Search results for: "Wisdom"

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  2. Can All Beings Be Happy?
     … It might work for you.” The same with wisdom and discernment: It’s good to be able to share what you’ve got, to encourage other people to develop their wisdom and their discernment as well. But, and this is where it gets difficult, there are limits to how much you can influence the behavior of other people. That’s where equanimity has to … 
  3. The Context for No Context
     … As the Buddha once said, if you recognize your own foolishness, that’s the beginning of wisdom; to that extent are you wise. Regardless of how much you may know, if you realize that your knowledge is not putting an end to suffering, there must be some better way of looking at things: That’s the beginning of wisdom. And you can cut through … 
  4. In Line with the Dhamma
     … That point is an important part of wisdom, an important part of our discernment: The problems of suffering can be cured. Believing that is something really basic. As the Buddha once said, there are four kinds of activities in life. There are things that we like to do that give good results, and things we don’t like to do that give bad results … 
  5. A Soiled, Oily Rag
     … These are the reflections that lead to the question that the Buddha said is the beginning of wisdom: What when I do it will lead to my long-term welfare and happiness? My—long-term—welfare and happiness. The three perceptions are related to those three parts of that question. If something is inconstant, it can’t be long-term. If it’s stressful … 
  6. Effective Self-Discipline
     … That larger perspective is part of wisdom. So these are some of the qualities that help with persistence, help with discipline. There’s the desire for the results; the conviction that what you do does make a difference, and then that a genuine happiness really is possible; the understanding of cause and effect; and finally a wise sense of humor. We tend to live … 
  7. Self-Reliance
     … To get to know a person’s wisdom, you have to notice how the person frames a question and tries to answer a question. And again, only over time and by being very observant will you notice these things. The same principles apply to the mind. You have to watch the mind, live with the mind, watch its dealings, see how it handles hardships … 
  8. Self View & Conceit
     … Even the beginning of wisdom starts with a question framed in terms of self: “What, when I do it, will be for my long-term welfare and happiness?” There you’ve got the self both as a producer and as a consumer built right into the question. What makes it wise is that you realize that there is such a thing as long-term … 
  9. Strength in Humor
     … The Buddha said that one of the signs of wisdom is your ability to see what is your duty and what’s not your duty, where you can make a difference and where you can’t make a difference. Then, let go of all the things that you don’t have to take on as duties so that you can really focus on what … 
  10. Capable
     … That’s genuine discernment, genuine wisdom. Then you just keep at it. Anything unskillful comes up, you learn how to let go of it. Anything skillful that hasn’t come around yet or is still very weak, you try to strengthen it. That’s where the persistence comes in. As long as the results aren’t what you want, you keep at it. But … 
  11. Wise About Pleasure
     … That’s the real sign of wisdom. After all, the quest for wisdom begins with that question, "What when I do it will lead to my long-term welfare and happiness?” This applies to how you deal with pleasures, how you deal with pains: pleasures of the senses and pleasures of the practice; pains of the senses, pains of the practice. So you want … 
  12. The Unity of the Path
     … That’s the wisdom faculty there in right effort. Right effort is not so much a question of how much effort you’re putting in, although that is one of the dimensions of right effort. More importantly, it’s question of wisdom and understanding: what kind of effort would be most skillful right now? This goes back to right view. Right effort has to … 
  13. The Economy of Goodness
     … Now, for the qualities that you do amass, that you do gather up—conviction, learning, and discernment, but especially with conviction—those are cases in which you’re basically borrowing the Buddha’s wisdom. With learning, you’re directly borrowing the Buddha’s wisdom. But it’s like what they call a non-refundable loan: You borrow it but you don’t have to … 
  14. Victory over Death
     … That, the Buddha said, is the beginning of wisdom, or discernment: the question, “What when I do it will lead to long-term welfare and happiness?” “What when I do it when I do it will lead to long-term harm and suffering?” You’re taking your desire for happiness for granted and you’re using your wisdom to develop it, to provide for … 
  15. Clearing a Space
     … That was back in the days when the only translation I knew for pañña was wisdom, and I kept thinking, “How am I going to use my wisdom when I don’t have any?” But he was talking about a faculty we all have. We all have discernment to one extent or another, and you have to put it to use all the time … 
  16. Gifts of Noble Wealth
     … This is when you learn to go beyond just the wisdom you’ve learned from other people and heard from other people, and you start producing your own wisdom, your own insights as you need them. I made reference just now to the three skills of the archer that the Buddha used to compare with discernment. To fire shots in rapid succession: In other … 
  17. You Are Not Powerless
     … But the Buddha’s wisdom is basically a wisdom of dualities: X is more skillful than y, so do x rather than y. This involves figuring out how to give rise to x, what the causes are, because from the very beginning of the path all the way to the end, you’ll be making choices. You want to be alive to the fact … 
  18. In the Mood
     … But when you stop to think about it, there’s really no way you can get good results out of the meditation unless the mind has at least some good qualities in it, some cheerfulness, some patience, some wisdom. These are qualities that act as seeds, that allow the meditation to develop. We’re not totally empty-handed when we come to the meditation … 
  19. Conviction & Confidence
     … The qualities of purity, compassion, and wisdom come from taking your desire for true happiness seriously. So these things are possible. They’re part of the range of possibilities of being human. That right there is a challenge. The Buddha, in effect, is asking you, “Do you want to live your life keeping this possibility open or do you want to close it off … 
  20. Look Around
     … the characteristic of someone with some wisdom. After all, looking at things, making sure everything is straightened out from all sides, that’s what you’ve got to do with your mind. All too often we get in these vicious thought-cycles and we can’t get out because we can’t see another way of looking at things. Everything becomes very narrow: This … 
  21. Breathing Easy
     … As the Buddha said, the beginning of wisdom is when you ask someone who knows: What when I do will be for my long-term welfare and happiness? The wisdom here is twofold: one, realizing that happiness has to come from your actions—it’s not going to just come floating by—and two, you want long-term happiness. Short-term happiness is something … 
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