Precepts & Anapanasati 4: Deep Listening & Loving Speech

This is the fourth of five talks on the practice of precepts in relation to Anapanasati meditation. The wording of the fourth of the five Universal Precepts is familiar: I undertake to refrain from false speech. This talk shares Thich Nhat Hanh's expanded wording of the precept and examines aspects of right effort as we work to see the effects of language in our lives.

Transcript

The Five Precepts and Anapanasati Meditation Deep Listening and Loving Speech Good evening everyone,

Good to see you.

We've been talking about the practice of precepts in relation to Anapanasati meditation and this is the fourth part of five talks.

Remember the heart of Anapanasati practice is to recognize our own patterns of suffering,

To see them rise and as they do to mindfully practice non-attachment,

Remembering impermanence and to allow these patterns of suffering thought to pass.

And we're helped in this by living in ways which lessen the suffering that we bring to ourselves and to others to begin with.

And that's really what the observance of precepts is about.

Remember the practice of precepts helps us with specific elements of our nature,

Including greed,

Anger,

Ill will,

Our tendencies toward physical or emotional violence,

These things that are hindrances on our spiritual path,

Defilements which cover our true basic nature,

Which obscure the expression of our own Buddha nature.

When we observe precepts,

When we live our lives by that commitment,

It's said that we live the life of the Buddha.

We live life as the Buddha did,

Practicing the Dharma in such a way where our clinging and diversion are understood and their effect minimized,

Where right effort leaves us to actively explore our practice,

Our potential for awakening,

Where the fruit of our meditation is a calm and open mind,

And where we've come to know the benefit of a life lived in the refuges of Buddha,

Dharma and Sangha.

There's an idea in Buddhism that's important to all of this and that's interdependence.

And there's a wonderful metaphor to illustrate this idea called Indra's net.

It's an ancient image and some of you may have heard this before.

Imagine,

If you will,

The kind of fabric that a hammock is made out of,

A backyard hammock,

That kind of thick cording that's woven into squares,

And at the corners of each square the thread comes together into knots.

So if you can imagine that kind of fabric extending endlessly in all directions throughout the cosmos,

And in each of the knots there's a jewel,

And in each of the knots there's a jewel,

And in each jewel is a reflection of each other jewel,

Creating a deep and vital connection between all of the jewels,

A sense of undeniable connection.

This is the idea of interdependence,

All things linked at the most basic levels.

And we can continue this idea into an idea called dependent co-arising,

The idea that things arise only because conditions allow them to arise.

When conditions are supportive,

Things come into being.

And when conditions are no longer supportive,

Things go out of being.

In that context,

We consider the five precepts as we see them in the Recovery Dharma book and other places.

The five universal precepts I undertake to abstain from taking life,

To abstain from taking what is not freely given,

To abstain from sensuous misconduct,

To abstain from false speech,

And to abstain from intoxicants as these tend to cloud the mind.

Precepts,

Remember,

Are a commitment to observe consciously chosen patterns of action.

Now,

As we've considered the first three of the five precepts,

We've been reading wording of the precepts by Thich Nhat Hanh as he developed them for the Order of Interbeing.

The Order of Interbeing was formed by Thich Nhat Hanh in the mid-1960s at a time when the Vietnam War was raging around him.

He felt that the teachings of the Buddha could be used in community to combat the hatred,

The violence,

The divisiveness that was happening in his country.

And the Order has continued to grow since then.

And as the Order of Interbeing has grown,

Thich Nhat Hanh has expanded the wording of the five precepts to extend them more deeply into the situations and the interpretations of our lives.

And in the rewording,

He has in turn retitled each of the precepts.

So the five precepts I undertake to abstain from taking life,

Thich Nhat Hanh has called reverence for life.

I undertake to abstain from taking what is not freely given.

Thich Nhat Hanh calls true happiness.

To abstain from sensuous misconduct,

True love.

To abstain from false speech,

Deep listening and loving speech.

To abstain from intoxicants,

As these tend to cloud the mind,

He calls nourishment and healing.

Last time we talked about the third precept to abstain from sensuous misconduct,

Or as Thich Nhat Hanh calls it,

True love.

And I'd like to just read back through that precept in his words.

Aware of the suffering caused by sexual misconduct,

I am committed to cultivating responsibility and learning ways to protect the safety and integrity of individuals,

Couples,

Families and society.

Knowing that sexual desire is not love,

And that sexual activity motivated by craving can harm myself as well as others,

I am determined not to engage in sexual relations without true love,

And a deep,

Long-term commitment made known to my family and friends.

I will do everything in my power to protect children from sexual abuse,

And to prevent couples and families from being broken by sexual misconduct.

Seeing that body and mind are one,

I am committed to learning appropriate ways to take care of my sexual energy,

And to cultivating loving-kindness,

Compassion,

Joy and inclusiveness,

Which are the four basic elements of true love,

For my greater happiness and the greater happiness of others.

Practicing true love,

We know that we will continue beautifully into the future.

The fourth precept,

Which we generally consider abstaining from false speech,

Thich Nhat Hanh retitles deep listening and loving speech.

Aware of the suffering caused by unmindful speech and the inability to listen to others,

I am committed to cultivating loving speech and compassionate listening in order to relieve suffering,

And to promote reconciliation and peace in myself and among other people,

Ethnic and religious groups and nations.

Knowing that words can create happiness or suffering,

I am committed to speaking truthfully,

Using words that inspire confidence,

Joy and hope.

When anger is manifesting in me,

I am determined not to speak.

I will practice mindful breathing and walking in order to recognize and to look deeply into my anger.

I know that the roots of anger can be found in my wrong perceptions and lack of understanding of the suffering in myself and in the other person.

I will speak and listen in a way that can help myself and the other person to transform suffering and to see the way out of difficult situations.

I am determined not to spread news that I do not know to be certain,

And not to utter words that can cause division or discord.

I will practice right effort to nourish my capacity for understanding,

Love,

Joy and inclusiveness,

And gradually transform the anger,

Violence and fear that lie deep in my consciousness.

The third precept,

To abstain from sensuous misconduct,

True love,

Helps us to practice love and understanding for others and ourselves,

And it really is the basis for the fourth precept,

Practicing loving speech and deep listening.

Thich Nhat Hanh writes,

When we can listen to others with deep compassion,

We can understand their pain and difficulties.

This helps us to feel calm and receptive,

And it becomes easier for us to talk with them using loving speech.

Sometimes when we attempt to listen to another person,

We can't hear them,

Because we haven't yet listened to ourselves.

Our own strong emotions and thoughts are so loud in us,

Crying out for our attention,

That we can't hear the other person.

Therefore,

Before we listen to another,

We need to spend time listening to ourselves.

Using loving gentle speech means letting go of anger,

Fear and suspicion,

In an effort to try to understand and to be understood.

There's a strong link here between Thich Nhat Hanh's thoughts on the fourth precept and our practice of Anapanasati contemplations.

Thich Nhat Hanh says that in order to truly engage in loving speech and deep listening,

We need to first listen to ourselves.

And isn't this really the heart of Anapanasati meditation?

With mindfulness,

We listen to our breath,

To our bodies,

We attune ourselves with our being,

And we settle ourselves into calmness and contentment.

With mindfulness,

We listen to our feelings,

Our reactive patterns,

We observe their impermanent nature and allow them to calm,

So we can begin to see more deeply with clarity and insight.

With mindfulness,

We find the essence of our minds and listen to the suffering that is there.

We observe the impermanent nature of our suffering thoughts and allow each expression of suffering to calm,

To pass.

We learn to find the space in between these expressions and to live there in gladness with deeper concentration and a growing sense of liberation.

The first precept,

Abstaining from taking life,

Having reverence for life,

Isn't just about not killing,

But not causing violence,

Physical,

Emotional,

Or verbal.

So much harm is caused by wrong speech.

Violence can live in our words,

Not just in our physical actions.

Thich Nhat Hanh acknowledges in his writing that using right speech isn't always easy and brings things back to the Eightfold Path,

Specifically to the idea of diligence or right effort.

Loving speech,

He says,

Requires the diligence of noticing when we find that we are watering the seeds of envy,

Anger,

Or despair in ourselves,

And to take steps,

Skillful actions,

To keep our minds and hearts in a state of wholesomeness.

In his book,

Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness,

Bhante Gunaratana notes that there are four specific tasks in the practice of right effort.

First,

To prevent unwholesome mind states that may not have yet arisen.

Second,

To abandon unwholesome mind states that have arisen.

Third,

To arouse wholesome mind states.

And four,

To maintain wholesome mind states that have arisen.

Let's look at these one by one.

First,

To prevent unwholesome mind states that have not yet arisen.

How?

By maintaining unremitting mindfulness,

Gunaratana tells us.

He counsels us to put up with the small,

Uncomfortable things in life without automatically trying to fix them.

When we keep choosing to change things,

He tells us,

Our minds can get fussy and unwholesome states arise more easily.

He also advises us to avoid foolish and unmindful people since we tend to pick up on their behaviors.

Instead,

He tells us,

Associate with people who have qualities that we want to emulate,

Spiritual friends who are upright,

Mindful,

Unrestrained,

And moderate in their behavior.

He also notes that we should not give so much attention to the signs and features of things that might give rise to unwholesome mind states.

The sign of something refers to the hook,

That thing that catches our eye and makes us want to observe more closely,

Giving rise to unwholesome states of mind of clinging or aversion.

The feature of something refers to specific qualities of something that may further stir up the unwholesome mind states that we experience.

Gunaratana speaks of practicing equanimity.

He writes,

If you are able to maintain continuous mindfulness,

Nothing will upset you.

You will not become angry or agitated.

You can stay peaceful and happy.

An unwholesome or negative state of mind cannot arrive at the same time as a moment of mindfulness.

The second quality of right effort,

To abandon unwholesome mind states that have arisen in mind.

You know,

No matter what we do,

No matter how skillful we become at preventing unwholesome mind states,

Some negative states of mind are still going to crop up.

We can't always choose what thoughts will arise.

We can choose,

However,

Which thoughts that we allow to grow.

Positive and wholesome thoughts help the mind and these should be cultivated.

Negative and unwholesome thoughts,

Such as those that we think of as the hindrances,

Are harmful to the mind and they should be opposed immediately with skillful effort and overcome.

There's a sutra in the Middle-Length Discourses of the Buddha called the Removal of Distracting Thoughts.

In this sutra,

One of the things that is mentioned is the idea of a carpenter who,

In dealing with a rotten peg in the construction of a wooden structure,

Will take a new sound peg and with a mallet,

Drive out the old rotten peg and replace it with the new sound peg.

You can hear this sutra in a podcast called Thus Have I Heard or you can find it written somewhere online,

I'm sure.

The third aspect of right effort,

To arouse wholesome mind states.

States that we talk about in Anapanasati meditation all the time.

Feelings of contentment in the moment.

Happiness,

Joy,

Gladdening the mind,

Concentrating the mind.

Overcoming unwholesome states of mind is a necessary step.

But even when your efforts have been successful,

The mind remains vulnerable and we have to use skillful effort to gladden,

To uplift,

And to keep the mind free of unwholesome mind states.

Gunaratana says that when an unwholesome state has been overcome,

The mind goes into a neutral state and we can use this interval of neutrality to cultivate positive states of mind.

In Anapanasati,

This interval of neutrality speaks to me of contemplations of the mind.

When the mind's suffering is seen and understood and allowed to pass,

We find there spaces of calm clarity in between.

Times where we can reside in simple gladness,

Which is in and of itself the progenitor of positive states of mind.

And this last aspect of right mindfulness,

To maintain wholesome mind states.

And this speaks again of diligence.

We have to repeat positive thoughts and actions,

Again and again,

Until our practice becomes perfect.

Practice makes progress,

As a friend of mine once said.

So again,

These four,

To prevent unwholesome mind states that have not yet arisen,

To abandon unwholesome mind states that have arisen,

To arouse wholesome mind states,

And to maintain wholesome mind states.

And we build our ability to do such things through meditation and practice.

So let's go ahead and sit.

Find your meditation posture,

Take a few good deep breaths.

Allow your weight to begin to sink,

Your muscles to relax.

The muscles of your face,

Your jaw,

The root of your tongue.

All relaxed and loose.

I heard these words of the Buddha one time when he was staying in Savatthi.

The senior practitioners in the community were instructing those who were new to the practice.

Some instructing ten,

Some twenty,

Some thirty.

And in this way,

Those new to the practice gradually made great progress.

That night the moon was full.

The Buddha,

The awakened one,

Was sitting in the open air and his disciples were gathered around him.

After looking over the assembly,

He began to speak.

Friends,

Our community is pure and good.

Such a community is rare and any pilgrim who seeks it,

No matter how far she must travel,

Will find it worthy.

Friends,

The full awareness of breathing,

If developed and practiced continuously,

Will be rewarding and bring great advantage.

And what is the way to develop and practice continuously the full awareness of breathing?

It is like this.

The practitioner goes into the forest or to the foot of a tree or to any quiet place,

Sits stably,

Holding his or her body straight,

And practices like this.

Breathing in,

I know that I am breathing in.

Breathing out,

I know that I am breathing out.

Yes,

No.

Reviews

Great talk. Great teachings. Great presentation. Thank you 🙏