11. Day 5, morning#
This morning we are going to look more at intention and desire. And we are going to have a look at who is doing the meditating. If there is no me, mine, no I, if there is nobody here, then who is doing the meditation practice?
Our meditation experience will be different for everybody, so don’t compare to anybody or with your own expectations. Just settle back in the moment. Be here, noting, knowing, trying not to get caught in your own stories that take us away.
11.1. Intention and desire#
I want you to start to have a look at your little wants or your little desires. Sometimes we have the mind with just wanting something a little, little things we want to do, «would it be ok if I just did this». No! Look at these little wants and little needs we have been catering for all our lives. We become the slaves of little wanting. It becomes habitual in our life. Our mind wants things to be just a little different than how they are. We start to tweak things, to interfere with what is functioning quite nicely but we are not satisfied with. We need to change it a little bit to satisfy our craving, to satisfy our wanting.
So all our lives we have been catering to these little perceived desires, 178 all these things that we think make our life better. A little better for me. Actually these wishes and wants, these desires and cravings are the cause of suffering. It’s those little wishes that give us so much stress and worry. Because when they are not fulfilled, they give us a lot of dukkha. In fact it’s in the definition of dukkha, «not getting what one wants». Any discontent with the way things are. If we are constantly reflecting upon it, we can become a miserable person, complaining about things, criticizing things. Things are not quite the way we want them to be, we want them to be a little bit different because that would be better for me. It’s always a question of what’s better for me. We can make ourselves more comfortable even when we are doing things for others.
So this content needs to be observed, needs to be noted and known and let go of. Try to become aware of any states of discontent in the mind. Have a look at it closely and the trouble that is going on. If we can understand this, if we can change this, we can change our life quite dramatically. If we come to understand the difference of what we want and what we need – necessity, we do need certain stuff, a place to sleep, food every now and then, some clothing – these are needs. Everything else are wants. If you don’t understand your mind wanting stuff, if you can’t see this, than you are going to have to run around after it. You are going to have to fulfill all its wants. Or worse, you are going to have to run around to fulfill other people’s wants! We do a lot of that, don’t we? We run around to fulfill what other people want, what other people expect. It can be tricky. The different groups in our lives want different things. Our parents, our boss, our girlfriend, our lover – each wants something. They are all wanting different things. It causes a lot of stress if we don’t see this wanting mind, this mind which is not quite satisfied. The tweaking mind. It wants to tweak itself. Making itself busy. Business is somehow relegated to a big thing in our societies. It’s kind of good. We want to be busy! Busy doing what? – Creating a sense of self!
Just this little discontent. «Kow Tahm is here to change you. You are not here to change Kow Tahm.» This was a sign of Steve and Rosemary here. People want to change things! Why? – To satisfy themselves. To feed their self, to make sure their self is getting a little pat, «it’s all going to be all right, it’s all going to be good», just trying to feel a little more comfortable. All 179 we are really doing, is running around trying to satisfy this state of me. It’s defilement. It’s corruption of our present moment experience. An imperfection of the mind.
If we constantly spend our lives running around catering to our wishes and wants, being their slaves, being their soldiers, then we run around doing craving’s work. It only leads to dukkha. So why not chill out and relax. Yes, relax a little bit – but no relaxing here, we are on a retreat – but when you leave you can relax a little bit.
Try to let go of some of your wishes and wants. Try to identify them in your mind when they’re swirling. I am sure there’s a few things coming up. Little things and wants. What is that you have been planning in this retreat here? Have a look at those little things. We are constantly catering to them. We are constantly trying to become content but just don’t know the way. We think that if we just get that done then this will be it. «That’s the last room I’m going to extend the house with. Five extensions is enough, there will be no more.» Maybe a garage. We have to stop adding on that stuff. It’s only if we stop getting into craving, we just say no, we can’t fulfill your wishes at the moment. And then we may fall into some contentment.
11.2. Contentment#
Talking about contentment here, being content is right here in the present moment. Contentment is really important in our meditation practice. And it’s really important for our daily live if we want to be sane. We want to be content. We need to understand and be cool with how things are. We develop a state of mind, this is how it is now, this is what is occurring right now. It’s just like this. This is dustness or suchness, tatata in the Pali language. We are just allowing things to be such. We’re just allowing things to be dust. We are letting go of cravings little wants and wishes. We are not going to feed it anymore. We think by feeding it constantly, finally we are going to become content. No! It’s never satisfied. That desire is unsatiable. Contentment only happens when we give up. Trying to change everything when we settle down into the moment, say well, «this is how it is, hurray! It is just like this at the moment». Today is now. Today it’s like this. Then we’re just ourselves and start accepting things. We acknowledge, we observe how it is. We wake up 180 every morning and say, well, this is how it is today. And we have a good day. All we have to do is to extend our moment of contentment out a few moments. Keep extending it into the future. If you’re feeling unhappy, just make yourself content with how things are and than, it makes moment content, makes moment content, makes moment content, whoever you meet, wherever you go. It’s all cool. It’s all good. There’s nothing wrong with people of the world. But sometimes our minds can create problems, our mind just sees things as good or as bad. Things are not inherently good or inherently bad. We make ourselves quite unhappy by not recognizing contentment is right here in now. Contentment is accepting the way things are. Try to notice these little intentions because they take us out of contentment. Contentment is the proximate cause of happiness. Happiness is the proximate cause for concentration. And concentration is the proximate cause for insight, for Vipassana. So we need to be content if we want to get Vipassana. It’s as simple as that. It’s a conditioned process, contentment makes us happy, happiness makes us concentrated in the moment, when we are concentrated and happy, we see things as they really are. If we are discontent and unhappy and moving and switching and dissatisfied you’re never going to concentrate the mind. You’re going to be restless, it’s going to be uncomfortable. So we need to become comfortable every moment of the day that we are meditating. We need to develop contentment with the way things are for our meditation practice to come to fulfillment. We have to understand our inability to stand up to defilements, the craving sense who attacks us. It’s really not that dissimilar to little children wanting more of this, more of that. More, more, we start to learn this from a young age. Observe the children and watch the craving grow in them. It’s quite bizarre if you start to observe that. Watch the little ones to get their sense of ego if they want to get stuff and to become.
If we don’t make an effort to note these little desires and wants, and to let them go, then we are going to remain spiritually immature. If you want to evolve as a spiritual being you will have to become content with the way things are. This is how your karmically conditioned world is operating. You are the heir, you are the owner of your own karma. It’s unfolding, don’t be upset about it. We only think our karma is really bad when we attach to it. If 181 we don’t attach to all that is unfolding, it’s all just fine. Nothing wrong with it at all. Just conditioned processes – mind and matter arising and passing away. It doesn’t belong to anyone. Just going its way. We do make enormous problems for ourselves, if we do become dissatisfied or when we want to change things, constantly changing and tweaking, making ourselves busy, busy with the thought of me, making the world a better place for me to live in. And it doesn’t stop. When you are doing it in your 20’s, in your 30’s, you are doing it in your 60’s. Constantly tweaking, constantly not satisfied, looking for something else to do.
So there is much dukkha in the mind that is discontent, which is unsatisfied. To be aware of this mind state, when it’s coming up – if you are not happy with something, if you are resisting something, if you are pushing against – have a look at that mind state. That is where your work has to be done. That is what you need to realize to become content with. Right there! There is no-one else disturbing your mediation except for craving. Craving is the one that gets in the way.
Let’s have a look at this cause of suffering. If you are experiencing some dukkha, the cause of it is craving. You are not content with the way things are right now. We want things to be different and so there is dukkha. When we can open our heart and open our minds into the present and accept whatever is there, not identifying with it, and allow it to be and let it pass away, than there is no dukkha in that moment. It is just a ceaseless flow of mental and physical phenomena.
11.3. The five faculties#
On the first evening of our mediation retreat, we asked the question what is meditation. We said meditation is the development of five spiritual faculties. They are known as the indrya. Our Vipassana practice can be seen as a process developing certain positive mental factors, certain positive faculties until they are powerful enough to dominate the mind quite continuously. Until they are powerful enough to take control of the present moment away from craving and its mission to be. Then these faculties hand things over to awareness and wisdom so that they can do their job. On an intensive retreat like this, our practice will start to develop these controlling faculties.
182 They are strong endurable faith and confidence, it’s faith and confidence in yourself and the teaching and the practice.
We develop a continuous energy, activating mindfulness, activating awareness in the present.
We develop a penetrative mindfulness or awareness where the mind really sinks into the object, it doesn’t slip off. Mindfulness keeps us in the present being here.
We also develop different stages of concentration. The mind becomes stable. We develop a type of concentration which allows for the fifth faculty to unfold – wisdom. We develop a profound insight or wisdom into the nature of things.
These five faculties are what we are developing on the retreat. In fact, these five faculties are doing the meditation practice. There is no-one doing it, they are meditating themselves. We activate them to get them going, so the mind starts to do its training. As we do the practice, these five faculties become stronger and more powerful. On a longer retreat, one month, two months or three months, these faculties become quite developed and they take over. They take over control of the mind and body process. Our mindfulness becomes continuous with sustained momentum. We don’t slip off of the object, we don’t have to activate our awareness so much, we are right there all the time. We are in the moment, noting, knowing and letting go. That is when the faculties are fully developed, they turn into powers. These powers have the ability to cut through defilement. Not just suppress them, cut them off! Cut off the nasties from arising again.
So these mental states do the meditating. They combine to watch the mind and body. They are the mind and body, but they are watching themselves. The thing is doing it itself. Please don’t inform craving what the faculties are doing. It will get upset. And please don’t tell the faculties that they are meditating themselves out of existence. That’s what it’s doing. The thing will meditate, this mind and body process, and the faculties are developed, it will mediate and meditate and meditate, until it sees clearly how it is coming into existence and then it will remove its cause for coming into existence and it will come to cessation. There is nobody here. It is an impermanent, impersonal process that we have been trapped in, that we believe is our life. 183 Very much like the matrix. That’s what we are living in.
So these five faculties have the power to shut down the mind and body process, to bring it to cessation, to free consciousness from the bondage of mind and matter. And the bondage to the rounds of being and existence, to the bondage of birth, old age, sickness and death. We can free the mind, free consciousness from being addicted to these narrow, small, four elements. And the mind, it goes with it. At the moment it is so strongly identifying with the body, it can hardly do anything else, constantly busy catering to these body’s wishes and wants trying to make it happy, trying to make it secure, trying to give it love and attention, looking at it in the mirror, smiling at itself, liking itself. It thinks about it constantly. It’s what it’s doing. So these five faculties have the ability to turn off the system so it comes to cessation and then the consciousness is free, unlimited. The knowing is not bound by the confines of its former addiction. It stepped out of its addiction to this mind and body process. It stepped out of its addiction to being, its wanting to be something, its craving for existence, for recognition, for power, for fame, for identity, for personality, for grooviness. It does all kinds of things, quite dependent upon what other people think about it. What other people think about the mind and body process can make us quite upset. Some people don’t like us or scold us for some reason. We get upset with them, upset of this mind and body process. We identify with other people’s craving, other people’s defilements. We let that upset us. So other people are in the mess and we get pulled in the mess as well. We have identified with their mess.
So we develop those five faculties. That is what our mediation practice is all about. There is no-one that is meditating, there is no meditator. Medita- tion is occurring. There is no meditator. Seeing is occurring but there is no seer. Hearing is occurring but there is no hearer. These things are going on. If we don’t train the mind, it will just be passive and receptive to whatever is there, and then reactive, passively reacting – if there can be such a thing – passive reaction. Sitting there and let the thing constantly just react: liking, disliking, wanting, not wanting. And we just go through our life like that. You think that is life! We think we have to conform to craving’s desires. Trying to conform how our societies’ craving is. As Krishnamurti says, «it is by no means a sign of good health, to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick 184 society». We don’t have to try and conform to craving’s desires and wishes. That’s not our purpose to become one of the herd, to become one of the sheep. Our purpose is evolution, evolve as spiritual beings. That is the quest of life. That’s our great fortunate circumstance, that we have been given the very fortunate opportunity of rebirth into a human body. A sense-sphere being that experiences dukkha and sukkha, experiences suffering and happiness, is fit and healthy and has come upon the Buddha’s teaching, is one of the lucky ones on the planet. Who has come upon this teaching? There is seven billion people on the planet. How many of them get to actually practice the art of evolution? Consider yourselves as extremely fortunate. To be fit and healthy and to have come upon the Buddha’s teaching. Allow the meditation process to evolve. And so that you can bring yourself out of dukkha.
As we are doing our practice, we are noting our ‚rising, falling, sitting, touching, hearing, smelling, tasting, remembering, planning, thinking angry, dissatisfied, frustrated, lusting’ – all the things that are going on in the mind. As we start to note and know, and let go – as we all have put the conditions in place during the last couple of days – you start to see some results of your efforts. Maybe minor, a few thrills and spills here and there, maybe some understanding is coming to you, the nature of what life is all about. Of course, your insight gets deeper and deeper the more concentrated you become.
We are doing our meditation and have our first good sitting, or something good happens, we become kind of satisfied. «Oh, what he is talking about happened.» «Oh, good», and so we develop the first faculty, sadha or faith. «This teaching works, maybe the Buddha was right, maybe if I follow this technique it will take me somewhere.» So we develop faith and confidence in the method and in ourselves. «I can do it!» What does that do? It makes us want to work more, get the whole, sit again. We put forth more energy. When we put forth more energy the facility of energy starts to develop. We are actively generating our awareness in the present moment. We are bringing our mind back into the present moment after it has been wandering somewhere. It’s the effort and the energy to be present, to bring ourselves back, that we are talking about here. When we have a little 185 bit of success in our practice, it builds our confidence, we put forth more effort, when we are putting forth more effort, then our mindfulness becomes more continuous. Our presence becomes more continuous. We sink into the objects that are being noted. Our mindfulness becomes more confronted, more penetrative. It stays longer. It is able to discern the nature of reality of whatever it is that we are noting. And so the faculty of mindfulness gets developed. It’s the third faculty.
As we do this, our mindfulness is continuous and penetrative, then the fourth faculty comes into being. The mind stabilizes, it will become quiet. It becomes still. – When you are in the back of a car wanting to take a photo, it becomes still fuzzy, not clear. As our concentration develops things become stable. We can take a photo and will see that that is crisp and clear. We are seeing things more clearly as our mind is more stable, becoming more concentrated. So the fourth faculty becomes developed. So when these first four faculties – faith, energy, mindfulness and concentration – when their work has been done, when they’ve been developed, then insight flows. We’ll have a taste of some dhamma. The curtain will open, knowledge will be revealed intuitively, you won’t come and need to ask me what happened, you’ll know it for yourself. You’ll see things as they are, you have a first taste of Vipassana knowledge.
Of course, when an insight arises there is a great deal of excitement and determination for the practitioner. We become enthusiastic. And then our faith faculty deepens again. We get more faith and confidence, that leads to more energy, which leads to a more penetrative mindfulness, a more continuous awareness, which leads to greater stability and concentration, and another insight unfolds. And then we get more faith and confidence…so it starts again. These faculties start to grow. The Buddha says, we need to develop these faculties. We build them until we can see things arising and passing away, until the knowledge of udayabbaya ñāṇa, the knowledge of arising and passing away. When we reach this, the mind will feel very fulfilled, very content with its progress, in its evolution. It sees all things as conditioned and impermanent, unwilling to appropriate and identify with any of the stuff. It’s no longer sticky. Awareness doesn’t get stuck in the objects. They’ve all become coated in teflon. They arise and pass away, they 186 arise and pass away. None of the stories stick. None of them really have any interest. We can’t even be bothered thinking about them. We don’t want to go into any stories of analyzing or identifying, things are just arising and passing away and we are very content in that moment. We start to see things as they really are. Vipassana insight arises.
This picture of Vipassana is given by the Buddha in the old texts: Vipassana can be compared to sharpening a knife. There are a lot of different conditions that we need to put in place to sharpening a knife. First of all the sharpening stone needs to be properly oiled, we need to hold the knife just at the right angle, we have to press with just the right amount of pressure, we have to go in a single direction, and we need to do it continuously, make sure we don’t blur any of the edges. Then we have to flip it over and do the other side of the blade. When we do this, when we develop our faculties in this way, the knife becomes very sharp. It cuts through defilement. It cuts through to wisdom.
We can look at the development of our practice just like sharpening a knife. To be observing all the different parts of the sharpening process. The right oil, angle, pressure, the right direction, all these things need to be monitored while we are watching, while we are noting and knowing in the present moment. We need to observe these faculties as well to make sure they are not getting unbalanced in some way. Learning to balance these faculties is an important part in our development. If we are lucky that we can practice with a meditation master who can do that, that’s good! I was fortunate enough to have a meditation teacher who paid a lot of attention to the balancing of the faculties making sure that the faculties are not becoming unbalanced but a condition for the arising of wisdom – wise attention. The voice of another. When we attend wisely to things, when we see the reasons and causes for things, we can see the reasons and causes for our meditation practice becoming successful, we can make appropriate decisions on how we do our practice.
11.4. Balancing the five faculties#
187 So the five faculties need to be balanced. Mindfulness is in the middle. Awareness is there, watching the show, observing, taking note of things. Energy and concentration need to be balanced with each other. Faith and wisdom need to be balanced with each other. And then all five need to be balanced together. In our practice we need to monitor how our mind is doing. If the faculty of energy becomes too strong, stronger than concentration, then the mind becomes restless. You can’t sit still, not concentrated. In this case we need to sit more than walking. Our walking meditation and sitting meditation can help us balance the faculties.
If we found ourselves not agitated but in a state of dullness, when our meditation is leading to a quiet state of dullness, when nothing is really happening, no further development, but is kind of nice and pleasant, when we’ve slipped into a dullness, then our faculty of concentration is stronger than our faculty of energy. We are not noting enough. The mind is spinning quite well and then it’s going into a kind of calmness. It just becomes dull and calm. So we’ll need to balance that. We’ll need to do more energyfaculty work, more walking meditation, more noting. When we note more continuously, this builds the energy faculty.
So we are trying to balance them. Too much slackness, do some more walking! Too much concentration, when it’s becoming dull, more walking! If we become agitated in our mind, we need to do more sitting. On a short retreat like this, we do just 45 minutes of each. On a longer retreat, we may monitor that. If we find ourself becoming restless, we just walk for half an hour and sit for an hour to develop the faculty of concentration. If we become dull and sleepy, we do an hour of walking meditation and half an hour of sitting trying to make more energy in the mind, more noting. You will notice when you try to note four objects, ’rising, falling, sitting, touching’, the mind is quite busy. Just noting like this for five minutes over and over again, takes a lot of effort, a lot of energy. When we do that our mind becomes very energized and then we can balance it with concentration.
On the other side, we have to balance faith with wisdom. If our faculty of faith and confidence becomes too strong then we may become gullible, we start believing any kind of story that people tell us. Or we may become overdevotional. 188 Or we may become obsessed collecting flowers for the Buddha, spending six hours of the day doing that. Well, devotional activities, nothing wrong with them, I like them very much. We do a little bit, that’s nice and inspiring. We don’t go overboard. We don’t allow our faculty of faith to become so strong that wisdom and reason disappear. We need to balance our intelligence, our reason, our wisdom with faith. If we don’t have enough faith, the mind thinks it knows everything. If it doesn’t have faith, it relies purely on science and on reason, only these things are true and everything else is nonsense. It starts getting into that mode of operation. And this can be a problem as well; if we start to think we know everything already, no further work to be done. We maybe start to admonish others, we start to look down on other people. So we need to develop the faculty of wisdom to be balanced with the faculty of faith. We don’t want too much faith, then we become gullible, and we don’t want too much wisdom or intelligence so that we start to think we are the smartest person in the class.
So these five faculties are to be balanced. Balancing the faculties is an aspect of meditation that needs to be understood clearly. You won’t always be on a retreat-setting like this. You won’t always be able to ask me, what should I do with my sitting, with my walking. You’ll have to take care of yourself. We need to be able to adjust and know. You’ll need to be able to read your own mind. «Oh, now the mind is feeling slack. It’s the time to do a long walking session and then I’ll do a short sit.» Or if we are feeling restless, worried and stressed, then it’s the time to do more sitting; just have a quick walking session before you have a long sitting to calm things down. You need to adjust the faculties yourself with your own practice. This is how we develop the faculties. These are the meditators. So we need to observe and watch that.
11.5. Developing the five faculties#
A few tips for developing the five faculties: The first of them is, pay attention to impermanence. Really have a good look at things arising and passing away. See it in the breath, it arises and passes away. Each breath is just a single momentary unit, coming into existence and passing away, never returning again. That breath is gone – finished! It’s arisen and passed 189 away. Our stages in the walking, they arise and finish, arise and finish, finish, finish. Sounds are finishing, our thoughts and ideas are finishing. Our memory will come and go. A pain in the body will come and go. Sensations, feelings, emotions, thoughts – they are all arising and passing away. Have a look at this, pay attention to this aspect of your experience. Try to see things as being impermanent. Nothing lasts, nothing lasts forever. That’s an understatement! Nothing lasts for a second! It’s all gone, if you are noting and knowing and letting go. If you are not noting and knowing, then you are holding, you are attaching and clinging. Things stay around a little bit longer because they are being used by craving to develop a sense of self. Craving found a nice little bed for itself, a nice little sofa to sit on and starting its job of causing problems. Also observe mind and matter, mental and physical phenomena arising and passing away at the six sense doors. This is where impermanence is seen. We see impermanence in our own mind and body processes. Impermanence externally is also interesting to pay attention to. The leaves falling, the light fading, the sun moving. Those things are impermanent but we are much more interested in looking at our own internal features. This is where dukkha arises, and this is where dukkha ceases. And this idea of impermanence can only be confirmed through our own observations. So your own watching, your own noting and knowing when you see it for yourself. Reading about it, doesn’t really do anything. You can have a nice read about impermanence, but that’s nice, close the book and go to sleep. It doesn’t really change you. When you see it in your own mind, happening in your own body, then you get a good taste of what the dhamma is all about. It’s visible in the here and now.
Secondly, we should have care and respect. This is a good basis for developing the faculties. Care and respect for the practice, for the training. An attitude of great care, we are trying to be meticulous in our practice. Have a look at the qualities of the sangha – those enlightened disciples of the Buddha. The Buddha has practiced straight forwardly, methodically, persistently. This is the qualities of the practice of the enlightened ones. We’ll need to develop this as well. We’ll need to have respect, have reverence for the training. It’s a noble training. It’s a training that has been passed down for 26 centuries. It’s very effective. Such a teaching has had a profound effect 190 on human civilization in the last 2000 years. Now it’s our chance to witness this. You can also reflect on the benefits you are likely to enjoy from doing this practice. Having care means slowing down. Slow down your movements. Your transitioning from the sitting hall, to the walking area, to the dinning hall, to your dorm. When you go to the toilet, slow down, be mindful and keep your awareness inside the body as much as you can. This is a second factor we can use to strengthen our faculties.
A third factor is unbroken continuity. Be continuous in your practice. This develops the faculties very well. Preserving the continuity of our activated awareness. Be in the moment as much as possible. Moment after moment. Don’t allow any breaks in your practice. This really strengthens the practice.
These spiritual faculties produce spiritual warriors, people who are on the path to enlightenment, who have let go the worldly associations. Not giving up all fun in life! But letting go of the nonsense that is not useful for our evolution. We start to recognize what is useful and what is unuseful in our life, what is beneficial and what is unbeneficial, what is suitable and what is unsuitable for walking the path. When we recognize what is suitable and what is unsuitable we can make wise decisions and our practice will develop from there.
So having unbroken continuity throughout the day, apart from the hours we are sleeping, we are paying attention from the moment we hear that bell in the morning, becoming aware of our head on the pillow, our ‘very strong desire’ to leap up and get to the meditation hall as quickly as possible – some of you may have been thinking about sleeping in the meditation hall, maybe – so our continuity should be as strong as possible. That is actually the secret of developing these five faculties. Continuity, the fire stick rubbing! You have to keep it going so the friction remains warm. When the friction remains warm, we never know when the flames and fire are going to jump out. We never know when that spontaneous flame is going to flare up. We never know when an insight is going to arise. We know, that it arises when the mind is continuously aware of the present moment but we don’t know when. So we just have to keep putting it into the moment and trust that all conditions are going to be in place and so then it pops up by itself. An 191 insight, an understanding about the nature of the mind and the body process, that has a transformational effect that allows us to let go of that particular object. We no longer identify with it as me or mine. It’s seen clearly and it’s moved on from. We shouldn’t spend any time reflecting on how to practice when we leave this place. If you find yourself thinking about next week, or next month, make a note of that planning. Bring you back to the present. Be strict with yourself. We have to be quite firm, kind of like when you are training an animal. You need to be kind, but set the rules, set the discipline and then you find that the dog becomes a very well trained friend. Just like the mind will become a very well trained friend as well after we have done our mindfulness training.
And fourthly, the development of patience, perseverance and commitment to our practice strengthens the five faculties, strengthens these meditators. Staying committed to what we are doing and being patient. In fact the Buddha says, patience is the highest training. Practice patience – it’s a practice! It’s not that some people are patient and others are impatient. No, it is something that we practice with. When we find ourselves becoming impatient, find ourselves getting frustrated because we are waiting for something or someone, that’s the time to be patient. When we are being attacked by a mental state or an emotional state, that’s the time to be patient. To ride it through, ride through the storm. The storm is coming, you can’t go outside to escape it, you can only go inside, go inside and become patient and watch the storm blow over without reacting to it. And it’s gone. This is very useful for the development of the faculties. We practice with effort, we don’t entertain any attachments. We don’t take any prisons. Everything is let go of, everything is to be noted and known and let go of. If we find ourselves getting a little close to something, then we got some work to do there. If we started attaching to it, there is work to be done. Things need to be let go of. If we are not prepared to confront our defilements, if we are not prepared to go in the battle, with our fears, with our anxieties, then we have just to keep attaching to them and dukkhering ourselves. But if we can just stand-up once with mindfulness and awareness and look at this emotional state or this fear or this concern, we look it right into the face, watch our problem and note it, know it. We stand up to it, we will see it fade away. In front of wisdom. 192 Wisdom is much tougher than the defilements. The defilements are more tricky. They have been ruling the show for a long time. They’ve had control for many, many years. So they are well exercised and well trained. Wisdom is a little bit weak, still in school, still learning the rules. Sometimes it wins, sometimes it looses. As long as we are developing, that’s fine. As long as we put forth effort, as long as we know what we’re doing, then we’re doing the training, the practice. The Buddha says, it’s a gradual training, a gradual practice and a gradual process. This is not the kind of practice that we do for a week and then put it on the shelf and say it was good. Finished. – Meditation is something that we continue in our lives. It goes much further than sitting on the mat or walking like a zombie in the forest. It goes much further than that, our meditation practice.
So these faculties, when we develop them, when we balance them, get us to deep understanding of nature and life. They are the meditators. So take care of them. They are the ones doing the work for you.