Who We Really Are By AJAHN SUMEDHO

Who We Really Are
By AJAHN SUMEDHO

There are different ideas about enlightenment: instant or gradual. Some may say: "Enlightenment is now", while others say thatit has to be done gradually, stage by stage, lifetime by lifetime. Both these are true - but not right, right but not true. They are just different ways of contemplating and reflecting on the experience of the moment. The idea of instant enlightenment is very appealing to the modern mind: one LSD tablet and we're there - without having to go through a monastic training or give up anything at all; instant enlightenment!

But we have to recognise the limitation of the thinking mind. These concepts - instant and gradual - are just ways of reflecting, they're not positions that we take. Take the word, 'enlightenment', itself: maybe we see it as some kind of absolutely fantastic experience in which we are completely taken over by the light and totally transformed from a selfish, deluded being into a completely wise one - seeing it as something very great and grand. Most of us feel that we cannot reach such a high state, because the personality view is very negative. We tend to emphasise what is wrong, our faults, weaknesses, our bad habits; these are seen as obstructions to this experience of enlightenment. But such thoughts cannot be trusted. So I often say to people: "Whatever you think you are, that's not what you are!"

The aim of Buddhist meditation is to let go of these conditions of the mind, which doesn't mean denying, or getting rid of, or judging them. It means not believing them or following them; instead we listen to them as Dhamma, as conditions of the mind that arise and cease.With an attitude of awakened, attentive awareness, we learn to trust in just being the listener, the watcher, rather than being somebody trying to meditate to get some kind of result.

Source: Who We Really Are

By AJAHN SUMEDHO

https://www.dhammatalks.net/Books3/Ajahn_Sumedho_Who_We_Really_Are.htm