… We really want to be
happy, and there is a way to find true happiness that doesn’t cause
any harm at all.
So he’s not the sort of person who says to forget about your desire
for happiness, just accept things as they are, or try to submerge your
desire for happiness in working for the happiness of others. After
all, if …
… Try to notice what way of breathing feels good, what way of
breathing doesn’t feel good, and realize that you have the choice. If
you want to breathe in a painful way, you can go ahead and do it, but
it doesn’t really help anything. It’s much more productive to find a
comfortable way of breathing, a way of breathing that …
… Ajaan Fuang once recommended a perception where you have
a cord of energy running down through the middle of the torso. As you
breathe in, the breath comes into that cord from all directions, and
it goes out from that cord in all directions. You just hold that
perception in mind. You don’t have to do anything to force the breath
that way …
… Aging, illness, and death are its shadows or effects that show by way of the body. When we want to kill our enemy and so take a knife to stab his shadow, how is he going to die? In the same way, ignorant people try to destroy the shadows of stress and don’t get anywhere. As for the essence of stress in the …
… Other times, it feels like there’s a column of energy running
down the middle of the torso, and the breath comes in to and out from
that column in all directions.
You wonder why it is that you can experience the breath energy in so
many different ways. Well, look into that, because in some cases it’s
because the breath is already …
… In the beginning we’re born, then in the middle we change, and in the end we fall apart and die. Death is something no one aspires to, and yet no one can escape it. We all have death at the end of our path.
Thinking about death gives rise both to benefits and to harm. For shortsighted people it’s harmful, because it …
… What you need is what the Buddha calls, “penetrative” knowledge, in
which you understand some activity of the mind, good or bad; notice
what’s causing it; notice its diversity—as the Buddha calls it—which
means seeing what ways it’s good, what ways it’s bad; what’s the range
of suffering or happiness that this particular phenomenon—like
feelings or perceptions …
… Fine results are of high quality and are useful in all sorts of ways—like atomic radiation, which is so fine that it can penetrate even mountains. Crude things are of low quality and hard to use. Sometimes you can soak them in water all day long and they still don’t soften up. But as for fine things, all they need is a …
… Instead, he found the middle way that led to true happiness inside, a deathless happiness, a happiness that doesn’t depend on any conditions at all. And he was able to do it not because he was some special divine being, but because he took the issue of happiness really seriously and he developed whatever qualities of mind were needed. So you want to …
… And you, monks, are very helpful to householders, as you teach them the Dhamma admirable in the beginning, admirable in the middle, and admirable in the end, as you expound the holy life both in its particulars and in its essence, entirely complete, surpassingly pure. In this way the holy life is lived in mutual dependence, for the purpose of crossing over the flood …
… a life that’s devoted to finding
true happiness rather than just muddling around the way we’ve been
doing in our wanton ways for who knows how long. You can make
something noble out of yourself. That’s the message of the noble
truths, all of them. So take that message to heart.
… The air can’t force its way in on its own.
Where does that energy originate? Ajaan Lee lists a couple of what he calls “resting spots” of the breath: above the navel, at the tip of the sternum, the base of the throat, the palate, the middle of the head, the top of the head. Experiment to see which of these centers is …
… In this way, Sāvatthī provides the stage for a multi-faceted
glimpse into the middle period of the Buddha’s life, in his
role as teacher to devas and human beings at large and,
simultaneously, founder of and rule-giver for the Saṅgha.
At that time, Anāthapiṇḍika the householder was the
brother-in-law of the Rājagaha moneylender. Then he traveled to
Rājagaha on …
… It’s because we’re stupid in so many ways that we suffer so much. When craving arises, it damages people all around us. This is why we should develop the causes for happiness and ease, so as to prevent these kinds of dangers—for when difficulties arise, the mind will start spinning in all sorts ways that will cause us to suffer.
For …
… This is the right effort that really constitutes the middle way: in other words, appropriate effort, appropriate for whatever the occasion, whatever the defilement coming up in the present, and whatever your state of mind. Sometimes this requires very delicate work, very refined, very easy. Sometimes it’s hard and takes a lot of effort. You have to sit through a good amount of …
… If something’s not working, can you think up another
way of applying the principles that would work?
In other words, you don’t throw out the principles, but you explore
them, you probe them, think them through. As Ajaan Lee once said, “The
ways of the mind are so many there’s no way any book could ever
contain them all”—and that …
… We’re looking for patterns—patterns in our behavior that
are unskillful—and for ways in which we can change our behavior so
it’s more skillful. For that, you have to look at your actions over
time and try to do them well, which is why there’s the ardency in
there.
There’s a strange passage in the Commentary, where it tries …
… There’s a certain way of
breathing that goes with the anger: Do you enjoy that? A certain way
of thinking that goes with the anger: Do you enjoy that? Do you enjoy
the perceptions? What kick do you get out of the perceptions or the
feelings that go with the anger? These are the things about which
you’ve got to be very …
… But the question is, where
does the teaching actually make a difference? Where does it really
help? Probably the most useful formulation of emptiness is one of the
earliest ones, where the Buddha talks about emptiness being a way of
perceiving in which you don’t add to or take anything away from what’s
really right here, right now.
We spend most of …
As you practice, there’s a way in which you have to think that the
path is the goal, and there’s a way in which you have to think the
path is not the goal. The path leads to the goal, so they’re two
separate things. The way in which the path is the goal is that you
have to pay full …
III. Inner Release | Inner Strength & Parting Gifts: Talks by Ajaan Lee Dhammadharo
… Aging, illness, and death are its shadows or effects that show by way of the body. When we want to kill our enemy and so take a knife to stab his shadow, how is he going to die? In the same way, ignorant people try to destroy the shadows of stress and don’t get anywhere. As for the essence of stress in the …
