This exercise highlights inanimate materiality that is not bound up with sense faculties. Consider that all materiality everywhere is impermanent, unsatisfactory, and not-self. Every possession that you cherish, the walls of your home, the wheels of your car, the copper in a penny, the laces that secure your shoes, the flowers in the field, and the rocks that form mountains are all impermanent. Your childhood scooter has long ago decomposed in a landfill. The daffodil bulb that you planted has grown, reproduced, blossomed, and transformed—the matter that is in the current bulb is not the same matter that you planted. The temperature-produced materiality that composes these objects arises and perishes moment by moment. Although a mountain may appear enduring or the wall of a city might seem sturdy, when you discern the rūpas that compose these objects you will find that earth, water, fire, wind, color, odor, flavor, and nutritive essence are continually arising and perishing.
Discern the materiality that surrounds you during each day in your hundred-year life span; emphasize the possessions that you cherish most dearly. Contemplate the impermanent, unsatisfactory, and not-self nature of the material objects. See all things as entirely ephemeral, vulnerable, unpossessable, and insubstantial.
EXPANDING THESE PRACTICES
Each of these exercises demands a comprehensive and systematic examination of ultimate materiality, past, present, and future. Whereas the first six exercises are performed on internal and external phenomena, the seventh exercise includes only external phenomena. By patiently examining matter, dispassion toward material phenomena can grow steady and strong. Again and again, past, present, and future, internally and externally, stage by stage, you will have looked and looked again, and never found anything that can be a stable and enduring expression of matter. This exhaustive survey will wear away attachment to the body and assumptions about a continuity to material forms.
These vipassanā exercises can be expanded as much as you like. You may refine the time increments into smaller and smaller segments until you are viewing material events in each day, each hour, each quarter hour, each minute, each half minute, the time it takes to complete an inhalation or an exhalation—each mind-moment. You might expand the range to incorporate past or future lifetimes, or substitute the forty facets of anicca, dukkha, and anattā as presented in meditation instruction 17.7 for the three characteristics. As you become more adept with these meditative processes you will find that your inquiry into the nature of phenomena may become playful as well as incisive. Seek to understand the true nature of things and instill dispassion; trust that your practice will wear away any residue of ignorance or tendency toward attachment that might be obstructing your realization of the great peace of release.
Reflection on the Ephemeral Nature of All Phenomena
The traditional instructions for this method emphasize the contemplation of materiality for the preceding seven exercizes. You may, however, notice and reflect that not only is materiality arising and perishing, but feelings, perceptions, mental formations, emotions, moods, and thoughts arise in one period of time and pass instantly; they do not continue into the next time period. For example, the feelings that you felt as a baby crawling on the floor are not the same feelings that you experienced as a teenager learning to drive a car, or as a senior playing a game of cards. The perceptions that you experienced as a child learning to read are not the same perceptions that you experience now as you study this book.
Alternatively, you may combine the mental and material contemplations by discerning phenomena in terms of five aggregates (materiality, feeling, perception, mental formations, and consciousness). Observe cognitive events that occur during each time increment and contemplate internal and external material and mental aggregates as impermanent, unsatisfactory, and not-self. Allow the insight to register deeply, that every single event (including the interdependence of materiality and mentality) that has ever occurred or will ever occur in your life is utterly fleeting, unretainable, and not possessable. Know that feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness that arise dependent upon materiality also do not last; there are no mental formations that can be owned, controlled, stored, or claimed as mine.
MEDITATION INSTRUCTION 17.11
Focus on Mentality through Seven Exercises291
To contemplate the impermanent, unsatisfactory, and not-self characteristics of mental phenomena, the traditional instruction recommends seven exercises that emphasize seeing the impermanence of the meditating phenomena.
Exercise 1. Highlighting the Meditating Mentality as a Whole Group
Group together the phenomena discerned through the previous seven methods and then contemplate that the mental process (include mind-door adverting, impulsion, and registration consciousnesses plus all associated mental factors in the cognitive series) that comprehended materiality as impermanent, unsatisfactory, and not-self is also impermanent, unsatisfactory, and not-self. Now you are contemplating the three characteristics of the meditating mind that is aware of the insight into the same three characteristics of materiality. You will, for example, find the standard twelve mental formations in the mind-door adverting consciousness moment of the mind-door process, followed usually by thirty-four mental formations in the impulsion consciousnesses of that meditating mind. With the occasional absence of rapture, however, there may be times when only thirty-three formations are discerned. As you discern the ultimate mentality that composes the meditating mind, contemplate every mental formation in the cognitive series as impermanent, unsatisfactory, and not-self.
Exercise 2. Highlighting the Meditating Mentality that Occurs in Each of the Seven Separate Methods
Repeat the previous seven methods that highlight the impermanence, unsatisfactoriness, and emptiness of materiality; then, with regard to each segment, contemplate the mental process that is aware of the three characteristics as also impermanent; then contemplate that mental process as suffering; and then as not-self. For example, you would meditate on rūpas that you find in each stage of life, in the lifting of the foot, in a period of hunger, or in a variation of temperature, and immediately perceive that not only is that matter changing, but the consciousnesses and associated mental factors in the cognitive process that knows the changing matter are also changing. Not only is the matter in that stage of life suffering, but the mental formations involved in knowing it as suffering are also suffering. Not only is the matter throughout your life span not-self, but the mental formations that compose the meditating mind that is knowing the not-self characteristic of matter is also not-self. Thoroughly contemplate every formation in the cognitive process of the mind that is having insight into the three characteristics of materiality throughout the various incremental stages of life.
Exercise 3. Highlighting a Series of Four Meditating Minds
This third method is similar; it also focuses on the meditating mind that has insight into the three characteristics. This third method, however, extends the comprehension to recognize that there is also a mental process that is aware of the impermanence, unsatisfactoriness, and not-self characteristics of the mental process that perceived matter. In this approach you would first contemplate the impermanence of matter in one of the incremental stages of life, then contemplate the impermanence of each formation in the mental process that is aware of the impermanence of that matter, and then contemplate that the mental process that is aware of the impermanence of that previous mental process is also impermanent. In order to contemplate ultimate reality and not concepts it is essential to discern the specific consciousnesses and associated mental factors at compose the cognitive series. You will find that each component of this second mental process is also impermanent, and so with the third and fourth mental processes. In fact, every constituent of every mental process that you find will be impermanent, but we don’t just assume or deduce this. For direct insight, we look carefully. Follow the contemplation through a series of four levels. At each level contemplate the impermanence, unsatisfactoriness, and emptiness of the pr
evious mental process with the aid of a subsequent mental process. Practice in the same manner to contemplate the characteristic of suffering, and then the characteristic of not-self regarding the all material and mental components in these cognitive series.
Exercise 4. Highlighting a Series of Ten Meditating Minds
To further examine the meditating mind you may continue this sequence of contemplating the meditating phenomena through a series of ten perceptions. Although this procedure could continue without end, the Visuddhimagga recommends stopping at ten because the mind may become too familiar with the practice after excessive repetition and it will cease to have a disenchanting effect.292 The procedure is as follows:
1. Meditate on the impermanence of matter found in one interval of the life span.
2. Contemplate that the mental process (include twelve mental formations of the mind-door adverting consciousness, thirty-four mental formations of each impulsion consciousness, and thirty-four mental formations of the registration consciousnesses) that is aware of the impermanence of that matter (we may call this mind 1) is also impermanent.
3. Contemplate that the mental process (including all mental formations in each stage of the cognitive series) that just contemplated mind 1 (which we may call mind 2) is also impermanent.
4. Contemplate the impermanence of mind 2, by mind 3.
5. Contemplate the impermanence of mind 3, by mind 4.
6. Contemplate the impermanence of mind 4, by mind 5.
Thoroughly contemplate every component of the meditating mind as impermanent through a series of ten processes. Then perform the same sequence while perceiving the suffering characteristic. Finally, repeat the exercise perceiving phenomena as not-self.
The Removal of Wrong Views, Conceit, and Craving
After you have thoroughly contemplated all three characteristics of phenomena occurring in the five-door and mind-door cognitive processes, internally and externally, in the past, present, and future, according to the structure of mentality and materiality, the five aggregates, or the sense bases, then you may for a period of time emphasize each characteristic individually.
Exercise 5. Highlighting the Removal of Wrong Views (diṭṭhi)
For a discrete period of time—at least one sitting or perhaps each sitting for a few days—focus primarily on the contemplation of not-self. Notice the absence of any wrong view of self. When you have thoroughly meditated on all the formations, material and mental, as not-self, wrong view will be removed.
Exercise 6. Highlighting the Removal of Conceit (māna)
Next, deeply contemplate the characteristic of impermanence for a discrete period of time. When you are contemplating impermanence, the conceit I am cannot arise. Conceit arises only when there is the perception of permanence. Observe the absence of conceit in that contemplating consciousness.
Exercise 7. Highlighting the Removal of Craving (taṇhā)
Similarly, focus for a discrete period of time on the characteristic of suffering and recognize the absence of craving when the characteristic of suffering is vivid. Craving can only arise when there is the erroneous perception that phenomena could serve as a suitable support for pleasure and happiness. Craving is abandoned through the insight into suffering.
Insight into the three characteristics has the immediate effect of removing the defilements that depend upon erroneous perceptions. This approach to training, however, cautions that defilements are not abandoned through the sole emphasis on a single characteristic. The combined force of insights into impermanence, suffering, and not-self generates the power that removes conceit, craving, and wrong views. The insight into impermanence has the ability to remove conceit only when it is supported by insights into suffering and not-self. The insight into suffering gains liberating power from insights into impermanence and not-self. Similarly, the insight into not-self effectively removes wrong views only when supported by insights into impermanence and suffering. Therefore, in this system of training you would meditate upon all three characteristics without neglecting any or favoring one. Allow the insight into the three characteristics to strengthen and mature so that together they transform the mind from a mode of ignorance to one of liberation.
CHAPTER 18
Release from the Bonds: Ten Fetters, Four Stages of Enlightenment, and Sixteen Knowledges
How did you cross the flood? By not halting
and by not straining I crossed the flood.293
—SAṂYUTTA NIKĀYA294
DO YOU EXPECT awakening to occur suddenly, like a lightning bolt that radically illuminates your life? Do you think of awakening as a gradual process that slowly transforms your life in the way that fine mist or fog slowly moistens cloth? The Buddhist practice offers a sure path for realization that includes the abandoning of unwholesome factors along with the cultivation of wholesome factors. The diligent practice of releasing the mind from the bondage of greed, hate, and ignorance develops virtue, concentration, and a clear understanding of things as they are and brings all causes of suffering to an end.
Long ago, two disciples of the Buddha, Venerables Sariputta and Punna Mantaniputta, compared Dhamma practice to a journey made by a king with relay chariots.295 In those days, a king with urgent business in a distant province might use a system of relay chariots, taking the first chariot to a station where he would mount a new carriage with well-rested horses, leave the last one behind, and travel to a third station, where he would leave the second chariot behind and mount another chariot with fresh horses, continuing his journey stage by stage until he finally reached his destination. If he were asked upon arrival, “sir, did you come by this chariot,” the king would answer “no.” It was through the network of chariots, not an individual vehicle, that he accomplished the journey. Similarly, we develop many practices and attainments on our meditative journey—each skill, method, and stage of development carries us closer to our goal. The purpose of practice is not the perfection of techniques or the elevation of particular attainments. The step-by-step training creates a sequence of platforms; each accomplishment serves as the base for successive stages of progress. Venerable Punna Mantaniputta described the aim as the “practice for the sake of final nibbāna without clinging.”296
Chapter 17 of this book includes instructions for an approach to insight meditation primarily derived from the traditional sources, thoroughly expounded in the Visuddhimagga, and taught by Venerable Pa-Auk Sayadaw. The present chapter places all these practices into the context of a series of traditional insight knowledges, as preserved in a standard progression of insight by Theravādan sources. The experience of this series produces an unmistakable and enduring sequence of inner transformations that culminate in a direct encounter with the deathless element—nibbāna.
1. The knowledge of analyzing mentality and materiality. This knowledge is accomplished by the type of clear discernment of material and mental phenomena discussed in detail in chapters 12, 13, and 16, in which you discern and analyze twenty-eight kinds of rūpas, fifty-two mental factors, cognitive processes, and the characteristics, functions, manifestations, and proximate causes of those factors. When this knowledge is attained, the mind is not habitually melding perceptions together into conceptual structures and narrative stories; it is able to tease out the distinctions, discriminate between the processes, and discern psychophysical elements as momentary events. You will be able to clearly distinguish the mental processes as distinct from material processes.
The Sixteen Knowledges
1. The knowledge of analyzing mentality and materiality (nāmarūpa-paricchedañāṇa)
2. The knowledge of discerning cause and condition (paccaya-pariggahañāṇa)
3. The knowledge of comprehension (sammasanañāṇa)
4. The knowledge of arising and passing away (udayabbayañāṇa)
(a) The tender knowledge of arising and passing away
(b) The mature knowledge of arising and passing away
5. The knowledge of dissolutio
n (bhangañāṇa)
6. The knowledge of appearance as terror (bhayañāṇa)
7. The knowledge of danger (adinavañāṇa)
8. The knowledge of disenchantment and dispassion (nibbidañāṇa)
9. The knowledge of desire for deliverance (muncitukamyatañāṇa)
10. The knowledge of reviewing the three characteristics (patisankharañāṇa)
11. The knowledge of equanimity toward formations (sankharupekkhāñāṇa)
12. The knowledge of conformity with truth (anulomañāṇa)
13. The knowledge of change of lineage (gotrabhuñāṇa)
14. The path knowledge (maggañāṇa)
15. The fruition knowledge (phalañāṇa)
16. The knowledge of reviewing (paccavekkhaṇañāṇa)
You may notice that when you take a step and walk, an intention arises and then a movement follows—interactions of mental and material conditions arise together and produce an effect. Phenomena neither exist before arising nor persist after passing away. Mentality is not waiting for an object, and objects are not waiting for mentality. The removal of the illusion of continuity is a distinguishing feature of this insight; mental and material processes are illuminated exactly as they actually occur—as processes of distinct momentary events.
At this stage it will be evident that only mental and material phenomena are occurring. This insight makes it shockingly clear that there is just this experience and the knowing of it—there is no one to whom the meditation is happening, there is no soul, no being, no creator, and no one who can control or claim experience as their own. All perceptions are directly seen to be devoid of constructed concepts. All ephemeral and conditioned events are perceived as pure characteristics—not beings, entities, structures, stories, or concepts. It is an immediate, vivid, and direct knowledge that requires no explanation or thought. Through this stage of insight the impurity of the wrong view of an I, soul, being, or entity is removed. Although concentration is strong, this first knowledge designates only a preliminary phase of insight. At this stage, perception is not yet quick enough to discern the beginning, middle, and end of every process completely.
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