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Guided Meditation: Certainty; Dharmette: Hindrances and Wholesomeness (1 of 5) Uncertainty - Gil Fronsdal

The following talk was given by Gil Fronsdal at Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, CA on September 30, 2024. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.

Introduction

Good morning and welcome again. I believe all the buttons, switches, and things are in place. I was away for three weeks teaching a three-week retreat at our Insight Retreat Center, and that was quite wonderful. I'm still somewhat with it, and this week I'll be teaching something that came from that retreat. So for me, it's a little bit of a continuation of the retreat, and for you, maybe a little taste of the teachings from that retreat.

One of the invaluable personal states for doing meditation is confidence. Of course, confidence is not easy to come to, so maybe a different word from the ancient tradition might be helpful, and that is certainty. To meditate with certainty. The core thing that the tradition emphasizes is not exactly what you do, but how you do it. We do our practice with confidence, focusing on practicing in a way that benefits us, that nourishes us, and to have certainty about the value of doing that. This is as opposed to maybe unconsciously having certainty in the value of doubting oneself, or criticizing oneself, or feeling inadequate in some kind of way. The rumination, the repetition of thoughts and attitudes toward ourselves that undermine what we're doing, can be quite pervasive and difficult.

The idea is to come to a way of understanding the teaching in such a way that, even in the simplest way, no matter what the background, what the past experiences we have, we can have some confidence in the value of showing up in a clear way for this moment, for this experience. However the past expresses itself in this moment, it's this moment that we want to have confidence in how we meet it—to meet it in a way that does not undermine ourselves, does not deflate us. And so, to sit with evoking some inner strength, some inner certainty in the value of seeing, knowing what's happening here and now in a way that is not deflating, that is maybe even nourishing or meaningful.

Guided Meditation: Certainty

So, assuming a meditation posture. This idea of sitting with certainty or confidence can begin with the posture. So even though it can be very difficult to call upon confidence sometimes, assuming a confident posture will begin calling on that. With a certain certainty about the value of being here and now, having a posture that feels grounded on the earth that is supporting you. The contact against the cushion, the chair, the bed, the floor where the weight of your body settles here on this spot. To know with confidence, to know with certainty that here you are, in this place, on this little place that supports your weight.

Taking a few deep, relaxed inhales. As you exhale, relax into this place. Let your body settle. As you breathe in, let the filling of the lungs also be a filling of yourself with confidence in the simplicity of being here now. And then to let your breathing return to normal.

There's a way of relaxing the body where there's a confidence or certainty in the value of softening in the body, that this is a good thing, that this is a way to be more here in your body. As you exhale, to soften the muscles of your face. As you exhale, to soften the shoulders. Exhaling, softening the belly. Exhaling, and softening the whole body, relaxing any ways in which you're bracing yourself against life.

As you exhale, softening the mind, relaxing the thinking mind, with certainty or confidence that the mind works better when it's relaxed, soft.

And then to settle into your breathing, relying on the simplest, most direct way that you can feel your body breathing. If it's difficult to feel your breathing, you might put your hand on your belly or your chest to feel the movements there. With the idea of keeping meditation radically simple, let yourself have confidence that you're able to know the present moment simply. You can know breathing in whatever way is obvious for you, but have confidence that that keeps you in the present, knowing, feeling the body breathing. And having confidence in the value of doing that without any harshness, aversion, or without doubt, or that the knowing itself can be free of anxiety. Find a way to know simply, having confidence in the value of the simple knowing of the present.

See if you can practice with a calm certainty, with a calm assurance that calmly being present for the simplicity of this moment is enough. Nothing to figure out, nothing to plan, nothing to fix. Just being present here and now in a kind way, in a non-critical way, in a way that doesn't deflate. To be mindful in a way that we're nourished by the confidence of simple knowing.

And then as we come to the end of the sitting, to take a gentle, deeper breath, to feel and sense here and now. To find a way to sense and feel and know here and now in a simple, gentle way. Simple, kind way, where we allow ourselves to be present to the simplicity of the moment, maybe calmly and in a way that feels good for our whole system, our whole nervous system. Just here, allowing ourselves to be the way we are, confident in this value of simply knowing.

And having confidence in the value of being present for others in simple ways. To be present to listen, to see, to experience others without the filters of our emotions and agendas and preferences and fears. To be present with others in a way that allows them to relax, allows them to feel at ease with us, so perhaps some deeper part of who they are has a chance to surface. May it be that this practice we do gives us the ability to set others at ease. May it be that it brings forth, makes room for the capacity that others have to feel happy, safe, peaceful, and free.

May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. And may all beings be free.

Thank you.

Dharmette: Hindrances and Wholesomeness (1 of 5) Uncertainty

So, being rusty from this technological process of being on YouTube, there was one more thing I had to do, and that was to plug in my laptop so I could see you all chat.

Welcome on this Monday morning to a new week and a new theme for our practice together. It's not exactly a new theme, since there have been times before that I taught on this, and it's a common topic for Vipassanā teachers to teach on, and that is the five hindrances.¹ I'll be teaching it differently than how it's normally taught, perhaps. For one thing, I'll teach it in reverse order. The five hindrances, the order is usually sensual desire, ill will, usually called sloth and torpor, the third one; fourth one, restlessness and regrets; and the last one is usually called doubt. So I'll start with the last one.

The reference point for all these hindrances will have a common reference point, and that is that of wholesomeness and unwholesomeness, skillfulness and unskillfulness. That was the topic of my Dharma talk yesterday morning, Sunday morning at IMC, that maybe in some ways was an introduction for this week. I'll be teaching the first three of these sessions this week, and then I'm traveling on Thursday morning, and I'm very happy that Kim Allen will follow up and finish the series. And then Kim will also be teaching next week while I'm away, so I'm delighted that this wonderful teacher will be here with you.

So, the five, usually called the five hindrances, the Pali word for them is called the five coverings. That's what the word means literally, that something covers over something and hides or makes inaccessible. And so the question is, what is it covering over? What is inaccessible? One way of understanding it is that the five hindrances in and of themselves, in order to be hindrances, are unwholesome, unhealthy, unsupportive for a good life, for a spiritual life. They're unwholesome, unhelpful. And so what they cover over is the wholesome. They cover over what's healthy for us, they cover over what's beneficial for a good life, for a spiritual life. In particular, they cover over our capacity to be settled and unified, to have a sense of being present in a holistic way, in a way that we feel fully here, that has qualities of freedom, has qualities of peace because we're not divided in ourselves. We're not covering something over. There's a place for all of who we are to be here, but to be here in a way that is supportive, that's nourishing, that's health-producing.

Some of this has to do with how we show up for ourselves, how we meet our experience in the moment. Not just ourselves, but how we meet the world. And to meet the world with these so-called hindrances is to meet the world in unhealthy ways. There might be things that are close kin to each of them that are sometimes confused with the hindrances. So not all desire is a hindrance, not all aversion is a hindrance. If we understand aversion to be an averting, a turning away from something which is harmful for us, or doing something which is harmful, there's a healthy way of doing that. And there's healthy doubt, if we translate the last one as doubt. What makes it a hindrance is this unhealthy quality.

Certainly, there can be a way in which we relate to ourselves, to our experience, and to the world, to others, where we're in the grip of greed for pleasure, greed for sensual pleasure, greed for the things of the world, greed for meditation experiences. And if you really feel the greed itself, it feels like it's grating for the deep inner part of who we are. It's grating for the heart. It creates strain and tension, and it contributes to a division within us because we're overemphasizing an object of desire rather than opening up to the wholeness of who we are and having some kind of healthy desire surface from that wholeness.

Ill will is a very intense form of hostility and wanting to harm. It could be towards ourselves, it could be towards our experience, it could be towards the people around us, it can be towards the world. Some people carry with them a low-grade hostility that pervades everything they see and touch and do. If you're really attuned to it, then we can feel how that's unwholesome. Even though sometimes desire, for example, has a joy and delight and promise in it, even though ill will sometimes has a certain pleasure of power, of strength, of righteousness in it that gives it a sense of vitality, if you really pay attention to these deeply, it can be felt how they harm ourselves. They do not nurture us, they diminish us, they divide us.

The same is true for the other three. The reference point I'm trying to use is wholesome and unwholesome, skillful and unskillful, healthy and unhealthy for us. This is something that hopefully we can feel for ourselves in an almost somatic way. You don't have to think your way into recognizing how it's unhealthy; it's clear. It's the way you would maybe feel if you're really parched and thirsty and you're able to drink a nice refreshing, cool glass of water. With that, something begins changing in your mouth, in your arms, in your whole body as the water begins coursing through your system and nourishing you. Something begins to shift and change, and that refreshment, that tingling, that goodness that can come. Or if you've been really cold and you stand in the sun, you can feel the goodness of the body warming up. You feel this kind of pervasive saturation of warmth beginning in the extremities maybe, or in the skin and coming in. Sometimes, after being hungry, eating a good, healthy meal and starting to feel how we get revived, this kind of good feeling of energy coming back in a nice, clear way. Getting a good nap and waking up in a very clear way. It's the whole body. You can't pinpoint exactly how refreshed the body is, but there is a clear way the body feels just better and awake and clear and has a kind of a simple, nice energy in it.

This inner somatic reference point can be in the body as a whole, in the heart, and it can even be in the mind in an almost somatic way.

So then we come to the fifth one, which is usually translated as doubt. The Pali word literally means uncertainty, vacillation, indecisiveness. And of course, in this complicated world of ours, there are a lot of things that we don't know, and so we can be indecisive, we can be uncertain about things. But in the classic kind of definition of this hindrance, it's indecisiveness or uncertainty about how we can live from a wholesome place. So there might be many things we don't know what to do, many things we don't understand, but how we are with the ordinary uncertainty of life—we meet it with certainty that we see the value of coming from a wholesome place, coming from a healthy place from within us.

The challenges of living an uncertain, tentative life, an indecisive life, not committing to anything, and certainly having doubt about what to do and not to do, can be quite draining, quite debilitating. Sometimes it freezes people to not act at all and do anything for a long period of time. But the idea in that as a hindrance is to turn more deeply in, because as practitioners, there's always something healthy we can do. It's how we are aware, how we meet our experience. So if we're uncertain about something, what to do? We may be uncertain about how to fix our... like today I had to fix some of this technology and was uncertain how to do it. One could be frazzled, could be afraid, could be angry. All these things can come that are not nourishing. But if we have confidence in the value of what is wholesome, that how we go about addressing the issue, let's do it in a wholesome way. In a way that we meet it with a calm presence, a kind presence, a clear presence, so that we don't succumb to ill will, we don't succumb to anxiety. These things might happen for sure, but the idea is not to center ourselves on them so we live a divided life. A mindful life opens up to the whole, recognizes what's there, but in the recognizing of it, the recognition is not anxious, the recognition has no aversion in it. The recognition isn't ruminating about what I should do. The recognition is always very simple: this is what's happening, this is what's happening.

I can't tell you how many times in my life I've been uncertain about what to do, and rather than being caught up and walking around in circles trying to figure out something in a way that didn't actually allow for creativity and intelligence to work properly, I've gone to sit down to meditate. Sometimes just meditating for 10 minutes is enough for me that then the mind begins to organize, gather, settle, be here. And in that calm, settled mind that I have confidence in, then I can find my way better with the issues of my life.

So, to let go of uncertainty—the uncertainty of how to be, how to show up. The Buddha says, "Having let go of uncertainty, one dwells having overcome uncertainty, without indecision about wholesome states, one cleanses the mind from ruminating about how one should respond, how one should do things." One has confidence in the wholesome, in how we meet what's here in the simplest way. Even if we don't know in the bigger picture what needs to be done, we can always be confident about the value of not diminishing ourselves, not undermining ourselves, not deflating ourselves by an unwholesome way of relating to what is difficult.

Thank you. Tomorrow's hindrance will be restlessness and regrets, anxiety and regrets, and we'll go on. So thank you very, very much. May this day be a day where you find a way to be certain, to be confident in how you show up, how you meet the situation, rather than getting swept away by the uncertainty that you might have. Thank you.