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Papañca – Proliferation of Thoughts

Christina Feldman
Talk given at the Insight Meditation Society
Barre, MA on July 22, 2009
http://www.dharmaseed.org/teacher/44/talk/6748/
Transcribed by Marcello Spinella

This evening I want to talk about a that we have gone around a hundred or
process, which in Pali is called papañca. If thousand times before.
there’s any word you’re going to remember in I’m going to read you something that
Pali and take with you from this retreat, this is so well illustrates what papañca is. Now you
the one I’m going to recommend: papañca. have to understand that this is a note written
Let it roll off your tongue, sit in your mind. by a yogi [a meditation practitioner], and
So I’m going to give you a loose translation before I read this, I have to tell you that we
of it which is a whole big mouthful. Papañca, don’t save your notes to read in future dharma
loosely translated, is ―the proliferation of talks. Please be assured of that. The yogi who
thoughts and mental events that generate wrote this note recognized in retrospect that it
reactivity and views that cloud and distort our was such a masterpiece of papañca that when
capacity to see and understand the way things I asked her if I could keep it and share it, she
actually are.‖ Did you get that? Anyhow, I’ll gave me full permission.
explain as I go along. This took place at a retreat I was
Papañca, as the Buddha speaks about teaching in California, and I was actually
it and as we experience it, is the source of quite reassured to get this note after having
most of the agitation, restlessness, anxiety, seen a naked yogi standing on a porch with a
and unease that we experience in our hearts bucket of water and a scrubbing brush. You
and minds. It’s papañca that often leads us to know, we are very tolerant on retreats but that
struggle with ourselves and others. Papañca is seemed to be pushing the limits a little. So
certainly very much involved in obsession, here it goes:
rumination, and preoccupation. Outwardly,
papañca has a very big role to play in the So I was taking a walk on one of the
generation of violence, war, greed, paths. Think: city girl feeling proud about
consumerism, and of all of the –isms that being adventurous, and all was well until
beset our world. Papañca is what is happening the woods. A big black spider [see picture
inwardly when we find ourselves tormented on back], glommed onto my sweatshirt. I
by an overfull mind. Papañca leads us to fall began squealing--so much for noble
into craving and hate, to fear about the future. silence—and then started running. I
Papañca has much to do with the loops of ditched the path and headed for the field
guilt that we can play and replay in our to get out of the woods. Unfortunately, I
minds. It’s part of what leads us to practice thoroughly disturbed some roosting
avoidance. It’s what is happening when we’re turkeys and they started squawking, which
lost in fantasies, constructions, and stories scared me. I ran back into the woods and
about ourselves and others. Papañca is what is on to the path and picked up the pace.
happening when we find ourselves replaying Then it crossed my mind that I was sure to
the unfinished symphonies that we carry be a mountain lions dinner, so I tried
through out lives. As we find ourselves once walking, saying to myself, “Be mindful. Be
more going around that familiar thought circle mindful.” But it was all too much so I

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said, “Screw mindfulness, screw the forgive me if I’m endlessly going on about
mountain lions,” and I took off at a high lunch, but it’s the most universal example on
rate of speed-- for me anyway seeing as a retreat and it’s not that I’m obsessed about
how I quit smoking four days ago. My lunch. But think about the journey to lunch.
lungs aren’t able to keep up with my legs. How does it begin? We hear the bell, and we
As I was cruising past the dead stumps of know the time. We’re sure of it. It’s not time
trees (homes of mountain lions???), I for walking. Just hearing the bell can provide
spotted in passing the dreaded poison oak. plenty of fuel for papañca to begin. How the
I am now convinced, since I was running, mind starts going:
squealing like an idiot and not paying
attention, that I am covered in poison oak “Gosh, the bell! I better get going, get to
oil. I threw my clothes on the floor and the front of the line. What if the food runs
washed my face and hands. But I’m out? No I was on the front of the line
worried. I saw the laundry soap in the yesterday. I better not go to the front of
manager’s office but it didn’t seem to be the line today because someone will
special poison oak soap. I didn’t see notice and think I’m very greedy. But that
anything poison oak-related. I did notice means I have to postpone my lunch plans.
that you have a wonderful supply of How am I going to fit both my nap and my
Chinese herbs, though. Anyway, what do walk into my lunch break if I’m not on the
you recommend I do, besides shutting up? front of the line?” We pass the notice
board on the way to the line, still
P.S. I woke up singing in my head “Thank undecided. “Oh, there are no notes for me
God I’m a Country Boy” by John Denver. today, but Julie’s getting lots of notes. I
It was probably an omen from the wonder if she’s getting a lot of extra
universe. I’m sticking to paved, open attention. Maybe she’s having a hard
roads. time. I wonder if I’ll have a hard time on
this retreat. Maybe I should write her a
P.S.S. [sic] Can poison oak get inside note of sympathy” Get in line. “Oh,
your body? Because as soon as I changed what’s for lunch? Oh no, not that again,
I went and ate lunch. more of this vegetarian stuff.”

It is a masterpiece, and I’m sure we all It just goes on and on. Does it sound
have our own masterpieces we could share if familiar at all? We get the picture. It’s this
we were brave enough. Now when we listen kind of psychological and emotional
to this note, and when I read this note, I just vandalism that we seem almost addicted to,
smiled. It was even humorous for her. It was that we feel hopeless, sometimes, before. In
humorous in retrospect, when she could see one of the discourses, the Buddha says that
what had happened, how a world had been the definition of a well-trained mind is a
created through thought, and through anxiety, person who thinks the thoughts they wish to
that colored and distorted the capacity to see think, but does not think the thoughts they
things as they were, and to respond wisely in don’t wish to think. Do you get the
the light of that scene. Now this particular implications of that, what that would look
piece of papañca took place over an hour or like? Imagine that, to think the thoughts you
two. But in reality it can happen in seconds. It wish to think but don’t think the thoughts you
happens, of course, countless times in a single don’t wish to think?
day. Think about the journey to lunch. Please

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Now some papañca can feel pretty It is important to see that papañca, can
pleasant. If we’ve got a lovely fantasy on the be individual, but it can also be collective.
go, really delicious daydreams, imagining Collective papañca is even more toxic than
some future delightful event, we’re individual papañca. Gossip is the classic
embroidering it in our minds, proliferating example of that. We don’t like someone, we
that. It can feel pretty pleasant. Some papañca find someone who also doesn’t like the same
feels fairly neutral. It doesn’t have any person and we feel much more reassured
extreme emotional character. It’s kind of like reaffirmed in our dislike and our views and
going through the day with this commentator the righteousness of it if we can generate the
running in the background. There’s this story together. We find the reassurance of
commentary that’s churning out. views through collective papañca.
Some of the papañca we find Some of you are old enough to
ourselves lost in is pretty toxic. The judgment remember the days when communism was
loops we get in about ourselves and others, going to take over the world. We fought the
the thoughts that go around and around, Vietnam War over it. It was a whole
solidify the truth of those judgments. We can collective papañca, wasn’t it? Communists
be lost in depression and our thoughts about were coming. It was going to be a domino
our worthiness, thoughts of despair and effect. Pretty soon the whole world was going
hopelessness can spin round and round, to be overtaken by communists. We went to
solidifying that sense of bleakness. We can be war. Thousands of people lost their lives, lost
anxious or phobic and the whole world is their homes. And who’s our favorite trading
assessed as being an invader or fearful and partner now? It’s like, ―Communism, well
generating endless thinking and then endless that’s actually not a problem anymore.‖
action to try to protect ourselves from injury. We’re even taking it off the immigration
What I think is really important to see form. You don’t have to declare anymore
is that even when papañca feels fairly benign coming in to America if you’ve ever been a
or even feels pretty pleasant, the habit of communist. That’s great news. Until this year
papañca is not at all benign. Because it has no you had to. But it’s okay now. Think about
conscience, and it’s not as if we can just the papañca that was produced, think about
choose to proliferate about the present and sexism, racism, homophobia, all of the –isms
then choose not to proliferate about the which are really a sharing of collective
difficulties. The habit of papañca, that papañca.
tendency within us will be hijacked by When we see this, we surely see the
aversion, by craving, by conceit, by fear. The importance of understanding how the process
Buddha once said that there is no one thing of papañca, in a way, is a process of building
that can do us more harm than an untrained our world. It’s building the world that we
mind, and there is no one thing that can be a believe in, share, and act in. Surely, then, we
greater friend, a greater ally, than a well- see the deep importance of taking care of the
trained mind. quality of our own hearts and minds, because
Much of papañca, of course, is an no one can do that for us. The Buddha once
internal activity. It’s a psychological and said that this mind, this body, it does the
emotional activity. But then it, of course, does bidding of the skillful and the unskillful. This
so much govern, direct, and shade our speech, mind, this body, it does the bidding of the
our actions, our choices, and our wholesome and the unwholesome. But used
relationships. well, used wisely, this body, this mind is a

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raft to freedom. But used unwisely, this body, process down. That’s what we’re doing with
this mind ties us to suffering. the practice of mindfulness, we’re slowing
So papañca is not something that is this internal process down so we can see it, so
predetermined. The emotional, the that we can understand it, so we can
psychological storms that we can find investigate it and liberate it.
ourselves in do not arise ready-made. It is a So here comes a simple example (and
process. It’s a process that can be understood. we’re back at lunch): You’re walking through
It’s a process that can be liberated. It’s almost the dining room in the morning when lunch is
as if this teaching and this path is really being cooked. And in that walk to the dining
inviting us to imagine a mind that is a room we have all the raw ingredients for
papañca-free zone, a mind that is not prone to papañca. First of all, is what I described as
papañca, and to imagine that is a very real contact. What is contact? It is meeting of the
possibility for all of us. sense door, the sensory information, and the
Papañca is an emotional, sensing. In this case it’s the nose, the smell,
psychological habit of constructing, of and the smelling. Those three meeting
fabricating, of obsessing and ruminating. In together is called contact. As that contact
this tradition it’s usually called the habit of happens, feeling and perception arise pretty
dwelling. But of course, the habit of dwelling much together. First of all we identify the
really persists, like all other habits, in the smell. It’s a perception. ―It’s garlic.‖
absence of mindfulness. One of the very That’s still fairly neutral, and fairly
direct effects of mindfulness is to loosen and universal. Whether we feel that perception as
to dissolve habit, and in the end to actually pleasant or unpleasant will depend quite a lot
uproot the habit of dwelling. on our memories and associations. So there’s
I’m going to give you some formulas the perception of garlic, and then immediately
in this talk, but don’t feel like you have to you can feel the surge of memory and
grab hold of them. I really hope that I’m able association coming in. ―I’m allergic to garlic.
to illustrate these formulas, that at first might I remember all the times I suffered from
sound a little alien, with some very specific garlic.‖ And away we go: ―Why do they
examples. And I’ll probably go back to lunch. cook? A good meditation center wouldn’t
The Buddha put forward this simple but cook garlic. Life is unfair. Things always
profound formula: dependent upon contact happen to me. I can’t even go on a retreat
there is feeling, that what we feel we because they cook garlic.‖ You can feel how
perceive, that what we perceive we think it goes.
about, that what we think about may Another person walking through the
manufacture and proliferate about, that what dining room with the same contact and the
we frequently think about and dwell upon same perception of garlic and they have an
becomes the shape of our mind. This is the entirely different background of association
basic formula of papañca. Contact, feeling, and memory. ―Oh garlic! We’re having our
perception, with all of it’s associations from favorite food for lunch. It’s going to be Italian
the past, the liking, the disliking, the dwelling, food. I remember the last time I went to Italy
the dwelling that turns into conclusions, into and I fell in love in an Italian restaurant. That
images, into beliefs about ourselves and wonderful vacation and I got married, but
others. then I got divorced…‖ It started with the
The process sounds very complex and same smell.
it is true that it happens incredibly quickly. We can spend the rest of our day,
But the work of our practice is to slow the actually, in that loop, in one way or another.

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Now what would it be like to slow the process if you’re in that loop about the garlic, how
down where the smell is just a smell and the you might immediately think, ―Oh I got to
garlic is just the garlic? The solution to write a note to the cook. I’m going to write an
papañca is not to hide ourselves away from essay to the board. I’m going to go to town
the world. This would be quite impossible. and get some other food.‖ You can feel the
And yet at the same time, papañca can feel wave of agitated behavior arising from the
like a prison and we forget that we hold the agitated mind. This happens a lot in our life.
key in our hand. It really is a question of What we’re doing even with the practice of
whether we can transform the heart, transform mindfulness, in being mindful of the body, is
the mind, that can feel like such an adversary, actually learning to undertake some restraint
into a friend, a source of peace. As I instead of trying desperately to fix and to
mentioned the other night, this teaching is not modify once state after another, to avoid that
about teaching us not to think. That would be which we think is going to destroy us. We try
ridiculous, apart from anything else. It is to calm the body. Sometimes we calm the
teaching us to think well, to think with mind and that calms the body. Sometimes we
creativity, with simplicity. We can see the calm the body, and calming the body helps to
problem, and I’m sure all of us who have a calm the mind. It is intentional. It’s a practice
mind can see the problem of being overtaken and a cultivation. So instead of feeding the
by these storms, these tsunami of thinking, of habit of distractedness, we’re feeding and
repetitive looping. nurturing the habit of non-distractedness, of
But what is the solution? First, as we being present and being simply here. Then
mentioned and stressed a lot here, we need to when we do that, you can feel yourself
be able to calm down, to be able to be mindful coming a little bit closer to that moment of
of our mind. We need to cultivate a mind that contact. When there is the smelling, there is
has a foundation of balance, steadiness, and the hearing, seeing, touching, you can feel
clarity. This is an ongoing practice that we’re yourself coming a little bit closer to that
undertaking here. It really is. You can feel it moment of contact. Sometimes with
as a training that we’re learning to, again and mindfulness, we learn that we have a choice,
again, attend to just this moment. You which we can proliferate or we can learn to
probably noticed that every time you come simplify. Restraint at the sense doors is not
back and somehow unhook from some of really culturally very praised. It’s not often
those loops, you are in truth training yourself seen as being alluring or tempting prospect.
in letting go. It’s kind of renunciation by Instead we’re a little bit more encouraged to
stealth. We’re sneaking it in. So we’re coming have more sights, more sounds, more
back, over and over again, collecting and sensations, more experience. But we see that
gathering. What’s actually happening in that without practicing restraint, some restraint at
process is that there’s a kind of inner fasting our sense doors, which we’re at the mercy of
rather than an inner feeding. So we’re papañca because we’re throwing so much fuel
learning to do a little bit of inner fasting that on the fire. Or, if we don’t practice restraint,
is really contributing to the health of our we become a beggar at the sense doors,
hearts and minds. We’re learning about pursuing our world where there’s just more
restraint. This is also part of letting go of and more and more, almost as if we think that
papañca, stepping back not only from the more and more and more is going to be a
thought process, but also with mindfulness, solution for papañca or unease. The Buddha
stepping back from some of the agitated once said that our world is born of contact.
behavior that is born of papañca. You can see

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Then he said that the wise seek to understand and security. That craving-based papañca is
contact and the foolish pursue it. the basis of expectation and demand, and then
Just learning to be aware in the of course often disappointment and
practice of how our sense doors are really frustration. But it is the basis of the
being used moment to moment, because it’s a expectation and demand that is directed
cultivation of wise attention. Wise attention is toward people and the world. It’s based upon
in this teaching, in this path, is described as unfulfilled need, a sense of incompleteness, of
not grasping at the sense impression or the insufficiency. It’s called tanha papañca. ―I
associations with it. So, we hear a sound. ―Oh must have. I need. I will be desolate if I don’t
yeah, it’s a track.‖ We don’t have to grasp at get this--the new car, the new relationship, the
the sense impression or the associations with meditation experience, a second portion of
it. That is where papañca starts. When we go lunch. It has no conscience. ―I will be
past the notice board with wise attention, we desolate if I cannot have this because that is
see just a note. With unwise attention we go the gatekeeper of my happiness. That holds
down a road of speculating, imaging, story the intrinsic power to make me happy or safe,
telling. We hear the sound that can be just a and without it I’m incomplete. Then we build
sound and not the story about its past or about stories about all of that.
its future. We don’t even need to go into the The second kind of papañca is what is
territory of liking or disliking. It can just be a called ditthi papañca, that stream of thinking
sound. Learning how to develop a capacity to that revolves around opinions, prejudices,
embrace all things with wise attention, with concepts, preconceived ideas. Ditthi papañca,
non clinging. It’s not just for our own well- view-based papañca is the basis of most of the
being. In so many ways there’s something so arguments we have with the world. ―My view
ethical about this, because it’s about liberating clashes with your view, and of course, I know
the world from our story about it, liberating mine’s right. So yours is wrong and I have to
other people and our story about them, and prove that it’s wrong.‖ That is ditthi papañca.
our likes and our dislikes and our demands It is sometimes the idea of how things should
and our expectations. be. It gets into generalizations like ―People
So when we begin to calm down you are terrible,‖ ―The world is like this,‖
probably begin to sense a way in which ―Europeans are like that,‖ ―This kind of
papañca is not all the same. It’s not all blanket person is like that.‖ It’s a whole generalizing
papañca. There are almost streams of papañca view. The thing we need to acknowledge
that hold different flavors, different emotional about views is that we have a considerable
tones. These emotional tones within papañca amount of investment in our life about being
are very important to understand because the right—a small understatement. &&&Political
emotional tones are the fuel that keeps the views, religious views, all those views. I
papañca running. They keep us getting caught remember when I first started practicing it
in the cycle of thought and obsession. Really was in Mahayana, Tibetan tradition along
seeing these emotional tones is the stuff of with Fred many, many years ago. We lived up
insight. high in the Himalayan foothills. Fred, of
So I’ll give you a list of the emotional course didn’t do this because he’s much too
tones. First, there is craving-based papañca. pure for this. But I had the sense that I was
Craving based papañca is mostly the superior because I was practicing the ―greater
unconscious projections through which we vehicle.‖ There were all those down on the
invest objects, people, events with the plains in India, those Theravadans. Usually
capacity to provide us with happiness, safety, we called them Hinayanas, practicing in the

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―lesser vehicle.‖ When I look back on that I the world as dangerous, a threat, and we have
can’t even believe that I was so smug, so self- all these stories about it.
righteous. But it was like an unarguable truth The last form of papañca is perhaps
for me. The more I could see the way that the the most important of all because it is the
view provided me with this sense of heart, the cornerstone of all of the papañcas
belonging, and identity, and therefore safety. I’ve already mentioned. It’s called mana
The third kind of papañca is aversion- papañca. It’s all the ways that we proliferate
based papañca. It’s called dosa papañca. It’s and build worlds and stories about ―me.‖ ―I
the base of a lot of proliferating that we do am wonderful, terrible, failure, success,
about ourselves and others. We dislike outstanding, unworthy…‖ Some of this mana
someone, someone offends us, does papañca, papañca about me, is fairly
something fairly innocuous in the grand historical, and some of it is very momentary.
scheme of human failures. Maybe they take But we see that the ―I am‖ of the moment is
the last nectarine or they wear the wrong formed by identifying with any event or
color socks—something fairly innocuous, and experience, but then we proliferate upon that
you can feel the aversion arise toward that identification. ―I am sad. Why am I sad? I am
person. Pretty soon you got your eye out for sad because, because, because... I am
them. They can’t escape you. You’re building unworthy. Why am I unworthy? I am
up this portfolio of imperfection. ―They not unworthy because, because, because... I am
only did that, but they do that, and that.‖ It’s angry. Why am I angry? I am angry because,
like they’re this terrible person without one because, because.‖ We have all this
redeeming quality. This is actually dosa proliferation around it, the loops that go
papañca. Of course, as long as we’re prone to around and around.
have both aversion and papañca, we’ll do the Some people, through countless times
same to ourselves. One innocent slip up, we of repetition, become specialized in one form
fell asleep in the meditation hall, we spilled of papañca. We can get specialized in
our salad—and we set off onto a journey of aversion papañca, or fear papañca. It just
condemnation that recalls all the ways that we shows us what we’re more prone to identify
had erred in the past and will continue to err with. That’s all. It doesn’t make it more true.
long into the future until we are convinced What the Buddha says is that what we dwell
that we are the most completely deluded, upon becomes the shape of our mind. the
confused person on this retreat, actually in the shape of our mind, with repetitive dwelling,
whole world. We become this story-teller, and hardens into character. It’s also very
soon there’s not one single worthwhile quality important to see that these very difficult
in ourselves that can be seen. threads of papañca are really in an ongoing
The fourth quality of papañca is called dialog with each other. For example, fearful
bhaya papañca. It is fear-based papañca, thinking can produce aversive thinking. It can
which is currently well-encouraged in our then create craving papañca, which can create
culture. It is not only creates the ―other‖ that mana papañca. If you’re sitting meditating
we need to be afraid of, to demonize, surely and you have a pain in your knee and you
not to understand. It includes all the phobias, identify with that, starting to think about it.
the desire to try to find safety and guarantees ―What’s going on? I always have a pain in my
in an unpredictable world. Bhaya papañca is knee. Maybe I’m doing damage to myself.‖
projected onto people, object, events, You can feel the anxiety and the aversion
countries, and races. It’s pretty big. We see arising. You can dread coming into the
meditation hall again. ―I’m a useless

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meditator.‖ That creates craving papañca. ―I Now we see ourselves in the face of
need to be a different kind of person I have to sounds, sights, thoughts, begin to build, begin
have a different kind of body to do this. It can to proliferate. We can learn to pause. Not to
go on and on. This is what we need to calm push away or to repress the thinking, but to
down, and really to go back to this very investigate. ―What is this?‖ In this teaching,
simple formula of contact (meeting with the we’re really learning what it means to see
sensory impressions), the feeling (pleasant, anew, to liberate the present and everything in
unpleasant, neutral), and perception. It was at it from the burden of the past—not the wise
this point, the feeling and perception that the learning from the past, but the burden of the
papañca really gets going. And it’s at this past. The glue that keeps the papañca going
same point of feeling and perception that the craving the aversion, the fear, the self-
papañca can really calm down and end. view, to look closely at it, to really see and
We really need to recognize that every time you begin to have those sentences
perception is not neutral. In fact, perception that start with ―I am.‖ to really see how that
follows the same neural pathways as memory. storyteller is creating the story based upon
It’s not neutral. Perception is very much tied view, and we’re learning to release the story.
up with memories of the past. Some of that Some of you have heard me use this example
memory built into perception is very before, but I’m going to use it again. A yogi
necessary and useful. If I go outside the back on retreat in England told me about their
door and see a car, it’s very useful that I know experience about being lost in agitation and
what a car is and I don’t have to learn to drive agitation-based papañca, roaming around the
every time I see a car. This kind of retreat center, endlessly feeding the sense
perception, memory association, is very doors, looking for things to do, spinning in
useful and very necessary. But we can also thought and at their wits end, really running
see that there is a whole load of perception low on resources, found themselves reading
that is not within this realm of being useful, the instruction on the fire extinguisher. The
but where perception is constantly triggering first instruction they read, ―Aim the nozzle at
the past into the present, memories and the base of the fire.‖ Aim the nozzle at the
associations into the present. It’s like when base of the fire. Look at what really is fueling
you see that person who has offended you, the agitation. Sometimes it’s said that if you
and you only need to see them and it’s right want to know about your past, look at your
there, the whole story. mind now. And if you want to know about
We might say that part of the work of your future, look at your mind now. Of
mindfulness is to sever this questionable link course, it’s only this mind of now that we can
between perception and the world of really calm and liberate. Certainly in that
association that’s rooted in craving, aversion, calmness of mindfulness is one of the central
and self-view. It’s not to get rid of the helpful, ingredients in calming the momentum of
necessary perceptual modes, but we can see papañca. But inside, understanding is
how much that mode of perception in essential in uprooting the source of papañca.
historical memories of craving, aversion, and The ―I am‖ that is born of identifying with
self-view is actually fixing the world over and thoughts, with emotions, with stories, with
over again into a kind of frozen place that can events. When we walk through the dining
never change. And of course that association, room and we smell the garlic we may have a
when it’s laden with judgement, is fixing our lot of thoughts about the garlic, but it would
self into a frozen place where we can never be unusual for any of us to say, ―I am the
change. garlic.‖ When we hear the sound of the truck

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outside the windon we can have a whole lot of happened to someone who never sat on a
thoughts about it, but we’re not going to say, cushion. Contact can be the place where we
―I’m the truck.‖ When we see the note on the build our world or a place of remarkable
board there can be a note on the board, there calmness, equanimity, and wise attention.
can be a world of thinking about it but we Feelings arise throughout our lives: pleasant,
don’t say ―I am the note.‖ But with thoughts unpleasant, or neutral. Again it doesn’t matter
and emotions, particularly with those that if it’s a buddha or one who never sat on a
have a long history and many repetitions, we cushion. But we can learn to meet this range
are certainly prone to say ―I am the thought,‖ of feelings equally or to be lost in the
―I am the emotion,‖ ―I am miserable,‖ ―I am underlying tendencies that surround them:
unwise,‖ ―I am inadequate,‖ ―The thought is aversion, craving, delusion. We can learn to
me.‖ This is really something helpful to see. pause in those moments instead of being a
Because it’s not surprising that we have so hostage to those reactions. We can let the
many thoughts. But what is surprising is that pleasant be pleasant, the unpleasant be
we give so much authority to them. If any of unpleasant, and the neutral be neutral.
you had the willingness to sit up here and Craving and aversion, okay they arise. when
articulate your mind, speak your mind, we’re all enlightened they won’t arise any
throughout a whole sitting, just report on what more. In the meantime we have a little
your mind is doing, most people would feel practice to do. All is not lost because craving
absolutely horrified at the thought. But the and aversion arise. We can learn to meet
horrifying part about it is the thought that if craving and aversion with equanimity, instead
you did that that everybody out there would of going down the pathway of feeding them.
be aghast. But that’s not true actually. There We can learn to fast rather than feed. What is
would be no surprises there. But interestingly, becoming? It’s that place where we arrive
if listen to someone else come up here and do through grasping that says, ―I am,‖ ―I am
that, what would you say to them? You would anxious,‖ ―I am hopeless,‖ ―I am unworthy.‖
probably say, ―Why are you giving so much That is becoming. We are becoming someone
authority to those thoughts?‖ But with through the identification. We are being
ourselves, we often find ourselves actually defined by what is taken hold of. Now we can
giving that authority even though a lot of it is with mindfulness and understanding begin to
really empty and without substance. see the fabrication and construction of ―I am,‖
Papañca is of very little value in and to hold it a little more lightly. It’s a little
abstract. But applied to moment to moment bit of creative disbelief, knowing that it’s part
experience, a profound understanding of of a process, not necessarily the truth or the
papañca is a profound doorway to end of the story. We can calm the cycles of
transformation. obsession dwelling, calm our hearts, calm our
Now I’m going to give you another minds. Then body, this mind, used wisely,
formula. It’s a shortened version, but one that truly is a raft to freedom.
is really easy to apply:

Contact → Feeling → Craving/Aversion →


Grasping → Becoming

Contact happens as long as we live. There


will always be sights, sounds... It’ doesn’t
matter: what happened to a buddha, or what

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