In todayand#8217;s FBA Dharmabyte, and#8220;The Third Great Stage of the Pathand#8221;, Sangharakshita talks about the process of spiritual death as the cultivation of unselfishness. This talk, titled, and#8220;The Path of Spiritual Developmentand#8221; is a book launch for and#8216;The Essential Sangharakshitaand#8217; published by Wisdom Publications.
Recorded 2009 at Essen, Germany. Talk translated in German.
[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] Most people will spend most of their lives, most of their Buddhist lives trying to practice, trying to travel on these two stages. We think that in most Buddhist and various ways, we'll give the vibe and bring it to you. There are higher further stages. I'll mention them only briefly. Let's keep the vibes of a real Australian, by 15 o'clock. Yes, because I've already been speaking, I believe, quite a long time. The third stage is what I call the stage of spiritual death. This is the stage of a really serious spiritual life and spiritual effort. So death of what? For death of the 'I', death of the ego. There are in Buddhism a number of practices, especially meditation practices, to help us undermine this false sense of ego. Some of you will be familiar with them. But I'm not going into them this morning. I'll just say one thing about this particular stage. If one wants to put it in very simple language, it really means practicing unselfishness. We usually put ourselves first. But when we practice trying to be unselfish, we do our best to put other people first. To consider their convenience. And sometimes even put it before our own. So it's not enough to engage in abstruse meditation exercises in our own daily lives. We have to try to be less selfish, less self-centered than we usually are. If the ego is very tough, it won't die easily. It will put up a lot of resistance. But if it is to die, it's much more likely to die by what we may call the death of a thousand cuts. Every time you consider others more than yourself, every time you give up your own convenience for the sake of the convenience of others, you made a little cut of the ego. There's a very beautiful line in one of the English poets which I sometimes quote in this connection. The poet is William Wordsworth, one of the great romantic poets. And he speaks of the little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love. It's a big one in Klein. It is these little acts, repeated again and again, day after day, month after month, year after year, it will undermine the ego. And these are Klein's tarts, non-hands long. And bring us nearer to enlightenment. A lot is completely happening then. We hope you enjoyed the talk. Please come and help us keep this free at freebuddhistaudio.com/community. And thank you. [music fades out] [music fades out] [BLANK_AUDIO]
