Search results for: "Impermanence"
- Swept Downstream… Aniccam usually was translated as “impermanent.” The question is, “If something is impermanent, is it easeful or stressful?” He said he didn’t see any direct connection between things being impermanent and their being stressful, because with some things, when they’re impermanent it’s actually good. When a disease is impermanent and goes away, that’s a good thing. Or if a bad …
- Inconstancy… Sometimes it’s translated as “impermanence,” but the word nicca doesn’t mean permanent. It means constant. *Anicca, *its opposite, means not constant. When you realize that, you see it all around you. Of course, we see impermanence around us, too. We know that everything is impermanent, even the mountain over there to the east. That’s impermanent. But we feel it’s solid …
- Exploring Contentment… I know some people who say, “Well, the path is something that’s impermanent. Concentration is impermanent. Even awakening is impermanent, so you’ve just got to accept impermanence and stop trying, relax.” That doesn’t accomplish anything. That attitude actually short-circuits the path. As we meditate, we’re exploring to locate the line between what we can control and what we can …
- The Intelligence of Restraint… You could take the lesson of the impermanence of things and do almost anything you wanted with it: “Things are impermanent, so grab onto what you can, while you can, when you get the chance”—but that’s very short-sighted. To listen to the Dhamma, you have to listen to impermanence and everything else in light of the four noble truths. That way …
- The Brightness of Life… All they had seen in the texts were suffering, suffering, suffering, and impermanence. So they expected Asian Buddhists to be pretty depressed. But they found that they were actually very happy. And their original conclusion was that Asian Buddhists didn’t know their own religion very well. The scholars felt superior because they’d been reading the books. They assumed that the people in …
- The Knife of Discernment… We hear over and over again that, because of the principle of impermanence, even Awakening must be impermanent, but that’s not true. The Buddha didn’t say that everything is impermanent, only that conditioned things are impermanent. And even on the conditioned level, it’s possible to make irrevocable changes. This is why training the mind is so worthwhile. With practice, we can …
- Defeatism? - Anything But… The Buddha is portrayed as saying that your body is impermanent, your mind is impermanent, the world is impermanent, anything you try for would be impermanent, so just give up. You’d be happier not trying—which, of course, is nothing at all like what the Buddha actually said. One of his terms for the noble eightfold path was, “unexcelled victory in battle.” He …
- Mindfulness + Discernment = Intelligence… If you just let your ox wander around as it likes and say, “Well, the ox is impermanent, where it goes is impermanent,” you’re not going to get anywhere. You’re not going to get any crops at all. So the Buddha offers us all these tools, and we have all these potentials within us. Intelligence lies in recognizing what’s happening right …
- A Tale of Two Kings… Might as well try to get what I can, while I can.” After all, the simple fact of impermanence can be interpreted in a lot of ways, can be used to justify all kinds of behavior, one of which is: “Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we may die.” Another may be more mouse-like in accepting impermanence, but if that’s all …
- A Graduated Discourse… After talking about the joys of heaven, he would remind them, though, that because the causes of going to heaven are impermanent, heaven itself is impermanent. You can’t go there and stay for eternity. You get there as a result of actions that are temporary, so heaven itself is going to be temporary. Think about that. There are some religions that say you …
- Inconstancy… The word anicca, which we’re translating as inconstant here, is sometimes translated as impermanent. I know a number of people who say that impermanent things are not necessarily bad. As the Buddha said, if something is anicca, it’s stressful. But say you’ve got an illness, and the illness goes away. It’s a good thing the illness is impermanent. So why …
- Using Perceptions… Sometimes it’s translated as impermanent, but that doesn’t get to the meaning of the word in the Pali language. It also doesn’t get to the simple fact that if you say something is impermanent, then the Buddha tries to draw from that the conclusion that it’s stressful. Yet not all impermanent things are stressful. If you have a disease that …
- A Path of Aggregates… Sometimes it’s translated as impermanent, but there are a lot of impermanent things that we feel are okay to hold on to. “They may be impermanent, but they’re less impermanent than I am, so I might as well hold on.” But if things are inconstant, it’s like trying to sit in a chair where one of the legs is not long …
- In the Context of the Deathless… They think that when the Buddha talks about things being inconstant and impermanent, he’s providing the context, saying that we simply have to put up with these facts and say that “If I’m going to look for happiness, I have to accept the fact that it’s going to be inconstant and impermanent.” That’s pretty miserable. But there are people who …
- Let Go Like a Millionaire… But then the fact that you’re impermanent, inconstant, means that you’re setting yourself up for a fall. I’ve been reading some books on the noble eightfold path. And one of the strange things is that when they define right view, they all tend to define it in terms of the three characteristics of inconstancy, stress, and not-self. They start out …
- Always Looking Inside… He was explaining to Ajaan Fuang his meditation technique, which was that whatever he was focused on, he tried to see it as impermanent, suffering, and not-self. Again Ajaan Fuang’s comment was to turn around to look at who’s doing the commenting, who’s saying that things are impermanent, stressful, and not self. That’s the troublemaker. So this is what …
- Scribe Knowledge, Warrior Knowledge… It’s not a matter of telling yourself, “Gee, my stomach is impermanent, and food is impermanent, therefore I’ll just stop eating.” You’re going to have to eat as long as there’s a body and as long as there’s a mind functioning. But there is this happiness inside that’s unfabricated, that doesn’t need to feed, but you attain …
- The Skill of Letting Go… Sometimes the word anicca is translated as “impermanent.” But you could argue that, with some things, the fact that they’re impermanent is a good thing. When disease is impermanent and goes away, that’s good. When bad conditions go away, that’s good. But think about things as being inconstant—and that’s basically what the word literally means, it’s the opposite …
- Ending Suffering… Sometimes we hear about his teachings on impermanence and inconstancy, and it sounds like he has a really negative attitude toward change. Well, that’s not the case. If it weren’t for our ability to change for the better, there wouldn’t be any use for the practice. What we’re doing here is learning how to change our habits. The impermanence that …
- The Dhamma Eye… In other words, you accept the fact of inconstancy or impermanence. But what kind of experience would legitimately lead you to accept that principle, and why would it be a milestone? Actually, though, the Canon’s language is very particular—notice that the insight is not about “arising,” it’s about “origination,” the act of causing something—and you have to think about what …
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