,

That the heart already knows is helpful in the qualities that the heart is working towards and training towards.

Okay,

Now we get to the positive.

And there's some overlaps here,

But I'll just list these.

And here's some questions,

What emotions fit here,

You know,

And also with the negative,

What,

What emotions I would say are negative,

Which emotions are positive,

And,

You know,

When can they be vice versa too.

So we've got these beautiful states like the Brahma Viharas,

Or what's called the four immeasurables of loving kindness,

Compassion,

And these heart qualities of sympathetic joy,

Being happy for other people's happiness,

Rejoicing,

You know,

Altruistic joy,

And vicarious joy,

Being,

You know,

Living through other people's joy.

So it increases our chances of happiness a lot.

And then equanimity,

This even keel balance,

Grand,

Apparently,

Happiness that we know we want the best for,

For those that we want the best for,

And yet we can't live their life for them,

They have to make their own choices.

And we're all responsible for what we think,

Say,

And do,

Right?

Emptiness,

You know,

A lot of people might not think that's a positive quality,

But empty of what I would say,

You know,

What about empty of any kind of ill will,

Empty of all these unhelpful qualities,

Empty of burdens and troubles,

Without denying anything,

Right?

Without pretending something isn't there,

That's there,

That's challenging without bypassing anything.

Emptiness,

And so without extolling the virtues of emptiness,

I'll go on here,

Because we're already almost 20 minutes in letting go in relinquishment,

You know,

Putting it down,

Let that stuff go.

Giving up.

This is can be we think of,

You know,

Letting go sometimes as a loss,

But what about something that's really not serving us?

And another quick story,

Before I continue here,

I think around effort,

It's kind of a newer classic teaching story.

Okay,

I'm going down a street,

I fall into a hole,

I don't know what happened,

I just fell into a hole,

I get up,

I go back.

So then I come back,

I go down the same street,

This time I see the hole in the street,

Yet I still walk into the hole and fall into the hole.

Okay,

Then the third time,

I see the hole,

But this time I'm able to walk around the hole and I don't fall in the hole.

And then the fourth time,

I go down a different street,

You know,

So this can be interpreted plenty of ways.

I mean,

It just,

I'm sure,

Probably like you,

Like when I heard it,

It just resonated on various levels that I really didn't,

You know,

Couldn't pinpoint with language,

But it just,

It made a lot of sense on various levels.

So we have the protective meditations,

Buddhanusati,

This means recollection of the Buddha.

The Buddha had different titles and you can just pick one of those and recollect them.

One of the most famous ones,

Arhat,

You know,

Enlightened and worthy of gifts,

Worthy of offerings,

Which by the way,

Here's a little plug because we're supposed to do this with the Insight Timer live events that you guys are most welcome to donate.

And I appreciate all those who have already,

Even though there's not too many of them anymore.

I still appreciate those things.

Thank you.

Protective meditations.

So again,

That's the next one's death.

So,

You know,

Why would death be in a protective meditation?

I'll let you contemplate that.

But I won't go into that now.

I've already given some talks on that and stuff.

And of course,

I already mentioned the four Brahma Viharas.

So then there's five daily reflections too.

And while these seem negative,

Like Debbie Downers on the surface,

These are about being in alignment with the truth of the way things actually are.

So when they do come and we do experience them,

There's not a huge shock anymore.

We're already prepared to deal with them.

We're not trying to deny or push them away.

And these are simply old age,

Sickness,

Death,

Separation.

I'm paraphrasing here that everything we hold dear and love will be separated from us.

That's just the nature of this until we go beyond it,

Right?

At least temporarily.

And then self-responsibility,

You know,

What I do and say and think with intention.

If there's an intentionality behind that,

Those actions in that speech,

Then it's going to have consequences due to causality.

Nothing happens randomly.

Skillful actions tend to have skillful results.

And I'm oversimplifying here,

But unskillful actions tend to have unskillful results,

Especially those are done intentionally.

And then we have these 40 meditation objects that are in the Abhidhamma and actually,

I'm sorry,

Visuddhimagga.

And we've got 10 casinas.

And I don't think I've listed all those.

Oh,

Yeah.

So we have the four elements,

Four colors and light space.

And then there's 10 ways a corpse decomposes.

So this is a foulness meditation.

So this is a classic antidote to lust,

Meditating on foulness,

But be careful because some people can fall into,

You know,

Get really grossed out and disgusted by it where they,

You know,

It's not helpful.

So realize when you,

If you do these various ways of visualizing your own corpse decomposing,

You know,

Then don't get too grossed out by it and where it leads to something that's not helpful,

But it is an antidote to too much lust too.

There's other ways to do a Subha,

It's called foulness meditation.

There's 10 recollections here on the Buddha,

The Dhamma.

So Buddha being fully awakened one,

Dhamma,

The truth of the way things are,

The teachings of the Buddha and the Sangha,

You know,

On various levels,

This can mean the monastic community,

Can mean the lay community,

But it could also mean just our relationships,

You know,

How I'm relating to the world,

All of our relationships,

All the people we associate with in a way,

In a more loose kind of modern way,

I guess.

Then we've got morality,

Ethics,

Generosity,

The qualities of the Devas,

You know,

You think about heavenly beings,

Whether you believe in that stuff or not,

You know,

We still have these notions of what that may be like and there's probably a more formal list of these.

I've already mentioned death,

Mindfulness of the body,

Huge,

Breathing,

Mindfulness of breath,

Anapanasati,

Huge practice,

And peace.

How much do we need peace?

Pretty much always and I think especially in the Americas,

If you're in the Americas right now,

Perhaps,

Probably a lot of other parts of the world too,

Right?

The four immeasurables,

I've already mentioned those,

The Brahma-Viharas,

The four formless Jhanas,

You know,

These are the,

Of boundless space,

Boundless consciousness,

Boundless no-thingness or nothingness,

And then the most subtle,

Neither perception nor non-perception.

And of course,

I don't comment much on the Jhanas because there's a lot of different ideas about that,

What constitutes Jhana and what doesn't.

So just stick to the Jhanic factors,

Getting the Jhanic factors online and temporarily suppressing the hindrances.

That's,

I think,

Pretty much everybody agrees on that.

Then there's the loathsomeness of food,

Which is real interesting,

You know.

So I haven't done this practice so much,

So loathing food,

Which is really interesting.

I hope nobody starves to death doing that one,

But I can see the benefit in some other people who are completely attached and craving food all the time,

Right?

And it's not to,

Anyway,

I can't speak on this because I haven't done this.

Then the four elements,

I think I already mentioned those,

Yeah.

There's ten perceptions for illness,

So this is real interesting.

During the lockdowns,

This was making the rounds and these are,

This is one little sutta that's said to develop these perceptions when one is ill.

And this is impermanence,

You know,

Anicca,

So changeability that nothing stays the same forever.

The other one is not-self,

So this is a not,

That's a whole another huge teaching that I don't want to go into right now.

The unlovely and impurity,

This is a subha that I talked about before,

So actually meditating on the unlovely and the impure things.

So,

And then abandoning,

So what's worthy of being abandoned,

You know,

What's the benefits of abandoning things?

Then developing the perception of danger,

But,

You know,

In a wholesome way,

Not being complete fear all the time,

Right?

Just realizing the helpfulness of knowing danger and what's dangerous.

Dispassion,

You know,

Not being completely inflamed by our passions and having a health,

Helpful,

Wholesome cooling of things.

And that way we won't be led around by the nose,

By whatever whims we have.

And people are definitely subject to control,

I think,

With their,

With their passions and it can lead them into ruin as well.

And I'm not talking about,

You know,

Don't be enthusiastic about various wholesome things,

But remember these are in the,

Also in the context of illness.

Cessation,

Ending,

So imagine all the unhelpful things ceasing,

You know,

Suffering,

Stress,

Cease,

That completely ceasing.

So non-delight or disenchantment,

So we don't become enchanted by things that will lead us astray or that will not be for our benefit,

You know.

Disenchantment with the world,

Especially,

So the worldly ways.

Wishlessness,

You know,

This goes along with,

You know,

If you don't have any wishes,

Well,

Then you already have all your wishes fulfilled in a way,

Right?

Like,

And then what we really want,

Again,

And nothing really wrong in and of itself,

I guess,

Because it depends what you want.

But the more we want,

The more that people are trying to take advantage of one,

They will see that and then they'll try to,

They can,

Could potentially try,

If they're not wholesome and ethical,

Use that to manipulate you and control you,

Because then they know what you're after and what you want,

And then they will play to that,

To their advantage,

And then it just turns to more games and things like this.

And the last one of these four,

10 perceptions for illnesses,

Anapanasati,

So mindfulness of breathing.

Then we go into things like momentary,

Momentary concentration,

Access concentration,

And then jhana concentration,

Which I mentioned earlier,

These are stages,

Right?

And then the jhanic factors,

Which you have the Thakavachara,

You know,

Pittisuka and agagata.

So basically,

Applying attention,

Sustaining attention,

And then rapture,

Lots of really pleasant feelings in the body,

Right?

And then sukha is happiness,

And then one pointedness,

Single pointedness,

Which I don't know if that's the right translation for it this time.

So I'll just skip that.

There's various samadhis that are mentioned,

I think,

Especially in the Mahayana.

So there's so many different samadhis mentioned,

But I won't go into that either.

Then there's seven factors of enlightenment.

We've got mindfulness,

Investigation,

Joy,

Tranquility,

I'm sorry,

Then energy is in there too,

Tranquility,

Samadhi,

And equanimity.

You know,

We have the five,

Lots of lists,

Right?

We have five faculties,

Spiritual faculties,

Which can turn into the five powers when fully developed.

We've got mindfulness,

Faith,

Which balances wisdom,

And then we've got energy and samadhi that balance each other too.

And then we have the four roads to spiritual power,

The itipada,

That chanda,

Virya,

Citta,

And vimamsa.

So those are chanda is a skillful,

Wholesome desire.

So it's not like,

Oh,

I want ice cream really bad.

It's that I want to use this built-in notion of wanting something to use it to have a uplifting goal and enthusiasm and desire for something that's helpful and wholesome.

Virya,

Energy,

Just oversimplified,

Citta,

The heart,

Mind,

And then vimamsa is investigation.

These are oversimplifying.

Peter has a question.

Yes,

Peter,

Please,

At any time,

Everybody just,

You guys have free reign in the chat here,

Just go whatever you want.

And I will see if I can answer these or mention them if there's any time left.

And we're wanting to wrap this up at 30 minutes,

But we're not too far behind here.

So,

And then we have some of the,

My favorite here,

This,

These lists of beautiful mind states.

We've got faith,

I mentioned mindfulness,

Moral shame,

And,

Or dread and moral fear.

These are here in itipada.

So,

But these are the helpful ones,

Right?

We're not talking about the shame where I'm ashamed of something for the rest of my life,

And I can't let it go.

I'm constantly in shame,

Or that I'm constantly in fear and I can't get out of it.

This is something that I've,

I've done something.

And now it's a,

It's a helpful,

Wholesome reminder that I feel shame,

But it's due to not that I want to perpetuate the shame.

It's there to prevent that action from happening again.

So,

I don't harm myself and others because I've seen what I've done,

And I've seen how it's harmed myself and others and or others.

And I don't want to do that again.

So,

That,

That moral shame is there as a protector,

Not as something to,

To drag me down,

To,

To hurt me and to hold me back,

But actually to uplift and protect me and others.

So,

This is a helpful reminder that we know from experience,

Right?

That it's there to,

To help us and not,

And not hinder us.

It will help support wholesome,

Helpful actions.

Same way with fear,

Moral fear,

That if I do this,

Because I know this will cause an outcome that I don't want,

That's not going to be helpful for me and others,

You know?

So,

This is a hearing Otipa,

Moral shame,

Moral fear.

Then we have non-greed,

Non-hatred,

Equanimity,

Tranquility,

Lightness,

And agility.

These are beautiful mind states.

So,

A lightness of mind and agility.

Agility means I can do something really easily and have a skill at it.

Malleability,

This is a classic word that's worked with certain types of metals,

Like gold is very malleable.

And let's see,

Like iron is not,

It takes a great deal of heat and force to,

To,

To manipulate iron,

But gold,

As far as metals go,

It's a lot softer.

It's a lot easier to spread out and bend and,

And,

And work with and use.

And then we have wieldiness,

Which is using,

If you,

If you can wield a sword,

That means you can use it quite well,

Right?

And then,

Or you can,

It's quite easy to move around.

Proficiency,

Of course,

Doing something very well on a high level.

And then straightforwardness,

You know,

In some cultures,

This is a little bit more not at the cultural forefront,

While other cultures,

They value straightforwardness,

You know?

So it,

It depends.

But for me,

I think overall,

Straight,

Being straightforward,

Instead of beating around the bush and hemming and hawing and saying one thing when I mean another and trying to go around and around things,

Just easier to be,

But it has to be done the right way,

The right time,

You know,

And for the right reasons.

And then wisdom,

Of course,

Wisdom,

Yeah,

Can't say enough about that.

So those are the ones of positive and negative.

And so I just have a few nuanced,

Subtle,

And maybe theoretical,

Experimental ones that,

Until this can be seen and known for oneself.

So don't hold me to this.

I'm just throwing some stuff out here,

Because I don't see and know this for myself.

These are higher level things I just wanted to mention that are mentioned in the Vasudhi Magga.

And this is the death moment consciousness,

Followed by the rebirth,

Rebirth-linking consciousness.

And so these are things that can be discerned in certain types of vipassana practice,

From one's,

It's said,

And I've met practitioners who say they've done this,

And they've discerned this in past lives,

Right?

And maybe they can even discern that in this very life.

And then some that say that they can even see into potential future lives and those moments there too.

So,

And maybe even see this in others,

Which is so super profound and rare these days,

If that is the case.

And there's no need for me to believe it or disbelieve it.

It's just very inspiring to know that there are people in this very life that are practicing very deeply and sincerely and cataloging these things and knowing techniques to go about this and the stages to get to these type of things,

If I'm getting that right.

Of course,

Then there's bhavanga,

Which is known as a resting consciousness where there's,

And I don't even know how to explain this,

So I won't.

So,

But the Pali word is bhavanga,

And I think one of the translations is a resting consciousness,

Which is really,

I don't know,

I don't know what to say about it.

And then there's this notion that some meditation teachers talk about just holding an object in awareness.

So,

If I just,

You know,

I want to meditate on my mouse cursor.

So,

I would just bring that up.

I would visualize it,

Mouse cursor,

Maybe even use the word and just have that in my awareness and see if what the experience is like holding it.

I mean,

This is a ridiculous example.

It's not helpful,

But you know.

So,

One would be investigating deeply and profound things like perception itself,

You know,

Investigating the dharmic factor of perception,

Not what we're perceiving,

You know,

Not that perception is happening,

But what is actually,

What is perception and how does it work?

Just holding that in awareness and seeing what material comes up.

But again,

I don't know if I can advise this too much,

Because if you want to practice systematically,

This is probably,

Unless you're at that point on a certain systematic level,

Then,

You know,

Maybe it's not helpful.

But for those who really want to see the power of investigation,

The power of the mind and seeing what's possible in a safe and wholesome way,

Then,

You know,

Maybe that might be something to experiment with.

You can,

You know,

Hold a memory in awareness.

You can hold any of the qualities that I mentioned in awareness and see what the experience is as well.

Now,

Whether I recommend you do that or not,

I don't know,

But it's,

It's possible.

So,

All right,

Guys,

This,

I had a lot more than I thought I was going to say here,

But it's been lovely and I appreciate all you being here.

And thanks so much.

And well,

If there's anything left or any questions,

I don't know if Peter's still here with the question,

But give a few more moments.

If anybody else has anything,

Then now's the time to do it.

Yes,

Absolutely.

Leslie says perception is experience,

Not belief.

Yeah,

The kind of perception I'm talking about is,

Is an identification,

Right?

I see a screen.

It's a label.

It's a,

It's a recognition.

I recognize this as a screen.

I've seen it before.

I,

It's been labeled a screen,

But actuality and down it,

I want a deeper level.

It's actually just color,

Various colors and light and form,

Right?

It's just been given the label,

A screen.

And then once I've labeled a screen,

Then I think I,

Oh,

I know what that is,

A computer screen,

Right?

But if we really were to investigate it deeper and deeper and deeper,

It goes,

I mean,

Some practitioners would say you can get down to discerning the ultimate materiality of it,

Which are these indivisible particles called collapses that have their own characteristics that are flashing in and out of existence so fast.

But I don't know that from experience because I'm not there.

But what I can see is that there are like an LCD,

The resolution,

If I zoom way in,

Used to be able to see the little pixels in the screen.

Now the higher resolution,

You know,

Um,

How shiny it is,

How dirty it is,

Um,

What kind of brightness there is,

What the color spectrum,

So on and on and on and on.

I can go deep and we don't really need to go into all that.

Uh,

Just knowing that once we identify something and label it,

Yes,

We need that too.

It's helpful because if I had to investigate it in depth,

Every time I saw it,

I would never get anything done.

You know,

It would be weird.

And I would be ostracized from society and wouldn't be able to interact with anybody.

So perceptions can be very helpful in that sense.

Um,

But yeah,

This recognition,

Leslie says,

Faith is a belief system rather than a true experience without labels.

Okay.

This is really important too.

Um,

So the faith I'm talking about is not a belief,

Right?

So beliefs are very,

Uh,

This is where we often get confused with faith and belief belief.

I don't find really,

Really that helpful at all.

You know,

There's really not much reason for me to believe or disbelieve anything.

It's,

It's kind of unnecessary.

It takes a lot of emotional investment that when something flies in the face of it and truth comes along,

Well,

Then that belief can either,

I have to put more energy into maintaining that belief or gets completely shattered.

And I kind of break down and get devastated.

And you know,

It,

Um,

The truth just destroyed the world I used to live in.

And so instead of belief,

I use information,

Take everything as information.

I don't have to believe it or disbelieve it.

It's easy to let go of easy to add new things.

Now,

Faith,

What I'm talking about with faith is more,

Um,

You know,

There,

I can see something,

But I don't know it for myself yet,

But I can already tell that somehow this is going to benefit.

I know people in my life that have benefited from it.

And I look at these people and I'm inspired and I want to be like them.

I want to,

I want to,

I want to work towards the qualities they have,

Even though I don't have it now,

I want to be able to eventually verify that for myself.

So then we can get into verified faith.

It's not blind faith.

I'm not talking about blind faith here,

Talking about like a inspired faith that we can see where we want to be or see others and see how helpful that is in a,

In a,

In,

In,

Like associate with them,

You know,

Associate with the wise,

Have faith that the wise,

Um,

Are,

Are being helpful,

That they can help us,

That they,

They know something of benefit and that it's,

It's a worthwhile thing,

Even though I'm not able to be like that now.

But there is a potential just like them to then go and verify what,

Maybe what they know,

What they experienced,

What they realize,

What they bring to the world.

I don't have right now.

And I'm,

I'm far from that,

But,

But according to them that I can do these things and then I can have these qualities too and be like this.

So then we can actually verify that faith.

So that's what I mean more by faith,

You know,

Very important distinction.

Cause we get these things mixed.

Uh,

I mean,

Uh,

We can not conflate,

You know,

But this is what I mean by faith and belief.

Yeah.

It is simple and pure without definition.

Very good point to hear.

Um,

Yeah,

Because,

Uh,

It's,

It's,

It's the balancing to wisdom.

So I was getting too much on the wisdom side here.

Um,

It is pure and simple,

You know,

I just heard the story about someone,

Uh,

A venerable that was foremost in faith.

He would just stare at the Buddha.

That's,

That's what he was known for every jingle chance he got,

He would just stare at the Buddha.

And I won't go into the whole story of what the Buddha did to,

To,

To,

And how that played out.

But,

You know,

That's,

Uh,

Uh,

Which kind of needs to be added onto that story to make it,

To,

To make it make sense and do the full teaching,

But I,

I won't give that now.

All right.

Well,

I appreciate those comments,

Leslie,

And thank you all for joining and wrap this up now.

So you all be well,

And may you balance your,

All your quote unquote,

Negative and positive qualities and,

Uh,

Gain wisdom and faith and,

And all the optimal,

Um,

States for the wisest right effort that you can muster,

You know,

For yourself and for all beings everywhere.

May all beings everywhere realize awakening and be free.

Bye.