The Quotable Thanissaro

A discussion on all aspects of Theravāda Buddhism
dhammapal
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:Society’s main aim, no matter where, is its own perpetuation. Its cultural values are designed to keep its members useful and productive — either directly or indirectly — in the on-going economy. Most religions allow themselves to become domesticated to these values by stressing altruism as the highest religious impulse, and mainstream Buddhism is no different. Wherever it has spread, it has become domesticated to the extent that the vast majority of monastics as well as lay followers devote themselves to social services of one form or another, measuring their personal spiritual worth in terms of how well they have loved and served others.

However, the actual practice enjoined by the Buddha does not place such a high value on altruism at all. In fact, he gave higher praise to those who work exclusively for their own spiritual welfare than to those who sacrifice their spiritual welfare for the welfare of others (AN 4:95) — a teaching that the mainstream, especially in Mahayana traditions, has tended to suppress. The true path of practice pursues happiness through social withdrawal, the goal being an undying happiness found exclusively within, totally transcending the world and not necessarily expressed in any social function. People who have attained the goal may teach the path of practice to others, or they may not. Those who do are considered superior to those who don’t, but those who don’t are in turn said to be superior to those who teach without having attained the goal themselves. Thus individual attainment, rather than social function, is the true measure of a person’s worth.

From: Upāsikā Kee Nanayon and the Social Dynamic of Theravadin Buddhist Practice by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:I’ve heard many people complain that they can think thoughts of goodwill [mettā], but they don’t get any warm feeling out of it. Well, it’s not necessary to have the warm feeling, as long as you think about other people’s well-being and take that into consideration as you plan your actions. That’s an awful lot right there.
From: Goodwill in Heart & Mind by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
If you read a lot of books about the Dhamma, it can get pretty confusing after a while, for there are so many different takes on exactly what the Dhamma is. On top of that, there are people who will tell you it’s all very complex, very subtle; only a very erudite scholar or subtle logician could figure it all out. With so many teachings, it’s hard to figure out which ones to hold on to. Of course, some people will tell you that you can’t hold onto anything at all. That makes it even more confusing and obscure.

So it’s good to remember that the Buddha himself taught the Dhamma in very simple terms. And all the teachings derived from a few very basic, very commonsensical principles. You might call it wisdom for dummies: the kind of wisdom that comes from looking at what’s actually going on in your life, asking some very basic questions, and applying a few very basic principles to solve your big problems.

When you use wisdom for dummies, it doesn’t mean you’re dumb. It means you recognize that you’ve been foolish and you want to wise up. As the Buddha once said, when you recognize your foolishness, you are to that extent wise. This may sound obvious, but when you think about it, you see that it teaches you some important things about wisdom. In fact, the realization that you’ve been foolish contains within itself many of the basic principles of the Dhamma. To begin with, this kind of realization usually comes to you when you see you’ve made a mistake you could have avoided. In recognizing that much, you recognize that your actions do make a difference: Some actions are more skillful than others. In recognizing that the mistake came from your foolishness, you recognize the principle that your ideas and intentions played a role in your actions, and that you could have operated under other ideas and intentions. You could have been wiser — the mistake wasn’t preordained — and you’ve got something to learn. That right there is the beginning of wisdom.

It’s when you’re willing to learn that the Buddha can teach you more about what it means to be wise. Start with one of his basic ways of distinguishing a wise person from a fool: If you’re a wise person, you tend to your own duties and avoid the things you’re not responsible for. If you’re a fool, you tend to ignore the things you’re responsible for, and to focus on things you’re not responsible for. This is probably the number one principle, because it cuts out a lot of other issues, such as taking a stand on where the universe came from, or if the universe came from anything, whether it’s finite or infinite; what your inner nature is. A lot of what we think of as metaphysical issues get put aside this way, because you’re not really responsible for those issues. And what are you responsible for? Your actions, what you’re choosing to do. No one else can make your choices for you, so you have to focus on doing them well.

This is why the Buddha says that wisdom starts growing when you ask someone who’s knowledgeable, “What’s skillful? What’s unskillful? What, when I do it, will lead to my long-term welfare and happiness? What, when I do it, will lead to my long-term harm and suffering?” Why are these questions wise? Because they come from seeing that the issue of how to find a worthwhile happiness is something you really are responsible for. Happiness is preferable to suffering, it depends on your actions, and long-term happiness is better than short-term. This is what’s meant by “skillful.”

The distinction between skillful and unskillful is another basic principle. Once one of the Buddha’s lay students was accosted by someone from another tradition who asked him, “Well now, does your teacher teach about the origin of universe, or whether it’s finite or infinite?” He went down the list of the big issues of the time, and the lay student kept saying, “No, he doesn’t talk about any of those things.” And the other person responded, “Well, in that case he’s a nihilist. He doesn’t teach anything at all.” So the lay student said, “No, that’s not true. He does teach the difference between what’s skillful and what’s not.” He later went to report this conversation to the Buddha, who approved of what he had said.

The distinction between skillful and unskillful forms the basis for the four noble truths. When you dig deep down into why people suffer, you find that it’s because of craving. How can people stop suffering? By developing the path, which is primarily composed of good qualities of mind. So you realize the mind has to be trained. That’s another basic principle of wisdom: that true happiness comes from training the mind, because the mind is what makes the choices. That’s why we meditate. And that’s why meditation requires that we focus our attention on the present moment, because these choices are being made right now.

From: Wisdom for Dummies by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
You see someone else doing something that gets you upset or something that offends you. Don’t focus on the other person; focus on the action in and of itself, as part of a causal process, and then turn around and look at yourself. If, in your mind, you create other people out there, you create a lot of problems. But if you simply see life in the community as an opportunity to watch the principle of cause and effect as it plays itself out, the problems vanish.

From: Admirable Friendship by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
Goodwill [mettā] does depend on a sense of right and wrong. Even though it’s immeasurable, there’s a certain dualism. Goodwill is better than ill-will; acts of kindness are better than acts of harshness and harmfulness.

Secondly, acts of goodwill and kindness are a gift, a free gift. Remember that bumper sticker they used to have about random acts of kindness and senseless beauty? You’re basically nice to strangers, which is not being senseless. It’s senseless only if you think that what makes sense in the world is doing whatever you can to get ahead, being recognized for whatever favors you do to other people so that you can take advantage of them. But from the point of view of the way to genuine happiness, the free gift of kindness, the free gift of goodwill makes a lot of sense in that it’s free.

By giving this free gift, you become free, and the freedom is immediate in the sense of spaciousness that appears in the mind. It lasts for a long time, but it does have to be maintained. You learn how to feed your goodwill by reflecting on the state of the mind that you’ve developed and then comparing that with the state of mind in fear, in competition. You realize you’ve got something much, much better.

So as we live in this world where it seems like everyone is running a race to the bottom and the competition is over who can do the most harm, we can free ourselves though from that competition and, in doing so, it’s a gift to other people and a gift to ourselves.

Where does it come from? It comes from your desire for happiness inside. It comes from being responsible for your happiness. This underlies the point that freedom and responsibility go together.

From: Goodwill for Free by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
When things don’t seem to be going well, remind yourself that you haven’t reached the point where you’re suffering too much to practice. And you’re fortunate that you don’t have so much pleasure that you can’t practice. You’re in a good spot. As long as you have the will to practice, the desire to practice, you’re in the right spot.

From: Count Yourself Lucky by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
So have faith in what you’re doing and in the skills you’re developing here, because they can see you through, even when everything else starts collapsing and the mountains come moving in. [SN 3:25] And remember: The mind is not crushed by mountains. Your goodness is crushed only by your own discouragement, by your own lack of faith, your lack of conviction, lack of persistence. Those are the things that crush you, and yet those are also things you can do something about.

The mountains keep moving in, moving in. The world is swept away. It’s the nature of the world. If the north mountain doesn’t get you, the south mountain will. But they get just your body. So focus on your mind: That’s your important refuge. All the skills you develop as you practice: Those are your refuge. Those don’t get swept away.

Remember where the escape is. The escape is inside. You can’t escape the world, as the Buddha said, by going to the edge of the cosmos. He had that image of the skywalker — an interesting term that got picked up later by some moviemakers here — someone whose every stride could be measured in miles, and who could stride, stride, stride across the universe. And as he said, even if you were a skywalker and had a hundred-year lifespan, you wouldn’t come to the end of the universe.

But he also said that you can come to the end of the world inside. There’s a spot in the mind, there’s a dimension, as he calls it, where the world has no footing. That’s the end of the world. That’s here inside you.

Some people say that your quest for finding that end of the world is selfish, and that you should be out there trying to keep the mountains away for a little bit longer. But you have to remember that to find that spot inside, generosity is one of the prerequisites, one of your inner treasures. We don’t leave the world by trashing it. We develop generosity, we develop virtue, all the things that make human life good. But we do it in such a way that gets us out, because outside the world is a lot better than in.

From: The End of the World by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
Question: You’ve said that mindfulness is to always keep something in mind. I thought that mindfulness was to be aware of the present moment, but if I’m keeping something in mind, I might not be aware of the present moment. I get a little confused. Could you say more about it?

Thanissaro Bhikkhu: There is mindfulness and there is right mindfulness. Mindfulness in general means keeping something in mind. Right mindfulness means remembering which qualities are skillful, which ones are unskillful, and remembering to be alert and ardent about recognizing and developing skillful qualities in the present moment.

From: Good Heart, Good Mind: The Practice of the Ten Perfections by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
Ajaan Suwat used to like to say that “Each of us has only one person in the world, that’s ourself” — in other words, one person we’re responsible for. And as the Buddha said, “You don’t go to heaven or hell because of other people’s actions. You go because of your own actions.” Those can take you to heaven; they can take you to hell. So why are you taking yourself to hell? And why are you upset with what other people are doing, which really has nothing to do, really, with you? It’s your actions that make all the difference.

From: Look at Yourself by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
When I was in Brazil, one of the people on the retreat asked a question. Actually, it was less a question than a statement. She had been told that when we meditate, we should meditate with our eyes half-open because the purpose of the meditation was to help with our work in the world, and because the work of the world is done with your eyes open, you should meditate with your eyes at least half-open.

I had no problem with meditating with eyes half-open. It’s a practical issue. The Buddha himself, when he gave meditation instructions, said nothing about whether your eyes should be opened or closed. So it’s a matter of personal choice. If you find that meditating with your eyes closed puts you to sleep, keep them open. Simply make sure that you don’t stare. Keep your focus gentle, fuzzy. If, however, having your eyes open is distracting, keep them closed. You make your choice based on what works.

The point that I did have a problem with was the idea that we’re meditating for the sake of the work of the world. We’re not training the mind for the sake of the world. We’re training the mind for the sake of the mind.

So as you sit here right now, put all your other concerns aside — because the big issue is not the world outside. The big issue is your mind. And you now have the time to focus total attention on the mind. There’s nowhere else you have to go, nothing else you have to think about. The mind at this moment doesn’t have to be a servant to anybody. All too often we have to serve the needs of the body, serve the needs of our social responsibilities, but right now you can put those aside.

From: A Mirror for the Mind by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
Oftentimes, we think of success in the world in terms of getting ahead in our work, doing good work that we like, leaving good results behind in the world. But so many times those results are dependent on factors that are totally outside of our control. So the emphasis should be on areas that are more under our control: the mind. You do good things for the sake of the good that it does for your mind. If for some reason the world changes so that the good you do gets wiped out, still the goodness of the mind doesn’t get wiped out. That’s what stays with you.

So spend your time on the aspect of life that does stay with you. Arrange the rest of your life around that. That way, as you sit down to meditate, the outside world doesn’t impinge so much. Because you remember: The outside world is not a set factor. A lot of your experience of the outside world depends on how you interact with sights, sounds, smells, tastes, tactile sensations. That’s the world you experience.

And so much of it comes from your intentions in the present moment. So if you can work on the mind to get its intentions right and skillful, as much as possible, then you find that you have a better world to live in, a better space to meditate in.

So remember this: You’re not a passive victim of outside circumstances. You’re part of the shaper of those outside circumstances. When you realize your responsibility for the world you experience, then you can do something about it.

When you see what’s under your control, what’s not under your control, and are very clear about that distinction, it clears up a lot of issues in life — and a lot of issues in your meditation. You may not have full control over the outside results of your actions, but you do have control over your intentions — if you simply take responsibility for them. That’s what we’re doing as we’re meditating. We’re taking responsibility for our mind, taking responsibility for the way we experience the world. We devote time and energy so that we can do it as skillfully as possible.

From: Right Livelihood by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
People can prey on your fears. This is a lot of what politics is all about. They want to make you afraid so they can influence you to do what they want. But if you learn how to develop a joy that comes from how you breathe, how you focus the mind, how you develop qualities of mindfulness, ardency, alertness, concentration, discernment — what the Buddha calls joy or pleasure not of the flesh, rapture not of the flesh, based on concentration: That kind of joy actually strengthens the mind. It’s a joy not touched by events outside. It’ll put you in a position where you can look at events outside and think about them in a new way, so that regardless of how well or poorly they’re going, you can maintain an inner sense of stable well-being. You won’t fall prey to fears when things threaten to change.

From: Feelings of Grief & Joy by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
The only type of clinging that’s not to be engaged in is sensuality. And remember what sensuality means: It’s your fascination with fantasizing about sensual pleasures. You don’t have to give up sensual pleasures altogether, just this fascination with planning for this, planning for that, and then saying, “No, how about this? How about that?” You’ve got to put all that aside; there’s no room for that.

From: Determination by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
Now, in doing an action and learning from it, you have to take responsibility for it. After all, the Buddha said, if you felt simply that things were happening on their own without any input from yourself, that would make a path impossible. Whether it came from a creator god or simply past actions or random fate, if you chalked all your experience of pleasure and pain up to something totally apart from what you’re doing right now, there would be no path possible.

That goes against a teaching you hear every now and then, that if you come to the path with the attitude, “I am going to do the path,” you’re coming from wrong view, and that taints everything you’re trying to accomplish. You have to have the attitude there’s nobody here doing anything; the path is just developing out of causes and conditions. There is simply awareness, seeing things arising and passing away. That’s all there is there.

That’s the enlightened way to approach the path, we’re often told, but what happens with an attitude like that is that whatever definition of self you might have goes underground. You start identifying with the awareness. You start identifying with what you think is an awakened awareness. In that way, you can let go of what may have been a neurotic self, but it turns into an overblown but very vague self.

One of the whole points of the practice is to see exactly where your sense of self comes in — when it’s skillful, when it’s not — and how to train your unskillful self to be more skillful. Of course, the emphasis is not focused on the self, but it’s always there in the background.

From: Self Bypassing by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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dhammapal wrote: Thu Jan 06, 2022 8:28 am
Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:
Now, in doing an action and learning from it, you have to take responsibility for it. After all, the Buddha said, if you felt simply that things were happening on their own without any input from yourself, that would make a path impossible. Whether it came from a creator god or simply past actions or random fate, if you chalked all your experience of pleasure and pain up to something totally apart from what you’re doing right now, there would be no path possible.

That goes against a teaching you hear every now and then, that if you come to the path with the attitude, “I am going to do the path,” you’re coming from wrong view, and that taints everything you’re trying to accomplish. You have to have the attitude there’s nobody here doing anything; the path is just developing out of causes and conditions. There is simply awareness, seeing things arising and passing away. That’s all there is there.

That’s the enlightened way to approach the path, we’re often told, but what happens with an attitude like that is that whatever definition of self you might have goes underground. You start identifying with the awareness. You start identifying with what you think is an awakened awareness. In that way, you can let go of what may have been a neurotic self, but it turns into an overblown but very vague self.

One of the whole points of the practice is to see exactly where your sense of self comes in — when it’s skillful, when it’s not — and how to train your unskillful self to be more skillful. Of course, the emphasis is not focused on the self, but it’s always there in the background.

From: Self Bypassing by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
Hmm 🤔 this doesn’t make sense with right effort. As much as I admire Thinassaro, to say there is no “doer” is to say there is no “one” MAKING the effort.

Who makes the effort? Effort implies an impulse and a conviction and a reliance on the part of “something”.

That something may disappear after enlightenment, but for the sake of provision it is REAL!
Like the three marks of conditioned existence, this world in itself is filthy, hostile, and crowded
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