Search results for: "The Three Characteristics"
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- Can Do… It’s interesting that when he taught the five brethren the three characteristics, nothing quaked. But the four noble truths caused the earth to quake. He’s basically saying that suffering is something you can comprehend; you can abandon the cause, and you can realize its cessation, and there’s a path of practice you can develop to do that. And the Buddha’s …
- Thoughts About Thinking… It’s usually around what are called, “the three characteristics,” as in the case where one of the monks said, “Well, given that all feelings are stressful, and all your actions creates feelings, that means all actions create stress and pain.” The Buddha says, “When you’re talking about kamma, you have to talk about the three kinds of feelings: pleasure, pain, neither pleasure …
- The Buddha’s Basic Therapy… the four noble truths, the three characteristics, emptiness. It’s like building a house without a foundation, or setting up a pole without having anything to support it. The foundation is important; the supports are important. Just because something is elementary doesn’t mean that it’s beneath us. It deals with elements, it deals with basic principles that have to be established before …
- Issues of Control… Think about Ajaan Lee’s observation that when you’re getting the mind in concentration, you’re going against the three characteristics. You’re taking this mind, which is inconstant, and you’re trying to make it constant in its focus, which means giving it a focus that it feels good about, a focus that’s expansive. Think of hunters going through the forest …
- Using Your Many Minds… They correspond to the three characteristics. “My” brings up the question of self and not self. “Long-term” brings up the question of whether things are constant or not. “Welfare and happiness” brings up the issue of suffering and happiness, suffering and pleasure, stress and ease. And the question gives you a context for employing those perceptions. The Buddha never talks about three characteristics …
- Protection… Often we hear of discernment being about the three characteristics and emptiness. But the Buddha also talks about discernment in very practical terms: understanding your mind, being able to convince the mind when things are difficult that it can do skillful things, even when it’s feeling weak or threatened. That’s how your discernment grows. These are your strengths and these are the …
- Antidotes for Clinging… The sense in which the five aggregates are stressful is related to stress in terms of the three characteristics. They’re inconstant and so they’re stressful. That’s simply the way they are, whether you hold on to them or not. But if you don’t grab on to these things, your mind doesn’t suffer. It’s when you grab on, it …
- Justice vs. Skillfulness… As for the suffering that comes from the three characteristics, that’s something that can’t be stopped. Those characteristics are still going to keep on manifesting themselves in the world. The question is: Do you have to suffer from them, does your mind have to suffer from them? And the answer is No. So the focus is specifically on how the way you …
- The Ennobling Path… You look for the disturbance—whatever changes, whatever is stressful—and that’s two of the three characteristics right there. Then you let go. You don’t try to create any sense of “you” around it. You don’t create anything more there. You don’t add anything to it; you don’t take anything away. That’s the essence of the teaching on …
- Perceptions of Self & Not-Self… Secondly, he never called not-self a “characteristic.” Sometimes we hear that the Buddha taught the three characteristics of inconstancy, stress, and not-self. But he never called them characteristics. He called them perceptions. That should alert you right there: Something is up. Self is a perception. Not-self is also a perception. And it’s not the case that one of those is …
- Questioning & Acceptance… Even his questions on what are commonly called the three characteristics are actually questions using three perceptions: inconstancy, stress, and not-self. He posed those as a series of questions on what’s working and what’s not, what’s skillful and what’s not. First you develop a strong sense of concentration, and then, when you’ve mastered enough, you can start investigating …
- Intelligent about Change… All too often, people talk about the three characteristics—or the three perceptions—totally without reference to the four noble truths. The four noble truths carry four different duties, and one of those duties is to develop concentration, to develop mindfulness. You don’t just watch these things come and go. Then, within the context of the four noble truths, you use the three …
- Selves with Skills… That’s taking the three characteristics and making them the main issue. The main issue is actually in the four noble truths, starting with the fact that we suffer in our clinging, we cling because of craving, and we crave because of ignorance. However, it is possible to put an end to that ignorance, put an end to that craving, by following the path …
- Feeding Frenzy: Dependent Co-arising… You’ve probably heard of the three characteristics, but it’s interesting to note that the term “three characteristics” doesn’t appear in the Pali Canon. The Buddha talks about anicca, dukkha, and anatta, but he doesn’t use the word for characteristic—lakkhana—to go along with them. He uses the word perception or mental label: anicca-sañña, dukkha-sañña, anatta-sañña. You …
- Experimental Intelligence… Sometimes we hear that the basic Buddhist insight is into the three characteristics — inconstancy, stress, not-self — which doesn’t seem to involve many connections between cause and effect. But here you have to remember two things. One, the Buddha never talked about “three characteristics.” The phrase “three characteristics” doesn’t appear in his teachings. That was something added later in the commentaries. He …
- Learning from What You Do… The dukkha or suffering of the three characteristics is something that’s built into things. But the dukkha or the suffering and stress that comes from craving—the dukkha of the four noble truths: That’s something that doesn’t have to be there. That’s something you can change. And learning to see the distinction between these two forms of stress requires that …
- A Good Foundation… should be abandoned. The other is the four noble truths, because the duties of the truths hold across the board. A lot of other teachings have their time and place. The three characteristics, for instance: There are times when you use those perceptions, and other times when you shouldn’t. They can actually get in the way. So you have to have a sense …
- How to Use the Three Perceptions… Now, notice that the three characteristics or the three perceptions are not mentioned there. That’s because they don’t always fit the Buddha’s categories for right speech. They are true, as in that sutta we just chanted right now, that says whether these is a Buddha or not a Buddha, these things are true. But holding them in mind is not always …
- Free Not to Suffer… There’s the suffering in what are called the three characteristics, which basically consists of the fact that things change, the change comes about because they’re conditioned, and the conditions are unstable. So, there’s a stress there, especially if you’re trying to find your happiness in those things. Then there’s the suffering and stress in the four noble truths, and …
- More than Just Letting Go… The suffering in terms of the three characteristics—in other words, the fact that things depend on causes that are unstable and will have to change, which means there’s stress built into those things: That you will never be able to change. But the stress that comes from your own craving and clinging: That’s not necessary; that’s not built into things …
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