Adventures Of Sariputta And Mogallana: Why Practice?

In this episode, Sensei Morris talks about one of the fruits of Buddhist practice that Sariputta experienced, then shares a dharma talk at White Sands Buddhist Center that looks at questions like "What good does it do me to meditate?" and "What does it mean to be enlightened?"

Transcript

You are listening to The Adventures of Seraputa and Mogulana.

I'm your host,

Morris Sullivan.

I'm going to talk to you today about why we practice.

I get asked,

What is the point of all this effort anyway?

So we'll discuss that.

But first I'll tell you how some of the fruits of Buddhist practice ripen for Seraputa.

Once when he was staying with the Buddha at a monastery outside a city,

A group of men were talking about him and one of them was impressed with his tolerance.

He has such incredible patience,

He said,

Even when someone abuses him,

He feels no trace of anger.

Well,

There was a Brahmin nearby,

A priest of very high social status.

Because of his adherence to his traditional views,

He was very skeptical of Buddhism,

So he was very skeptical of what these men were saying.

Who is this that never gets angry,

He asked.

They explained that they were talking about one of the Buddha's key disciples.

Well,

I'm sure he can be provoked to anger,

He said.

I bet I could do it.

Well,

They argued for a while until the Brahmin resolved that he would do something to make Seraputa angry in front of these men and embarrass them.

So later,

When Seraputa came into the city for alms,

The Brahmin came up behind him,

Hit him hard on the back.

Seraputa merely shrugged off the blow and with hardly any comment or glance behind him,

He just continued on his way.

But as soon as he touched the great monk,

This Brahmin was overcome by remorse.

He came around in front of Seraputa and dropped to his knees,

Prostrating to him,

Begging his forgiveness.

Forgive you for what?

Seraputa asked.

The Brahmin said,

I struck you to test your patience and tolerance and to defame you.

Seraputa said,

Well then,

Okay,

I pardon you.

The Brahmin asked Seraputa to come to his home for food.

He took his alms bowl from him and led him to his house for a meal.

But the men who witnessed this assault were outraged.

They picked up clubs and stones and went to the Brahmin's house,

Intent on punishing him.

When the venerable Seraputa finished his meal,

He came out,

Followed by the Brahmin.

The men cried out that they were going to give this Brahmin what he deserved for hitting their beloved monk.

Seraputa said,

Wait,

Stand back.

Was it you he struck or me?

One of the men said,

He struck you,

Venerable sir,

And he will pay for that.

Seraputa said,

No.

If it was me he struck,

Then any harm done was done to me.

He has asked my pardon and I have given it.

So go about your business and leave him alone.

When the Buddha heard about this later,

He explained what makes one a Brahmin.

Being worthy of high esteem doesn't come from birth or wealth,

But from the ability to prevent the mind from being hijacked by attachments and hatred.

I got a couple of questions and comments last week during the Q&A and then after the service too,

Some people came up to talk to me.

Questions that had to do with meditation specifically and to some extent more generally Buddhist practice.

They all kind of fell into this category that you might sum up as what are we doing and why are we doing it?

This question,

Why practice,

I think is a valid and useful question.

There are teachers who back away from that question and there are some good reasons for that and I'll talk about them.

It's a mistake,

For example,

To sit down and meditate with an expectation about what should happen,

What your meditation should be like.

First you're just setting yourself up for frustration if you do that.

To sit in meditation with an expectation,

For example,

That some blissful state of mind is going to arise.

You're pretty much guaranteeing that you're not going to have a blissful state of mind because you'll be sitting there wondering,

Is this it yet?

And by expecting it,

You're basically preventing it more or less,

You're creating an obstacle to it.

But maybe not.

If you get that,

Then you can get really good at creating a certain meditation experience perhaps and then you're likely to get hung up there.

There are more refined states that you can move to but you can get stuck.

In fact,

A Thai monk that taught me a lot about meditation a long time ago told me that he spent three years hung up in this one meditative state before he realized that there was actually something beyond that.

And if you are expecting some certain thing to happen,

You're likely to dismiss or overlook what's actually going on.

What we need to be doing is getting intimately acquainted with our own minds,

Not just check out or zone out or whatever.

Sometimes that involves getting to know some stuff that's maybe unpleasant that arises in our mind.

But we tend not to do a thing if we don't anticipate some positive result from it.

And so let's go back to this question,

What are we doing and why are we doing it?

So most of you probably know that Buddha isn't someone's name,

It means awake.

And so when we talk about the Buddha,

We mean the one who is awakened.

And our practice is to follow his guidance so that we also awaken.

And he would tell people sometimes when they asked certain questions that he didn't get into explanations of cosmic stuff and that kind of thing.

He said,

I teach suffering and the end of suffering.

In other words,

At base,

At the foundation,

We examine how are we causing suffering and then what can we do to stop experiencing it.

And then as Buddhism spread and evolved,

Its purpose became more broad,

More all-encompassing.

So now it's not just transcending the cycle of suffering but becoming a Buddha so that we can free all beings.

And that's the highest Buddhist purpose,

To awaken ourselves to our Buddha nature so that all beings can be free from suffering.

But most people who show up for services here for the first time are really not thinking about that.

Some people may be,

But most newcomers probably are hoping that Buddhism can help them with more immediate issues,

Anxiety,

Anger,

Dissatisfaction with life.

Those kinds of things.

And that's fine.

The cool thing about Buddhism is this.

The mental mechanisms that bring you to day-to-day suffering are the same mechanisms that bring you back to stress life after life.

And so the cycle of samsara is the cycle of samsara whether you're looking at eternity or this afternoon.

And so the path of practice is essentially the same thing whether you came here deadset on enlightenment so that several kalpas from now you can be a great being who frees all other beings,

Or whether you came in this morning hoping that you can stop being so anxious all the time.

So I said something last week and just a few minutes ago about realizing your Buddha nature.

And then someone asked me later,

Would you talk about what you meant by that?

And I will,

But I want to tell you a story first.

So there's these things called kowans that are stories that defy sort of logical understanding.

And the first koan that people get if they're in one of the schools of Zen that work with kowans is this one.

A troubled monk asks Joshu,

The master,

Does the dog have Buddha nature?

And Joshu says moo,

Which is not mooing like a cow.

It's basically like,

It's kind of like saying no,

But it's more like not or negative or nothing.

So we say that all beings have Buddha nature,

Meaning we all have the capacity to awaken.

That's at its most fundamental,

That's what that means.

We all have the capacity to awaken.

And so the koan is asking then,

Why did Joshu say moo?

So I actually heard a conversation once between a student and a Zen master,

A modern guy,

One that I like,

But he's pretty non-traditional.

And the student asked him something about Buddha nature.

And he said,

Well,

He didn't say moo exactly.

He said something more contemporary and quite profane,

Which I won't repeat in the Dharma hall.

But it was the same thing.

Don't get hung up on that.

Sit with your stuff and deal with it.

So I kind of think that that's what Joshu was telling this monk.

Don't worry about whether the dog has Buddha nature.

Sit with what's going on with you.

So the usefulness though of the concept of Buddha nature is that this knowledge that the Buddha awakened and you can too.

So now what does that mean?

What does it mean to awaken?

So we could probably fill a library with books analyzing Joshu's question about moo.

Then we could probably fill a couple more libraries with books analyzing what it means to awaken.

So I'm going to talk from personal experience because that's all I know is what I've experienced.

And this is going to require some self-disclosure.

It might not be particularly comfortable.

But without going into any detail,

Through a combination of environmental factors and genetic factors,

By the time I was in my teens I was a mess.

I managed to keep it together in part thanks to people like my mom and in part thanks to my interest in contemplative practices.

I started trying to meditate and do yoga and things like that when I was about 13 years old.

And so there were things that kept me from going completely off the rails,

But by the time I was an adult and starting into the workplace and all of that,

I had severe social anxiety.

I was chronically depressed.

I was physically a wreck.

I was underweight.

I kind of missed that part.

And I had substance issues and that kind of thing.

But I had this interest in Buddhism,

Especially Zen.

And I had mainly tried to figure it out from books up to that point.

But around 1989 I had quit drinking and was battling my mental demons without the assistance of self-medication.

And I started sitting with a Buddhist practice group for the first time.

And things kind of started coming together for me.

I didn't decide to become a Buddhist,

But one day I realized I was one.

And so I made a commitment to the practice,

Even though I really didn't have a monk to go for refuge with.

I made a practice.

This is what I'm doing.

And so the next day all my problems were solved.

Right?

No,

Of course not.

I was still a mess.

But now I had a process.

I had guidelines for working with things.

And it took a while.

It took a long time.

But I'm a very different person now than I was when I was in my 30s,

For example.

So my awakening,

Or perhaps you might say awakenings,

Were not sudden.

There have been occasional epiphanies,

These sort of aha moments that clear things up for you a little bit.

But mostly I'll just suddenly realize that I'm relating to something really differently than I used to.

And so I have patience with things that I didn't have patience with before,

For example.

I can be really disgusted with somebody's actions and still find myself caring very deeply about them.

And not in some abstract,

Well,

This is what Buddhists are supposed to do kind of way,

But really in my heart.

I have times that I get depressed,

I get anxious,

I get angry,

But I'm guided by purpose instead of by feelings.

I have a path,

A refuge,

And an anchor.

So you have to ask yourself,

What is your purpose?

And I don't know.

I can't give you one.

You have to find your own why.

So as to the question,

Why are we doing this?

You have to find your own answer to that question.

And that's probably going to evolve.

You might come here initially hoping that somebody will say something that will help you relax for a little while.

And so you might learn a relaxation technique that you can use in meditation.

And then you find over a period of time,

Concentrating on your breath,

The way Dr.

Chow says to services here that you start to learn about the roots of your stress.

You start to see a little bit about how you're creating stress.

And so now it's more than just a way to relax.

It's more of a comprehensive stress management program.

And then after you're handling your stress a little bit better,

Your mind starts to clear.

And now you have room for things like goodwill and compassion and gladness and feelings of joy that you didn't have before.

And so now you can have this deeper relationship with others and with the reality that you live in.

And so then when you come in,

You'll find out while you're chanting one day,

You're saying raising the voting mind and realizing the enlightened way,

That you're not just repeating some Buddhist jargon that's up on the screen.

You are raising the voting mind.

You are realizing the enlightened way.

So this is an ongoing process.

Every step of the journey is the journey,

As our Abbot says.

Realizing the enlightened way begins the moment that you raise the voting mind,

The moment you say,

I'm going to do this.

And so now what are we doing?

We started out thinking we wanted to learn something that will help us relax.

And now we're raising the voting mind.

We are becoming enlightened.

We're not wanting to become enlightened.

We are becoming enlightened.

So let me see if I can find a more kind of nuts and bolts answer to the question.

What are we doing here?

What should we do during our two hours or so at White Sands on Sunday morning?

And how does that relate to the other 166 hours in my week?

So I'll focus on meditation,

But that's certainly not all we do here on Sunday mornings.

We pray.

We sing songs about happiness.

We listen to Dharma talks.

We spend time in fellowship.

All those things are important.

Besides meditation,

The path includes the intention to live an enlightened life,

To refrain from causing harm,

Sharing community,

Things like that.

But a lot of people come to Buddhism for the meditation.

And training the mind,

Whether you do it,

Whether you're sitting on a cushion watching your breath or in other ways,

Is essential to the practice.

I mean,

That's basically what Buddha's practice is in a nutshell,

Is training the mind.

The Buddha said at one point after he left home and went into homelessness to seek a way out of the cycle of coming and going,

He said,

I realized that some of my thoughts led to suffering and some of them lead to well-being.

And I thought,

What if I were to let go of those that lead to suffering and develop those that lead to freedom and to well-being?

And that's a big part of our process.

The sixth factor of the Noble Eightfold Path is Right Effort,

Which means letting go of the mental activity that leads to stress and suffering and working to prevent its re-arising and developing mental actions that lead to well-being and then working to sustain those.

The seventh factor is Right Mindfulness,

Which means being aware of what the mind is doing from one moment to the next and how we're engaging with what's coming up.

And then the eighth factor is Right Concentration,

Which means keeping your mind resting on an appropriate thing,

Focused in an appropriate way.

So perhaps greed arises or attachments to harmful things or hate,

Confusion,

Those kinds of things.

You practice letting those things go and you avoid nurturing the thoughts associated with them so that they arise less often.

And there's also ways of cultivating goodwill and compassion,

Heartfelt desire to become enlightened for the benefit of others and things like that.

Those are the mental conditions that lead to well-being.

So when we meditate the way we're instructed here during services,

We keep our attention on our breath and that helps develop our concentration.

And then while we're sitting,

All kinds of things come up,

All sorts of things come into our awareness,

Thoughts and feelings and physical sensations and sounds.

All that junk can come floating through your mind.

And the practice is to notice that and either let them go,

Don't hang on to them,

Or let them be,

Don't push them away.

It kind of depends on what it is.

Some things you can easily let go.

Some things are just going to be there,

So you have to let them be there.

In either case,

You don't have to engage with them in a way that creates stress and difficulty.

And when we don't do that,

Then that allows us to have some pleasant mental experiences.

When we stop creating stress,

We make room for things like bliss and joy.

But this also develops our ability to be more selective in our responses to things that come up when we're not meditating,

When we're not sitting on the cushion.

Our mind creates less stress and we become more resilient so that we recover more quickly from difficulties.

So you're really learning to use your attention more skillfully.

Our experience of life,

I should be able to stop here and at least ten of you should be able to finish this sentence.

Our experience of life has relatively little to do with our circumstances and a great deal to do with what we pay attention to,

With how skillfully we use our attention.

And over time,

Practicing that way makes us available to things like a more authentic relationship with life,

More openness to awe and the profound.

So where do you start?

Right here,

Right where you are.

This is a path of practice.

There's at least a few guitar players in here.

If you wanted to learn how to play the guitar,

The first thing you do is you get a guitar.

You don't need to read a bunch of books about the guitar or study music theory or any of that stuff.

You get a guitar and you start trying to make sounds with it.

It helps to work with a teacher,

Practice with a community.

You're less likely to develop bad habits.

You get some guidance on what kind of things will actually help you,

But you start with some basics and you go from there.

And it's the same with spiritual practice.

If you want to practice Buddhism,

Well,

Here you are.

You're doing it.

You showed up and you listened and then you put what you heard into practice.

And over time,

You'll grow and you'll refine that,

But for now,

You're doing exactly what you should be doing.

So thank you for your attention.

Thank you for listening to Episode 15 of the Adventures of Saraputa and Mogulana.

I hope you got some ideas to motivate your practice from the Dharma talk.

Now go save the world.

Reviews

🙏💕

This talk really helped me connect some dots about what I’m looking for, and why.

Thank you for this talk. As someone with no prior knowledge of buddhism I learned a lot from your explanation and will listen to more of your teachings.

🙏🏾 you

Excellent talk. It would be nice to sit with you in person some day