Action & Result

The Buddha said that his teachings could be tested, which implies that they’re about actions and their results. In fact, that is the major focus of his teachings. The question of who’s doing the actions, who’s receiving the results, who’s behind everything, the questions we had this afternoon as to who designed saṁsāra, who designed nibbāna: Those are not the sorts of things you can test. But you can test the question of when you do this, what are the results. As the Buddha laid things out, he expressed them in terms of paths. There’s a path that goes to the lower realms, there’s a path that goes to the human realms, there’s paths that go to the higher realms, and there’s a path that goes to nibbāna: a path of action and results, or as he says, path and fruit.

When he talks about rebirth, he doesn’t talk about who or what gets reborn. This is very unusual, because back in his days, people would preface their remarks on whether or not there was rebirth by defining what you are. Then the question would be, does what you are leave room for rebirth? If you’re just your body, there’s no room for rebirth. If you’re different levels of concentration, there’s no room for rebirth. But Buddha left that question open, because what you are is not something you’re responsible for. You do define yourself through your clingings, but then again, those are actions. When you cling to form, feeling, perceptions, thought fabrication, or consciousness, there is some pleasure. The Buddha doesn’t deny that. But the clinging itself can turn things into pain and can lead to more suffering.

We go around defining ourselves this way all the time. This is why we get reborn. We find that the things by which we define ourselves are falling apart, and there’s a desire to find something else to latch on to. It’s in latching on: That’s how we define ourselves. So when someone asks the question, “How does the Buddha define you?” The answer is, “He doesn’t define you. You define you.” Your act of defining yourself is an activity. Your perception of self can change. It’s like an amoeba. It can take on different shapes at different times. Whatever is inside the skin of the amoeba, that’s you. Whatever’s outside, that’s not you. If you look at that sense as you go through the day, you’ll notice that it changes, it moves around.

Think back to when you were a child. Someone’s beating up on your little sister. She’s your little sister, so you go and defend her. You get her home safely. Then she starts playing with your toy truck. All of a sudden, she’s The Other. Your sense of you and what belongs to you has shifted. The boundary line has shifted. We’re doing thoughts of self and not-self all the time. And it’s an activity. It’s good to see it that way, because then the question is, “When is it skillful, and when is it not?” That’s something you can test.

When we sit here and meditate, we’re not trying to find the true nature of what reality is. We’re trying to find out which ways of acting lead to more suffering, and which ones lead away. It’s a question of action and result. That’s something you can prove through meditation. Some people say they’ve proven the truth of no-self through meditation. But all that’s happened is either something that they’ve identified as their self stops, and they say, “Oh, then there’s no self.” But there could be other things that you identify with. They’re still going on. Or you’ve blanked out entirely. But what does that prove? It just proves you’ve blanked out. So the question of whether there is or isn’t a self is not one you can answer or prove through your meditation.

A question you can prove, though, is which ways of identifying yourself are actually helpful on the path, and which ones are not. The idea that you’re competent to do this, that’s helpful. The idea that you’re going to benefit from this, that’s helpful as well. And the idea that you’re going to be responsible for doing this, that’s also helpful, as is the idea that you can look at your actions and see where you’re making a mistake and can change your actions. In other words, you have agency and you also have freedom of choice to some extent, enough to make a difference. That’s a useful way of thinking of self.

So you’re looking at things in terms of cause and effect. When you do x, what are the results? When you do y, what are the results? This is why all the Buddha’s major teachings are all about action and result. Teachings on skillful and unskillful actions come down to what are the long-term results of these actions? The four noble truths are about cause and effect, action and result. You do the craving, and there’s going to be clinging, which is going to be suffering. You do the path, you reach the realization of nibbāna. Nibbāna lies beyond action, though. The act of realizing it is on the threshold. Everything up to that threshold is a question of action and result.

The question is, are you going to be a good judge of your actions or not? When we talk about testing the Buddhist teachings, a lot of people say, “Well, I tested it, tried it out, but it didn’t work.” But exactly what did you do? How honest and committed were you in actually doing it? How dedicated were you? And how truly did you read the results? This throws everything back on you.

Fortunately, the Buddha gives you guidance on how to make yourself more reliable. He teaches you where to focus your attention, say, on the body in itself, the breath in itself, and how to develop powers of mindfulness and concentration around that. When the mind gets well-fed with the concentration, clear with the concentration, then you start asking the right questions. And again, these are questions of action and result—the kinds of questions the Buddha said are categorical, which don’t need to be rephrased, they don’t need to be cross-examined. The questions are good in and of themselves. And the answers you get are true across the board. They’re all about action and result; skillful action, unskillful action. How do you develop skillful qualities? How do you abandon unskillful ones? Or questions of: How do you develop the path? How do you do the duties of the four noble truths? How do you comprehend suffering to the point where you have no more passion for it?

We don’t usually like to think that we have passion for suffering. But after all, how is suffering defined? It’s the clinging-aggregates. You cling to things because you have passion for them, yet suffering comes out at the other end. As Ajaan Chah says, we’re like the person who doesn’t think that the tail of the snake is connected to the mouth of the snake. The tail seems safe, doesn’t have any barbs, doesn’t have any thorns, so you touch the tail, but then the head of the snake comes around and bites you—because they’re connected.

So we’ve got to see how what we’re doing is connected to the suffering and stress we feel. Why is it that we cling to things and suffer from the clinging? Well, it’s because we have craving, and our craving is so strong that it blinds us to what’s happening.

To get past the craving, you have to develop the factors of the path so that you can see clearly what’s going on. That helps you to develop dispassion for those things that you were passionate for to begin with.

And that’s what takes you to the threshold of nibbāna. Beyond that, there is no action. There is that moment of no intention at all.

Our experience of the world is defined through our actions, our choices. Take that home and think about it quite a bit. It’s not that the world is imposed on us, willy-nilly. We’re looking for things, making choices, and in making choices, we develop our sense of the world, of what’s here and what’s over there. What comes first? What comes second? That’s how space and time are defined. So we’re defining space and time by our actions. When there’s no action, there’s no experience of space or time. The Buddha’s teachings are that radical.

What happens if there’s no choice between here or there? Think of the question that the deva asked the Buddha, “How did you get across the flood?” The Buddha replied, “I got across the flood neither by pushing forward nor by staying in place.” Well, in space and time, those are the only two options: moving or staying. The option of doing neither is what takes you out. Which is why nibbana is not part of the system. It’s released from it. As in math, when you divide something by zero, it takes you out of the system. But until then, it’s all in the system of action and result.

So look at the Buddha’s teachings in that light. Test them in that light—and test yourself in that light as well. When you keep this basic principle in mind, it helps you realize which questions are worth asking and which ones are not. The act of asking a question: That’s an action too. And what are the results? The question is like a hole of a certain shape. And it demands a certain shape of an answer. Some answers that meet that demand are not going to be helpful. As the Buddha said, if you define yourself, you place limitations on yourself. So the question, “Who am I?”: Just asking that question, trying to get an answer, is placing a limitation on you. It’s totally unnecessary. A better question is, “How do I create my sense of self? How can I stop?” That’s a question worth answering.