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Venerable Ajahn Pasanno -
Practice as Process
One of the things that could be brought up concerns
attainment or progress in practice. It's something which we worry about: we talk
about it, we get caught up in it in various ways. That's the attitude we have to
our progress in practice. Are we progressing? Are we not are we regressing? Are
we getting worse at practice, or . . ? How do we measure our practice?
We spend a lot of time
measuring our practice by comparing ourselves to other people. You know: are
they more progressed than we are? Are we less progressed? We go around and
around with this idea of trying to measure progress or our growth in practice.
It's something which we have to investigate and watch, because we go to extremes
of getting caught up in trying to decide what is progress; and then going to the
other extreme of saying we shouldn't really think about progress, we should just
not bother to consider what progress is.
This is one of the things
I found when I was traveling through the United States, reading an article on
Buddhist practice and finding out that there is less and less emphasis on
enlightenment. People don't want to talk about enlightenment any more, because
it's daunting to people to think in terms of practice and to think in terms of
enlightenment because it seems so far off and remote which means that people are
taking more of a worldly standard of what they think practice should be. I think
a lot of it relates to the extremes we go to in trying to either measure
progress or to avoid the measuring of progress. Hence our confusion as to what
practice is and how to relate to practice; or what we consider growth and
maturity in practice is. So I'd like to just give some reflections on what the
Buddha gave as standards for growth in Dhamma, growth in practice,
maturity in practice.
These are a set of four dhammas
which are not talked about so much. They are called the four dhammas
conducive to growth, to maturity. The first one is coming into contact with a
wise being (sappurisa sasevana) - just the contact with someone who's wise. The
second one is hearing the Dhamma, hearing the teachings sadhamma
savanaa. The third one is skilful reflection, wise consideration yoniso
manasikaara. And the last one is Dhammanupata patipattaa practising Dhamma
in accordance with Dhamma. These are a framework for how to relate to
growth.
One of the things we do is
we tend to measure progress in terms of experience. We have some experience and
we think This is . . .' and then we measure it and say, "This must mean
that I'm progressing somehow". And then we have some other experience and
say, "Well, this must mean I'm falling apart". We don't look at things
in terms of process. We tend to isolate instances, isolate experiences; and then
measure them, gauge them, and experience happiness or suffering because of them.
The Buddha's teaching is more concerned with process. How do we get involved in
the process of maturing? How do we get into the process of growing and
progressing in our practice, rather than holding to some experience or trying to
create some experience, so that we can say "Oh, right, I definitely must be
progressing, I must be growing"?
It's necessary to take an
interest in this process. It's something which is cyclical, it's not a linear
progression. As you notice in the sense of coming to meet a wise being, of
listening to Dhamma, skilful reflection, practising Dhamma in
accordance with Dhamma these are things which revolve around each other
all the time. You're not taking a linear progression and going from point A to
point B. It's a process which is working all the time, on an external level and
on an internal level because the wise being we should meet is also the wise
being who's within us as well.
On an external level, we
need to rely on teachers, on people who set the example, so we need to seek out
a teacher, seek out someone who is a good example. And even if we're living in a
monastery, practising together, to also seek out the teacher, seek out the
people who are setting examples. This is where supporting each other is
important. It doesn't mean if you're sitting at the top of the line you're a
teacher or you're called a wise being. For each of us, it's our duty to try to
set an example for others; and then for us, as we're living together, to try to
support each other in practice. So seeking each other out is necessary seeking
out those who can encourage us, who can give us guidance.
In the same way, with listening to teachings, if it's in the
form of formal discourse, or listening to tapes, reading books whatever way that
we can receive the teachings and reflect and contemplate the teachings is a way
which is conducive to growth. Our practise is nurtured by coming into contact
with teachings which are direct and in accordance with truth sadhamma sevan. Sadhamma is the `good
Dhamma' you're listening to, the good
teachings - the teachings which are in accordance with Truth. Investigating
them, listening to them, hearing them: it's the hearing of Dhamma which
is one of the conditions for the arising of right view. If we've not heard the
teachings, or not come into contact with teachings which are direct or straight,
it's difficult for right view to arise. Unless you're a fully enlightened Buddha
or a self-enlightened Buddha, it's difficult. We need to listen, we need to pay
attention, we have to come into contact with teachings. And if we're not
listening, not paying attention, then, of course, even if teachings are being
given, they're not absorbed, not brought into the heart. So, then, listen to the
teachings.
Skilful reflection is
using the capacity for investigation to recognise clearly the way things
function. How do we use our thought process? This is something that we have: we
definitely have the ability to think. Sometimes the quality of yoniso -
careful consideration, skilful reflection is not exercised as much as it should
be. I remember an article I read (someone wrote a book about it; the title of
the book was based on this article): In a small town, a fire was reported
upstairs in a house. Smoke was coming out of the windows and the fire department
was called. They go to the house, break in, go upstairs and find that the bed is
on fire, smoking away, and there's somebody lying on the bed. So they rescue
this person and put the fire out. And then after the fire is out and the
danger's over, they ask the person who was lying on the bed how the fire
started. And the person said, "I don't know, it was on fire when I lay
down." Which is a distinct lack of yoniso! We laugh at it but, you
know, how many times have we done really stupid things? And the kind of
suffering that we get into, the confusion and the chaos that we create in out
lives, should normally be ringing all sorts of alarm bells! But we disregard
them, and just go ahead and butt our heads up against this wall of suffering. So
with yoniso, careful consideration, we can look at what it is that is
creating suffering. This is our guideline in practice.
The Buddha has quite
brilliantly used it as the bottom line in the teachings. What is it that is
creating suffering? What is the way out of suffering? How is suffering caused?
We need to be able to reflect and consider. There are different ways of
investigating that: investigating the experience of suffering; how it's caused;
where it comes from; what it revolves around. It's also just reflecting on the
nature of our experience which things are pleasurable, which are suffering. What
is the way out of both of them? Because our natural tendency is to go towards
the pleasurable and to try to avoid what is suffering. But maybe that's not the
way out. We need to be able to reflect sometimes, and contemplate the things
which are pleasurable: they may be a fleeting pleasure, but inherently they lead
to more suffering. Some of the things that are suffering are not necessarily
just suffering; there could be something beneficial in them. So we need to be
able to investigate experience as well. Some of the things also which seem
pleasurable are pleasurable and should be cultivated.
Even though the Buddha
uses suffering as a bottom line or a foundation in teaching, it's also skilful
to recognise that the path we follow, the path of practice, is one that leads to
something which is considered happiness, and is pleasurable: the pleasure or
well-being of keeping our precepts well; the pleasure or well-being of
restraint; the pleasure or well-being of kindness and compassion; the pleasure
or well-being of the peaceful mind. These are all things which we need to
cultivate, to develop. We need to understand their use or function and how to
bring them up. But then we also have to recognise the grasping at the
desire-based pleasure which leads to frustration and so to more suffering. In
the same way, suffering is seen in two ways: the suffering which leads to more
suffering and the suffering which leads out of suffering. We can notice when
we're in the suffering of aversion or anger. It's unpleasant in the present
moment and it leads to more suffering.
Whereas with something
like, say, the suffering of having to endure something, the suffering of
training oneself, the suffering of just having to sit still and watch the
breath: there's an element of suffering there, but then it's also something that
leads to a sense of well-being a training, a stabilising, a settling. So to be
able to investigate, to be able to consider things carefully, is important. Our
tendency, as I said, is to always consider things in black and white: "This
is pleasurable, I'll go for it." "This is suffering, I want to get out
of it, to avoid it." Whereas, if we look at things in terms of a process,
there is that which is a cause for something else to arise. We're seeing it in a
different light, relating to it in a different way. So that, through our
consideration, our reflection, this is a supporting of our growth in practice.
We have to consider: what is the way out? What is the way to peace? What is the
way to freedom, to liberation?
Regarding practising Dhamma
in accordance with Dhamma , there is a story in the Christian tradition.
During the time of the building of the great cathedral at Chartres, there was
much excitement at this great monument going up. Of course, it took several
generations for it to be built, and word spread through Europe of this great
cathedral. At one time, an Italian pilgrim came to Chartres to pay respects and
see this cathedral being built. Arriving there in the late afternoon, coming in
and looking around, he sees people packing up and doing this and that, cleaning
up and he sees a man covered in wood shavings. He asks him, "What are you
doing here?" "I'm a carpenter, I'm making doors and windows. I do all
the woodwork here." Then he sees somebody else, all dirty and grubby and
covered in dust. He asks again, "What are you doing here?" "I'm
doing the stonework, carving these stones for the building." And then he
sees somebody else, covered in various colours and glittering with bits of
glass, and he asks him, "What are you doing here?" "Oh, I'm a
glass worker, I'm making these windows." Then he sees a little old lady who
is cleaning up, sweeping up at the end of the day, and he asks her, "What
are you doing here?" She stops and looks up, and looks around her at the
cathedral with its great sense of awe, and says "I'm here helping to build
this great cathedral for the glory of god." That's a different perspective.
That's a sense of seeing what the practice is, seeing what it means when they
say, "practising Dhamma in accordance with Dhamma". You
have to have a vision of what you are going towards, a vision of what you're
practicing for. You have to have a vision of what the purpose is. And that's
what our practice is. The practice that we're doing is what is going in that
direction.
If we don't have a vision of
what we're doing, a clear sense of what it's going towards, and try to lift our
minds up towards that, then we get stuck in our own little dramas of me'
practising the Dhamma and my difficulties and my suffering over it. Or we get
caught up into being nice little Vinaya monks, keeping the rules and taking that
as the path; or getting caught up in trying to get our meditation down. . . All
these things are part of the path. We have to learn how to keep the rules, we
have to learn how to be restrained according to a discipline, a sla. But it also
has to be seen in terms of what it's for what its purpose is, what it's going
towards in the same way as with the building of the cathedral: if they just get
caught up in their little jobs, they miss the point of it and they miss the joy
of the cathedral around them. So in our practice also, we have to have a sense
of what we're practising, what we're doing to have a clear perception of that.
But then, also, what is it going towards? You have to keep lifting the mind
toward that.
Our sila is for lifting
the mind beyond a tendency to just not be restrained; to be established in a
sense of wanting to do the right thing you know, what is in accordance with
truth. And meditation is not just to become proficient in keeping the mind on
the breath. It's being able to develop a mindfulness and a clarity, which is
able to stay with the object of meditation, but then also see what its nature
is. Why is the mind bowing to our own feelings and thoughts and perceptions? Why
do we keep taking it as self? If we don't have a sense of lifting the mind
beyond just the mindfulness or a concentrated state, then we get bogged down and
we don't experience the freedom of the mind, we don't experience the cessation
of suffering, because it hasn't been in the context of its nature. The same with
the teachings the teachings of the Buddha, or the Wisdom teachings: they're not
just to be memorised or copied down in our notebooks and referred back to when
we forget them. They're to be internalised and recognised. What are they for?
They're for cutting off our delusions, for cutting through our attachments. So
we have to keep bringing them in and lifting them up.
One way of seeing our practice
of Dhamma is of going towards a goal: It has to be going towards
something. Another aspect of it is, I think, putting the "little dhammas"
in the "big dhammas". By that I mean getting ourselves orderly. Dhammaanupatipadaa: anu is the little things and it's going towards the
bigger dhammas. So our practice is a progressive practice, it's a
process. We have to learn how to fit it together. And also how to refer back.
Sometimes we have difficulties in practice, sometimes doubts come up. Learn how
to come back to the beginning. Learn how to start over again. Start from the
beginning and do the basics, and then it grows from there, so that our practice
is a constant sort of growing. Our progress then happens on its own. We also
have to nurture it, to look after that process. That's what we have to learn:
how to pay attention in practice and how to develop our practice. Our maturity
comes from that. There's a tendency again to try to create some experience and
then hold that experience - trying to have a clearer experience of "That's
what Dhamma is.", "This is what practice is", or
"This is what peace is." I think this is a great obstacle that we keep
coming up against. We have to learn to pay attention to the process of just
looking after things which support the growth of Dhamma - and then it
grows from there.
This is what Ajahn Chah would
emphasise over and over again in practice. We would come to him and ask him all
sorts of questions. "Give us the method, give us the way". And he
would so often tell us, it's not just squeezing an experience out of the mind.
It's like growing a tree: you don't just put it in the ground and then force it
to come up. You have to prepare the ground, you have to put the seed in the
ground, you have to fertilise the soil, you have to water it, you have to look
after it. . . and then the tree will grow on its own. And the tree will grow
according to its own nature, and it will give fruit according to its nature.
It's not our task to try to designate or try to force the tree to grow faster,
or to give fruit in a particular way that we think it should. Learning how to
look after the mind is similar to learning how to look after the tree.
So I offer this for your reflection.
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