Search results for: "Wisdom"
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- Training like an Adult… In other words, we’re not trying to make a self or create a self around our virtue, around our restraint, around our renunciation, around our concentration, or around our wisdom. We’re doing these things because they work. So learn how to look at what you’re doing, learn how to read the results of what you’re doing, starting from the outside …
- Testing Karma… doesn’t ask you stop desiring happiness. He simply says to try these different ways of looking for happiness. As you do that, your conception of happiness is going to change. Wisdom begins with this question: What when I do it will lead to my long-term welfare and happiness? Right there in that question you have the seed for the big issues of …
- Dhamma Medicine… But it was a sign of the wisdom of the Buddha—and probably of Ven. Ananda or whoever was responsible for the fact— that we have all these discourses that describe who came to the Buddha with what particular problem. We get to see the Buddha as a doctor in action, treating his patients. Unfortunately, Pali is not a living language anymore, so there …
- Refuge in the Dhamma… We’ve talked about how taking refuge in the Buddha means developing his qualities, taking him as an example in terms of wisdom, compassion, and purity. The same with the Sangha. You take the Sangha as an example. They practice well. They practice straightforwardly. For the sake of knowledge. They practice masterfully. You think about their example and it gives you inspiration. But what …
- Refreshment… We tend to think wisdom is a matter of abstractions, but it’s not. It’s a matter of skill, skill in seeing what is the right thing to do, and why it’s right. Of course, primarily, we should be asking ourselves: What are the right things to do in the mind? You want to be able to watch what the mind is …
- On Top of Your Actions… But if you realize that there are other beings in here, other voices, other opinions in there, try to figure out which ones are speaking wisdom right now and listen to them. Get to the observer who wants to watch the ones that are acting. That way you can use the committee of the mind to good advantage.
- Factors for Awakening… What are the needs of body and what are the needs of the mind? How can you meet them so that they’ll be willing to stay together? Seeing this distinction is analysis of qualities, which is the wisdom faculty in the factors for awakening. You’re bringing right view to bear on your mindfulness practice. With persistence, you’re bringing right effort. You …
- Don’t Believe Everything You Feel… The phrase we chanted just now—chandam janeti, generating desire to abandon what’s unskillful and to develop what’s skillful—is a sign of wisdom and discernment. When there are things you feel like doing that you know are going to be harmful, you’re able to talk yourself out of doing them. As for things you know are good for you, but …
- In Your Power… Which means you have to try to find a path that leads to wisdom, to knowledge. That’s what the noble eightfold path is all about: letting go of qualities that get in the way of knowledge. You abandon wrong speech, abandon wrong action, abandon wrong livelihood. Why is that? Because those things make you dishonest. When your mind is dishonest, its left hand …
- Don’t Practice in a Row… As Ajaan Lee points out, that’s the beginning of your wisdom and discernment, as you learn to evaluate what’s working in your concentration, what’s not working, and what you might do to make it work. You also need discernment to help you with your virtue. There are times when what you want to do, what you like to do, is going …
- Totally Secure… One of the definitions of discernment or wisdom is all-around knowing of this process of fabrication. As you start by looking at what you do, and what you say, you see that this is why we have those precepts. What are you doing with your body? What are you creating? What are you creating with your words? It’s interesting to reflect that …
- Using Right View Rightly… That’s why Ajaan Lee says that when you’re practicing mindfulness, ardency is the factor of wisdom, the factor of discernment. In other words, you don’t simply notice skillful and unskillful qualities, but you realize the wise thing to do with the skillful qualities is to develop them. The wise thing to do with the unskillful qualities is to abandon them. Or …
- Only One Person… You want be a generator of virtue, you want to be a generator of generosity, a generator of concentration and wisdom. That’s how these things come out into the world. You’ve got the source right here. So grant yourself that dignity: that you’re going to create a good source in every possible opportunity. Now, generosity has its limitations. You can have …
- An Admirable Friend — In Memory of Luang Loong… You see the wisdom of generosity. As Ajaan Lee used to say, it’s like getting a coconut. You squeeze the milk out of the coconut flesh and you throw the dregs away. You take the milk. In the same way, when you give something away, you’ve basically squeezed all the good out of that thing. The object itself is like the dregs …
- Resistance… It’s also an act of wisdom. When a particular reflection or contemplation brings up uncomfortable issues in the mind, realize that that’s part of its purpose: to bring up those uncomfortable reactions, if they’re there. If they’re not there, you’re fine. If they are there, you want to know. As I said, sometimes when they come up they just …
- Restraint Leads to Freedom… When you look at something, why are you looking at it? Who’s doing the looking? For what purpose? Is greed doing the looking? Anger? Delusion? Or is wisdom doing the looking? What is your purpose in doing these things? This is one of the insights you’re going to have to develop as you meditate as it gets deeper and deeper and more …
- Right Resolve… Mindfulness is like the gatekeeper; wisdom is like the smooth walls that nobody can climb up to cause danger. And right concentration is like the food you have stored away to keep yourself nourished. This way, as you develop skill in your pursuit of happiness, you find that you need fewer things outside. There’s less need to compete with others over things outside …
- Sensitivity Through Generosity… This principle of generosity is an important foundation for wisdom. In other words, learning how to be generous, learning how to accept generosity, learning how to take care of other people’s generosity – not just in terms of things but in terms of the things they do for you: That kind of sensitivity then gets turned into your own sensitivity to yourself – what the …
- Respect for Tranquility & Insight… In that way, you borrow the Buddha’s wisdom. But you also want to learn to create some of your own. For that, you need to get the mind really, really quiet so that you can step out of the formation of thoughts and see them as something other. We live so much in our thought worlds, and we often can use one thought …
- Potentials… do something with our feelings, with our perceptions, with thought fabrications, and with consciousness. That’s how we create the path: looking for the potentials we have here and developing them. Wisdom isn’t simply a matter of accepting things. It’s seeing potentials and learning how to develop them in the proper way. There are some unskillful potentials, like the potential for sensuality …
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