One of the senior monks in the Ajahn Chah lineage said that Buddha talked about dāna[giving] first because if someone didn’t understand the value of basic generosity, they weren’t even teachable. If we don’t have a sense of its significance, and don’t have some degree of maturity in our experience of it, then other forms of practice—sīla, bhāvana, mettā—won’t even get off the ground. There has to be a malleability of heart, a softness, a diminished self-absorption, before the engines can even get started! And this softness is developed largely through our increasingly mature direct experience of dāna.
Giving as a ritual is not the same as giving as practice. There can be various motives for giving, and many of them have to do with varieties of clinging. We cling to the idea of what is expected of us, or what would “look good”, or we give to relieve a feeling of guilt, or even because we think it will produce a better afterlife. But there is a higher motivation that we can tap into, one that moves us away from any form of clinging.
(from Gloria Taraniya Ambrosia) There’s a wonderful story in the Vināya (Mahāvagga 8:15) about a very generous laywoman who lived at the time of the Buddha. As the story goes, she wanted to give a large gift to the community—lifetime gifts of food, clothing and medicinal requisites. Before agreeing to receive this offering, the Buddha asked Visakha why she wanted to make such a generous offering.
Her reply may surprise you. She said that when she sees the monks and nuns she will know that they are wearing robes made out of the cloth that she offered, etc., and it will make her very happy. Thus, her mind will be calm and her meditation will go well. As if to say, “Yes, that’s the right answer,” the Buddha accepted her gift.
So we can give to make our minds peaceful and happy. This may sound like a selfish motive – we want to be happy – but this sort of happiness comes from profound unselfishness, which feels entirely different from building up our self-image. Is this happening without our noticing it? Do we overlook this subtle and beautiful feeling?
Only we know what is in our minds and hearts, and we can track whether we are producing the kind of mental peace that is the foundation for wisdom or the product of a satisfied ego. Mindfulness is essential to discern this difference, but once we see it, we are naturally inclined to pursue a wholesome path.
Patience has always been a challenge for me. Lynn J Kelly’s blog post today (see link below) helps me better understand how my impatience is a form of anger which I would be much better off without.
“Have patience with all things but first of all with yourself.” – Francis de Sales
Tricycle’s online magazine offers a provocative article which discusses two key questions: Why love what you will lose? and What else is there to love?
Below is a highlight from this worthy article. To read the entire article see the link at the bottom of this post.
Suffering is, strangely, both sickness and medicine, impossible to tease apart in the end. … That we suffer and share this great fact of impermanence together is profound medicine in itself, a medicine that releases compassion, love, connectedness, and forgiveness as the healing source.
“Pursuing beneficial practices brings good kamma, and that can overcome any past unwholesome kamma. It’s not a closed system, it’s not fate; it’s a dynamic process.”
Lynn J Kelly blogpost today reminds us our actions matter every minute of every day. We can improve our lives when we seek the good of others too.
Sensei John Pulleyn, Co-Director of the Rochester Zen Center, offers a provocative explanation of why and how to let go of what others think about you. Learning to let go of social approval gives us the freedom to be who we are and let other people be who they are.
A couple of highlights from the article, The Big Man Can’t Shoot, are:
It isn’t easy and it’s not comfortable to turn our back on the values and conventions all around us, especially when they’re unexamined.
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For most of us, the approval or disapproval of others is an overwhelming force. We’re conditioned and accustomed to reading the crowd, to devoting a significant amount of our mental energy to understanding where we stand in the gaze of others.
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(As) Anthony de Mello points out, “Being president of a corporation has nothing to do with being a success in life. Having a lot of money has nothing to do with being a success in life. You’re a success in life when you wake up! Then you don’t have to apologize to anyone, you don’t give a damn what anybody thinks about you or what anybody says about you. You have no worries; you’re happy. That’s what I call being a success.”
There’s a new Tricycle article titled Education and Work that call outs the false messages we receive from both educations systems and corporate bureaucracy. Here are a few of the very provocative points made:
Education turns human beings into commodities.
People should exist not as interchangeable parts of an economic machine
When people are alone, they’re not so bad. However, when a group forms, paralysis occurs; people become totally foolish and cannot distinguish good from bad.
People live relying on groups and organizations, drifting along in them like floating weeds without roots.
“An organization man is an employee, especially of a large corporation, who has adapted so completely to what is expected in attitudes, ideas, behavior, etc., by the corporation as to have lost a sense of personal identity or independence.”
Suffering arises from our narrow concept of I, combined with our insatiable greed.
Check out the full article at the link provided below. I’d enjoy hearing your thoughts on this assessments of modern-day society.
Lynn J Kelly regularly shares wisdom and compassion in her blog posts. The one linked below is especially helpful to me today. I hope you find it helpful as well.
“I undertake the training rule to abstain from taking what is not given.”
This is a higher standard than “not stealing,” Lynn J Kelly explains with reference to Gil Frondal’s teaching of the second precept in her blog post link below.
Lynn J Kelly provides us with another “pearl of wisdom” with her post below. As she says:
“We want to train ourselves to avoid acting (or speaking) when we are angry or displeased. The mind state comes before the action and can be worked with before any harming occurs. The Buddha put this practice first on his list of guidelines for training laypeople because it may be the primary way we harm ourselves and others.”
May we avoid harming ourselves and others more skillfully today. _/\_
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