Search results for: virtue
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Contents
… 17. Arahants of every sort attain both release through concentration and release through discernment, having developed the threefold training to completion. The Ever-present Truth § 1. The root meditation themes § 2. Virtue. § 3. Potential § 4. Contemplating the body § 5. Purifying the mind § 6. The method of practice for those who have studied a great deal § 7. The principles of the practice are ever-present …- A Happy Tradition… You develop your virtue; you develop your discernment. So, there are skills that can enable you not to suffer, no matter what your past karma is. He’s giving you power. For a lot of us, that takes a lot of getting used to. Either the culture of our families or the culture of the religion we were raised in told us to have …
- Pain… conviction, virtue, generosity, discernment. But you’re really going to need them at the moment of death, too. Conviction that the Buddha was right: What you do with the mind right now is really going to make a difference. That was one of his major insights in the night of his awakening. Your past karma throughout life may have an influence on where you …
- Nurturing Patient Endurance… On top of conviction, comes virtue. In fact, virtue is part of conviction. If you really are convinced in the power of your actions, you’re going to be very careful about how you act. And generosity: That, too, grows out of conviction. As the Buddha said, you’re convinced that something good will come from your generosity; it’s not a waste. It …
- The Search for Happiness… But if you see that you’re living a relatively harmless life, that yields more joy in of the practice of virtue. You see that you’re principled: that people could give you rewards for breaking the precepts but you wouldn’t accept those rewards. That gives you a sense of self-esteem, a higher level of happiness. Then, of course, there’s goodwill …
- Catch It in the Act… All the basic elements of the path—virtue, concentration, and discernment—are things you already have to some extent. So if your virtue is weak, you can develop some concentration, not as much as when your virtue is strong, but still you can develop some. And you can develop some wisdom even when your concentration is weak. It won’t be as good as …
Noble Strategy
What is Emptiness?
… To master the emptiness mode of perception requires training in firm virtue, concentration, and discernment. Without this training, the mind tends to stay in the mode that keeps creating stories and worldviews. And from the perspective of that mode, the teaching of emptiness sounds simply like another story or worldview with new ground rules. In terms of the story of your relationship with your …Show 4 additional results in this book- Reflect… In the same way, virtue is a mirror. Concentration is a mirror. And ultimately, of course, discernment is a mirror. It teaches you how to relate to your thoughts, both the thoughts that occur in the context of the concentration, and those that occur outside. You want to be able to step back and not get taken up by what you think is true …
- The Seven Treasures… That was it, as if virtue simply had to do with externals. As Ajaan Mun pointed out many, many times: The essence of virtue is in the intention. Intention is a quality of mind, so virtue is a quality of mind. It’s a quality you want to ensconce in your mind, because it makes life easier for you and for the people around …
- Heedful of What’s Precious… But for the Buddha, the simple fact of being alive or having belongings is not in and of itself a virtue. As he once said, “One day lived mindfully is better than a hundred years lived mindlessly.” One day lived with virtue, one day lived with concentration, one day lived discerning the arising and passing away of your mental states, is better than a …
- A Sense of Yourself… That leads to the second quality the Buddha asks you to look at, which is your virtue. To what extent are you actually causing intentional harm? He gives five types of harm you want to avoid across the board: killing, stealing, illicit sex, lying, and taking intoxicants. But there’s also the harm that comes by inciting greed, aversion, and delusion in yourself by …
- A Generosity of Spirit… One is generosity; the other is virtue. Virtue is basically abstaining, not harming anybody, and that’s a gift that can be given to all beings. Just as goodwill is unlimited, our virtue can be unlimited. In other words, we don’t harm anybody, we don’t kill anybody, we don’t steal from anybody, have illicit sex with anybody, don’t lie to …
- Setbacks… The standard explanation is that virtue nurtures concentration, concentration nurtures discernment, discernment leads to release. But the actual Pali explanation of this is that, “Concentration nurtured with virtue leads to great rewards. Discernment nurtured with concentration leads to great rewards. When the mind is nurtured with discernment, then it’s released from the effluents.” In other words, there is the possibility of having concentration …
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Nobility is the Best Policy
… The point here is that you know you’re going to lose these things someday, but you make sure that you don’t lose your virtue or your right view in trying to hang on to them. Because even as you hang on, they get taken away, and then you’ve lost everything. Virtue, right view: These are things you don’t have to …
- How to Read Yourself… If you’re down on yourself, think about your own virtue, your own generosity. All of us here have practice in virtue, practice in generosity. We’re all people of wealth: inner wealth, inner worth. There’s no need to get down on yourself. Just remind yourself that meditation does have its fallow periods. They usually come from a lack of heedfulness. You start …
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Refuge
Preface
… After beginning with the joys of generosity, he would describe the joys of a virtuous life, followed by the rewards of generosity and virtue to be experienced here and, after death, in heaven; the drawbacks of sensual pleasures, even heavenly ones; and the rewards of renunciation. Then, when he sensed that his listeners were inclined to look favorably on renunciation as a way to …Show 4 additional results in this book
- The Benefits of Refuge… What it means is that you use it well, use it for the purpose of generosity, for the purpose of virtue, for the purpose of training your mind, knowing that there will come a time when you have to let it go. That’s getting good use out of it. But if you latch on to it, then because you’re latched on to …
- The Buddha’s Buffet… The thread running through all of his instructions for how to hang around is virtue. Make sure you don’t break the five precepts. He says, “When a husband and wife living together both observe the precepts, it’s as if they both are living with a deva.” As I mentioned this afternoon, there was a case of a couple who came to the …
- Respecting the Dhamma Together… we look for happiness in terms of generosity, we look for happiness in terms of virtue and in terms of developing good qualities of the mind. If we’re looking for happiness someplace else, we’re looking for trouble. This is one of the reasons why the world doesn’t have any peace. Very few people are looking for happiness inside, they’re looking …
- Maybe the Buddha Knew Something… developing virtue pleasing to the noble ones. It’s a very delicate balancing act. On the one hand, it means you observe the precepts in a way that’s unbroken—in other words, you really hold to the precepts without exception. Whatever they tell you to do, you follow them, even if it demands changing your habits. One of the precepts I’ve noticed …
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