A Taste for the Dhamma In the basic principles of the doctrine, we are taught that, `A delight in the Dhamma surpasses all other delights. The flavor of the Dhamma surpasses all other flavors.' This statement was made by a person who had felt delight in the true Dhamma, who had tasted the flavor of the true Dhamma: namely, our Lord Buddha. For this reason, those who take an interest in listening to his teachings find that no matter what the statement, each word, each phrase goes straight to the heart--except, of course, for people who are simply going through the motions of listening without focusing the mind, letting it drift engrossed in various things in keeping with its original inclinations without gaining anything of any worth. The teachings of the religion have no meaning in a mind of this sort until it turns to the Dhamma, develops an interest of its own accord, and puts the Dhamma into practice. Only then will the flavor of the Dhamma seep deep into the heart, nurturing it and giving rise to conviction step by step. This is because the heart now has a continuing basis for the Dhamma which supports it in ascending stages. In particular, when listening to Dhamma dealing with the practice, if our mind doesn't have any experience with meditation, has never taken an interest in the Dhamma, has never taken an interest in practicing the Dhamma, then not even a single statement will arrest the attention. When listening to a talk on the practice dealing with the stages of the mind, the progress of the mind, setting the mind aright in relationship to the defilements or to the path-- mindfulness and discernment, or persistent effort--we won't understand. When we don't understand, we become frustrated and turn our attention elsewhere. Perhaps we may become drowsy and want to go to sleep or something of the sort. The talk seems long because it acts as a drag on our defilements, preventing them from roaming around as they please. This is because we have to keep control over the mind while we listen to the talk; and the mind, when kept under control in this way, feels hemmed in, imprisoned within limits it finds oppressive. Annoyed and bored, it doesn't want to listen, except for the purpose of creating useless issues for entangling itself. But when we keep listening with interest, meditating even while we listen, the mind becomes focused and follows along with the stream of Dhamma being explained. The mind grows still because the awareness which makes con-tact with the Dhamma maintains that contact continuously, step by step, without break. The heart has no chance to slip away to any other preoccupations which are its enemies while listening, and so it is able to settle down and be still. To be able to settle down in this way is to begin build-ing a base, or to scrub our vessel--the heart--making it clean and fit to receive the Dhamma. The heart will start growing more peaceful and calm, seeing the value of listen-ing to the Dhamma as explained by the Buddha: `Listening to the Dhamma has five rewards.' The fifth reward is the important one: `The mind of the listener becomes radiant and calm.' This one is very important, but it must build on the earlier ones. `The listener hears things he or she has never heard'--this is the basis for the rest. Suppose that we have never listened to anything in the way of the practice or whatever. When we come to listen, we gain an understanding of things we have never heard before. Things which we have heard before, but never understood clearly, we gradually come to understand more and more clearly. We can bring our views more correctly into line. And finally we reach the stage where `the mind of the listener becomes radiant and calm.' When results of this sort appear, a delight in the Dhamma will develop of its own accord. The flavor of the Dhamma will begin to appear while we listen and while the mind is stilling itself to listen. Even though this flavor may not yet surpass all others, it is nevertheless absorbing and arresting, and will remain long in the memory, not easily erased. This is why meditators place great importance on listening to the Dhamma. If you were to call it being attached to one's teacher, I wouldn't disagree. Meditating monks always like to listen to their teachers. If they have a teacher they venerate and revere in the area of meditation, in the area of the mind, then wherever he lives they will keep coming to be with him until there is hardly enough room for them to stay. The Venerable Acariya Mun is an example. Wherever he stayed, students would come continually from near and far to search him out. Even though they couldn't all stay in the same place with him, inasmuch as there wasn't enough room, they would still be willing to stay in nearby areas, two, three, four, or seven to eight kilometers away, so that they might conveniently come to hear his teachings on the uposatha days and `Dhamma meeting' days. On the uposatha days, after listening to the Patimokkha and to his instructions, anyone who had any doubts or questions about the Dhamma could ask him to resolve them. For this reason, the township where he stayed was filled with nothing but meditating monks and novices. When uposatha day came, they would begin gathering together after the morning meal. At 1:00 p.m. they would hear the Patimokkha; and after the Patimokkha, Venerable Acariya Mun would give his talk--that's when he'd usually give his talk, after the Patimokkha. This would be an important part of the practice for those who lived with him. During the Rains Retreat (vassa) we would meet like this every seven days. Outside of the Rains Retreat, the schedule wasn't too fixed, but this is how he would usually schedule things for those of us who stayed directly with him. Each time we would listen to his talks we would gain in insight and understanding--without fail. This is why meditation monks are attached to their teachers. Each time we would listen to him, he himself would be like a magnet drawing the interest of the monks and novices. In all things related to the Dhamma, he would be the major attracting force, inspiring fascination and delight in the Dhamma. There was a delight in seeing him and meeting him each time, and even more so in hearing him speak--talking in general, giving instructions, conversing about ordinary things, joking--because he himself was entirely Dhamma. Everything he would do or say in any way would keep revealing Dhamma and reasonability which could be taken as a lesson, so that those who were interested could gain a lesson each time they heard him. This is why meditating monks find a great deal of enjoyment in the area of the Dhamma by living with a meditation master. They go to be with him of their own accord. When they are far from him, and their minds aren't yet to the stage where they can look after themselves, they are bound to feel lonesome. Or if they come across a prob-lem they can't solve, they are sure to miss him. If they can't work out a solution, they have to run to him for advice so as to save a great deal of the time it would take to figure out a solution on their own--because he has been through every-thing of every sort. If we would take a problem to him, then as soon as we had finished the last sentence, he would immediately have the solution and we would understand right then and there. This is why when living with a master who has realized the truth, there is no delay, no waste of time in dealing with each problem as it arises. This is a great benefit for those who come to study him. They're never disap-pointed. The fact that one who has seen the truth is giving the explanation makes all the difference. A moment ago I began by mentioning a delight in the Dhamma. What I have just been talking about is the same sort of thing: finding pleasure in the Dhamma, continual pleasure, through listening to it constantly. In the same way, when we practice the Dhamma constantly, the results--the flavor and nourishment that come from the practice--increase continually, becoming more and more solid and substantial in the heart. Especially in the practice of centering the mind: The mind is calm, tranquil, contented and relaxed. Its thoughts don't go meddling with anything outside. It's as if the world didn't exist, because our attention isn't involved with it. There's simply the Dhamma which is to be contemplated and practiced so as to give rise to more and more steadiness and strength. And on the level of discernment, no matter how broad or narrow our investigation of the many phenomena in the world may be, it is exclusively for the sake of the Dhamma, for the sake of self-liberation. We thus become thoroughly engrossed, day and night. The more strongly our heart is set on the Dhamma, the greater its stamina and courage. It has no concern for life itself, no worries about its living conditions or anything external. Its only support is the guiding compass of the Dhamma. Whether we are sitting, lying down, or whatever, the heart is engrossed in its persistent efforts in practicing the Dhamma. On the level of concentration, it is engrossed in its stillness of mind. On the level of discernment, it is engrossed in its explorations of the Dhamma from various angles for the sake of removing defilement, step by step, as it investigates. Peace of heart is thus possible in each stage of persist-ing with the practice. The more quiet and secluded the place, the more conspicuously this awareness stands out. Even knowledge in the area of concentration stands out in our inner awareness. It stands out for its stillness. In the area of discernment, our knowledge stands out for the shrewdness and ingenuity of the mind as it explores without ceasing--except when resting in the stillness of concen-tration--just as water from an artesian well flows without ceasing during both the wet season and the dry. When phenomena make contact with the mind--or even when they don't--a mind already inclined to discern-ment is bound to investigate, peering into every nook and cranny, gaining understanding step by step. For example, when we are first taught mindfulness immersed in the body (kayagata-sati), it seems superficial--because the mind is superficial. It has no footing, no mindfulness, no discern-ment. It hasn't any principles--any Dhamma--to hold to. Whatever it hears doesn't really go straight to the heart, because the mind is buried way down there, deep under the belly of defilement. But once it develops principles and reasonability within itself, then--especially when we're sitting in medita-tion in a quiet place, investigating the body--the whole body seems clear all the way through. That's how it really feels to a person meditating on this level. It's really enthralling. Whether we are contemplating the skin or the body's unattractiveness, it appears extremely clear, because that's the way its nature already is--simply that our mind hasn't fallen in step with the truth, and is thus constantly taking issue with it. So. Now that the mind can develop stillness and investigate using its discernment, let's take it on a medita-tion tour, exploring the body: our five khandhas. We can travel up to the head, down to the feet, out to the skin, into the muscles, tendons and bones to see how all the parts are related and connected by their nature. As the mind contemplates in this way, step by step, as it gets engrossed in its investigation, the final result is that even though we are investigating the body, the body doesn't appear in our inner sense of feeling at all. The mind feels airy and light. The physical body disappears, despite the fact that we continue investigating the mental image of the body as before. Even though we are using the mental image of the body as the focal point of our investigation, the physi-cal aspect of the body no longer appears. It completely vanishes. We investigate until there is a refinement in the mind's sense of awareness to the point where we can make the body in the image die and disintegrate, step by step. Our awareness is confined solely to the mental image which we are investigating by means of discernment. We see it distinctly because nothing else is coming in to interfere. The mind feels no hunger or desire to go skipping outside. It is completely engrossed in its work of investiga-tion. Its understanding grows clearer and clearer. The clearer its understanding, the greater its fascination. Ultimately there is simply the mental image, or the idea, and the mind, or discernment. As for the actual body, it disappears. You don't know where it's gone. There's no sense of the body at that moment, even though you are investigating the body until you see its condition disintegrating clearly within the mind--disintegrating until it returns to its original condition as the elements of earth, water, wind and fire. Once the body in the image returns to its original elements, the mind then withdraws inward, leaving nothing but simple awareness. Feelings all disappear at this stage. Sanna, sankhara and vinnana aren't involved. There is simply awareness, suffi-cient for the mind's state at that moment. It enters a really solid stillness, leaving only simple awareness. The body sitting here disappears entirely. This is something which can occur in the course of investigating, but please don't plan on it. Simply listen now for the sake of becoming absorbed and gladdened while listening. This will give rise to the benefits of listening which you will actually see for yourself. What will happen when you investigate in line with your own personal traits is a completely individual matter which will appear in keeping with your temperament. As for what occurs with other people, you can't make yourself experience what they do, know the way they do or see the way they do. This is something that depends on each person's individual traits. Let things follow your own inner nature in line with the way you are able to investigate and to know. This is one point I want to explain. A second point: When investigating the body in terms of inconstancy, stress and not-self, then--whether or not you think, `inconstancy, stress and not-self'--when discernment makes clear contact with the bodily khandha, it will be able to know these things on its own, because things which are inconstant, stressful and not-self are things which deserve to be relinquished, which inspire dispassion and disenchant-ment, step by step, until you let go. When the mind has investigated so that it fully understands, it lets go of its own accord without being forced, because each part, each aspect of the body or of the khandha being investigated is simply an individual truth. When the mind investigates clearly in this way, it makes the break automatically, because a truth has encountered a truth: The mind is the mind, and each of these individual conditions is a separate condition which hasn't come to involve itself with the mind at all. The mind will then turn around to see its own fault in being attached. `Here I've really been deluded. Actually things are like this and this.' This is one stage: When the mind hasn't yet made a complete break--when it doesn't yet have adequate strength--it will start out by knowing at intervals in this way. The next time you investigate, you know in this way again and it keeps seeping in, seeping in, until your know-ledge on this level becomes adequate and lets go. Like duckweed which keeps moving in, moving in to cover the water: After you spread it apart, the duckweed comes moving in again, and you spread it apart again. This is how it is when discernment investigates these things, making forays into these things or unraveling them. As soon as discernment retreats, subtle defilements come moving in again, but after you have investigated many, many times, the duckweed--the various types of defilement--begins to thin out. Your investigation of these phenomena becomes more and more effortless, more and more proficient, more and more subtle, step by step, until it reaches a point of sufficiency and the mind extricates itself automatically, as I have already explained. The mind--when the strength of its mindfulness and discernment is sufficient--can extricate itself once and for all. This knowledge is clear to it, without any need to ask anyone else ever again. The heart is sufficient, in and of itself, and sees clearly as `sanditthiko' in the full sense of the term, as proclaimed by the Dhamma, without any issues to invite contradiction. A third point: Sometimes, when investigating the body, the mind makes contact with a feeling of pain, and so turns to investigate it. This all depends on the mind's temperament. In the same way, when we turn to investigate the feeling, the mind sends us back to the body. This is because the body and the feeling are interrelated, and so must be investigated together at the same time, depending on what comes naturally to us at that particular time, that particular feeling and that particular part of the body. When the mind investigates a feeling of pain, the pain is nothing more than `a pain'. The mind looks at it, fixes its attention on it, examines it, and then lets it go right there, turning to look at the body. The body is the body. The feeling is a feeling. Then we turn to look at the mind: The mind is the mind. We investigate and experiment to find the truth of the body, the feeling and the mind--all three of which are the trouble-makers--until we have a solid understanding of how each has its own separate reality. When the mind pulls back from the body and the feeling, neither the body nor the feeling appears. All that appears is simple awareness. When a mental current flashes out to know, the feeling then appears as a feeling. These currents are the means by which we know what phenome-non has appeared, because this knowledge gives a meaning or a label to the phenomenon as being like this or like that. If we're going to think in a way which binds us to `ourself'--in other words, in the way of the origin of stress --we have to make use of this act of labeling as what leads us to grasp, to become attached, to make various assump-tions and interpretations. If we're going to think in the way of discernment, we have to make use of the discernment which is this very same current of the mind to investigate, contemplate, until we see clearly by means of discernment and can withdraw inwardly in a way that is full of reason-- not in a way that is lazy or weak, or that is groveling in abject surrender with no gumption left to fight. In investigating feeling, when a sanna flashes out, mindfulness is alert to it. If our investigation of feeling has become refined and precise, then when a sanna simply flashes out, we know. When sankharas form, they are just like fireflies: blip! If no sanna labels them or picks up where they leave off, they simply form--blip! blip!--and then vanish, vanish. No matter what they form--good thoughts, bad thoughts, crude thoughts, subtle thoughts, neutral thoughts, whatever--they are simply a rippling of the mind. If they occur on their own, when nothing is making contact with the mind, they're called sankhara. If they occur when something is making contact, they're called vinnana. Here we are talking about the sankharas which form on their own, without anything else being involved. They form --blip--and then vanish immediately. Blip--and then vanish immediately. We can see this clearly when the mind converges snugly in the subtle levels of concentration and discernment. The snugness of the mind's convergence will not have anything else involved with it at all. All that remains is simple awareness. When this simple awareness remains stable this way, we will see clearly that it isn't paired with anything else. When the mind begins to withdraw from this state to return to its awareness of phenomena--returning to its ordinary state of mind, which can think and form thoughts--there will be a rippling--blip--which vanishes immediately. It will then be empty as before. In a moment it will `blip' again. The mind will form just a flash of a thought which doesn't yet amount to anything, just a rippling which vanishes immediately the instant it's known. As soon as there's a rippling, we are alert to it because of the power of mindfulness keeping watch at the moment--or because of the strength of concentration which hasn't yet dissipated. But after these ripples have formed two or three times, they come more and more frequently, and soon we return to ordinary consciousness, just as when a baby awakens from sleep: At first it fidgets a bit, and then after this happens a number of times, it finally opens its eyes. The same is true of the mind. It has calm...Here I'm talking about concentration when discernment is there with it. The various ways of investigating I have mentioned are all classed as discernment. When we have investigated enough, the mind enters stillness, free from mental forma-tions and fashionings and from any sort of disturbance. All that appears is awareness. Even just this has the full flavor of a centered mind, which should already be enough to surpass all other flavors. We never tire of delighting in this stillness. We feel a constant attraction to this stillness and calm in the heart. Wherever we go, wherever we stay, the mind has its own foundation. The heart is at ease, quiet and calm, so that now we must use discernment to investigate the elements and khandhas. The important point to notice is the act of formation in the mind. Once something is formed, sanna immediately labels it--as if sankhara were forming things to hand on to sanna, which takes up where the sankhara leaves off. If then interprets these things from various angles--and this is where we get deluded. We fall for our own assumptions and interpretations, for our own shadows which paint pic-ture stories that have us engrossed or upset both day and night. Why are we engrossed? Why are we upset? Engrossed or upset, it's because of the mind's shadows acting out stories and issues. This story. That story. Future issues. Things yet to come. Things yet to exist--nothing but the mind painting pictures to delude itself. We live in our thought-formations, our picture-painting-- engrossed and upset by nothing but our own thought-formations, our own picture-painting. In a single day there's not a moment when we're free from painting imaginary pictures to agitate and fool ourselves. Wise people, though, can keep up with the tricks and deceits of the khandhas, which is why they aren't deluded. The moment when mindfulness and discernment really penetrate down is when we can know that this is actually the way the mind usually is. Like people who have never meditated: When they start meditating, they send their minds astray, without anything to hold on to. For example, they may have a meditation word,like `buddho', and there they sit--their eyes vacant, looking at who-knows-what. But their minds are thinking and painting 108 pictures with endless captions. They then become engrossed with them, or wander aimlessly in line with the preoccupations they invent for themselves, falling for their preoccupations more than actually focusing on their meditation. They thus find it hard to settle their minds down because they don't have enough mindfulness supervising the work of meditation to make them settle down. Once we have used our alertness and ingenuity in the areas of concentration and discernment, we will come to know clearly that these conditions come from the mind and then delude the mind whose mindfulness and discernment aren't quick enough to keep up with them. The heart causes us to follow after them deludedly, so that we can't find any peace of mind at all, even though our original aim was to meditate to find peace of mind. These deceptive thoughts engender love, hate, anger, irritation, without let-up, no matter whether we are meditators or not--because as meditators we haven't set up mindfulness to supervise our hearts, and the result is that we're just as insane with our thoughts as anyone else. Old Grandfather Boowa has been insane this way himself, and that's no joke! Sometimes, no matter how many years in the past a certain issue may lie, this aimless, drifting heart wanders until it meets up with it and revives it. If it was something which made us sad, we become sad about it again all on our own. We keep it smouldering and think it back to life, even though we don't know where the issue lay hidden in the meantime. These are simply the mind's own shadows deceiving it until they seem to take on substance and shape. As what? As anger, greed, anxiety, pain, insanity, all coming from these shadows. What sort of `path' or `fruition' is this? Paths and fruitions like this are so heaped all over the world that we can't find any way out. So in investigating the acts of the mind, the important point is that discernment be quick to keep up with their vagrant ways. When mindfulness and discernment are quick enough, then whatever forms in the mind, we will see that it comes from the mind itself, which is about to paint pictures to deceive itself, about to label and interpret sights, sounds, smells and tastes of various kinds. The heart is then up on these preoccupations; and when it is up on them, they vanish immediately, with no chance of taking on substance or shape, of becoming issues or affairs. This is because mindfulness and discernment are wise to them, and so the issues are resolved. Ultimately, we come to see the harm of which the mind is the sole cause. We don't praise or blame sights, sounds, smells, tastes or tactile sensations at all. The heart turns and sees the harm which arises in the mind which deceives itself, saying `That's worth praising...worth criticizing...worth getting glad about...worth getting sad about.' It sees that the blame lies entirely with the mind. This mind is a cheat, a fraud, a deceiver. If we study it and keep watch of its ways through meditation, we will gain a thorough knowledge of its good and evil doings, until it lies within our grasp and can't escape us at all. This is how we investigate when we investigate the mind. Ultimately, other things will come to have no meaning or importance for us. The only important thing is this deceiving mind, so we must investigate this deceiver with mindfulness and discernment so that we can be wise to its tricks and deceits. In fixing our attention on the mind, we have to act as if it were a culprit. Wherever it goes, we have to keep watch on it with mindfulness and discernment. Whatever thoughts it forms, mindfulness and discernment have to keep watch so as to be up on events. Each event--serious or not--keeps vanishing, vanishing. The heart knows clearly, `This mind, and nothing else, is the real culprit.' Visual objects aren't at fault. They don't give benefits or harm. Sounds, smells, tastes, and tactile sensations don't give benefits or harm, because they themselves aren't benefits or harm. Only the mind is what fashions them and dresses them up so as to deceive itself into being gladdened or saddened, pleased or pained through the power of the pre-occupations which arise only from the heart. Mindfulness and discernment see more and more clearly into these things, step by step, and then turn to see that all the fault lies with the mind. They no longer praise or blame other things as they used to. Once they have focused solely on the mind, which at the moment is the culprit, the time won't be long before they can catch the culprit and put an end to all our concerns. So then. Whatever thoughts may be formed are all an affair of the mind. The `tigers and elephants' it forms are simply sankharas it produces to deceive itself. Mindfulness and discernment are up on events every time. Now the current of the cycle (vatta) keeps spiraling in, day by day, until we can catch the culprit--but we can't yet sentence him. We are now in the stage of deliberation to determine his guilt. Only when we can establish the evidence and the motive can we execute him in accordance with the proce-dures of `Dhamma Penetration.' This is where we reach the crucial stage in mindfulness and discernment. In the beginning, we used the elements and khandhas as our objects of investigation, cleansing the mind with elements, using them as a whetstone to sharpen mindfulness and discernment. We cleansed the mind with sights, sounds, smells, tastes and tactile sensations, using them as a whetstone to sharpen mindfulness and discernment; and we cleansed the mind itself with automatic mindfulness and discernment. Now at this stage we circle exclusively in on the mind. We don't pay attention to matters of sights, sounds, smells or tastes, because we have already under-stood and let go of them, knowing that they aren't the casual factors. They aren't as important as this mind, which is the primary instigator--the culprit renowned throughout the circles of the cycle, the agitator, the disturber of the peace, creating havoc for itself only right here inside. Mindfulness and discernment probe inward and focus right here. Wherever this mind goes, it's the only thing causing harm. So we watch patiently over this culprit to see what he will do next--and aside from being alert to what he will do, we also have to use discernment to penetrate in and see who is inciting him. Who stands behind him, so that he must be constantly committing crimes? He keeps creating deceptive issues without pause--why? Mindfulness and discernment dig in there, not simply to pounce on or lay siege to his behavior, but also to go right into his lair to see what motivating force lies within it. What is the real instigator? There has to be a cause. If there's no cause, no supporting condition to spin the mind into action, the mind can't simply act on its own. If it simply acts on its own, then it has to be a matter of khandhas pure and simple--but here it's not pure and simple. Whatever behavior the mind displays, whatever issues it forms, all give rise to gladness or sadness. This shows that these conditions aren't `simply' coming out. There's a cause. There's an underlying condition which sends them out, making them give rise to real pleasure and pain when we fall for them. While we are exploring inward at this point, we have already seen that the mind is the culprit, so we must con-sider letting go of all external things. Our burdens grow less and less. There remain only the issues of the mind and the issues of formation and interpretation which arise solely from the mind. Mindfulness and discernment spin whizzing around in there, and ultimately come to know what it is that causes the mind to form so many thoughts giving rise to love, anger and hate. As soon as it appears, the heart knows it; and when the heart knows it, the `Lord of Conventional Reality', which is blended with the mind, dissolves away. At this point the cycle has been destroyed through mindfulness and discernment. The mind is no longer guilty, and turns into a mind absolutely pure. Once the problem of the cycle is ended, there is no way that we can find fault with the mind. When we could find fault, that was because the fault was still in the mind. It was hiding in the mind. Just as when criminals or enemies have taken up hiding in a cave: We have to destroy the cave as well, and can't conserve it out of affection for it. Avijja--unawareness--is the lord of the three levels of existence which has infiltrated the mind, and thus we have to consider destroying the entire thing. If the mind isn't genuine, it will dissolve together with unawareness. If it's genuine in line with its nature, it will become a pure mind--something peerless--because all things counterfeit have fallen away from it through the use of mindfulness and discernment. When the counterfeit things which are like rust latching firmly onto the mind finally dissolve away through the power of mindfulness and discernment, the mind becomes genuine Dhamma. You can call it `the genuine mind' or `the genuine Dhamma': There's no contradiction, because there is no more reason for contradiction, which is an affair of defilement. You can say 100% that the flavor of the Dhamma has surpassed all other flavors. When the mind is pure Dhamma, it has had enough of all other things. It is absolutely no longer involved with anything else at all. It is one mind, one Dhamma. There is only one. There is only one genuine Dhamma. The mind is Dhamma, the Dhamma is the mind. That's all that can be said. I ask each of you to take this and contemplate it. This is the basis for the truth of the teachings which the Lord Buddha taught from the beginning until the moment of his total nibbana. The purity of his mind was a deeply felt Dhamma which he experienced with his full heart. He then proclaimed that Dhamma, with the benevolence of his full heart, teaching the world up to the present. To call his teachings, `the benevolence of the Lord Buddha' shouldn't be wrong, because he taught the world with true benevolence. When we take those teachings and put them into practice in a way which goes straight to the heart, we will come to see things we have never seen before, never known before, within this heart, step by step, until we reach the full level of practice, know the full level of know-ledge, and gain release from suffering and stress with our full hearts, with nothing left latching on. This is called wiping out the cemeteries--the birth and death of the body and mind--for good. What a relief! And now that we've reached this point, I don't know what more to say, because I'm at a loss for words. I ask that you as meditators practice, train yourselves and explore all Dhammas until you too are at a loss of words like this speaker at his wits' end. Even though we may be stupid, infinitely stupid, I'll ask to express my admiration straight from the heart. Evam. Feelings of Pain In the Discourse on Good Omens (Mangala Sutta), the Buddha teaches us to associate with sages, and not with fools. The first and foremost fool here is our own heart. In other words, there are fools outside and fools inside, and for the most part the fools inside are the ones who keep stirring up trouble all the time. When we live with meditation masters, which is called associating with sages, we keep gaining lessons from sages, because that's what they are. They are wise in the various tactics they teach us. They have prac-ticed and gained knowledge of everything from experience. Their teachings are thus correct, precise and convincing to those who listen to them, with no room for any doubt. In particular, the Venerable Acariya Mun: There never was a time when he would teach saying, `It seems to be like this. It seems to be like that.' There was nothing but, `This is the way it is for sure, for sure'--and we were sure, because he spoke only the absolute truth taken right from a heart which had already known and seen, and from his own well-conducted practice. Especially in the case of illness: If there were any weak-willed cases, he would tell them, `Whoever is weak, whoever cries and moans, can take his moans as his medicine. There's no need to search out medicine any-where, no need to have anyone to look after him. His moans are his medicine. If moaning serves any purpose, then why search for medicine to treat the disease?' Then he would add, `Keep moaning. Everyone can moan. Even children can moan--if it serves a purpose. But here it doesn't serve any purpose at all other than to annoy those good people who are unflinching in the practice. So you shouldn't moan out of weakness. You're a meditation monk. When you act like this, who can bear to see it? If you were a child or an ordinary person, there wouldn't be anything wrong with it, because they haven't received any training. They don't have any knowledge or understanding of the various ways to contend with the pain, such as contemplating it. But you, you already know everything of every sort. Yet when trouble comes, such as illness, you can't find any methods or tactics to care for yourself. You just go all to pieces. This won't do at all. You're a shame to yourself and your fellow meditators.' The Venerable Acariya Mun was very talented in teaching the heart. When those of his disciples who were intent on studying with him would listen to anything he'd say, it would go straight to the heart. Straight to the heart. The things we should put into practice, we would put into practice. The things we should understand right then, dealing with internal matters, we would understand--every time, step after step. When we were ill, he would teach us how to contem-plate. `When you have a fever, where did you get it from?' He'd say this so as to serve a purpose, as food for thought for meditators. `From where did you drag out the fever and chills? They arise in this body, don't they? When they disappear, where do they go, if not back to where they came from? Even if they don't disappear, they die together with each of us: There are no exceptions at all in this body. Investigate it so as to know it. `All stress, all pains are Noble Truths. If we don't investigate them, what are we going to investigate? The Buddha gained Awakening with the Noble Truths, his disciples gained Awakening with the Noble Truths--so are we going to gain Awakening with weakness? Would that be in keeping with the Dhamma of the Buddha? Then we've come to resist the Dhamma! `Where does the pain arise? In which part? Ask so as to find out. When it hurts here and aches there, who is it that hurts? Who is it that aches? Probe on in to find what instigates it. Where does it come from? Where does it hurt? What causes it to hurt? What perceives it as pain? When the body dies and they cremate it, does it hurt? Who is it that deceives itself into thinking that this hurts or that aches? Investigate so as to find its initial causes. `If you're a meditator who doesn't know initial causes, and doesn't know their effects--this heap of suffering--then how are you going to cure suffering? What is your discern-ment for? Why don't you think? Why don't you find it and put it to use? `Your mindfulness and discernment are for keeping things in mind and investigating them--things such as feelings of pain which exist in your body and mind.' He would keep stressing his points, step by step. If the person listening was intent on listening--and especially if he had any fighting spirit--he'd find it easy to grasp the point, and it would appeal to him immediately. Immediately. When we'd leave Venerable Acariya Mun to live in any spot suitable for the practice, his teachings would seem to reverberate through the heart. You could remember every facet of his teachings, every important point that should be used as a tool in the practice. For example, if you were staying in a challenging place, it was if he were right there in the heart. The heart would be really audacious and exultant in practicing, knowing the Dhamma, seeing it, understand-ing it. You would understand with audacity, and with a warrior's spirit_-not by being discouraged, irresolute or beating a retreat. That's not the way to make the defile-ments fear you and disappear from the heart. That's not at all the way to cure defilement, to know the affairs of defilement or to be able to remove them. This is the religion! There is nothing to compare with it in being so correct, so precise, so genuine, so true, so indis-putable. If we all were to follow the principles of the religion, there would be no need for prisons or jails. What need would they serve? Nobody would be doing any wrong! People would see in line with reason, and acknowledge their rightness and wrongness, their good and their evil, using the principles of reason as their standard. We human beings would then be able to live with one another. The reason we need laws, prisons and jails is because we don't admit our wrongs. When we're wrong, we don't admit that we're wrong. Even the moment after we see ourselves do something wrong, we won't admit to it. Even when we're put in jail and are asked, we still say, `They accused me of stealing this and stealing that'--even though we ourselves actually stole it. This is simply an unwilling-ness to admit to things in line with reason, in line with the truth. Even within the heart, with things that concern us exclusively, the same holds true: We don't admit to them, which is why we receive so much pain and suffering. If we admit to the principles of the truth, the things which appear in line with the truth can be resolved through the truth. For example, even when pain arises in the body, it won't disrupt the mind because our knowledge is wise to it. As the principles of the Dhamma say, pains have been appearing in our body and mind ever since we first became aware of things. There is no reason for us to get excited, frightened or upset by them to the point where they disease the mind. This is why mental development, or meditation, is an excellent science for gaining knowledge on all fronts: Those who practice consistently are not upset when pain arises in the body. They can even focus on the spot where the pain arises to investigate and analyze it in line with its truth until gaining skillful and courageous tactics for dealing with it admirably. The important point is to associate with sages, wise people, those who are sharp and astute. If we aren't yet able to depend on ourselves, we have to depend on our teachers to instruct us. If we listen often, their teachings gradually seep into us and blend with our temperament until our mind becomes a mind with Dhamma. Our mind becomes a sage, a wise person, and can eventually take care of itself, becoming `atta hi attano natho'_-its own mainstay. So in every activity where we aren't yet capable, we first have to depend on others. In living with those who are good, we are bound to find peace and happiness. Our traits come to mesh with theirs--this is important--until our own traits become good and admirable as well. It's the same as if we were to associate with bad people: At first we aren't bad, but as we associate with them for a long time, our traits blend themselves with theirs until we become bad without being aware of it. When we are fully bad, this makes us even more blind. We feel that we've become even better. No one else can push us around. Otherwise our `goodness' will jump into action--the `goodness' of a bad person, an evil which wise people everywhere fear. Bad people and good people. Evil and good. These things get turned around in this way. Bad people thus can't see the truth that they are bad, and so flatter themselves into thinking, `I'm good. I'm smart. I'm clever. I'm one of the most renowned operators around.' That's how they twist things! For this reason, associating with meditation masters, with sages, is important for anyone who is striving to become a good person, who is hoping to prosper and be happy, because sages will teach us often. Their manners and deportment which we see day after day will gradually seep into and nurture our minds. We can hold to them contin-ually as good examples, for everything they do in every way is all Dhamma. Especially if they are people devoid of defilement, then there is nothing to compare with them. Like the Venerable Acariya Mun: I'm certain that he was devoid of defilement. After hearing the Dhamma from him, I had no doubts. He himself never said that he was devoid of defilement, you know. He never said that he was an arahant or anything, but he would say it in his ability to explain the true Dhamma on every level in a way that would go straight to the heart and erase all doubt for all those who came to study with him. This is why I can dare to say unabashedly that the Venerable Acariya Mun Bhuridatta Thera is one of the important arahants of our day and age--an age in which arahants are exceedingly rare, because it's an age sadly lacking in people practicing the Dhamma for the sake of arahantship. Instead we practice to eliminate arahantship by amassing all kinds of miscellaneous defilements. This holds for all of us, so no one is in a position to criticize anyone else. Let's return to the subject of feelings: To investigate feelings of pain is very important. This is something I learned from Venerable Acariya Mun. He took this very seriously whenever any of the meditators in his monastery became ill. Sometimes he would go himself and ask, `How are you contemplating your illness?' Then he'd really empha-size the Dhamma. `Go probing right there. Wherever there's pain, investigate so as to see the truth of the pain.' He'd teach how to investigate: `Don't retreat. To retreat is to enhance the pain. `To be a warrior, you have fight using discernment. This is what will bring victory: the ability to keep up with the feeling of pain which you hold to be an important enemy. Actually, that feeling isn't anyone's enemy. It doesn't have any sense of consciousness at all. It's simply a truth--that's all. So investigate on in. You don't have to anticipate it, or concern yourself with whether it's a big pain or a small pain. All that's asked is for you to know its truth with your own discernment, so that the heart won't deceive you.' That's what he would say. Actually, our heart is deceit incarnate, because that which deceives is within the heart and fools the heart into making assumptions and interpretations. Stupidity has an easy time believing lies. Clever people have an easy time deceiving stupid people. Deceit has an easy time fooling stupidity. The cleverness of the defilements gets along well with our own stupidity. This is why the Dhamma teaches us to ferret things out to investigate down to their truth, and then to believe in line with that truth. This is our means of gaining victory step by step. Ferret out the pains which are always with you so as to see them. Don't run away from them. Whether they're big or small, investigate right there. Investigate right there. If you're going to concentrate, concentrate right there. When you are investigating its causes, no matter how great the pain, keep probing in. The thing we call pain: What does it depend on as its foundation? It depends on the body as its foundation. It depends on our attention as its means of flaring up--in other words, the attention which labels it in various ways: This is what makes pain flare up. We have to cure this kind of attention by investigating to know both the pain--what it's like--and the place where pain arises, in whatever part of the body. Try to know clearly whether or not that spot is really pain. For example, if there's pain in the bone, in any part of the skin or flesh, the skin and the flesh are skin and flesh. The pain is a pain. Even though they dwell together, they are separate things, not one and the same. The mind--the knower which is aware of these things--is a mind, but it's a deluded mind, so it assumes that this is pain, that's pain, and conflates these things into being its `self', saying, `I hurt here. I hurt there. I don't want myself to be pained. I want the pain to vanish.' This desire is a defilement which encourages pain and suffering to arise. The heart is pained. The feeling of pain in the body is pain. The pain in the heart flares up with that pain, because it wants it to follow the heart's desires. These things keep feeding each other. This is our own stupidity, loading us down with suffering. To be intelligent, we have to investigate, to watch the feeling of pain in the heart. What does it come from? What does it depend on? It depends on the body. Which part of the body? From what spot in the body does the pain arise? Look at the body and the feeling: Are they one and the same thing? What kind of shape and features do they have? The feeling doesn't have any shape or features or a posture of any kind. It simply appears as a feeling of pain, that's all. As for the body, it has a shape, a color and complexion --and it stays as it was before the pain arose. When the pain arises, it stays just as it was. Actually, the pain is something separate from this. It simply depends on a malfunction of the body to arise. The mind is what takes notice of it. If the mind has any discernment, it should notice it in line with its truth. The mind then won't be affected by it. But if the mind is deluded, it latches on to the pain--in other words, it pulls that pain in to be its `self'--and then wants that pain, which it says is its self, to disappear. This is why we can't analyze it. Once the pain is our self, how can we separate it out? If it's simply a pain, a separate reality, then the body is a separate reality. They aren't one and the same. Each one exists separately. Each is a separate reality in line with its nature. Only when our awareness is like this can we analyze things. But as long as we see the pain as our self, then we can analyze it all day long and not get anywhere, because once we hold that, `This is myself,' how can we analyze it? We haven't separated these things with discernment, so we have to keep holding on to them as our self. When the khandhas and the mind blend into one, we can't analyze them. But when we try to use mindfulness and discernment to inves-tigate in to see the truth of these things--that each exists separately, each has its separate reality, which holds true for us and for everyone else--and this realization goes deep into the heart, then the pain gradually fades away, fades away. At the same time, we know what makes the connec-tion from the pain into the heart, because the connection comes from the heart. When we investigate the pain, it comes retracting into the heart. All the affairs of pain come from the heart which labels, or which experiences mental pain because of an insidious connection by way of attach-ment (upadana) which we don't yet know. When we investigate so as to see clearly, we follow the feeling of pain inward. We come in knowing, knowing. The pain keeps retracting and retracting, into the heart. Once we know that the heart is what created the attachment, making itself construe the pain to be itself, creating a great deal of suffering_-once we know this, the pain disappears. Or--alternatively--once we know this, the pain stays real, but the heart doesn't latch onto it. Even though the pain may not disappear, the mind is the mind. It doesn't make any connection through attachment. Each is its own separate reality. This is called the mind being its own self-- cool, calm and collected--in the midst of the pain of the khandhas. This is to know that the mind is a reality just as each khandha is a separate reality. This is the path for those who are practicing so as to become wise to the five khandhas, with feelings of pain as their primary focus. But for those who understand all the way, to the point of reaching `the unshakable mind, the unshakable Dhamma' (akuppa-citta, akuppa-dhamma) which cannot be provoked into being anything else, there is no problem at all. Whether pain is little or great, they have absolutely no problem because their minds are always true. There is never a time when their minds, which are already pure, can become defiled, can become `worlded'. There's no way it could happen. For this reason, whatever conditions the khandhas may display, such people know them in line with the prin-ciples of nature. The khandhas themselves appear in line with the principles of nature and disappear in line with nature. They remain naturally and then disappear naturally. The mind knows in line with its own nature, without having to be forced or coerced in any way. The minds of those who know totally all-around are like this. As for those of us who are investigating the khandhas to know them and withdraw from them step by step, even though our minds are not yet like that while we are prac-ticing, even though our hopes aren't yet fulfilled, still our investigation of pain is for the purpose of separating the mind from the pain so that it's not entangled in pain, so that whenever pain arises in greater or lesser measure, the mind doesn't cling to the pain as being itself. We do this so as not to gather up the pain as being our self--which would be the same as taking fire to burn ourself. When we can do this, we can be at our ease. Thus pain is an excellent whetstone for discernment. However much pain arises, set your mindfulness and dis-cernment focused right there. Then turn to look at the mind, and then expand your awareness to encompass the feeling and the body, each of which is already a separate part. The body is one part, the feeling is another, and the mind another. Keep going back and forth among them, investigating with discernment until you understand--and it really goes to the heart--that, `Each khandha is simply... and that's all.' None of them appears to be any such thing as `you' or `yours'. They are simply different realities which appear, and that's all. When you understand clearly like this, the heart becomes its own free and independent self at that moment, and it knows that the mind and the khandhas are separate realities, neither affecting the other. Even at the moment when you are about to die, the heart will be up on events in the immediate present. It won't be shaken by pain and death because it is sure that the mind is the mind: a stronghold of awareness. Each khandha is simply a condi-tion. The mind thus doesn't fear death because it is sure of itself that it won't get destroyed anywhere. Even though it may not have yet reached the level where it is absolutely devoid of defilement, the mind has still prepared itself using discernment with the khandhas so that it's supreme. In other words, it lives with the Noble Truths. It lives with its whetstone for discernment. Discernment will spread its power far and wide. The heart will grow more and more radiant, more and more courageous, because discernment is what cleanses it. Even if death comes at that moment, there's no problem. For one thing, if you use mindfulness and discernment to investigate pain without retreating, to the point where you understand it, then even when you really are about to die, you'll know that the pain will disappear first. The mind won't disappear. It will revert into itself, knowing exclu-sively within itself, and then pass on at that moment. The phrase, `Mindfulness lapses,' doesn't exist for a person who has practiced the Dhamma to this level. We can thus be sure that a person with mindfulness, even though he or she may not be devoid of defilement, will still be clearly aware at the moment when pain arises in full force to the point where the khandhas can no longer endure and will break apart--will die. The mind will withdraw itself from all that and revert to its `mindness'--to being its own independent self--and then pass on. This is a very high, very refined level of Dhamma! For this reason, meditators who are resolute and unflinching for the sake of knowing every level of the Dhamma tend to be earnest in investigating pain. When the time comes for them to know, the knowledge goes straight to the heart. They regard their pain as a Noble Truth in line with the Buddha's teaching that all living beings are fellows in pain, birth, ageing, illness and death. Thus when investigating the khandhas so as to know them in line with their truth, you shouldn't try to thwart or resist the truth. For example, if the body can't endure, let it go. You shouldn't cherish it. As for the pain, it will go on its own. This is called sugato--faring well. This is the way of investigating the mind and training the heart which gives clear results to those who meditate. They have meditated in the way I've described so that when the time of death is really upon them, they don't hope to depend on anyone at all--parents, brothers, sisters, relatives, friends, anyone. They have to withdraw the mind from all things which entangle and involve it so as to enter that crucial spot where they are engaged in hand-to-hand combat. At a time such as this, at the moment when you are about to die, take pain as the focal point for investigation. Don't be willing to retreat--come what may! All that's asked is that you know and understand this point. Don't go thinking that if you die while being embroiled in investigat-ing pain like this--while the mind is in the midst of this commotion--you'll go to a bad bourn. Why should you go to a bad bourn? You're embroiled, but with a noble task. You're embroiled with knowledge, or for the sake of know-ledge, and not because of delusion. The mind is focused on investigating and probing pain. When the time comes for it really to go, this knowing mind--the mind with mindfulness knows--will withdraw instantly into itself. It will let go immediately of the work at hand and withdraw into itself, to be itself--the mind and nothing but--and then pass on like a `sugato' with the full capability of a meditator, even though we may not yet be devoid of defilement. This is called having full strength to our full capacity, in line with our level of mind and Dhamma. Investigation and mental development are thus important matters, matters on which our life and death depend. We needn't hope to depend on anyone else at all--of this we are certain within ourselves. The heart knows within itself how strong mindfulness and discernment are, and needn't go asking anyone else. If the heart is able to investigate to the point where it can pass on at that moment, all doubts vanish. There are no problems at all. If you think that because you're a woman or because you're a layperson, you can't realize nibbana, that's your own misconception, which is one kind of defilement deceiving you. The Dhamma is a truth, and everyone's common property. Whether we are men or women, lay or ordained, we can all have mindfulness and discernment. We can all cure our defilements. When we are willing, any man or woman, any monk or layperson can use any of the methods to cure defilement and gain release. We needn't create problems to plague our hearts and waste our time. `Since when do I have the potential to do that?' Don't think that! You are developing the merit and potential right now! However much or little, you can see it right here in the mind. We should examine ourselves. Wherever we are stupid, we should develop intelligence: mindfulness and discernment. Only then will we be doing what is genuinely right in terms of the principles of the Lord Buddha's Dhamma. If we criticize ourselves, thinking, `That person is on this level or that level while we don't have any level at all; wherever we go, this person gets ahead of us, that person gets ahead of us,' actually nobody is getting ahead of us except for the defilements which get ahead of us and deceive us into feeling inferior and depressed, into thinking that we have only a little potential. That's simply a misconception aimed at making us discouraged and self-pitying, because defilement is looking for a way to kill us without our realizing it. We shouldn't think in those ways. We are full of potential--all of us. And why shouldn't we be? We're meditators. We're all devoted to making merit. Potential isn't something we can set out on the market to compete with one another. Every person has potential within him or herself. We're taught not to belittle one another's potential. Even with animals, we're taught not to belittle them--think of that!--because potential lies in the heart of every person and every animal. So when curing defilement, you needn't waste time thinking those things. They'll simply ruin your morale and your resolve. To think, `I'm a worthless woman... a worthless man... a worthless monk... a worthless layperson. I don't have any paths or fruitions at all. Other people have them, but I don't. I'm ashamed to show them my face'--these are wrong thoughts which will spoil your resolve in developing the various forms of goodness. The right way to think is this: `Right now I'm making an effort, with mindfulness and discernment, to cure defile-ment and to develop what is good and meritorious step by step, which is the direct way to develop my perfections (parami). I have the potential. I was born in the midst of the Buddha's teachings and have developed the potential and the perfections to my full capacity all along up to the present.' Women can have mindfulness and discernment just like men, because women and men both have defilements, and defilements are cured with mindfulness and discern-ment--backed by persistent effort--both by men and by women. And where do they have defilements? They both have defilements in the heart. When mindfulness and discernment are complete, women and men can both pass over and beyond--with no question of their having to be ordained. This is the truth of the Noble Truths, which are not particular about status, nationality or any of the human races, and which are not particular about the male or the female sex. All that's asked is that we strive, because the Dhamma is common to us all. Women and men, lay and ordained, we can all listen to it, understand it, practice it and cure defilement. The defilements don't favor men or women. We all have defilements. Even monks have defilements: What do you say to that? Monks thus have to cure their own defile-ments. If they don't, they lie buried in defilement just like people in general who aren't interested in the Dhamma--or even worse than people in general. The Dhamma thus doesn't stipulate that it's only for those who are ordained. What is stipulated is that we cure defilement with persistent effort. This is something very important. We have to be very interested in this point. As for release from suffering and stress, where do we gain release? We gain it right here, right where there is suffering. If we can cure defilement, we gain release from suffering. If we can't, then no matter what our sex or status, we all have to suffer. Here. This is where the religion lies, here in the heart. If doesn't lie anywhere else. If we want to be incapable of it, we can be incapable--right here in our heart. Whether lay or ordained, we can be incapable--if we make ourselves incapable. Or we can make the religion flourish in our heart --that we can also do. When the religion flourishes, where does it flourish? In the heart, and nowhere else. The impor-tant point is the heart. The important point is our practice: the actions, the manners we display. When the heart develops, the various aspects of our behavior develop beautifully. Admirably. In particular, the heart flourishes within itself. It has mindfulness and discernment looking after it constantly. This is called a flourishing heart. The defilements can hardly ever come to damage it: That's when the religion flourishes. We should make an effort to examine and straighten things out step by step. The defilements, you know, are no wider or greater than the limits of our ability to cure and remove them. They're only here in the heart, so investigate right here. Whether we're men, women, lay or ordained, we all have defilements in our hearts. No matter how thick they may be, if we consider them, we can know them. They're like darkness: Even though darkness may have existed for aeons, all we have to do is turn on a light, and the darkness disappears completely. The darkness doesn't have any way to brag, saying, `I've been dark for aeons, so there's no way that this puny light can chase my darkness away.' When the causes are ready, the darkness has to disappear completely, and brightness appears in its place. Even though the darkness may have existed for aeons, it all vanishes in that instant. Even though the defilements may be thick and may have been lording it over our heart for a long time, we should investigate them thoroughly with mindfulness and discernment. When mindfulness and discernment are capable, they immediately become all-around. The defile-ments, even though they may have been in the heart for aeons, will immediately disintegrate, in the same way that the darkness which had existed vanishes as soon as a light is lit. Brightness arises instead, through the power of mindful-ness and discernment. Within the heart it is dazzlingly bright at that moment with `dhammo padipo'--the light of the Dhamma. This is all there is. This is the important point we have to investigate. Be sure to see it. The religion is marvelous-- where is it marvelous? The religion flourishes--where does it flourish? The Buddha says to gain release from stress-- where is it gained? It exists only here in the heart. To analyze it, there are the four Noble Truths: stress, its origin, its cessation and the path. 1. Stress (dukkha): We know it's stress because we aren't dead. 2. The origin of stress (samudaya): This is what fosters or produces stress. What forms does it take? We're taught, `Craving ... embued with passion and delight, relishing now here and now there, i.e. craving for sensual pleasure, craving for being, craving for not-being.' This we know. Whatever the mind may love or crave, we should try to straighten it out. It loves and craves the five khandhas, and especially the five khandhas it says are `me'. So try to become wise to these things, step by step. And then there's more love and craving: love and craving for the mind, attachment to the mind, cherishing the mind. So straighten out the mind. Wherever it feels love, that's where defilement is. Keep going in, straightening things out, until you have reached the truth. Then the heart will have no love or hate, because they are all gone. The defilements are all gone. The mind has no love, no hate, no anger. It's a pure principle of nature within itself. This is the nature we truly want. 3. Investigating for the sake of Dhamma: This is the path (magga), with mindfulness and discernment its important factors. 4. The cessation of stress (nirodha): Stress stops, step by step, until the path is fully capable and nirodha stops all stress in the heart without leaving a trace. When nirodha has finished stopping stress, that which knows that stress has stopped and defilement has stopped ... that which knows is `the pure one'. This pure one lies beyond the Noble Truths as a marvelous, extraordinary Dhamma. The Noble Truths are activities, conditions, conven-tions. Even nirodha is a convention. It's the activity of stopping stress. It's a conventional reality. When stress is completely stopped, nothing remains. All that remains is an entirely pure awareness. This is not a Noble Truth. It's the purity of the mind. If you want, you can call it nibbana. There's nothing against calling it whatever you want. When we reach this level, there are no conflicts--no conflicts, no disagreements with anyone at all. We don't conflict with ourselves; we don't conflict with anything. Our knowledge is wise to everything, so we can say what we like. There are no problems at all. All I ask is that you know this marvelous, extraordinary Dhamma. Its excellence exists of its own accord, without our having to confer titles. This, then, is the genuine religion. Probe right here. Probe on in. When in the practice of the religion we come to know, we'll know right here. If the religion is to flourish, it will flourish right here. The Buddha, in teaching the beings of the world to gain release from suffering, taught right here --and release is gained right here, nowhere else. We qualify as beings of the world, and lie within the net of the Buddha's teachings. We're in the Buddha's following. Each of us has the right to practice and remove defilement so as to go beyond suffering and stress. All of us in the four groups of the Buddha's following (parisa) have the right to realize ourselves and reach nibbana. So. I ask that you contemplate. Investigate. Be brave in fighting the things which should be fought within the heart. Develop courage. Develop mindfulness and discernment until they are sufficient. Search for various tactics for probing: These we should develop within ourselves. To probe on our own is the right way. It's our own wealth. Teachers lend us bits and pieces, which are merely fragments to serve as hints or as leads for us to contemplate so that they'll grow and branch out into our own wealth. Any Dhamma which is a wealth is coming from our own tactics: That's truly our own wealth. We'll never exhaust it. If we can think and probe cunningly in removing defile-ments until they fall away completely, using the tactics we develop on our own from the ideas our teachers lend us as starting capital, that's our own Dhamma. However much may arise, it's all our own Dhamma. What we derive from the texts is the Buddha's--and we borrow it from him. What we get from our teachers, we borrow from them--except when we are listening to them teach and we understand the Dhamma and cure defilement at that moment: That's our wealth while we are listening. After that, we take their tactics to contemplate until they branch out through our own ingenuity. This is our own wealth, in terms both of the causes--our contemplation--and of the outcome, the satis-factory results we gain step by step all the way to release from suffering and stress--and that's entirely ours. It stays with us, and no one can come to divide up any of our share at all. This is where the excellence becomes excellent. It doesn't become excellent anywhere else. So try to find the excellence, the peerlessness which lies within you, by striving and being energetic. Other than this awareness, there's no excellence at all. But at present the heart is concealed by things which are filthy and worthless, and so it too has become something which lacks its proper worth. Right now we are washing it, peeling away the various kinds of defilement step by step. When we have used our full strength to peel them all away until there aren't any left in the heart, then the heart is fully pure. Excellence appears here in this heart--and so the excellence is excellent right here. We don't have to search anywhere for anything more, for we have fully reached the `land of enough.' So then. I'll ask to stop here.