“The true revolutionary is guided by love.” (Che Guevara). In this weeks FBA Podcast, “Finding Freedom,” Amalaketu explores freedom through images and stories and the Chappanakopama sutta, the discourse on the simile of the 6 animals, and shows how Buddhism is the way to ultimate liberation.
Free Buddhist Audio
Finding Freedom
(upbeat music) This podcast is brought to you by Free Buddhist Audio, the Dharma for Your Life. Our work is funded entirely by donations from our generous listeners. If you would like to help us keep this free, make a contribution at freebuddhistaudio.com/donate. Thank you and happy listening. - So I was reflecting on freedom and so lots of images comes to my mind. So there's images from our popular culture. This is kind of a strange one, but it came up for me. The old spice advert with the surfer on the way you saw, probably on Hawaii beach or something like that, with the coming, the barona playing in the background. (sings) I won't continue playing in the background and just sort of that freedom of surfing and just being away from everything. And there's songs of freedom, like the songs of John Lennon and Imagine. For example, in songs by Bob Marley in particular. And also images from me of freedom fighters actually, that really came up strongly for me, strange enough. So as Che Gueveira, the beret wearing doctor who became a revolutionary after travelling around South America and seeing the suffering. And I've got a quote from him, which I really love actually. And it's just simple, simply, the true revolutionary is guided by love. I really love that, yeah. And there's Nelson Mandela that came into my mind. Yeah, so it's been christened for over 25 years fighting against apartheid. And again, another quote of his I love, "For to be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others." And also another inspiration for me, another sort of image of freedom is that Muhammad Ali, actually the boxer. And again, he was imprisoned as well and he lost his well title because he refused to fight in the Vietnam War. You know, he didn't believe in it. But also, he actually took a stronger position to the racism that was prevailing in the US at the time. And again, I've got a little quote of his, which I quite like as well. "That Cassius Kclay is a slave name. I didn't choose it and I don't want it. I am Muhammad Ali, a free name. It means beloved of God. And I insist people use it when people speak to me and of me." And you can kind of imagine himself saying that, can't you? It's very powerful. But of course, there's images from the Buddhist tradition. And we are here at Burma, like as Harshapal says, I could go on for hours on different aspects, but I'll try and keep it focused to Buddhism today. And I thought I'd draw firstly from the Buddha's life, actually. And then I'll be talking a little bit about Bante. And then myself, to indulge, I think. So in the course of the Buddha's life, it's called lots of freedom, aspects of freedom in it. And firstly, of course, is Siddhartha, as he was before he became the Buddha. Siddhartha's going forth. And that image of him leaving his palaces, his wife perhaps, if he had one, difficult to know, his child, if he did, certainly his wealth, his social position, riding on the horse with Chandrana, and just riding out and just leaving those palaces in a couple of astro, and going forth. And there's many images and many stories of that going forth. But actually one of the oldest texts, which is when the Buddha reminisces in his old age to his disciples that I'm going to quote from, and he simply says, "Then I months after a time being young, my hair cold black, possessed of radiant youth, in the prime of my life, although my own winning parents wept and welled, having cut off my hair and beard, having put on the yellow robes, went full from home into homelessness." So it kind of been easy for Siddhartha to leave his family. But it also represents his freedom from the group. And it's personified by that action of going forth. So it's a freedom over his culture and family conditioning. And it's sort of taking the initiative for himself. It meant living his own life, and it meant him becoming an individual. So Vante obviously has a lot to say about what age who individual it is. So the next event I'm just going to mention, it's when the Buddha, after having gone forth into homelessness, he approached on separate occasions to spiritual teachers, the most famous spiritual teachers of the time in India. And each of them taught the Buddha or Siddhartha as he was then all and everything they knew. And each time Siddhartha excelled and he reached the pinnacle of their teaching. And each time the teacher, I've offered them leadership of the group or shared leadership. And each time Siddhartha refused, because he realized that wasn't what he wanted. That wasn't truly what he was seeking. So this was a freedom by him taking that refusal. And it was a freedom over spiritual complacency and also spiritual ambition. He knew there was more to discover and he wasn't concerned with leadership. He was concerned with the search for truth. And it's just interesting by the by to mention that he overcame spiritual complacency and spiritual ambition. If you like, well, not quite simultaneously, as they're quite connected. If we're spiritually ambitious in the sense that we're seeking spiritual leadership, we're likely to become or we could become spiritually complacent. So similarly, if we're going to become spiritually complacent, we may then tend to find that we search for spiritual leadership roles, as it were, to compensate that. So it's something to be aware of as we get more involved, I suppose. So the next freedom depicted in the Buddha's life that's inspiring to me, anyway, is his freedom over fear. So this is represented by him going forth into the forest and meditating there. And the forest in India, of course, not like the forest here in England, yeah. The forest in India were a scary place and not only were they physically scary with snakes and tigers, they were also bandits and also there was a lot of mystery and myth around at the time, you know, about being haunted and ghosts and so forth. So there was all that as well to overcome. Yeah, it's a day for when and he practiced in in solitary places in the forest and overcoming his fear. And it's a fear too that I think we will need to overcome in our own search for freedom. But of course, we won't probably presumably be going off into the forest of India, but nevertheless is that internal fear that we must overcome. So the next freedom or example of freedom that Siddhartha, I suppose, goes through experiences is when he's practicing his extreme asceticism. So he went for a stage of becoming the most famous ascetic in North East India at the time and for starving himself, so much so that he could sort of touch his backbone. It said through his stomach, so by pressing he would actually touch the back of his spine. So he was extremely thin, presumably, yeah. And he realized he came to the realization that this wasn't the way for him to win his ultimate freedom. And so he was prepared to start again, he was prepared to admit his mistakes. So even though his his spiritual companions with him at the time they left him as well in disgust, he knew that he had to give it all up as it were. And start again if you like. So this represents the freedom over that human tendency to refuse to admit that we've made a mistake, that we've wasted time and energy and that we need to start again. And then there's obviously the episode, probably the most famous episode of course of freedom in Siddharthas, finally going to sit under that Bodhi tree in North East India to sit under that in this month in May, although we've missed the full moon, but the full moon he made to sit down and gain full and perfect enlightenment. And of course that's the complete destruction of greed, hatred and delusion, and him winning the final, well not final, winning the varna form perfect enlightenment, complete freedom. So there's obviously that example of freedom in the Buddha's life. And even so there's one more example that I'm going to draw and even after full achieving form perfect enlightenment, there's still another freedom in the Buddha's life that we can draw and that we can take inspiration from. And that's his freedom over spiritual individualism by taking up the path of teaching and going out to others because he was still not satisfied with his accomplishments. They could have perhaps taken it easy but he chose to go out and teach and he did so until he died. So these images of freedom from the Buddha's own life are high power of inspiration to you and you can draw on them as they are for me. And very much in our movement at the moment there's a real tendency, you know, imagining the Buddha bringing them Buddha more life to us. So by considering these aspects of stories in terms of freedom, it's another way of looking, appreciating and getting to know the Buddha I think. So there's images of freedom from our own teacher, Sangharachita, which also come up for me when I reflected on freedom. This is the image, the most famous image I think of him tearing up his basketball while he lived in India and becoming a monk. And of course deciding to set up a new Buddhist movement in spite of the opposition. So one of my favourite books by Banta is not his dharma text, his writings, he's actually his autobiography The Rainbow Road. I've just got a short passage from The Rainbow Road when he realises and sets out and goes out into this path of homelessness. So he says, "There was only one way out religious societies, organisations and groups, far from being a help to spiritual development, were only a hindrance, however lofty the ideals with which they were founded, they had a natural tendency to degenerate in the hands of selfish human beings into instruments for the acquisition of money, position, power and fame. Instead of trying any longer to work with them, we would follow the example of the Buddha and sever at one stroke our connection with an incourable world. We would renounce the household life and go forth into the life of homelessness as wondrous in search of truth. For the last few months we had only sat hesitantly on the shore of the vast ocean in the spiritual life, now casting aside all fear we would punch boldly in." And then that chapter finishes as he walks away with his friend and why the book's called The Rainbow Road of course. So as we left Ghassali it was raining, but as in the course of our descent we emerged from the clouds into the bright sunshine below we saw arching the road at intervals of a few dozen yards, not only single but double and triple rainbows. Each time we turned a bend we found more rainbows waiting for us, we passed through them as way through the multi-coloured arcades of some celestial palace. And I love that image of him walking off into the sunset as it were a bit like a western, anyway. I don't think you'd appreciate me saying that. And this whole set of some images of freedom of my own life, but I'm going to draw notes a bit later on. So I'm saying a little bit more about freedom now generally, yeah. So the idea or the idea of freedom really inspires me actually, and I realised actually when I was reflecting more and more that this is actually what I am seeking on a really deep level, yeah. The stories, songs and people who represent that for me, I hold above all others. So there's the Buddha, there's Manto, there's these ideas, these freedom fighters. And so, you know, to give a talk on freedom really, it's thrilling for me, it's exciting, but I wonder if I can really do it justice, it's so much actually, it's so much. So you kind of, when you're giving a talk, you kind of live that life, and every reference you sort of crop up freedom, freedom, freedom, it's sort of everywhere. And, you know, so much more could go in, but limited time, of course. So theoretically, we're in control of our own lives, and we can make our own decisions. We can vote for the government of our own choice, we can choose what products to buy, what job to take, we can choose whether or not to get married, have children, who we hang out with, and, you know, what religion we can practice, and so on, you know, we're, this country, in this country, we're pretty free, yeah. But we don't really feel free. So why is that, yeah. In this country of freedom of speech, and we know we've got food available close to our roots, I've had. So why is that, yeah. So when we talk about freedom, we're often, well, we're talking about its opposite, so there's bondage, lack of control, lack of independence, and we don't like this one bit, in fact. We can feel quite angry or distressed when we feel our rights or life and liberty are taken away from us, when we are not given the control and the choices that we want. I mean, I feel quite angry about the merest fault of my time being taken from me against my will, and through upset when I hear the injustices of the world, you know, when Tibetans can't practice the Buddha Dharma, people looked up against the unfair regimes in the world, where 80% of the world live in poverty, you know, living on less than $10 a day. I mean, the nature of samsara is clearly unsatisfactory, but even so, it does make me mad. But according to the Buddha, we all have the capability to be free, so the true nature of our mind is pure, aware, fit of wisdom and compassion, it's open, it's clear, it's bright. We don't, obviously, on a day to day level at least, perceive this, and we live in a state of delusion and often self-imposed suffering, in fact. So the Buddhist path can offer us a way to free ourselves from the illusions that we create for ourselves, and also those of our society, and those that our religious and cultural impositions create too. And it's not easy to see beyond our conditioning to break through, through the expectations of our family, of society, our religious groups, and see the nature of our own mind. In fact, it can be difficult to realise how far our own condition actually does affect us, how much our parents' influences affect us, and those of our friends as well. And even the language that we use has a profound effect on how we see the world. This is my time to be a bit self-indulgent now. So my only experience of this was when I travelled to Israel after graduating from university. So my parents wanted me to start a proper career, and they helped me to get a job in our family business, and they brought me a flat in Croydon, and that's where I was brought up. I brought a little car for £150 ratio, and I even brought my first business seat. However, after graduation, I went on a two-week vacation to Greece to celebrate my graduation in effect. And when I was there, I realised I didn't want this. I didn't want this kind of life. I didn't want to settle down. I didn't want a job. I didn't want to work until I was 65 for retirement and then die. That wasn't the life for me. And my spirit felt free when I was in Greece. I was running around a bit like an English. It actually proved me right. And I just wanted to be free of all the expectations placed on me, and really that was my first real taste of freedom. So I was young and happy and enjoying life to the full. And I was on this beautiful island of powers in Greece. And I was free. I was really free. I felt free. And so I decided that I was not going to go back to England. I was going to stay in Greece. And I started chatting to a Scottish chap who worked at a cafe and he said he needed to get home. He had no way financially of getting home, and he had planned to cycle home. And I said, well, we worked there. We'll take him about a month to get home. And he didn't have any money. So I sold him my return ticket. I think it was for £10. And I took his job on at the cafe. And I find my mum and dad and said, I've got him my return ticket way. I'm not coming home. And I went absolutely ballistic at me. And said, you must come home. You know, we need to talk about this. Anyway, I think that was my moment of truth. And I said, no to my parents. And they cut off ties for me. And it didn't feel, you know, good to fall out with them. I knew I kind of had to do that. And I'd really been brought up under my parents, really, in their expectations. And my mum and dad, I've been brought up in a, you know, Jewish life, Jewish parents, believe me, have a lot of expectations. Yeah. But the main thing I remember from the conversation, ironically, is when I find out my mum from Greece. And I said, you know, I'm not coming. I want to remember my Jewish mother. I hope she doesn't listen to this talk, actually. But it's required my Jewish mother saying, but what about the suit? Sorry, mum, just in case. I realized I was to an extent on my own then. So I had to save money while I was working in that cafe. And I decided to go across to Israel by boat. And eventually I got to Israel. I just managed to get in with some difficulty, actually. That's another story. And I ended up on a kibbutz. And I ended up staying there for quite some years, actually. And in the meantime, of course, I made up with my parents. But actually, during that time, I really did start a journey of self discovery. I was often very alone there. I didn't speak the language. I was learning the language. And I didn't really have anything to particularly fall back on. But in a way, strangely enough, you know, with all that, everything became a lot clearer for me. And I started seeing how life is more and more. Learning a new language, communicating in it. I was thinking differently and living in a complete different culture. But in a way, I felt like a new being. Yeah, I was like coming on. And that's, please don't keep on coming into my head kind of thing. And it still does. You know, some I'm an alien. I'm a legal alien, or by a bit of a take. I'm an Englishman in Israel. I won't sing that. So I learned a lot about myself at this time. And I changed an awful lot. So when I left England, I was a bit of a wild child truth being known. And I loved the party and I had a pretty easy life, really. And I was pretty superficial. Let's be honest, I was. But when I came back to England, I was kind of like this new being. I became a vegetarian. I gave up smoking. I gave up drinking as well. I was gotten to yoga. I started meditating. I mean, and I found out a lot from books and so forth. And occasionally, I met these friends on the way. And they showed me another way of being really. And there was some, you know, days and nights, you know, the dark nights of the soul. There was some tough times there. But by distancing myself from all that cultural and parental obligation, I kind of found a new me, a real me, one that was a lot freer and more myself or how I wanted to be. But my search for freedom actually wasn't yet over, I have to say. It's still not over. So after spending some years through Israel, I decided to become a full Israeli citizen. And by virtue of my Jewish heritage, you can take your right to return. Yeah. And I decided I wanted to do this. I wanted to live in Israel, become Israeli system. And this is a long process. And part of that process involves becoming part of the Israeli war machine. You have to join the army, basically. That's part of the obligation for people there. And I had to go to the army headquarters and undertake various psychological, mental, physical tests and so forth. But at some point during this process, I started having second thoughts. Yeah. I started realizing, not quite like the Buddha, but realizing I'd made a mistake actually. And I didn't want to live in Israel. And I started seeing for all of it and started not liking what was going on. And I started finding myself not agreeing with the war and what was going on in Israel. And actually, one of the times I went to the army headquarters, so I remember looking in the back of the bathroom door, and somebody had inscribed the words of the door song that end. This is the end. My only friend, the end. And I just started panicking. I'm thinking, I'm going to get shot in Lebanon. I had all these visions that I wasn't going to come back. If I end up, I'm not going to get back to England. I'm not going to get home. Yeah. I mean, there are reasons for that. I mean, I'm taking my glasses. I am severely blind. I can't even see. I can't see anybody. I just want to be blind. And I've got no sense of direction whatsoever. I mean, I've been lost in serving him, for God's sake. So, yeah, so it was quite a reasonable vision to have that I would get shot and killed and, you know, be taken back in a box of some kind. So, I thought, right, I don't want to do the army problem. U.K. Patterson book was with the Israeli authorities. They don't return your passport. You have to go through the crisis. And there's only two ways to get out of the Israeli army. One is to become fully religious, obviously, in the Jewish tradition. Although, such, I could have probably got away with the British, but you can't have done that. It's hard to perhaps become a what's known as a from Jew, Don the old black cat in the beard, you know. So, I could have been standing here, you never know. You're a big beard on. Or you go mad. So, I took the second roof to obtain my freedom. It was a bit of a risky approach, but when I undertook one of my psychological profiles, there's a sort of section right at the end once you've answered all these questions, which actually I can fly for these questions. But at the moment, is there anything else you want to say? This is all in Hebrew, by the way. And I said, yes, I have smoked marijuana. Oh, I think I smoked marijuana. And I handed them the paper and then went back to the kibbutz. And of course, I got a letter from army headquarters holding me back into the HQ about this. And it was a gamble. And because actually in Israel, well, like here, it's illegal to smoke. And actually, it's in prison for seven years, up to seven years you can get in prison for. So, it was a bit of a gamble. So, I went back to the army headquarters. And I was facing free army officials. And I think one was an army psychiatrist. And they were just barraging me with questions. I can't remember many of them. And one I remember was, you know, why do you feel the need to take something external to yourself for happiness, which was an interesting question when I look back now. And but I had my kind of get out. My plan was and say, well, I have smoked, but I don't anymore. So, this was my idea at the time. In my deluded state. But it was sufficient. And actually, there was a point in that interview. One of the guys said to me, he said, do you want to go into the army? Do you want to join the Israeli army? And it hit me as a bit of a shock that I was kind of like, I had that choice. And actually, strange enough when I was thinking about this, I thought I had that same experience in the QUTI vidrassna, just before my ordination. And after Korea sat up with me and said, are you ready for donation? Do you want to be ordained? And it kind of hit me again. I've got this choice. Instantly, I did say no to the Israeli army and yes to ordination. But that same kind of it hit me. I have a choice. And it's up to me. So yeah. So, and on on that basis, it just started a whole rolling program. You know, they returned my passport. Okay, we'll let you, we'll give you release from the army, get me my passport back. And I booked out that return for, and I got back to the club because I could actually. And it was soon after coming back to the QUTI came across the, what was then the F.W.B.O. but of course, now the three retina. And, and they like crazy people. So, I fell at home. I was in 1997, 15 years ago, that was, I met your husband over. Yeah. 10, 15 years ago. Yeah. Now, when I left England originally, you know, when I went off to Israel, I knew what I didn't want. I didn't want that life. I didn't want some of some in life. It kind of helps me like a whole kind of death actually of a waste of a life actually. But also, I didn't really know what I did want. I didn't know. I knew there was something more, but I didn't really know what it was. I knew I didn't want that, but I knew I wanted something else. Yeah. So, in order to find freedom, we need to look for it. It's not going to, I mean, obviously, practicing now, we realize it's not going to come from outside us. Not only do we need to look for it, we do need to want it, and we need to really want freedom, I think. Unless we realize we're in prison, it's a bit of a metaphor to saying this to a likeness. We won't look for a release. And this is the problem. We don't necessarily realize we're in prison, or samsara, if you like. We kind of like to make everything nice and comfortable here in samsara. So, we fit out our sale with a nice flat screen TV, perhaps. Perhaps we get a little Apple Mac. Perhaps we get a nice rug for our old sale. And we find some nice coffee, and we drink our nice coffee. But actually, if we start looking around, we might sort of catch a glimpse of a still bar, maybe a locked door somewhere, limitations on where we can go. So, when we're talking about freedom, we should ask, freedom from what? Do we think it means freedom from external control to do whatever we please? So, this might feel temporary liberating, but could it actually bring pain? Or would we like choice, sort of unlimited choice, perhaps? Would this really bring happiness? I remember coming up for a retreat one time, as perhaps human experiences, and hitting Tesco's on the way back to Colchester, and being completely overwhelmed by all the products, yeah? Absolutely, it's been so easy on retreat. This is our lunch, I don't know what it is, probably soup, curry Friday night. At this time, everything's all set out, and it's quite liberating. But I just went into the soup zone, just stuff everywhere, so much stuff, so much choice. And I thought, you know, I couldn't even find, you know, what type of bread to buy, there were so many. And actually, this is a strange bit of research, but I went on Tesco.com for this talk, just to research how many types of bread there were out of interest. Would you believe there were 536 options of bread? Yeah. When I go to buy bread, I pretty much buy the same knife every time, and I think it's a bit like that with our lives. We just go through the same routines, yeah? So, just because we have the choice, it doesn't mean we achieve freedom, and paradoxically, if we want to embrace freedom, we have to shut down on our choices. So, for example, if you want children, you've got to give up your Sunday lines, for example, yeah? We act from habitual patterns, either consciously or unconsciously, and we live our lives like this, and our mind is what looks the same, and therefore, it's a source of our suffering, and so it's a mind that can ultimately release us. And the better we know, our mind, the greater the possibility of liberation. So, when we sit and meditate, and perhaps we arrive around, perhaps we become agitated, or we get lost in a ray of thought, I kind of figure to myself, that's okay, because at least I'm learning what my mind's like. And our mind can be like someone we pass on the street every day, so we see them, but we don't really stop to talk to them. We don't even know them intimately sometimes. We may notice they're a little bit changeable, and maybe they've got likes and dislikes, and sometimes they get angry and sometimes upset, sometimes our friends, sometimes our worst enemy, but not knowing our mind means we cannot fully appreciate who we really are, and we cannot fully experience our lives. We are, in fact, in a prison of sorts, and we don't recognize our own natural potential for fulfillment. But when we see the true nature of our mind, we are relieved of the deep anxiety of life, and we don't need to spend time labelling, we are aware of our feelings, and there's more open experience of being, any spring's energy, and we do need to free up energy to practice. And we should be aware that it is an individual freedom that we seek. It's an individual path, actually. We don't all suffer in the same way, so what my drives are, they're not necessarily your drives. What my senses move towards is not what your senses necessarily move towards, our taste and inclinations are not the same. However, we are all inclined towards pleasure and away from pain, and that's something we can resonate with. We're drawn to what we like, and away from what we do not like. And the more integrated we are, the more we can go beyond this inclination and act from a more accepting perspective. So integration, which is kind of what I'm leading to here, is seen as the first of the five great stages of the spiritual life, and obviously the others are just for your reference, positive emotion, spiritual death, spiritual rebirth, and if you like altruistic activity, and these stages are often related to different practices. So, of course, in the cases of integration, it's mindfulness of breathing practice, and positive emotion would be the metaphor for them. So, the more we practice, the mindfulness, the more we hone in on our breath, the more our mind comes and its settles, that kind of just brings us more into being an integrated forebeing. So, I'm going to try and reference that more now to the sita that we're going to be studying in our study groups. So, we're going to be looking at the similarly of the six animals, yeah. And I'm just going to sort of draw on that a little bit now, just to sort of finish off the talk. So, hopefully this will help in the study. So, again, I ask you to engage your imaginations, and we take six lengths of rope, and we tie each bit of rope to a different animal, as you do, you know. So, we'll get a snake, a crocodile, a dog, a hyena, and a monkey. I don't know how they come up, these nieces, exactly. So, each of these animals is fast and with a rope, and then we tie all the ropes together in the middle with a big knot. I don't know how you tie six fingers, I'm sure there's all that doing it. And so, each animal is pulling in a different direction, and each animal is going to where it wants to go. So, the snake, for example, tries to go to the anthill, the crocodile wants to go to the water, the bird wants to fly up into the air, the dog wanders into the village to find humans, the hyena will go to the sort of the carnal ground where the dead animals are for feasting, and the monkey wants to climb up on trees into the forest. And this is exactly what's being suggested in this sutta that we're going to be studying. It's from the Samutta and Nikaya, if you're interested, and, yeah, the discourse on the simile of the six animals. But, of course, it's a metaphor. It's to show the state of our senses and how our senses are, all six of them, according to Buddhism, of course. So, the mind sense, this eye, ear, nose, tongue, and body, of course. And they each join in their own preferred direction, all in the pursuit of pleasure, to avoid suffering and awaken pain, yeah? So, the Buddha describes this as a situation with our own undisciplined state, and thus we can find no freedom, as each of our senses will put us in one direction after another, eventually exhausting us, and we will become a mixture of desire and evasion. Does that sound familiar? So, what do we do? How do we solve this problem? How can we find freedom? So, the Buddha offers us the solution. So, for those engineers amongst you or those things, the solution is we take a stake and we drive it through that central knot to hold down each of the animals at a single point. And this is the stake of mindfulness, and it's through mindfulness that we can find the freedom. And, of course, it sounds like a paradox. How can staking ourselves down be the root of freedom? Surely, freedom comes from doing whatever we want and whenever we want. What could we do with all the time, money and good book, good looks in the world, go wherever we want, whatever draws us our fancy, surely this is the freedom we seek, surely that will bring permanent happiness. So, we need to look more deeply at the Buddha's solutions, his communication to us in our unenlightened state from his unenlightened state, the man who found complete freedom and ultimate liberation from bondage. So, let's look at each of the animals, our senses. Each animal thinks it's free, or our senses are free, in itself, to wander down the avenue of its likes and dislikes pursuing pleasure of voiding pain, going where it believes will bring it pleasure from the places it likes. But this, of course, is bound to affect the other senses. So, in order to go to that place, it will need to put along all the other senses. So, whatever is the strongest will probably win. I think in this case, probably the crocodile. What we do with each of our senses will affect the other senses. Thus, acting from compulsion will only cause suffering from the other. So, the addict may not mentally want the drugs, but the body's suffering with draw symptoms. Our mind, perhaps, likes the effects of a bit of alcohol, but then the body feels the effects of the poison the next morning of the cracking hangover. And I'm sure you can come up with your own examples. So, what the Buddha is saying is that mindfulness offers us a necessary restraint to overcome this tug of war that's going on between our senses. We notice how one of the senses draws us in a particular direction. So, when the mind wanders off in pleasurable faults, or the body feels a sense of desire and wants to pursue this or that, we catch these impulses with mindfulness, and gently, but firmly, bring ourselves back to that central position, the here and now. So, I'd be coming fully present with what is and finding contentment in that, rather than rushing off the stimulation outside ourselves, we can find peace in our current field of experience. And as the mind settles and the senses settle down, the mind becomes more powerful, more controlled, and more at peace. The sutra ends in a rather lovely way, with each of the six animals lying down, next to each other quite contentedly, no longer needing to exert themselves, and no longer needing something else. The tug of desire and aversion has been quieted, restlessness and anxiety has subsided, doubt and indecision put to rest. The mind then is open to experience, to what is, and is open and can thus find freedom. It is this mind we are seeking, the unlimited mind, capable of experiencing freedom through wisdom, not freedom to shallowly seek our sense desires, here and there, with no regard to the consequences, where we like. It's the ability to shake off all constraints of desire completely and investigate experience as it is. So, it's not what we see, hear, feel or taste, or touch or think. That's the important thing, but it's how we respond to what we see here, taste, touch or think, yeah. So, it's not what we see, but it's how we respond to it. So, our view that finding freedom is having all that we desire, then all our wishes will be satisfied. So, sorry, our view that finding freedom is having that we, whatever we desire, then will be satisfied. But the Buddha takes that false view and completely turns it on its head. And he says that if we really truly want to find freedom, we need to be free from the wanting itself, free from desire, free from craving, yeah. We consider the stake of mindfulness to be the fetter and freedom to be the ability to get the object what we want, whereas the Buddha actually says the pursuit of happiness is to be the fetter. That's what's holding us back. And mindfulness is a way to be free. So, this is liberating and revolutionary as it is now as it was, you know, over 2,500 years ago. And, you know, it's perfectly exemplified in our consumer culture, suggesting we need to feel our every desire, and then you'll be happy, then you'll find freedom. So, this radical transformation of turning about of consciousness comes from realizing from fully integrating this, knowing that finding freedom is within us, and not from outside of ourselves. And mindfulness is the key. And it's no coincidence that this was the Buddha's last words before his final paranoia. And that's what I'm going to finish on to, for finding no better words or no better ending. So, with mindfulness, strive on. Please help us keep this free. Make a contribution at freebuddhistaudio.com/donate. And thank you. [BLANK_AUDIO]