Search results for: "Impermanence"
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- The Stakes Are High… The fact that it was their karma that determined where they were going meant that the causes were impermanent. And so the results would have to be impermanent, too, even for the highest levels of the gods up in the Brahma levels. They’d stay for a while and then they would fall back down again. So time and space are defined by our …
- Poison Your Fantasies… You know that food is impermanent, your stomach is impermanent, but that’s not enough to make you decide you’re going to stop eating. The needs of the body, the needs of the mind, force you to keep on eating. You’ve got to look into what creates those needs. This is why we have to get the mind still: to see these …
- The Best of a Bad Situation… Learn to accept the fact that these pleasures were impermanent but basically learning how to let go of one pleasure so you could embrace another. That seemed to be the main attitude. Then there came the airplane attacks and everybody’s attitude changed. All of a sudden people were suddenly aware of danger. And it’s interesting to see how people who were so …
- Everybody Suffers… But what does that mean, the fact that there is this drive to want to be connected with someone else, yet constantly frustrated by impermanence? What’s to be done about this? You can think about it in your own particular terms. You might say, “Well, just find somebody else.” Or you can start thinking about the larger patterns of human life. The same …
- To the Far Shore… His brother asked him, “All those years you’d been spending as a monk, what did you learn?” The monk said, “Everything changes.” And the brother said, “Duh, of course.” Yet the teaching that everything changes—everything fabricated, everything put together, is impermanent, inconstant: It is an important teaching. The question is, why is it important? To see how it’s important, you have …
- The Noble Truths Come First… In other words, they say that we suffer because we don’t realize that things are inconstant or impermanent, or because we don’t realize that there’s no self, which is one of the interpretations of anatta. If we’d only learn the truth of these things, then we wouldn’t suffer anymore. We wouldn’t have any unrealistic expectations and we’d …
- Cutting the Fetters… You think about how, yes, the aggregates are the things that make up what you are, but they’re obviously impermanent, so they can’t constitute a permanent self. That’s what they say. Actually, the aggregates are what you use to create your sense of self. But in any event, they claim that you see that these things are impermanent, and you agree …
- Happy for People You Don’t Like … Not only is the happiness they’ve gained impermanent, and the things they’ve done to gain it are unskillful—at least, right in the present moment—but the happiness doesn’t prevent them from acting in unskillful ways. This shows you that happiness is not all that safe. We may aspire to happiness of one kind or another, but it’s important that …
- A Better Place to Feed… It’s going to take time. “From the cessation of this comes the cessation of that”—the seed is impermanent, which means that no matter how big and solid the tree may grow, it, too, is going to be impermanent. But we’re not dealing with trees, we’re dealing with our own actions. What this means is that what you’re experiencing right …
- Antidotes for Narcissism… Ultimately, all these qualities are meant to lead to a sense of disenchantment, dispassion, as you see that all bodies are equal and impermanent, all feelings are equal and impermanent, whether yours or somebody else’s. The same holds true for mind states and mental qualities. No matter where you wander, no matter what you might crave or cling to, it all leads to …
- Enlightenment is Not a Hot Dog… We may have an idea that we want a particular insight, great insights into anicca, upekkha, impermanence, equanimity, dependent co-arising, but you don’t get there unless you focus on the nitty-gritty of everyday life. When greed arises, how does it arise? If you want to understand dependent co-arising, you’ve got to look at your greed. You’ve got to …
- Perceptions of Self & Not-Self… Sometimes that word, anicca, is translated as impermanent, but that’s not precisely what it means. It means to be inconstant. It’s unreliable. So your body is unreliable. Your feelings, your perceptions, your thought constructs, and your consciousness are all unreliable. So, if these things are unreliable, why do you want to continue to cling to them? The answer usually is, “What else …
- Is It Worth It?… more effort spent for what? What results? When the Buddha advises us to look at things as impermanent or inconstant, stressful, and not self, it’s to remind us that we put a lot of effort into these things and that’s all that can be created through our effort: things are inconstant, stressful, and not-self. Most things just end right there. The …
- The Beginnings of Wisdom… It’s important to keep that point in mind, especially when we listen to the teachings on inconstancy or impermanence. Remember that the desire for long-term happiness provides the framework for understanding how to use the teachings on inconstancy, because a lot of people get it the other way around. They say that wisdom starts with seeing how everything is inconstant. Then, from …
- The Arrow in the Heart… It’s not the case that, when concentration comes, you just watch it come and watch it go and say, “Oh, yes, we’ve learned something about impermanence or inconstancy.” Your duty with regard to concentration is to develop it. You should make it strong enough to be your refuge. You cultivate it: You try to make it come and to keep it from …
- The Buddha’s Shoulds… This is where the ugly side of the eating nature of the mind shows itself, when you look for your happiness based on something that’s impermanent like that. You have to realize that the Buddha’s vision begins with something utterly different: realizing the importance of your actions. We’re all looking for happiness, and we’re all going to have to be …
- Four Mountains Moving In… But even good connections are impermanent. They don’t last forever. This is why the path we follow is the kamma to put an end to kamma, to cut all the connections. As the Buddha said, discernment is when you see things as separate. In other words, you separate yourself out from the connections. It’s only there that you’re safe. Now, some …
- Your Inner Coach… You’d have to live in a world of conflict, you’d have to live in a world of impermanence, disappointment, sorrow, grief, lamentation, despair. There would be no way out. But if you believe there is such a thing as nibbana, there is a way out. And as it turns out, the path leading there is an honorable path. So he said, even …
- Location, Location… We complain about the objects of craving, saying that they’re impermanent or inconstant, but the craving itself is pretty inconstant and unreliable. Still, it is something you can tame. As you tame it and use it to keep the mind concentrated, you get to know it better and better. You see what it means to have a location, and how the mind creates …
- Testing Karma… So anything that’s inconstant or impermanent will not qualify. Two, it really does have to be happy, so anything that’s stressful doesn’t qualify. And three, it has to be something you can trust. So anything that you can’t control doesn’t qualify, either. How do you test those things? You push the limits. As when you practice concentration: As I …
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