Dependent Co-Arising: Conclusion

So we’re concluding the investigation on conditionality and dependent co-arising. The teaching on the human pattern of how suffering unfolds. The tendency in our minds to be caught in a particular loop or cycle reinforces struggle. So our explorations will focus on how we can through a different perspective on our experience shift these deeply conditioned patterns. So dependent co-arising is a teaching about 12 different conditions that reinforce each other and cycle around each other.

Transcript

So,

We're concluding the investigation on conditionality,

On dependent co-arising.

The teaching is on the human pattern of how suffering unfolds.

The tendency of our mind to be caught in a particular loop or a particular cycle that reinforces struggle.

So we'll review briefly these processes,

But the piece that I want to focus on is on how a shift in conditions can radically alter the unfolding in our lives.

So that this habitual cycle of suffering,

Which looks like wanting to get what we want and wanting to get rid of what we don't want,

There is a way out of that.

But there with an absence of any understanding,

There is not a way out.

So we're really looking at and understanding those patterns.

So our exploration this morning will focus on how we can cut through different perspectives on our experience and shifting these deeply conditioned patterns.

So dependent co-arising is a teaching about 12 different conditions that reinforce each other and cycle around each other.

It's often depicted in Buddhist art as a circle.

The art is actually of this,

The circle of Samsara continuation.

And in the past couple of weeks,

I've talked about nine of them,

I think nine of them.

So I'm going to pick up where we left off a bit.

But I want to talk about the simple body and mind that we have,

Keeping it really simple.

So we all have a body.

And we all have a mind.

And in our body and mind,

We have these six sense spaces.

We have ears,

Eyes,

Nose,

Tongue,

Body and mind.

So you could see these six senses as a receiver.

The eyes receive sight,

The ears receive sound,

The nose receives smell,

The tongue receives taste,

The body sensation,

And the mind,

The mind receives thoughts and emotions.

So the mind is understood to be the sixth sense in Buddhist psychology.

So these six receivers receive our experience.

So all this is pretty human at this point.

So with every sense contact,

Again,

And this is in the Buddhist psychology,

For every sense contact,

They all have a flavor to them.

So every sense will either be pleasant,

Unpleasant or neutral.

So this is called feeling tones in the Pali,

It's known as Vedana.

And again,

This is just what it is to be human.

So in one teaching,

The Buddha talked about how someone who hasn't been exposed to these teachings,

An ordinary human being,

When they experience the impact of pleasant,

Unpleasant or neutral,

What happens is there's a reaction to it.

And it's mentioned that with the unpleasant experience,

The reaction is often sort of why me?

You know,

Kind of a despairing response.

And he says that someone who has done this work,

Has followed these teachings,

When they experience unpleasant,

They experience an unpleasant experience.

This is unpleasant.

There's nothing added,

It doesn't lead to reactivity.

So for ordinary human beings,

Unpleasant tends to lead to the next link in this chain of dependent co-arising,

Which is craving.

I want more pleasant.

I want to get rid of the unpleasant.

And we don't really notice the neutral so much.

We're just not in touch with it.

So this is the craving grasping link we talked about last time.

The habitual response is craving.

We want something so we're reaching out and grasping is taking hold of it and picking it up.

And we may feel like we have some control once we pick it up.

Like,

Okay,

I got this thing that I wanted that's going to bring me happiness.

I have some control now,

Which leads to this next link in the chain and it's called becoming.

And becoming is the beginning of a sense of agency,

Of controlling our world.

The intentions and the actions of becoming is sort of like,

I'm going to do this thing and I'm going to go and I'm going to have this thing.

And it actually feels good.

It's the identity that feels like it has control.

It's in charge.

And what happens when we become is that there's this sort of full birth of an identity.

So now I'm this.

It can really be encapsulated in the phrase,

I am.

I'm the one.

I'm in charge.

Or it could be something like,

I'm a failure.

We can take birth in that as well.

But as soon as we take birth into this identity,

At some point,

Because of the law of impermanence,

It will change.

And something will prove to us that we are not this identity.

And then suffering follows like the wheels of the cart.

And sometimes that identity,

Let's say that it's an identity that I'm a failure.

It feels pretty good when that identity disappears.

But then we cling to,

We reach out.

There's craving that I'm successful.

And so then we reach out and we grab a hold of,

No,

I'm a success.

But that keeps the wheel of the samsara turning.

Any kind of clinging to this identity of I am eventually is going to set us up for disappointment and suffering.

So this is the pattern of dependent co-arising.

And we all share this pattern.

So when we meet suffering,

We tend to respond with our habitual ways of wanting to push it away and replace it with something more pleasant.

So the ignorance,

This is at the head of this wheel.

So the ignorance that points,

The ignorance in the beginning,

Really what it is pointing to is this process of how suffering works.

How this starts is with ignorance,

The belief that this is the only way to live.

Push away what we don't want,

Pull what we do want,

Belief that if something that is unpleasant is happening,

We need to get rid of it.

And if there's something that's pleasant happening,

We need to hold on to it.

And the belief that this is the only way to live,

This is the fundamental ignorance in the mind.

This is what starts the whole wheel.

So the Buddha encourages us throughout these teachings to bring attention to feeling tones.

These are,

This is a very important doorway in the instructions of mindfulness,

The four foundations of mindfulness,

Which we've been through several times.

There are specific instructions highlighting the feeling tones in the mindfulness practice.

So feeling tones are a place to orientate,

To start to experience.

And the instruction in the foundation of mindfulness says,

When feeling a pleasant feeling,

One understands,

I'm feeling a pleasant feeling.

When feeling an unpleasant feeling,

One understands this is an unpleasant feeling.

That's the instruction.

There's not another instruction to do anything with it.

Just hold it in mindfulness.

It's a powerful practice if you try this out.

Let's say you have a little pain.

Unpleasant,

Not adding anything to it.

Quite extraordinary.

So that's a shift in relationship at the arising of an experience.

So this is the place in the cycle,

In this chain of dependent co-arising,

That rather than just reacting from the habits of the mind,

If we bring mindfulness and curiosity,

What is this human experience right now?

Not how can I have more pleasant,

You know,

How can I have more pleasant experiences,

But simply what is this pleasant,

Unpleasant or neutral?

Just looking at the feeling tones.

When we explore our feeling tones in this way,

With just curiosity,

We can feel the shift of craving happening.

First of all,

It's sort of like there's a reaching out,

Oh,

This is unpleasant and there's this reaching out,

But you can sort of short-circuit it for a moment.

This is just unpleasant and there's no need to change.

There's nothing to do.

I often do this when there's pain in my body.

I invite you to try this.

And at first there's a lot of aversion,

But when I do this practice,

When I drop into the sensations,

It's a little bit unpleasant.

But you know what's more unpleasant is the idea that it's going to get worse.

That's more unpleasant.

The idea that it's a problem.

So we start to see that there's this whole bunch is going on in the mind around just an unpleasant experience in the body.

So attention to feeling can highlight the feeling tone itself and how we react to it.

But it can also show that overlay,

That reactivity,

That process is so powerful of reaching out for it to be different and then seeing the changing conditions of our mind.

So feeling tones are really a weak link in the chain and bringing attention to suffering is also a weak link in the chain,

Like to really see,

This is suffering.

Really whatever we notice,

Whatever we really notice in this cycle,

Wherever you're seeing,

Like whenever you're seeing change in the cycle,

It's a place like whenever we see any of these conditions operating,

It's a place where the mind can let go.

So when we bring mindfulness,

We're bringing a new set of conditions to dependent co-arising and it can radically change the conditions and how they unfold.