[This document can be acquired from a sub-directory coombspapers via anonymous FTP and/or COOMBSQUEST gopher on the node COOMBS.ANU.EDU.AU] [This version: 24 January 1994] ----------------------------------------------------------------------- This material is republished from the January 1994 issue of GASSHO, a Buddhist electronic newsletter, published by DharmaNet International, P.O. Box 4951, Berkeley, CA 94704-4951, a not-for-profit organization. This text addresses some of the most fundamental and delicate religious issues. Therefore, it should be read, quoted and analysed in a mindful way. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTHING SPECIAL by Sister Ayya Khema Spiritual practice is often misunderstood and believed to be something special. It isn't. It is one's whole body and mind. Nothing special at all, just oneself. Many people think of it as meditation or ritual, devotional practice or chanting to be performed at a specific time in a certain place. Or it may be connected with a special person without whom the practice cannot occur. These are views and opinions which lead to nothing. In the best case they may result in sporadic practice and in the worst case, they lead to fracturing ourselves, making two, three or four people out of ourselves when we aren't even one whole yet. Namely, the ordinary person doing all the ordinary worldly chores and the other one who becomes spiritual at certain times in diverse ways. Meditation, rituals, devotional practice, chanting, certain places, certain people can all be added to our lives but they are not the essence of our spirituality. Our practice consists of constant purification; there's nothing else to be done. Eventually we will arrive at a point where our thought processes and feelings are not only kind and loving but also full of wisdom, bringing benefit to ourselves and others. That is possibly a designation of a goal. In order to get to that goal, however, we need to know exactly where we stand; otherwise how can we start on this journey? Many people go around in circles in their spiritual practice either having exaggerated or underrated ideas of their own worth. Both are detrimental to a fundamental recognition of ourselves. We need to enquire into any discomfort arising within. Imagine you are sitting on a pillow with one leg bent in such a way that the discomfort becomes greater and greater. Would you do something about it or would you just keep sitting like that for the rest of your life? Physical discomfort is something that all of us wish to escape or alleviate, and discard as quickly as possible. What about mental and emotional discomfort? What can be compared in importance to that and why do we feel uncomfortable so often? Nobody feels at ease in an untidy, messy household, or likewise when there are unwholesome aspects arising in our inner household such as resistances, dislikes, fears, feeling threatened, worries about our past or future. How can that be comfortable? Only when we realize that we are the manufacturers of our own discomforts is there any opening for change. If we still believe that other people, situations or the lack of appreciation, praise, love or opportunities, are at fault, we haven't started our practice yet. We must arrive at a starting point. If one runs a race, one has to find the starting line. We have to find a point of departure for this practice which is found within our own inner being. Only those people who are determined to grow in spirituality will find that fundamental basis within, from which inner growth can be generated. The whole person becomes involved and not just for the few hours of meditation or scattered moments of remembrance. The whole of each of us working the whole time at it can become purified. There must be no lip-service; it has to be real. All discomfort within us, all unhappiness, fear or worry, have been created by ourselves. Only then is the field wide open for change. That moment of acceptance and realization changes our whole world because now we can do something about our lives. Until then we were helpless victims. We cannot change the world or other people; we can hardly even change the behavior of a dog, but we can change ourselves. As long as we only believe this, but don't do it, we haven't started to practice. We can even sit in meditation, but no results will show in our lives. It starts with inner softness, acceptance and pliability. We become open to people and situations around us. If we retain our own ideas and viewpoints, continually liking or disliking the same areas of life, we are not sensitive to our inner reactions. Softness, acceptance and pliability may result in a great deal of pain, but that's part of practice. But because it's painful, it's often rejected. Surely that is the wrong way of dealing with ourselves. If we break a leg and don't want to have it set because that is painful, it would mean limping for the rest of our lives. This is equivalent to looking for a lifelong anesthetic which dulls all awareness and keeps us in a semi-awake state. Because all of us have the six roots of greed, hate and delusion and their opposites of generosity, love and wisdom, we are constantly manifesting one of these. Love and hate, greed and generosity, are usually equally distributed in most people. Delusion, however, is the underlying factor of all our mental emotional activities, and wisdom is rare. We are not actually hating anyone because he is hateful, but rather because our inner hate is looking for an outlet. This is one of the great absurdities of humanity, and only a very few people are aware of this simple fact which could change our whole life. When we hate, we don't do so because there's anything worth hating or disliking but only because hate wants to manifest itself. The one who becomes unhappy in the first instance is the one who is hating. This negative emotion is like a barb which we would like to use to hurt others, but it first pricks the one who is holding on to it. This is a law of nature and so simple that most people overlook it completely. We go through life having a distinct demarcation line: on the right everything we like and on the left everything we dislike. Certain qualities and characteristics are always either good or bad in our opinion. Sometimes it does not work out quite that way and we hate to shift our demarcation line. It's not a comfortable way of living. One is a person who cannot be happy because it's impossible to find only people and things that one likes. Since there is no perfection in existence, there's no hope for happiness in such a mode of reacting. It is amazing that most people have not woken up to this fact. Many have spoken and written about it but it remains a matter of spiritual practice. To recapitulate: first, we know that we are the doer. We are responsible for whatever is arising within us. Second, we can change because we realize that the dislikes, hates, fears and worries are creating unhappiness for ourselves. Change necessitates substitution. Here we can appreciate the training in meditation, where we are constantly called upon to substitute our thinking with being attentive to the breath. For one who doesn't meditate the substitution of one thought for another is an unknown factor. To exchange an unwholesome thought with a wholesome thought is an almost unbelievable idea for people who do not know anything about spiritual practice. We are prone to believe what we are thinking. That nobody else is thinking the same has never occurred to us. To be the only one with such a thought amongst four billion inhabitants is an absurdity rarely noticed. The next important step in our maturing process is the recognition of our own //dukkha//. This seems so simple that one wonders why it is often difficult to follow through with it. If we have //dukkha// like everybody does, we are in the first instance inclined to blame someone or something. We can start with people, continue with situations, and include our sense contacts, what we hear, see, taste, touch and smell. The possibilities for blame are infinite. But when we indulge in them, we are refusing our first insight; namely, that we, ourselves, are responsible. If we hold fast to that understanding, then we begin to see //dukkha// in a different way. Namely, as part and parcel of being human; as a universal and not a personal truth. However, when we are disliking our painful feelings and are not willing to accept the fact that our own mind is the culprit, then we will look for a scapegoat. This is a very popular past-time and possible scapegoats are innumerable. When we remember that we're causing our own //dukkha// we are back to spiritual practice. As we dislike our own //dukkha//, hate arises at the same time which results in "double //dukkha//." Using insight into self-made //dukkha// as our next step, we have a chance of changing the discomfort within ourselves from dislike and hate to, at least, acceptance. Eventually a feeling of being at ease with oneself arises, without which meditation cannot flourish. These are fundamental aspects of ourselves which we need to investigate and experience. Spiritual practice involves one's whole being and the exploration of our reactions, developing sensitivity and vulnerability to others and being able to roll with the punches. We begin to realize that there are certain necessary learning situations in our lives and if we don't make use of them, we will get the same ones over and over again. If we look back for a moment, we may be able to see identical situations have arisen many times. They'll continue to do so many lifetimes, unless we change. Spiritual practice is not just sitting on a pillow but more an opening of the mind to what is actually going on inside. If that opening is closed the moment we stand up, then we haven't really been meditating successfully. It is not so much how long we can attend to the breath or the sensations but rather how aware and how awake we become. Then we can use that awareness in our everyday reactions and thinking processes. There is the Cartesian view: "I think, therefore I am." Actually it's the other way around: "I am, therefore I think." Unless we can get some kind of order into our thoughts and emotional reactions which follow the thinking process, our mind will constantly play havoc with our inner household. The realization of where our //dukkha// comes from must be followed by the understanding that disliking it will not make it go away; only letting go of wanting makes //dukkha// disappear, which means unequivocal acceptance. Accepting oneself results in being able to accept others. The difficulty with other people is that they present a mirror in which we can see our own mistakes. How useful it is to have such a mirror. When we live with others we can see ourselves as if it were a mirror-image and eventually we learn to be together like milk with water, which completely blend. It is up to each one of us to blend; if we wait for others to do it we are not practicing. This is a difficult undertaking but also a very important one. Eventually we will create the inner comfort to expand our consciousness and awareness to an understanding of universality. The world at large is very busy and we get caught up in extraneous matters. The world inside is also very busy but we can do something about that. We can quieten it down to see more clearly. The way of spiritual practice is nothing special, just our whole body and mind. [AYYA KHEMA was ordained as a Buddhist nun in Sri Lanka in 1979. She established Wat Buddha Dhamma, a forest monastery near Sydney, Australia, and in 1989 established Buddha-Haus in Germany, where she is currently spiritual director.] ----------------------------------------------------------------------- end of file