This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Clear Awareness; Udayi Sutta (2 of 5) Speaking Practically. It likely contains inaccuracies, especially with speaker attribution if there are multiple speakers.

Guided Meditation: Clear Awareness; Dharmette: Udayi Sutta (2 of 5) Speaking Practically - Gil Fronsdal

The following talk was given by Gil Fronsdal at Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, CA on June 25, 2024. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.

Introduction

Hello everyone, and welcome. I was just looking out the window—we have these very high windows here—looking up at the sky through the windows and the clouds that are here. If it begins to rain, then first there have to be the clouds. The clouds are the condition for the rain.

The idea of conditionality, that things appear because of other conditions that have to be there, is a central feature in Buddhism. One of its purposes is to help us break through the delusion of permanence, that something is there forever, and the delusion of self that many of us live under. The particular delusion of self is the idea that there is a permanent self, that anything defines us in a permanent way. There's a movement in the mind of attachment that is very closely connected to the ideas of self, ideas of permanent selves—"this is who I am," the idea that something is fixed.

In meditation practice, one of the ways that the teachings on conditionality can function and support meditation is that when you're aware of something occurring in the present moment, whatever it is, that experience is a conditioned experience. Certain conditions have come together to bring forth this particular thing. But now that you're aware of it, now that you really see it and know what it is that's happening, you've introduced a new condition into the ecosystem, into the moment. The idea now is to trust that that's enough for your part of the contributions to causes and conditions: a clear awareness. You don't try to fix anything, you don't have to think about it, you don't have to analyze it, and you don't have to use what's happening as a basis for judging yourself. All you do is recognize, "Oh, things are here for now from causes and conditions."

Maybe it's obvious to see what the conditions were. Maybe your mind wandered off, and that's a condition that, when you see that, you criticize yourself: "I'm not a good meditator because my mind wandered off." That's a delusion of self that's operating there, defining oneself by that, as opposed to just recognizing clearly, "This is the mind that wanders off." To say, "I'm a lousy meditator," that's a condition for feeling lousy. When we feel that lousiness, we see, "Oh, that arose because I had this belief." Each step along the way, what we take refuge in, in mindful practice and meditation, is simply having the clarity that things arise because of conditions. We don't have to own them, we don't have to define ourselves by them, we don't have to see them as if it's going to be this way forever. It's just the conditions of this moment.

Now I contribute a new condition, and the condition is being aware of what's here. If it's obvious that you can see the conditionality, then that helps the clarity: "Oh, this is here because of these conditions," but not because you're analyzing or thinking about it. The goal is to find clarity in the knowing—a clarity, a crispness, an openness, a spaciousness—to just know this is how it is right now. And in knowing, in doing that, you are contributing a new condition. Nothing stays the same. No conditions stay the same when they're observed. That's kind of the premise here. Maybe if you look at a chair, the chair doesn't change, but if you look at a chair and just look at it, you change. What we're aware of as we're meditating, of ourselves, changes because we're aware. Don't try to make the change, just be aware, and then notice how the conditions change. The conditions are always changing, and every changing condition, every condition, is an opportunity for further clarity, clear awareness. That's what we contribute.

Guided Meditation: Clear Awareness

To begin, recognize the conditions of what has contributed to how your body feels right now. How does your posture contribute to how your body feels right now? Before we start meditating, adjusting your posture is contributing the proper or better conditions for the body to participate in the meditation. The body participating in the meditation—the body is not just an appendage that you have to make comfortable enough so you can meditate. The body is here to be part of the meditation, in a posture of participation.

Gently close your eyes and invite the body into the meditation, to be part of it. Take a few long, slow, deep breaths, relaxing as you exhale.

Letting your breathing return to normal. Given what's happened just so far in meditation, those are the conditions for some of what you feel right now. Maybe some has shifted, changed. If that's the case, be aware of it in a simple, clear way. A way of being aware, and being clearly aware, is something like giving room, space, for each thing we're aware of to be as it is.

Letting your breath breathe normally. If you're aware of your breathing in your body, the breathing now is participating in your meditation. As you exhale, relaxing more. Exhaling and maybe relaxing the thinking mind. Maybe relaxing the belly, so the weight of your torso settles a bit into your sitting bones.

Continue with your meditation on your own in the silence. From time to time, when something new arises, recognize it as arising, occurring because of conditions. That's all. And rely on simple awareness of what's happening, contributing a new condition, contributing being aware. The more clear the awareness is, without changing anything intentionally, the more it contributes to a new way of being. It's a condition for what's going to happen next.

When clear, relaxed awareness fills the field of awareness, the field of attention, thinking is no longer at the center. Clear awareness, a clarity of knowing, is not nothing. It's one of the most significant acts, conditions we contribute to this moment and the next moment.

As we come to the end of this sitting, how do you feel? How are you? Have the conditions of this meditation somehow contributed to you being different now than you were at the beginning of the sitting? What might have been the conditions that contributed to how you are now? And was one of those conditions your practice of mindfulness, of clear awareness, clear knowing of the present moment? How was that a condition?

May it be that what we learn through meditation, what we learn about being aware, translates to how we live in the world of other people. May we learn to hear, listen to people with clear listening. May we learn to see others with clear seeing. There's a little saying that says that adults need to be heard, children need to be seen. May it be the practice we do helps us to contribute positive conditions to this world by listening and seeing others.

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

And may the way that each of us listen, the way that each one sees others, be done in safety and peace, offering others to be free of our attachments.

[Music]

Dharmette: Udayi Sutta (2 of 5) Speaking Practically

Hello and welcome to this second talk based on the Udayi Sutta.¹ I'll read you that sutta again. This is a sutta where the Buddha talks about what qualities or characteristics should be established in someone who wants to teach the Dharma.² Last week, I talked about the core teachings that I have, but as important as the teachings is how we teach. I certainly aspire to teach in the way the Buddha encouraged us to. So, I'll read the five again:

The Dharma should be taught to others thinking, "I will speak step-by-step." "I will teach, I will speak of a gradual path." The Dharma should be taught to others thinking, "I will speak for practical reasons." The Dharma should be taught to others thinking, "I will speak grounded in kindness." The Dharma should be taught to others thinking, "I will not speak for material rewards." The Dharma should be taught to others thinking, "I will speak without wounding myself or others."

When I introduced these yesterday, I said that these five qualities are equally valuable as guidelines for how we speak with others, even if we're not teaching them. I'll talk about mostly the teaching side of it, but I'm hoping that those of you who are not going to be teaching will consider these as invaluable ways of looking at your acts of speech. Today, I'm doing them a little out of order, but coincidentally, I'll talk about the second one for the second talk: The Dharma should be taught to others thinking, "I will speak for practical reasons."

Some translators will translate this as "speak based on causes and conditions," or "explaining causes and conditions." The word that's being used here can also mean instructions, and I like that because rather than teaching people abstract truths or things to believe in, the emphasis is always on instructions of what we can do, what we can practice. This goes along with what I talked about last week as the second core teaching principle that I have: that of no views, not relying on beliefs, not relying on dogmatic ideas, but rather relying on what's practical, what we can do ourselves. We can see the cause and conditions.

Some people might say, "Wait a minute, we have to believe in things." Someone might come up with the idea that in order to get water out of the faucet, we have to believe that turning the handle of the faucet will make the water come out. This is pushing the idea of belief to an extreme. But yes, there's a kind of belief, but it's a belief that we can immediately see whether it works or not. The proof is right there; it's practical. The condition for the water coming out is turning the handle. So, it's not exactly a belief; maybe there's confidence that it will work because the whole plumbing system is in order.

It's that kind of practical way. There's a cause and condition for water coming out, there's a cause and condition for developing this practice, there's a cause and condition for our suffering, and a cause and condition for the end of suffering. When we teach, we're constantly using that as an orientation: teach practically, teach what's useful, and teach the cause and conditions so we can really see what's going on.

There's a wonderful teaching of the Buddha that's called "the preservation of the truth." This is where the Buddha says that if you have a belief, you should explain to people the basis for that belief. If you believe it because you have faith in something, so there's no proof, no seeing why this is the case, then you say, "I believe this because of faith." You don't say, "This is true." You say, "I believe this is true because I have faith in it." If you say it that way, you're preserving the truth because you're stating, "I base this on faith." So people know you're not making an absolute claim, but you're making a claim for yourself, and they know the assumption underneath it. They know the basis, so they can be in conversation with you. If you just say something is true dogmatically or declaratively, people don't know how to find themselves. They either have to believe it or not believe it; they can't participate in it in a robust way.

But if we preserve this truth by saying it's based on faith, he goes on to say that if we base it on what we've heard from our teachers, or what's popularly believed by the society around us, we should say so. "I believe it because it's in my sacred books," or "I believe it because I thought about it logically and my rationality led me to believe this." In each of those cases, when you say that to someone, they can go back and check with you the source of the belief. Is that source a useful source? Do they want to rely on that source too? But if you just make a declarative statement which then becomes a view, people can't really participate or engage in a more realistic way to find out what's really going on here.

This idea of speaking based on practical reasons is important. One of the great questions is asking yourself, "Why do I want to say what I want to say?" or "Why do I want to do what I want to do?" To take the time to ask that question is not to look for metaphysical answers, but to ask, "Right now, what am I trying to accomplish? What is the practical reason for why I want to say what I want to say?"

The first time I really clearly saw the value of asking myself that was just before I was going to give a Dharma talk many years ago. An old friend showed up, and we had a little chat. Then I went into the meditation hall to sit down, meditate, and give a talk. Just before I went to sit down, I said to my old friend, "You know, I haven't prepared for this talk today." Because I sat down to meditate right after saying that, I asked myself, "Why did I say that?" I realized the reason was I was trying to protect myself from my friend judging me in case I gave a bad talk. If I had asked myself the question before I said what I said—"Why do I want to say that I didn't prepare the talk today?"—I would have seen the reason I did it, and then I probably would have done something different.

Understanding the reasons, the practical cause-and-effect relationship, the conditions underlying what we do—this is the alternative to having beliefs, having fixed views, having dogmatic views, having metaphysical views that Buddhism emphasizes we don't have to have. We don't have to believe in anything we don't see for ourselves. The emphasis in the Dharma is "come and see for yourself." It's visible here and now. Because of that, you can count on the teachings being meant to be practical, to be instructions. They're meant to be something that is reasoned out. There are reasons for how we say it, and "reasons" means it's based on conditions, based on cause and effect, based on how conditions influence how things are.

In teaching the Dharma, I interpret this particular phrase, "I speak for practical reasons," as explaining the conditions for what we're teaching. What are the reasons? What are the rationalities? How can we see this for ourselves? What's the basis for what we're saying? So what I just did now was a little bit the case. I said, "I'm going to interpret this text this way," and that's preserving the truth. I'm giving you the reason, the background for why I'm interpreting it this way. I'm saying it's an interpretation, and the reason for it is I would like the teachings I give to guide people away from fixed beliefs, dogmatic beliefs, and declarative statements, towards what they can know and experience for themselves and verify for themselves. "Oh, this is true. I see that this works." It's as true as turning the handle on the faucet and the water comes out. It's that practical, that immediate, what we can do.

In the meditation, I don't want to just make a declarative statement that mindfulness is always useful. What I'd like to say is that mindfulness is useful in many circumstances, and we can discover that by paying attention to the effect that being mindful has on us. If we bring clear awareness to our experience, that's a condition that then changes the ecosystem of our experience. If you really pay attention to what happens when you bring clear, simple, relaxed attention, then you'll see that this is useful.

The place to look to see where the evidence is, is primarily in yourself. Though sometimes, clear awareness that translates into listening carefully to others and seeing them clearly also changes the environment we're in. We can see that other people relax, other people feel cared for, other people feel understood, feel respected. And you see that that changes a circumstance. Cultivating clear awareness is a condition that can have an effect that is beneficial. That's speaking for practical reasons. The reason to be mindful is to benefit self and others, and that's something that you can see for yourself as we learn to do this practice.

In fact, we're supposed to see it for ourselves. Everything in the Dharma, I believe—based on how I read the ancient texts—everything in the core Dharma of the Buddha should be verified in our own experience through our own practice. So, may that be for you. As you go through the day today, may you ask yourself the question, "Why do I want to say what I'm going to say now?" or "Why do I want to do what I want to do now?" See if that brings forth a better understanding of the conditions that influence your life. Thank you.