Persistence

Last night we talked about how the desire to put an effort into the practice comes from meeting a reliable teacher and deciding that the Dhamma the teacher teaches makes sense. But the desire to practice comes from more than that. The Canon tells the story of one of the Buddha’s relatives who died. The Buddha said that if that person had put an effort into the practice when he was young, he would have become fully awakened. If he had put an effort into the practice when he was middle-aged, he would have reached a lower level of awakening. If he’d put an effort into the practice when he was old, he would have reached the first stage of awakening. But he never put an effort into the practice at all, and so he missed out on the opportunity to gain awakening in this life.

That’s a chilling story. It should give rise to the desire that you don’t want to miss out on what can be attained through human effort. That desire is what lies at the basis of the perfection of persistence, which is our topic for tonight.

The Pāli word for persistence, viriya, can also mean “energy” and “effort.” It’s identical with right effort in the noble eightfold path. As the Buddha explains, right effort works closely with right view and right mindfulness. Right view tells you what is skillful and what’s not. Right mindfulness helps you remember the lessons of right view. Right effort is what actually puts those lessons into practice, so as to abandon the wrong factors of the path and to develop the right factors in their place. So tonight, I’d like to look into the different ways in which discernment, or right view, and right mindfulness work to develop the perfection of persistence.

Persistence is directed by discernment in four ways:

• The first way is seeing the distinction between what is skillful and what’s unskillful.

• The second way is giving you the motivation to want to put forth effort to abandon what’s unskillful and to develop what’s skillful.

• The third is teaching you the different types of effort that can be skillful.

• And the fourth concerns the amount of effort that is skillful.

So let’s look at each of these four.

The first one doesn’t require much explanation, because we’ve already been talking a lot about what’s skillful and what’s unskillful. Unskillful qualities are those that lead you to do harm. Skillful qualities are those that help you to avoid doing harm.

The second way in which discernment guides your persistence, though, requires more explanation. That’s in providing motivation. There are many different ways in which you can motivate yourself to want to practice. The Buddha says that the primary motivation underlying all skillful activity is heedfulness, in which you see the dangers that come from not acting in skillful ways and the benefits that can come from acting in skillful ways. For example, you focus on the drawbacks of ordinary sensual pleasures as a way of motivating yourself to want to find a non-sensual happiness, such as the happiness in concentration, which is higher and more secure.

All the other ways of motivating yourself to practice derive from heedfulness.

For example, you can motivate yourself to practice through developing compassion. This is based on heedfulness because you realize that by practicing, you will benefit, and people around you will benefit, too. After all, the less greed, aversion, and delusion you have in your mind, then the less you’ll suffer from them and also the less other people will be inflicted by them as well.

Another way of motivating yourself is to try to develop a sense of humor around your defilements. If you can see them as ridiculous, it’s easier to give them up. This is based on heedfulness because a healthy sense of humor comes from stepping back and looking at something objectively, seeing where it’s incongruous and doesn’t make sense. Heedfulness is what inspires you to step back.

Most people miss the examples of humor in the Canon, largely because they’re most prominent in the Vinaya, which is the section concerning the rules that the monks have to follow, and very few laypeople read that section. Each rule has an origin story to explain the reasons why that rule was formulated, and often those stories contain an element of humor.

I think this is interesting because, first, it helps you see how ridiculous the mistake would be if you broke the rule, and that helps to distance you from any desire within yourself to break the rule. That’s the objective viewpoint that comes from stepping back from your defilements. Second, it’s a lot easier to live by a system of rules if you can see that the people who formulated the rules had a good sense of humor. It helps you appreciate that the rules are not grim, punitive, or dull.

For example, one of the origin stories concerns a monk with psychic powers who has defeated a fire-breathing serpent. The laypeople hear about this and want to make merit with him. So, they ask the monks, “What is it that monks usually don’t receive on alms rounds?” However, they ask the wrong monks. The monks say, “We never get any hard liquor.” So, the next morning, everybody in the city has prepared a glass of hard liquor for the monk who defeated the fire-breathing serpent. He drinks the liquor at house after house after house, and then passes out at the city gate.

The Buddha comes along with a group of monks and sees the monk lying there, so he has the monks take him back to the monastery. They lay him down on the ground with his head toward the Buddha. Now, he doesn’t know where he is, he tosses and turns, and he ends up with his feet pointed straight at the Buddha, which in India is a sign of great disrespect. The Buddha asks the monks, “In the past, didn’t this monk show respect to me?” “Yes.” “Is he showing respect now?” “No.” “And didn’t he do battle with the fire-breathing serpent?” “Yes.” “Could he do battle with a salamander now?” “No.” This is why the monks have a rule against drinking liquor.

So, that’s another way of motivating yourself to want to do what is skillful: by using your sense of humor to see how ridiculous your defilements are.

Another way of motivating yourself is to take inspiration from the examples of the Buddha and the great teachers, because they expand your idea of what human beings can do. There’s a story in the Canon where a monk is out in the wilderness and he’s ill. He asks himself, “Am I going to try to go back to the city to find a doctor?” Then he thinks of the example of the Buddha and the great noble disciples who treated their diseases by developing the factors for awakening and the five faculties, and he decides, “I’ll try that, too. I’ll stay on in the wilderness.”

Another way of motivating yourself is by cultivating healthy versions of what the early texts call craving and conceit. In other words, you think, “Other people can gain awakening. I’d like that, too.” That’s healthy craving. “They’re human beings, I’m a human being. They can do it, so why can’t I?” That’s healthy conceit. Even though you eventually have to abandon craving and conceit, there are stages in the path where you need to use healthy versions of them to convince yourself that the goal is worth pursuing and that you’re capable of attaining it.

There are even some instances when the Buddha recommends some fairly unskillful motivations to get yourself to do something skillful. For example, when it’s very difficult to have goodwill for someone you’re angry at, you can remind yourself that if you acted on your anger, you’d probably do something very stupid, and that would please your enemy. Do you want to give pleasure to your enemy?

It’s not a very skillful thought—it’s actually quite spiteful—but it can prevent some unskillful behavior. And it, too, is based on heedfulness: the desire to use a lesser unskillful state to avoid a more damaging unskillful state.

I know in my own case, when I was a monk in Thailand, I came to realize that some people there view Western monks like dancing elephants. The simple fact that they can dance is enough. They don’t think they’re going to dance well. In the same way, there were people who would say, “These Westerners, can they really understand the Dhamma?” So, I said to myself, “I’ll show them.” Which may not be the most skillful thought, but it got me to meditate a lot more.

Now, you’ll notice that all of these forms of motivation require a healthy sense of self. This is a point that has to be underlined many times. We hear so much about the teaching on not-self that we tend to forget that the Buddha said we should try to make the self its own mainstay. You do that by developing a healthy sense of self: that you’re responsible, you’re capable, and you will benefit from developing skillful actions. This also requires a resilient sense of self that’s willing to admit mistakes and learn from them.

There’s a medical university in the United States that has, as one of its specialties, brain surgery. Of course, everyone who applies to a brain surgery school will have good grades, but not everybody with good grades would make a good brain surgeon. So, the administrators at the university tried to find a way of asking questions during the interview that would help weed out the people who would not make good surgeons. They found two questions to be especially helpful in this area. The first was, “Can you tell us of a mistake you made recently?” If the candidate said, “No, I can’t think of any mistakes I’ve made recently,” the candidate would be rejected. The second question: “If you had to do it again, how would you do it differently?” If the candidate hadn’t thought of how to do it differently, again the candidate would be rejected. What you’re looking for in a good brain surgeon is someone who recognizes mistakes and thinks about how not to repeat those mistakes. This requires a sense of self that’s very solid, that’s not threatened by admitting mistakes and doesn’t try to deny mistakes. This is precisely the kind of healthy sense of self you need as you practice, to motivate yourself to develop the path even further.

In fact, you want to be proud that you can learn from mistakes. This relates to another one of the teachings that the Buddha gave to his son. He said, “Before you meditate, try to make your mind like earth. People throw disgusting things on the earth, but the earth doesn’t react.” The Buddha says the same thing about wind, fire, and water. Wind can blow disgusting things around, but the wind doesn’t get disgusted by them. Water can be used to wash dirty things away, but the water doesn’t get upset. Fire burns things that are disgusting, but the fire isn’t disgusted by them. In the same way, you need to have a solid attitude toward looking at your past mistakes. When you can admit them and not be shaken by them, you put yourself in a position where you can learn from them.

These, then, are some of the ways in which discernment gives guidance in how to motivate yourself to put forth effort.

As for the types of skillful effort, there are basically four: The first is to prevent unskillful qualities from arising, the second is to abandon unskillful qualities that have arisen, the third is to develop skillful qualities that have not yet arisen, and the fourth is to develop and maintain skillful qualities that have already arisen.

Now, it’s important that we notice that there are four different kinds of right effort. All too often we hear that there’s just one, which is letting go, letting go, letting go. But there are a lot of things that you should not let go of, or that you should develop first before you can let them go later. For example, when concentration arises, you don’t just let it go and think that you’ve gained insight into the impermanence of your concentration. When concentration arises, you should try to maintain it and develop it further. That’s when you’re engaging in right effort.

Now, of these four different kinds of effort, the one that gets discussed least is the act of preventing, so that’s what I’d like to focus on tonight.

One way of preventing unskillful qualities from arising is by exercising restraint over your senses. In other words, when you’re looking at or listening to something, ask yourself why. What purpose do you have? Or you might ask another question: “Which member of the mind’s committee is in charge of the looking or the listening?” Only if one of the skillful members is in charge should you continue looking or listening. For example, you’re walking down the street. You see something that you’d really like to have, and you’re looking at it in a way that aggravates your greed. You have to ask yourself, “Do I really need this?” And if you realize that you don’t really need it, then you should look at the object in a way that helps to undercut your greed.

Nowadays, most of our problems with sense restraint don’t happen so much while we’re walking down the street. They happen when we turn on the computer or we look at our phone. You have to remind yourself: These things do not turn themselves on. You’re turning them on and you have to ask yourself why. If you’re not really clear, don’t turn them on. You can prevent a lot of unskillful mind states that way.

Another way of preventing unskillful qualities from arising is by contemplating what the Buddha calls your requisites. We live in dependence on four requisites: food, clothing, shelter, and medicine. Each time you use these things or think of getting new ones, you have to realize they have a proper purpose, which is to help you develop skillful qualities of the mind. If you’re going to use them in ways that give rise to unskillful qualities, you’re misusing them. So, it’s good to reflect on these requisites with these questions in mind each time you use them. That will undercut a lot of unskillful behavior. For example, when you go out to get something to eat, remind yourself that you eat simply to keep the body alive and healthy. Anything beyond that is a waste of your resources, which could be put to better purposes, and you’re placing unnecessary burdens on other people. So, it’s good to reflect on these things on a daily basis.

Another way of preventing unskillful qualities from arising is, at the end of your meditation every morning, to think about what you expect to happen during the day. If you anticipate any situations in which you might do or say something unskillful, ask yourself, “How could I prepare for that situation so that I don’t do anything unskillful?” Run a few scenarios through your mind until you can think of a skillful way to avoid doing or saying something unskillful, even when the people around you do or say things that would ordinarily provoke you. All too often, we emphasize the present moment in our meditation and forget that we can use the meditation to prepare for the future—and that’s a perfectly legitimate way of using our meditation.

Those are some thoughts on the different types of effort.

As for the amount of effort, you try to find an effort that’s just right, and this is going to depend on two factors: One is the task at hand, and the other is the amount of energy you have.

In terms of the task at hand, the Buddha said the causes of suffering in the mind come in two forms. Some of them will go away easily if you simply look at them. These are cases where you should look at them with equanimity. There are other causes for suffering in the mind, though, that when you look at them, they stare right back. They don’t go away easily. They have no sense of shame. This, the Buddha said, is the time when you have to “exert a fabrication.” Remember what the three kinds of fabrication are: You learn to breathe in a different way, you learn to talk to yourself in a different way, and you bring new perceptions to the issue. This requires that you can take apart your unskillful state, analyzing it into the three types of fabrication, and then use skillful versions of those three fabrications to create something skillful in its place.

So, those are cases where the amount of effort that is just right will depend on the task at hand.

The second issue is the amount of energy that you have. There’s a story in the Canon of a young man, gently brought up, whose feet were so tender that they had hair growing on their soles. The story is quite long, but eventually this young man ordained as a monk. One night, he was doing walking meditation, and it was so hard on his feet that they started bleeding. Feeling discouraged, he sat down and thought, “Maybe I should disrobe. I could still make merit as a layperson.”

Well, the Buddha was on top of Vulture Peak, and so he disappeared from Vulture Peak and appeared right in front of the monk. He said, “Were you thinking of disrobing just now?” Can you imagine? You’re sitting and meditating, and you’re thinking, “I might as well give up,” and all of a sudden, the Buddha appears in front of you. So, the young monk said, “Yes, I was.”

The Buddha asked him, “When you were a layperson, were you skilled at playing the lute?” The monk said, “Yes.” The Buddha said, “When you tuned the strings of the lute so they were too tight, did it sound good?” “No.” “And when they were too loose, did they sound good?” “No.” “How about if they were tuned just right? Did the lute sound good then?” “Yes.” Then the Buddha concluded, “In the same way, when you’re practicing meditation, you tune your effort to the level of energy you have, and then you tune the rest of your five faculties—your conviction, mindfulness, concentration, and discernment—to that, and then your practice will go well.”

In the same way, as you’re meditating at home—it’s been a long day, you’re tired, all you can think about is wanting to sleep—that’s not the time to say, “I will not get up from my meditation until I’ve achieved full awakening.” You tell yourself, “Okay, I’ll sit and meditate for the hour”—or however long you’ve determined—“and try not to fall asleep.” However, on other days when you do have more energy and you’ve set the timer for half an hour, if the alarm sounds and you still have energy, give yourself another half-hour.

That’s determining how much effort is just right based on how much energy you have.

So, these are the four different ways in which discernment gives guidance to your effort and persistence:

• in pointing out what’s skillful and what’s not,

• in giving you ideas for how to motivate yourself,

• in pointing out the different types of effort that are appropriate, and

• in determining the amount of effort that’s just right.

For your persistence to be right, it’s best guided by right view as to what issues in life are important and what qualities in mind will keep you on track. Remember, right effort focuses on skillful and unskillful qualities in the mind, and as your discernment points out, the mind is the most important factor in your life. So, that’s where you have to focus your right efforts. Discernment also teaches you how to determine which efforts are right for attaining the goal.

Now, right mindfulness remembers these lessons and it keeps you alert so that you can apply them at all times. In this way, you’ve got mindfulness working together with discernment. Now, it’s interesting to note that in Thai, the words for mindfulness and discernment, sati and paññā, when you put them together—sati-paññā—form a compound that means “intelligence.” And here we’re talking about the kind of intelligence in which you’re alert to what needs to be done, you have presence of mind to remember what should be done, and you use your knowledge to good effect. True intelligence requires more than just mindfulness and discernment. It also requires effort. In other words, if you learn something but then don’t try to remember it, that’s not really intelligent. If you learn and remember but don’t try to put it into action, that’s not very intelligent either. It’s when you try to learn, try to remember, and try to put into action what you’ve learned: That’s when you’re really using your intelligence. And that’s when your efforts, your persistence, become the perfection of persistence.

Questions

Q: How can I meditate to overcome laziness in daily life?

A: Ajaan Maha Boowa once said his least favorite question was, “What’s an easy way to overcome laziness?” You have to remind yourself that if you want anything good out of life, you have to put in effort. Think of the bad things that happen to lazy people, the things they miss out on, and then think of all the good things that come from putting in effort. Then the question is “What is the appropriate effort for this task I have right now?”

Q: Why do we feed on the vicious cycle of not doing what we know is good for us?

A: There’s part of the mind that doesn’t really believe that what is good for you really is good for you. You have to find which part of the mind that is and ask it, “Why? What’s the allure of being lazy?”

Q: I have a lot of psychological defects, including laziness, ill will, and attachment to material things. What can I do to fight this?

A: With ill will, consciously try to develop thoughts of goodwill, and the members of the committee that like ill will will start to complain. Then you can get in a dialogue with them. Ask them, “Why do you like ill will? What do you get out of it? It’s miserable food for the mind.” As for attachment to material things, make a practice of giving things away. Here again, part of the mind will complain, and then you can get into a dialogue with it. As for laziness, give yourself little rewards for being more energetic, and after a while your energy will develop momentum.

Q: If any unskillful thought arises and you acknowledge it as unskillful, does it still have negative kammic effects?

A: No.

Q: In other words, does the arising of unskillful thoughts cause bad kamma or is it just our reaction to them?

A: It’s our reaction to them that can cause bad kamma. The fact that the thought arises is the result of old kamma. What you do with it is your new kamma. If you simply acknowledge it and it goes away, or if you think skillful thoughts that counteract it and make it go away, then the new kamma is good new kamma.