The teachings of Ajahn Suchart
“The fear arises out of your own negligence that your body is subject to ageing, illness, and death.”
Craving and desire, which are the cause of depression and fear, will be under the control of samādhi. Therefore, they won’t conjure up depression and fear in your mind. Your mind will then be able to recollect and contemplate death. You will see that death is something as normal and expected as the weather; it has no effect on your mind at all.
The body is what is affected by death.
However, the body cannot feel or acknowledge its own dying. The body is just like a tree that shows no reaction when it is being cut down. So it is only the mind that reacts to the body’s dying.
When there is wisdom in your heart, telling you exactly who is being affected by death, then your mind won’t react to it. It will accept and acknowledge the reality—the dying of your body.
It is not your mind that dies, but only your body. However, it is only your mind, and not your body, that suffers from the death of your body. It is like a tree that isn’t bothered by getting cut down, but its owner is the one who gets upset. If the owner cares about and is attached to the tree—not wanting it to die, then he’ll be very upset and angry when somebody cuts it down.
It is the same with your body and mind. Your mind is the owner of your body. You’re a woman UUID’s mind is only a temporary owner of your body. It is not a permanent owner, because your body doesn’t belong permanently to your mind—your body is bound to grow old, get ill, and die eventually.
If your mind is aware of this truth and able to distinguish itself from your body through contemplation, it will remain equanimous and be able to let go when something happens to your body. Your mind won’t be bothered by your body’s death.
Your suffering is due to your craving for the body not to die. However, with wisdom come equanimity and the ability to let go. Consistent contemplation and recollection of the inevitability of ageing, illness, and death will allow you to keep calm and let things be when something happens. This is because there is wisdom in place to keep reminding you so that you don’t forget. But suffering will arise if there’s craving for not dying, ageing, and getting ill.
Your wisdom and mindfulness come from your sustained effort in recollecting death. If you don’t make the effort, then these Dhamma qualities will not take hold and resonate within you. You’ll only be aware of them temporarily, i.e. while listening to the Dhamma, just as you are at the moment. When you go home, back to where you live or to all the things you do, you’ll forget about what you’ve heard if you don’t keep reminding yourself of death. It will just turn into perception (saññā). It will become a memory.
When you encounter your own death or that of others’, you’ll suddenly panic and get frightened. This is because you don’t have the wisdom firmly rooted in your mind to prevent such fear from arising.
The fear arises out of your own negligence that your body is subject to ageing, illness, and death. When there are delusion and heedlessness, craving will arise—craving for the body to last. So when you’re facing death, fearfulness will arise along with suffering. This is because you don’t have the wisdom to keep you constantly grounded. But if you keep in mind what you’ve just heard about death—even after leaving here, and recollect it frequently—your mind will have the wisdom to protect you from being bothered and troubled by death.
It all comes down to your determination and diligence: you must keep developing mindfulness and cultivating wisdom as much as possible. Keep doing sitting meditation to calm your mind. Once your mind is calm, you will be able to let go of your body—your wisdom will make you aware that your body is not you, nor does it belong to you.
Your body is composed of four elements: earth, water, air, and fire. It will eventually revert to its original elements. The composition of the four elements in your body—earth, water, air, and fire—will eventually dissolve and disband.
The air element will no longer go in and out of your body, and so the fire element will disappear. The water element will leave your body to the point where your body is all dried up and turns into earth. This is how it is with everyone’s body. Having been born, each and everyone of us is subject to ageing, illness, and death. No one can prevent their body from ageing, getting ill, and dying. Your wisdom, however, will allow you to accept such reality—to accept the natural course of your body: ageing, illness, and death are inevitable.
By Ajaan Suchart Abhijāto
Youtube: Dhamma in English
No comments:
Post a Comment