Todayand#8217;s FBA Dharmabyte and#8220;Samsara andamp; the Three Laksanas,and#8221; by Dhammadinna, is from the first talk in a five-part series from Tiratanalokaand#8217;s retreat on the and#8216;Four Mind Turning Reflectionsand#8216; of the Tibetan tradition. This introductory talk by Dhammadinna is an ideal entry point to the world of the mind-turnings. Seen as foundations for the building of practice, the reflections encourage us to make life meaningful in the face of a relentlessly ungovernable reality. Here she explores seeing conditioned existence in terms of the three laksanas and ways of giving up craving without harmful side effects. A strong look in the mirror of the heart. Talk given at Tiratanaloka Retreat Centre, 2005
Dharmabytes from free buddhist audio
Samsara and The Three Laksanas
[music] Dharma Vites is brought to you by Free Buddhist Audio, the Dharma for real life. Our work is funded entirely by donations from our generous listeners. If you would like to help us keep this free, come and join us at freebuddhistaudio.com/community. Thank you, and happy listening. [music] And the thoughts of Sanghsara is just looking at Sanghsara as a whole, and whether we look at those six realms or cosmologically or psychologically. We're looking at the wheel of life and looking to the nature of conditioned existence. Again, my tray is going to introduce us to this later on in the retreat in more detail. But I suppose primarily we're looking at Sanghsara in terms of the three likes, or the three marks, that conditioned existence is painful, impermanent and insubstantial. So, in looking at sort of a bigger picture and reflecting in this way, we're beginning to overcome our fascination as it were with the marbles of Sanghsara, which there are many. [laughs] Condition of distance gives us much pleasure. But we're beginning to see that it won't, it can't give us total happiness. And an understanding that even within pleasure, sometimes there's hidden or latent suffering. So we enjoy many things, but it was interesting to reflect how much pleasure there is, actually, the things that we enjoy, how much is there in the moment, or is much of anticipation and memory. [laughs] So, kind of, you know, focusing on pleasure as a reflection is quite interesting. What is pleasure? What is it? And, yeah, sometimes if you look at things in that way, we see how momentary the pleasure is, and even associated with something that's very pleasurable. Often, you know, there's kind of deeper anxieties about loss, losing the things that we enjoy. So these sort of reflections point more at that. And I suppose what the four mind-turnings do in leading us to renunciations is to kind of, in a way, they're quite strong, but also they're kind of so gentle way of bringing about insights, which quite naturally turn us away from delusion towards a kind of more realistic understanding of life and existence. So that's going to withdraw, then, as a kind of natural withdrawal, rather than a kind of what to do at all, whatever, which probably means you'll do that thing again later on, in my experience. You kind of, you know, react in and out of things. There's a wonderful line in Pingi's praises to the way to the beyond, which is a favorite reading, isn't it, in the F.W.E.O.? Pingi is talking about the Buddha and what the Buddha teaches, and he says it's something about, he shows the way to give up craving without harmful side effects. I think, I'd love to give a talk on that one day, let's get around you one day. I think it's a wonderful phrase. And again, I think so often we kind of can fall into thinking, you have to give things up in a sort of alienated, ascetic kind of way, which will give us harmful side effects and reactions. So I think the four mind-turnings are a way of giving up, you know, addiction to the pleasures of this life and of, you know, any addictions we have, but possible pleasures of the next life without harmful side effects in a kind of natural kind of way. So that's what I hope will come out of this retreat. So just to sort of, that's a brief sort of overview of what we're going to be exploring in the retreat. Sometimes they are expressed in a different order, so you may come across them expressed in a different order. Preferly, I think this one's probably good for us, and I think it is the more usual one, but I have seen them approached with impermanence first. And a way that's understandable, isn't it, because that is the actual nature of ourselves and existence generally, that it's a kind of truth that's there. It's an actual characteristic of existence. It's a latchness, a definitive mark. And thirdly, if we engage in a reflection on impermanence, you know, we also understand that, you know, attachment to impermanence, things bring suffering. So we're very much involved in reflections on the noble truths as well, and the four mind-turnings do associate with the four-level truths. So that may lead us to think, well, we really need to practice the dharma, and then we realise, well, we have got the means to practice them, we've got a precious human birth, we've got the freedoms and opportunities, we've got the context, so that would lead us into the first reflection as a second reflection. And sometimes Sanghsara comes third, we sort of see the nature of existence and our attachment to it through our reflection on impermanence, as it were. And then we realise that we can abandon our attachment to Sanghsara because of the truths of calm and calm through Parker, because of the truths that actions do have consequences, and what we do does matter, because we have the power, we have the ability to change what we do, you know, and to engage in a part of practice developing more and more skillful actions independent upon which insight can arise. So you can sort of turn around one and two and turn around three and four. But I think it's probably better to approach them in this way. I mean, I suppose really they're just so interconnected, aren't they? You approach one, you can arrive at any of the others because the dharma is a sort of total truth in which everything does interconnect. But for methodological purposes, we'll take them up with a set of reflections in this order. So we'll start with the precious human birth, and we'll really explore our opportunities and freedoms and our own potential and the context in which we find ourselves in, and allow that over the next two weeks, nine days, to, you know, see what happens, but what should happen is that, you know, feelings of appreciation of what we've got, things of gratitude, the faith begin to arise, and that allows us to explore death and impermanence and understanding that, well, our context can change. You know, we may live a long life, but we just don't know what's going to happen with our context and our circumstances. So, you know, that gives us a sense of, a positive sense of urgency to practice more deeply. And, you know, to understand that we do have the possibility of directing our life by understanding karma and kambu paka. We can choose at any moment in time skillful actions of body, speech and mind. We can direct our life skillfully to the practice of the precepts, and we can understand more and more deeply that conditioned existence has nothing ultimately to offer us and allow that to give us a sense of a very strong motivation for liberation for ourselves and all sentient beings. We hope you enjoyed the talk. Please come and help us keep this free at freebuddhistaudio.com/community. And thank you. [MUSIC] [BLANK_AUDIO]