Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Readings from Thich Nhat Hanh, Mother Teresa, and Saint Paul sit alongside Buddhist philosophical reasoning in this nearly two-hour session by Ven Jampa Gendun, which advances through three causes of the seven-point cause-and-effect instruction for awakening the heart: remembering the kindness of all beings as our mothers, the wish to repay it, and “appealing love.” Gendun first lays out the case for rebirth — mind arises only from a prior moment of mind, traceable back without beginning — then leads a guided meditation on recognizing all sentient beings as having been our mother. Extended readings from Thich Nhat Hanh on maternal love are paired with frank guidance on navigating difficult mother relationships. The session closes by defining genuine love as a will to extend oneself for another’s well-being, contrasted with romantic projection. Suited to practitioners working through the Lamrim.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 2007 12 17 Jampa Gendun Three Principal Asepects of the Path 17-12-07.mp3
UUID: 0963101b-4cd5-4f09-9b44-a33357eea76f
Teacher: Ven Jampa Gendun
Collection: Three Principle Aspects of the Path 2006-2007 (Ven Jampa Gendun)
Date: 2007-12-17
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 113.9 minutes
Words: ~12,541
How is everybody? So we begin by adjusting our motivation. Motivation. I think we’re involved in a long range project in this process of changing our mind. Don’t think it’s going to happen overnight.
I think we have to be gentle with ourselves, we have to be patient with ourselves, but within that context we have to actually do something for ourselves. We have to try. You know, as a sort of a consistent gentle effort in implementing the means to become that type of person that we want to be. You know, maybe five years, ten years, we can find some some kind of meaning in just that. You know, there’s some kind of fulfillment even in just the trying itself.
And we can respect ourselves. We can feel good about ourselves. We can find some kind of contentment in the fact that we know that part of our lives, part of our energy and time and resources are being dedicated to something which goes beyond the pleasure pain principle of the present moment, beyond our attachments, our habitual preoccupations with gain and loss and so forth. We have some long term goals for ourselves and living out some kind of values. Seems as if a good life, a successful life, necessarily entails that we begin to try to understand what it is that we value most and what resonates within our own hearts.
What do we want to see our life representing? And in some small way, as best we can, begin to act that out and make it some kind of practical reality. That seems important and necessary ingredient for a good life. You know, good clothes, good food, relationships, and all of that, they go into the mix for sure. They’re part of what a good life, a successful life might be about.
But we have to feel that our life is being lived out out of a deeper part of ourselves. We may not completely comprehend or know exactly why, but still there’s a certain satisfaction that’s in reassurance reassurance of the heart when we know that we’re making effort in that direction. So we’re involved in a cosmic project, in a way. So we have to be patient with ourselves, but we have to make the effort. So one way we can be assured that our efforts are going to bring about some benefit for ourselves, what it is that we would want for ourselves is in terms of our motivation, the intention why and the purpose for.
And there are two basic problems that we’re dealing with, which lie the base of it all, the foundation of our neurosis and all our suffering, our ignorance and self centeredness. And we’re trying to work with those and working with the three principal aspects of the path. You know, first developing the motivation to take up the difficult task of contradicting these dysfunctional patterns of mind through awakening our heart, going beyond our self centeredness, and developing awakening our mind, going beyond ignorance. But, you know, we’re doing that. And we can feel assured that one way we can feel assured that our coming here together as we do is going to be a benefit to ourselves is if it is motivated by intention which contradicts our own self centeredness.
And what I mean by this is, you know, I keep asking to please adjust your motivation, you know, thinking of if only one other person beginning there, someone that you naturally feel good about. It makes you feel good to think that they would be happy and that you’re willing you know, we’re talking we’re going to talk about and we’re talking about for the next couple months about love and compassion essentially. And that you would be willing to put yourself out for in some way, that you’re willing to extend yourself for, you know, walk that extra mile or, you know, whatever it takes for this for this person to be happy that they not suffered. And, you know, it’s difficult, you know, to connect that up as our pleasant or more or less pleasantly sitting here peacefully. I guess the chairs are fairly comfortable.
I don’t know. How am I how is this bringing about the benefit of this person that I love? And then trying to make like, I I mean, not just an artificial or simply in terms of words from our mouth, but make some genuine connection between what it is that we’re doing here in listening to these very educating ourselves, listening to these various teachings and discussing them and meditating on them, and actually being there for this person that you want to be a benefit, that you love. The more that we are, the more that we’ll have to give. Otherwise, our love may be real, but there are obstacles to implementing it, to bringing about what it is that love actually wants.
That is to say, the alleviation of this person’s problems, bringing them happiness. And that we have to go beyond love is important, but we have to go beyond simply the blind leading the blind. You know? We we have to make making of ourselves something is part of the process of the way that we show our love. And the more skills, the greater our patience, the greater our understanding, the greater our ability to be there in some significant way for this other person.
It’s the way that our love can find practical expression in bringing about what it is that love wants, the wish that the other person be happy. Education process that we’re all involved in. And this is the process of becoming more so that we have more to give, and therefore we can bring about those ends that we want both for ourselves and others. So though it may not directly appear that we’re benefiting anyone else to ourselves, don’t think we’re simply navel gazing, you know, kind of going off into some kind of fantasy world. I think it’s a great challenge to face your mind and to deal with the mind in the ways that we’re doing.
I think it’s very admirable. And I think it’s a project. It’s work. It’s labor. And this labor is not only for ourselves.
You can think in your own minds, this one person is someone that, you know, have a when you think of them, your heart kind of smiles. There’s a warmth that goes out. And you hate to think of them suffering, and you would like to see a smile on their face that you want them to be happy. And how can I do that? And how can I take that responsibility?
You know, if the word responsibility is to have any real meaning, we have to be able to respond. The more we are, the more we’re able to respond. The greater that we’re able to respond, the more that we can actually bring about what it is that our love wishes for, their happiness. And this way, they were expressing that, taking a responsibility and developing the ability to respond at this present moment right now is through our process of listening, meditating. So I’m doing this not just myself in a very real sense.
And it’s not mental gymnastics. It’s not abstract or a theory, but in a real practical sense, I’m doing this also for you so I can be there for you in some more meaningful way in the future. This is for the both of both for the both of us. If we whatever actions stem from that intention, that motivation serve to contradict the patterns of self centeredness, and it is imploding in upon ourselves, we’re doing it for something other than ourselves, if we’re only one other person. And therefore, it serves an antidote to one of our most basic problems, you know, our fundamental problems, that of self centeredness.
So our evening together, you know, over and above the information, we may be able to gather the insights and information we may be able to gather, the insights and the understandings, simply that as a positive action is we can be assured it will be beneficial to ourselves. It will be help ourselves at a fundamental level simply through the motivation, the intention for doing what we do together. So the inner focus of our life is, you know, becoming a Buddha, is the best person that we can possibly become. That’s what I want to be in terms of wisdom, in terms of love and compassion, in terms of my own inner strength, how these fine practical expressions in my everyday life, and how I how I be in this world skillfully with others and relating with this world of others. And we we we have to do something.
You know, we we have to do the work necessary to bring that about. Wishful thinking is not enough. Sincerity is not enough. Having suffered on the path is not enough. We have to take up the challenge in implementing these teachings in our daily life and bringing about the changes in our own minds.
And we try to this all occurs the social context of people like us, and just trying to help each other out as best we can, our spiritual community, assisting in whatever way, both in terms of giving advice and teachings and whatever, but also in very practical terms in material needs and just to shoulder the burden whatever is necessary in order to help another person take another step along their particular path on their journey. And again and again that we started with one person, it’s not going to end there. We’re trying to raise the level of our motivation to the scope of our intention to include an ever widening circle of others. Ultimately, you know, all sentient beings, but at least begin with one person. At least begin begin somewhere.
The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step. We have to begin no matter how faltering, how hesitant our first steps might be. Nonetheless, if we’re ever to reach the path’s end, we actually have to begin. There’s no substitute for actually beginning if we’re ever going to reach our goal. And we have to begin.
We always have to be beginners. And we have to re re begin putting one foot in front of the other, choosing and re choosing what it is that we want to become. It’s never there’s an end to it, but it seems it’s an ongoing process of re choosing the person that we want to become, making that choice day by day, exercising that freedom that we all have. I go for refuge until I am awakened to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Through my practice of generosity and the other perfections, may I become a Buddha for the sake of all sentient beings.
I go for refuge until I am awakened to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha through my practice of generosity and the other perfections. May I become a Buddha for the sake of all sentient beings. I go for refuge until I am awakened to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Through my practice of generosity and the other perfections, may I become a Buddha for the sake of all sentient beings. May all sentient beings have happiness and the causes of happiness.
May all sentient beings be free from suffering and the causes of suffering. May all sentient beings be inseparable from the joy that is without sorrow. May all sentient beings abide in equanimity, free from attachment for some and aversion toward others. Reverently, I prostrate with my body, speech, mind. I present clouds of every type of offering that is actually arranged and imagined.
I disclose all my negative actions accumulated during beginningless time and rejoice in all the virtues of superiors and ordinary beings. Please remain to the end of cyclic existence and turn the wheel of Dharma for migrating beings. I dedicate all virtue, my own and that of others, to the great awakening. You wanna stand up and stretch before we meditate? Tired.
Had a long day. So we’re meditating on the we’re discussing and meditating on the seven-point cause and effect instruction, one of two meditative traditions for developing an awakened heart, an aspiration to achieve highest awakening for the sake of all sentient beings. And we begin begins on the foundation of equanimity, an unbiased, unpartial mind which doesn’t hold some close out of attachment and other have aversion for others having, you know, pushing others away out of aversion, an even minded attitude. You know, we we we don’t begin to lessen this, categorize. You know, we’re habitually categorizing others in terms of friend, enemy, and stranger, putting them in these boxes, and then we automatically react with aversion, attachment, and indifference On that basis, in that psychological space that we create by not getting caught up in these patterns of ways of relating in terms of attachment, aversion, and indifference, we can begin to nurture in a real, genuine love, a positive way of regarding, unconditioned by these negative patterns in mind, which usually dominate our thinking in ways of relating with others.
Then on that foundation, we’re building the six causes and bringing about the seventh effect. The six causes are recognizing all sentient beings as our mother, remembering their kindness, developing a wish to repay that wish, a gratitude wishing to repay their kindness, appealing love, great compassion, and exceptional resolve, and finally, the awakened heart, bodhicitta. Last week we talked about the first of these six causes, that of recognizing all sentient beings as our mother. This is a great challenge. Would admit that.
I think this meditative tradition is difficult, but I think it’s worth a try. We can work with it. And in recognizing, you know, I mentioned the fact that I think of Pabongka Rinpoche, one of the great masters of the early twentieth century Tibetan Buddhism, said that the two most difficult realizations of the graduated path, the stages the path to enlightenment are seeing one’s teacher as a Buddha and recognizing all sentient beings as one’s mother. So, you know, don’t feel bad if you find this difficult. You’re in good company.
But it’s worth working with just see where, just to develop a feeling for it. So we talked about recognizing all sentient beings as your mother and this requires that we develop some feeling or some appreciation that maybe this isn’t the only life that we’ve had. Maybe there are past and future lives. We’ve talked about this in the past when we’re going through some of the proofs and the reasoning, which more or less tend to support the existence of past and future lives. What it comes down to essentially is we want to know the insight is, you know, if you have insight into the nature of mind.
Past and future lives comes down to that. Getting a pre developing appreciation for the nature of mind, that mind arises from a previous moment of mind. It doesn’t arise from a cause which is dissimilar in type to itself, which is dissimilar in identity to itself. The most basic characteristic of consciousness or mind is that it is non material and knowing. Knowing.
The quality of knowing. Now, does you know, we could argue, well, does a computer know? A computer a computer can calculate extremely quickly. It can some some ways, it’s probably more efficient than most human minds. But does it know what it’s computing?
We can ask that question. From the point of view of this reasoning process, the logic is that since everything arises from a cause, principal cause, which is similar in type to itself, the consciousness which has the central characteristic of knowing must arise from a cause which is similar in type to itself. That is, a cause which has the central characteristic of being knowing. Therefore, the cause of consciousness is that which is knowing. And the cause of that previous consciousness was that which was knowing, and the cause of that previous consciousness is that which is knowing.
Just as, in fact, we can analogously do the same with matter. Know, that matter arises from a cause which is similar type to itself, a previous moment of matter. And that that previous moment of matter, again, arose from a cause similar type to itself, which was previous moment of matter. Different transformations of matter, tremendous varieties of the way matter can recombine itself in various forms. But nonetheless, it’s still matter, whatever shape, form it takes.
And we trace that. We can never find a first movement of matter. Matter cannot rise from nothing and nor does it arise from something which is dissimilar in type from itself. Parallel to that is mind. Mind arises, didn’t rise from, does not arise from nothing.
It, well, it as well arises from a cause similar type to itself that is mind. We can never find a first moment of mind. This is very roughly some of the principal arguments used to reason out the proof of rebirth. Why? Because if we were to trace back our present mind, we see that it always arises from a previous moment of mind.
The mind that you came that you have at this present moment as you’re listening to my voice is of a similar type. There was a similarity of attitudes, predispositions, cognitive functions arising from the mind as you walked through that door. They all replicated themselves, more or less, with some simple minor variations to the mind that you’re using to listen to my voice at present. There is a relationship between the mind you have at present and the mind that you walk in through that door with. There’s a relationship of cause and effect, a continuum.
There’s an ongoing process. The mind is not a static, is not a single thing like we might take the glass to be a thing. It’s dynamic process. Actually, we’re more than having a mind, we’re mining. It’s an ongoing process.
Various functions of mind are continually enacting and expressing themselves. That mind that you came in through the door, we could trace back moment by moment by moment by moment to the to the mind that you woke up with this morning. Yeah. There’s minor variations, which, you know, you’ve you’ve learned new material. You’re maybe certain attitudes have have been developed to some lesser greater degree.
Various cognitive functions have been developed to a lesser, greater degree. But more or less, the various the principal functions of mind are very consistent over the course from when you woke up this morning to when you walked through that door. Those functions of mind have been replicating their potentiality from that moment you woke up to the moment you walked through that door to the moment you sat down in this chair, in your seat, or your cushion, the moment you’re listening to my voice at present. The moment that you woke up with the mind that you woke up with this morning, again, we can trace it back to the mind that you went to sleep with last night. You didn’t you didn’t reinvent yourself when you woke up.
That would be a hassle. There was a continuity of predispositions, attitudes, cognitive functions. All that constitutes are mind, what it means by mind. The very fact of knowing was always present. Even in sleep, there’s a knowing.
The continuity of that stretches back to when you went to sleep last night. And we can begin that same process of tracing back, infinitely back, to the time of ten years ago, twenty years ago, when you were a child, when you were just born, and you came out of the womb. There’s this little baby with a mind, certain potentiality, certain cognitive functions, and there’s a factor of knowing present. And we trace that back all the way through to the fetus. And we come back, we trace it back to the first moment of conscious awareness of this life.
Where did that mind come from? This is what the reasoning of rebirth comes down to, that very first moment of consciousness. Did it come from the sperm and ovum of the parents? Did it come from matter? Or did it come from a cause which is similar in type to itself?
Matter is not similar in type to that which is nonphysical. The factor of knowing. The Buddhism is saying that that moment of knowing, that moment of mind with all its various attitudes, predispositions, cognitive functions, so forth, it arose from a mind of a similar type previous to itself. And that mind previous to itself was the last moment of mind of the previous life. It’s simply continuity.
The embodiment, you know, there’s no question the embodiment has changed radically. We’ve had a radical change of lifestyle. And we’ve taken a human embodiment. That mind has become associated with a human embodiment. Perhaps it wasn’t in the previous life, but nonetheless there was mind there.
So we develop we can trace this back, back, back from one life to the previous life to the previous life without beginning. So we get the sense of a continuum of mind without beginning and without end. You know, we a we reify, we see our mind moments as isolated events. But in fact, there’s a process which stretches back from beginningless and will extend itself into endless future time. So on the basis of subtle consciousness, subtle mind, subtle consciousness and subtle energy, we label I.
Okay? Jampa, this, you know, this I, this person who is talking to you right now. There’s a body, a gross body. It’s getting old, but it’s pretty gross. Ah, in mind.
Okay? On on this basis, we label I. We label Jampa. Okay? Jampa come Jampa is a person.
You know? I’m I’m an Australian citizen. What else am I? You know? I’m all these various things.
I’m a male. Okay? We on this particular body and mind, we label, impute person, male, Australian citizen, and all the all these various identities. The the person exists. The I exists in the same way.
I, person, self, synonymous. So, but there’s also a more subtle level to our consciousness and body, and this is what is extending from beginningless time to beginning of this future. On this, label I. I. I this is a particular instant of that continuum.
Jampa. So we want to get a sense that there is a continuum of I ness. Label the I, the sentient being, which is being labeled to this these mind moments, these continuum of body and mind, subtle body and subtle consciousness, from beginningless time to the future. I, I, I. There are particular instances when this continuum becomes reassociated with a gross embodiment, a human being, a body of a human being, a dog, a cat, whatever.
Okay? So it’s continually being reassociated with a gross embodiment, but nonetheless there’s a continuum. So we want to have a we want to develop a sense, a feeling that all sentient beings you know, and over the course, since beginningless time that this reassociating with gross embodiments, we call that rebirth. And over the course of beginning this time, we have each of us has taken infinite number of rebirths again and again and again, reassociating with a gross embodiment. That gross embodiment, finally, you know, the karmic bond between that subtle mind and subtle and gross body breaks.
That gross body simply decays, returns to the elements, but the mind continues on, reassociates with another gross embodiment. That gross embodiment ages, decays, returns to the element, and the mind continues on. So there’s a continuum of a mere I, which is continually reassociating and reassociating with a gross embodiment. Over that continuum of reassociating with these gross embodiments, we have been reborn infinite numbers of times. In each of those times, we have been born to a mother.
So all these sentient beings, the people here, the people that you are going to meet when you leave here, the people you’re going to meet tomorrow, every sentient being that you ever met has been relate has a relationship with this continuum. Over infinite time, they’ve all related to this continuum in the way of being its mother. There’s not one sentient being who we can point to and say this person has never been my mother. In fact they have. So it’s, you know, this is quite a challenge, isn’t it?
The goal is to be able to have a sense that this person, this person, this person, this person is has been my mother just like my mother of this lifetime. That they’ve all had this relationship to this continuum, not this particular eye of Jampa, but to to the continuum which got Jampa is an instant of, a particular moment of. And all sentient beings have related to that continuum in terms of being its mother. So that’s what we’re going to meditate on. Okay?
I’m gonna try it. So taking a firm, comfortable posture. So a posture that you feel a purposeful stable posture, you know, like feel like a mountain, like firm, straight, your head towering in the sky, a dignified posture. And then we’ll meditate on the breath. First, we’ll relax the body, then we work with the six breath exercise.
Then we’ll practice mindfulness of the breath, and then we’ll meditate on recognizing all sentient beings as our mothers. So beginning beginning with relaxing the body, starting at the crown of the head, the scalp, the forehead, feeling the wrinkles in your brow beginning to smooth pressure in and around your eyes diminishing,. The muscles of your face softening, relaxing. Your jaw is relaxed. Bring your awareness to the muscles at the back of your neck, perhaps gently turn your head to each side a few times, very gently.
Stretching, loosening the muscles of the back of the neck. And bring your awareness to your upper back and shoulders, perhaps rotating your shoulders a few times and lifting them and allowing them to drop comfortably to the sides, feeling this burden, this weight that we carry around on our backs moving down and through your body into the ground. So you’ve had a hard day, you’ve carried a great weight on your shoulders. Just feel it letting go, just let it go to the ground. Moving your awareness down to your hands.
Your hands are soft and loose. Relaxing your lower arms, Your upper arms. Your chest is at ease. Relaxing throughout the heart area and the lungs. And the middle region of your back, Your stomach.
Releasing the tension that we hold in our stomach muscles, allowing your belly to go soft. And throughout the abdominal cavity. Keeping your your back straight, your trunk erect, relax your lower back muscles. Your buttocks And throughout the upper legs, thighs, lower legs. And your feet.
And bring your awareness to your body in general. Working through the body, just notice any tightnesses, any tensions which remain in the body. Any feelings of areas of discomfort. And focusing upon those areas. Consciously relaxing and softening, feeling the tension diminish, the tightness loosen.
If there’s some discomfort, an area of discomfort in your body, accepting, don’t try to fight it, resist it, don’t try to avoid it, just allow it to be with the feeling, with the sense of acceptance, breathing into it gently, with the feeling of acceptance. It’s okay if it’s there. Just allow it to be there. A gentle acceptance. This feeling of physical well-being pervading your entire body.
Just be with your body. And then we’ll practice the six part breath exercise. Breathing in normally comfortably but when you exhale extending the exhalation completely emptying the lungs again breathing in normally comfortably extending exhalation forcing all the air out of the lungs and doing this six times individually. Completed that, just bring your mind to the breath. Just the easy gentle in and out flow of the natural breath if it’s helpful using the techniques of counting and noting.
If your mind wanders distracted gently, patiently bring your mind back to the breath. Bring your mind back to the breath. Now we’re going to meditate on recognizing all sentient beings as our mothers and we’re going to begin with developing a sense of the continuity of mind. So we have our present mind. Most essentially the quality of knowing.
You know my voice, sound. You know the feeling of the cushion or the seat underneath your buttocks. That quality of knowing and all the the various attitudes and cognitive functions and predispositions that make up what you call your own mind. Just reflect upon what you mean by mind. What is this stuff of mind?
So it’s like a stream. It’s always, it’s dynamic, it’s always changing, it’s a continuum of process And we can trace it back to the mind that you walked into this room with. Do you remember that mind when you thought, where am I gonna sit? It’s cool in this room. It’s warm in this room.
That mind. The mind you experienced throughout your day, working and eating all the way back to this morning when you woke up. Remember that mind? I’m continuing back to this morning, the mind as you woke up when the alarm clock went off. Before the alarm clock went off, there was a mind.
There was knowing, deep sleep, dreams, all the way back to when you went to sleep last just before you fell asleep last night, the last moment of awareness of consciousness. And tracing that mind, just going back upstream to the mind that you woke up with yesterday morning. There’s always a mind there. There was always knowing, cognitive functions, dispositions, attitudes. And going back last month’s mind, all the days and hours and seconds back into November.
That mind just keeps on going back. October, it’s always there. Just a steady stream. September. All the way back to New Year’s, January first, and the year before.
Think think about what you were doing five years previously. There was that mind was still there. It’s always there. It’s always been there. No matter what’s going on, it’s always there.
See if you can remember something twenty years ago. Mind’s still there. It’s always there. When you’re a child, little boy, little girl, there’s a mind there still going on. All the way down to when you were just born, that little baby there, there’s a mind there who was crying, maybe suffering from exposure, sensitive.
Before it was born, before it actually exited your mother’s womb. Inside the womb, the fetus is a mind there experiencing, knowing. Going back through the embryonic development, very first moment of mind when this life began, there’s always a mind there, and where that mind moment come from. Just go back one more moment. The moment, the consciousness that you died with in your last life, the last moment of consciousness of your last life, there’s always that mind.
And the mind going back in that life, in the previous life. When you were healthy, you weren’t dying. When you were young, when you were born in that previous life, when you were in the womb, a fetus, the moment of conception. One more moment back. The dying moment of the last life, the mind at present at death going back.
Steady stream, a continuum of mind all the way back, infinitely back without beginning. Never had a beginning. So this continuum of mind has uninterrupted taken infinite rebirths, reassociated with gross embodiments again and again and again infinite numbers of times without beginning, numberless. The mind, Every sentient being, every living being has related to that continuum of mind as its mother. Every living being has been in a relationship with that continuum of mind as its mother.
Every living being has been your mother. Just like your mother of this life. When you open your eyes, you’ll see many different people. But they’ve all been your mother, just like your mother this time. And then bring your mind back to the breath.
And get in touch with your body, perhaps the pressure of your your buttocks on your cushion, on the seat, your pressure of your feet on the floor, the various positions of the parts of the body. Just get in touch with your feelings and sensations in the body. Ings and sensations in the body. And in easy and relaxed manner, slowly become aware of your surroundings connecting up with the room. The first person that you see was your mother in the previous life.
Have you been a good girl? So we looked at all sentient beings as one’s mother and now we’re going to it’s not so we’re developing that sort of connectedness that we feel toward our mother. We want to imbue that with the real meaning of what it means, the bond of a mother and child. So we started last week discussing the kindness of our mothers. So it’s not sufficient simply to if we were to think of all beings as our mother, we have to remember their kindness.
Just like the kindness of our mother in this life, every sentient being has been equally kind to us. And so we and last week, we were going through, you know, the various kindnesses that that our mother has shown us, you know, from the moment of our conception, you know, this little mass of cells in her in in her womb becomes a central concern of her of her attention. You know? She her mind keeps coming back to the fact that she’s pregnant, she has this new life evolving, developing within You know? And we come naked, and, you know, she goes through this process of all the morning sicknesses and all the life, you know, the life threatening possibilities of of birth and the pain of labor and so forth.
And then we come naked into this world like like like a worm. And and after, you know, these hours, perhaps hours of labor, that’s all forgotten. She takes us into her brings us close to her warmth, to her breast. It’s all, you know, and as if we were the most valuable thing in the universe. And for a moment, we are to her.
And then, you know, all the attention that she showers upon us over the course of our growing up, you know, educating guarding us from harm. Her attention turns to her to us a hundred times a day, creating a cocoon of protection and safety for ourselves. And then we don’t we aren’t even aware that that that she’s doing this for us. She fed us. She washed us.
She clothed us. She played with us. She held us. She sang to us. She she provided us with a complete environment of well-being as best she could.
A great deal of her life was dedicated to the welfare of this this little being, which wasn’t even aware of of the great kindnesses which were, you know, being showered upon it, had no way of earning that love, you know, had no way of repaying that love. It was love just because it existed for no other reason than that. It was. So we would begin to read I’d like to read a few more quotes from Thich Nhat Hanh, the Vietnamese monk. We mentioned him last week.
So we’re trying to get in touch with some of the feelings that may have been buried or that we’ve repressed and so forth that are associated with this relationship of mother and child. There are moments after a fever when you have a bitter, flat taste in your mouth and nothing tastes good. Only when your mother comes and tucks you in, gently pulls the cover over your chin, puts her hand on your burning forehead. Is it really a hand or is it silk of heaven? And gently whispers, my darling, do you feel restored, surrounded with the sweetness of maternal love?
Her love is fragment like a banana. Her love is fragrant like a banana, like sweet rice, like sugarcane. Father’s work is enormous, as huge as a mountain. Mother’s devotion is overflowing like water from a mountain spring.
Maternal love is our first taste origin of all feelings of love. Our mother is the teacher who first teaches us love, the most important subject in life. Without my mother, I could never have known how to love. Thanks to her, I can love my neighbor. Thanks to her, I can love all living beings.
Through her, I acquire my first notion of understanding and compassion. Mother is the foundation of all love, and many religious traditions recognize this and pay deep homage, with the deep honor to maternal figure, the Virgin Mary, the goddess Guan Yin. Hardly any infant has opened her mouth to cry without her mother already running to the cradle. Mother is gentle mother is a gentle sweet spirit who makes unhappiness and worries disappear. When the word mother is uttered, already we feel our hearts overflowing with love.
From love, the distance to belief in action is very short. And he begins another quotation. Mother is a boundless source of love, an inexhaustible treasure. But unfortunately, we sometimes forget. A mother is the most beautiful gift life offers us.
Those of you who still have your mother near, please don’t wait for her death to say, my God, I have lived beside my mother all these years without ever looking into her eyes. Just briefly, just a brief glance, a few words exchanged, asking for a little pocket money or one thing or another, like the car keys. You cuddle up to her to get warm. You sulk. You get angry with her.
You complicate her life, causing her to worry, undermining her health, making her go to sleep late and get up early. Many mothers die because of their children. Throughout her life, we expect her to cook, wash, and clean up after us while we think only about our grades and our careers. Our mothers no longer have time to look deeply at us, and we are too busy to look closely at her. Only when she is no longer there do we realize that we have never been conscious of having This return from school or work, or if you live far away, the next time you visit your mother, you may wish to go into a room and with a calm and silent smile, sit down beside make her stop working, then look at her for a long time.
Look at her deeply. Do this in order to see her, to realize that she is there. She is alive beside you. Take your hand and ask her one short question to capture her attention. Mother, do you know something?
She will be a little surprised and she will probably smile when she asks you, what dear? Keep looking into her eyes, smiling serenely and say, do you know that I love you? Ask this question without waiting for an answer. Even if you are thirty or forty years old or older, ask her as a child of your mother. Your mother and you will be happy, conscious of living in eternal love.
Then tomorrow when she leaves you, you will have no regrets. And then finally, one last quote by Thich Nhat Hanh. When love is present, that is enough, and there is no need to talk of obligation. To love your mother is enough. It is not a duty.
It is completely natural, like drinking when you are thirsty. Every child must have a mother, and it is totally natural to love her. The mother loves her child, and the child loves her mother. The child needs her his mother, and the mother needs her child. Please do not think I’ve written this to give a lesson in morality.
Loving your mother is a question of profit. A mother is like a spring of pure water, like the very finest sugarcane or honey, the best quality sweet rice. If you do not know how to profit from this, it is unfortunate for you. I simply want you to bring this to your attention to help you to avoid one day complaining that there is nothing left in life for you. If a gift such as the presence of your mother doesn’t satisfy you, even if you are president of a large corporation or a king of the universe, you are probably will not be satisfied.
I only want to remind you that a mother is like a banana, like good rice, like honey, like sugar. She is tenderness. She is love. So you, my brothers and sisters, please do not forget her. Forgetting creates an immense loss, and I hope you do not, either through ignorance or through lack of attention, have to endure such a loss.
That is all. So, you know, Buddhism wouldn’t ask of ourselves that we see black as white, that we try to involve ourselves in some kind of mental gymnastics and try to force ourselves to believe something which we don’t believe was the case. Are sometimes there are cases where mothers do, in fact, abuse their children emotionally, physically. You know, maybe maybe you had such an unskillful mother, and and maybe perhaps some of us bear the scars of our our mother’s inability to parent as well. But some point along, you know, this journey of ours in this we’re we’re trying to grow and become a better person.
It’s not simply enough to leave it at that. I don’t think, you know, to to leave the wounds fester, to pretend that they don’t exist or matter, it’s not important. It does matter. Maybe it’s necessary that we confront and work with these feelings that we harbor toward our mother. Know, understanding that what we are attempting to do is not so much for our mother, you know, it’s for ourselves.
You know, we’re not doing it out of a sense of guilt or some kind of moral imperative that we should love our mothers, but to understand that there’s a payoff, there’s profit to loving our mothers in order to heal ourselves and become healthy people. So it’s a matter of profit, not necessarily for your mother, but for yourself. So it may be the case where, you know, we may have to use an object other than our actual mother of this life in our meditation. You know, maybe the but we should try to understand what happened. You know?
How did our way of relating evolve to way it did? Try to understand the world out of her eyes, how it was for her. Our memories aren’t photographic. They’re not accurate reflections of what was. And we have to question our memories and try to see if, in fact, they’re accurate or not.
You know, I can remember for myself, you know, my father died when I was eight. So I had three three brothers and one sister, so there were five children. But I thought I was the center of the world. And and here, my mother had to bring up five children by herself. And now only as an adult can I look back and understand that the impressions, my memories, the feelings that, know, that I went away with, that I experienced as a child would I can I have to I had those feelings, but I I can see that those feelings weren’t in any way justified and that the the situations and my mother’s abilities were such that the way I felt was not an accurate expression of what I could expect from anyone, any mother, no matter how superhuman she might have been?
But I think it’s important to acknowledge and openly question, explore, and honestly, both the positive and negative feelings that we had in terms of this relationship. It seems like it’s an important relationship, the the perceived qualities of our mother, you know, with all the demands that we made upon our mother. You know, the the mother figure is something much bigger than life. Know? It’s mother figure is much larger than our individual personal mother that we’ve what we experienced when we were young.
Although the mother experience is archetypical, we tend, as Jung observes, to load that enormous burden of meaning, responsibility, duty, heaven and hell onto the shoulders of one frail, fallible human being who was our mother. You know, I think perhaps it’s the case that no ordinary or maybe even extraordinary being could ever lived up to our expectations, could ever have met our rational or even irrational demands, needs, our wants that we placed upon this one frail, fallible human being we called our mother. And she was neither omniscient, nor superhuman, nor infallible. But in our childish minds, thought she was, or which she should have been. And maybe we still harbor those feelings with regard to our mother.
We can’t blame, as long as we can’t blame our present suffering and neurosis on our mother. To some extent, we might like to dump it on her. It was her fault in some way. As long as we create negative karma, we will suffer. As long as we have ignorance within mind, we will be neurotic.
It’s not her fault. There may be specific instances of abuse or negligence in what she did, didn’t do for ourselves. May We but we can temper our blame, you know, whilst still we’re doing justice to our our experience with an understanding that which surpasses all reason. You know, they recognition that she was just one frail, fallible human being just like ourselves. And she wanted to be happy and just didn’t want to suffer just like ourselves.
You know, Beyond all the hurt and possible real justifications for how we feel, to the contrary, we can begin to open our hearts to this individual we called mother at some time in the past. You know, we we we want to connect up with this feeling of being loved unconditionally. That and this through mother love. It’s it’s the it’s the primal it’s the archetype. It’s the model.
It’s the paradigm that we’re making use of. That, you know, that we can trying to associate this with all sentient beings, all our mothers. Each and every one of them, each and every person that you’re going to meet when you leave here, that’s sitting here at present, that you’re going to see tomorrow, that you will ever meet, has related to you in that same way as in terms of kindness and love as the mother of this life. All the same. All the same caring, all the same protection, all the same nurturing, and shown us all of the same kindnesses again and again.
They have all loved us in the same way, whoever they might be, males and females, maybe the beautiful, the good, bad, and the ugly, plumbers and physicists and politicians, even John Howard. It’s only due to time and and our our limited vision that we aren’t able to see that for ourselves, that that we appear so separate and unrelated. Yeah. But still, we we you know, there might maybe there’s too much too much history in terms of negative history between yourself and and your mother at present. Maybe there’s temporarily, we where there may be too many obstacles, too many fears, too many too much resistance, too too much too many hard feelings between you know, that that been built up over the years and stand in the way.
So in that case, maybe you have to select someone else to use as the model of how you’re going to relate with others, this paradigm. Maybe it could be your father, you know, it could be your brother or sister or a family friend. But somebody that you that can act as the substitute, that you have this bond toward. And that’s that’s a feeling of having been cared for unconditionally, that they were there for you in some way. Whoever it might be, we want to try to imagine this person in front of ourselves and try to recall all of the kindness that they’ve shown us in all the various ways.
It’s said it’s best if you look upon them, if you see them in appearance of when needing of assistance, like maybe when they’re very elderly. So your heart goes out to them in their need. There’s more of a willingness to relate with them in much more open manner. And try to generate all the all the the feelings associated with the kindness that they’ve shown us. And then, you know, putting generating sense of closeness, a bond of the the kindness associated with this person.
And then take somebody put somebody next to them who is is close to you, but not quite as close. You don’t have the same connection, a close friend, and put them next to them and try to reassociate that same quality of that your feelings that you associate with this person to them, thinking that, in fact, they’ve been exactly they’ve related with me in the exact same way as the mother of this life. You know? That they it’s just a matter of rebirth, lack of vision, that this person here, someone that you naturally feel close to, has treated me in exactly the same way as this person here, my mother, this life. And see and working with the mind to re arouse those same feelings of connectedness and gratitude toward now toward this second person.
Try to to to use this person as the focus of these feelings, you know, taking these feelings and transferring those feelings to the second person, re evoking those feelings that you had for the your mother now toward this person. They are exactly the same. They have treated you exactly the same as your mother of this life. No difference in a previous life. So, know, even without the belief in rebirth, we can take this as psychological challenge.
A way, we can gain some kind of perspective on our relationships. You know, like if you do have conviction and rebirth, it becomes like, what, like a, you know, a pot of boiling stew, you know. The stew is rolling, you know. Sometimes all the positions of all the vegetables keep changing. Sometimes there’s a carrot on top, sometimes there’s a potato, sometimes it’ll be celery.
And likely, we have this cosmic stew of sentient beings and our relationship positions of all these sentient beings are constantly undergoing change. We relate with all these different beings in all these various ways over time. So developing a sense of remembering the kindness of all of these sentient beings as when they were our mother. Okay. So seeing, recognizing all sentient beings as our mother, developing, remembering the great kindness that they’ve shown us.
Now we’re going to develop a wish to repay our mother’s kindness. You know, in thinking about and working with this method, seeing beings as our mothers, there are various reactions which can come up for ourselves. There’s, you know, sometimes our mind, you know, maybe some people see their mother as unkind. And maybe they have to use another model to to consider the kindness of others. Some may argue that, you know, okay.
My mother did what she did for me, not out of kindness, but simply out of responsibility. She had to do what she had to do. And she had this kid, and she had to take care of. It was not a matter of kindness. So we forget that at some time, and this is true for every one of us, that we were completely dependent upon another human being for our survival.
We we aren’t these self sufficient people that we know and hold ourselves to be. I can take care of myself. I don’t need anybody else. At some point, that was absolutely not the case. Our very survival depend upon our being taken care of.
And who was it that probably took care of us? It was probably your mother. So regardless of your intention behind us, the very fact that you’re alive today isn’t dependent upon your mother assuming that responsibility for whatever her intentions. And that’s kind. The fact that you’re alive today is simply through the kindness of your mother, this primary caregiver who took care of you at once sometime in past.
And you don’t even remember it now. Regardless of her intention, we owe our life to her. Know, for some people, we’re dealing with really, I think, really deep seated feelings and emotions, aren’t we, when you get into these areas? And some many people, I guess, they’d rather not stir up these feelings, these emotions. Leave well enough alone, as it were.
For some, there’s an unwillingness to acknowledge that maybe my mother really was kind to me. There’s a fear of being, wow, if I really got in touch with how kind she was feelings I had and what she did for me, she’d be in control, wouldn’t she? I’d have this, you know, I’d have to repay her in some way, you know, these feelings of appreciation and gratitude. If I were to admit my mother’s kindness, then I would be obligated. I would be obligated to her in some way.
And I don’t want to be obligated. I don’t want to have to do everything that she tells me to do. But, you know, we aren’t we can have a sense of gratitude. We can get in touch with her and develop a wish to repay our mother’s kindness. But we are adults now, and we ourselves can determine how we’re going to repay that kindness.
We have a debt, but as adults, we can determine how we’re going to repay that debt. That’s up to us. But nonetheless, we can acknowledge our debt. So, you know, this sense of gratitude, that’s what we’re trying to develop, is simply an expression of our basic sanity. Gratitude is an expression of a healthy mind.
To open up our hearts to others is as much as much to allow ourselves to feel loved as it is to love others. And we we we we always want to learn how to to love others. But to open your heart is a two way transaction, isn’t it? There’s a flowing that we must also appreciate how we ourselves are have been loved and are being loved in the same way we are able to love others. As adults, we can choose how to express our love, how to repay our mother’s kindness.
So I think, you know, this idea of this wish to repay kindness is like is like an a natural response to becoming aware of just how much we have been loved unconditionally. We must be really something special. But everybody’s special, aren’t they? Everybody’s been loved in that very same way. We didn’t it was a type of love that couldn’t be earned, that we couldn’t somehow justify.
We couldn’t manipulate. It wasn’t in response to some demands we were making. It was just because we existed. We were locked in that way. The very fact that we existed made us worthy of that love.
We were lovable at some time, not for what we did or didn’t do, what we gave or withheld, just because we were. You know, there must be something basically right about ourselves if we could have been if we were loved so much at some time, and we did nothing to deserve it. Just naturally, naturally, there must be something good about ourselves. You know, there’s a sense, you know, like getting in touch with one’s own intrinsic worthiness. There’s a I think maybe there’s a sense that one begins a sense of a richness about oneself.
One has a a superabundance, remembering the great kindnesses that have been shown to us simply because we were. And it’s natural to develop a sense of repaying that kindness and to return, the wish the wish to repay our mothers, all sentient beings. So most of us, I think, carry around a great sense of unworthiness or feelings of insufficiency or a matter of self pity of some level or one way, one way or another. We we really never noticed how worthy we are of of being loved. And it’s not something I can earn.
We’re lovable. Somebody found us lovable naturally at some time. You know, we not finding ourselves lovable naturally, you know, we we we want to manipulate ourselves. We we we set standards and criteria to feel okay about ourselves. It’s difficult for us to love others because we don’t really love ourselves, because we don’t really feel naturally lovable, worthy of being loved.
So, you know, to to open our hearts to others is as much to feel that we are lovable as it is to love others. To know deeply that we are lovable, we can we begin to appreciate our own self worth. And now that superabundance of our own self worth, we’re able to repay the great kindness that others have shown us. It’s a natural response. We we’ve all been loved unconditionally.
And it’s it’s like, you know, it’s like a a gift that’s been given to us by our mothers. And, you know, it kind of softens our hearts, I think. How can I repay this great kindness that’s been showered upon me? What can I do? You know, there’s nothing greater than I can do for my mother than to really bring about her happiness, to try to help her to work through her suffering.
You know, I can there are there are superficial methods, your material needs and so forth. These practically need to be met. But I’m talking about it on a very profound level. What can I what can I do for my mother? Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be able to repay your mother’s kindness by helping her to find real happiness, true happiness, reliable happiness, lasting happiness, and never have to suffer again?
What a wonderful way to repay with all that she’s given to you. Developing this wish, this gratitude, repaying others kindness. So we have we’re working through series of six causes. On the basis of recognizing all beings as our mothers, we go on to remember their kindness, developing a gratitude which wishes to repay their kindness. Now we’re going to work with the fourth of these six causes, that is appealing love.
The Buddha extolled love as that faculty that far more than all other lofty loftiest religious and ethical deeds is capable of softening the hardened ego structure, the ego delusion, and so open the way to liberation and enlightenment. He said, therefore, monks, you should learn thus, that love that is the liberation of the heart and the mind, we will produce in ourselves, increase it further, make it wholly ours, practice it, perfect it more and more, and employ employ it to perfection. So equanimity as the foundation, on that foundation, recognizing all beings as our mothers, developing a wish to repay their kindness, and remembering their kindness and developing a gratitude which wishes to repay their kindness. These are the basis for awakening our heart. The remaining three causes love, great compassion, and exceptional resolve are the means of developing this aspiration to achieve awakening for the sake of all sentient beings, the actual ways, the means to awaken our hearts to others.
And we’re trying to develop a transcendent aspiration, unconditioned by what’s in it for me, directed equally toward all living beings, that for whomever we meet, I have to become a Buddha for that person. I have to become a better person for that insect, whatever. And it’s kind of unimaginable. So not only do we have to develop a sense of of the significance of others in our lives, which is that foundation, but we have to go on to develop a commitment to developing ourselves, to benefiting them. I have to help these people.
Know, I can’t remain passive. I have to do something. So if we have meditated well on equanimity, on recognition of mothers, recognition of all sentient beings as a mother, remembering their kindness and developing in gratitude, which wishes to repay their kindness, then appealing love will naturally begin to arise. What do we mean by appealing love? It means that the idea is that people begin to appear very beautiful to our eyes.
They’re very attractive, attractive, appealing to ourselves. We pay attention to them. Like you see a mother watching her little baby play. She’s enraptured. She keeps looking over and watching it, smiling.
It brings a warmth to her heart to see her little baby playing. Other people get kind of bored with it, but anyway, a mother is completely totally absorbed in their little child and all that it does, all its little challenges, all its it’s the fact that it’s able to push itself up one day. Isn’t that wonderful? And she really pays attention. So we’re learning how to pay attention to all our mothers.
Learning how to pay attention to all our mothers. We’re fascinated by our mothers. It’s like a mother watching her little child play, exploring the world. Now we be you know, paying attention, you begin to more and more understand others. And I Thich Nhat Hanh said, understanding is another word for love.
Love is another word for understanding. We begin to understand others. What is their actual situation? What are they actually experiencing? What are their what are their their dilemmas?
You know? What are their what are their problems? We begin to know them maybe for the first time. But, you know, but we haven’t chosen to love. You know, maybe this is the the real distinguishing feature about what is meant by love as opposed to what passes for love, what we talk about love.
You know, the word love has been so overused. It’s almost become meaningless, hasn’t it? You know? We talk about Colonel Sanders fried chicken. I love Colonel Sanders fried chicken.
You know? And it doesn’t mean anything anymore. So, you know, love, the will to extend oneself for the purpose of nourishing one’s own or another’s well-being. The will to extend oneself for the purpose of nourishing one’s own or another’s well-being. So it’s a it’s a matter of will.
It’s a choice. It’s a decision. And the will to to extend oneself. To extend oneself is to go outside one’s usual comfort zone. You know, it’s not always pleasurable to love.
It can be like work. You know, it’s like you’re saying, I’m willing to go that extra bit for you. Take, you know, go the extra mile. Do that extra something for you because I love you. Basically, you know, most simply, it’s, you know, wish that someone else be happy.
So and and ultimately, it comes down to a commitment to to, in fact, bringing that about in whatever in whatever skills and whatever ways that you have, whatever ways that you can. You know, really choosing and committing oneself to another’s true happiness and doing whatever needs to be done to promote that happiness. So it poses a willingness to struggle, you know, to to involve ourselves in some maybe maybe some kind of legitimate suffering that that that in for the sake of nourishing that other individual. The essence of love is to labor for something, to make something, to grow. That love and labor are inseparable.
One loves for that for which one labors, and one labors for that which one loves. So this will to extend oneself for the purpose of nourishing one’s own or another’s well-being, the will involves a choice, a decision. When we love someone, our love is only demonstrable when we actually practice it, when we actually are willing to put ourselves out for them, isn’t it? Otherwise, we can’t be sure whether we, in fact, love or not. Maybe it’s just a romantic idea, a sentimental feeling somewhere.
You know, it’s it’s not, you know, like a romantic feel good or, you know, a sentimental lover. It’s all light and beauty. It is not enough to this is a quote from Mother Teresa. She was pretty good at loving. It is not enough for us to say I love God, but I do not love my neighbor.
Saint John says that you are a liar if you say you love God and you don’t love your neighbor. How can you love God whom you do not see if you do not love your neighbor whom you see, whom you touch, with whom you live. And so it is very important for us to realize that love to be true has to hurt. It hurt Jesus to love us. It hurt him.
You know, some if we’re waiting for a Bodhisattva certificate, before we actually take up the the difficulty of working for others in some whatever capacity we may presently have, you know, that before we’re qualified, then we’re we’re, you know, we’re never going to begin at all. You know, that it it won’t hurt, that it won’t be putting ourselves out in some way. There is scarcely anything more difficult than to love one another. That is the work, day labor, day labor. God knows there is no other word for it.
For one human being to love another, that is perhaps the most difficult of all tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation. You know, it’s not like, I I I I love potion, you know, that we can drink and we expect all our fantasies, this other intimate to this other person to magically fulfill all our fantasies. And that’s the popular version of love. People do not actually love each other. They use each other as vehicles to have intense passionate experiences they long for.
In such people, the egotism, the use of each other to create passion for its own sake is so blatant, so naive, and so childlike that is unmistakable. But our versions of this are scarcely more subtle. It simply never enters our romantic heads that there is something strange about a so called love for the sake of my fulfillment, my thrills, my dreams coming true, my fantasy, my need to be loved, my idea of the perfect love, my security, my entertainment. When we genuinely love another person, it is spontaneous act of being, an identification with the other person that causes us to affirm value and honor him or her, to desire that person’s happiness and well-being. In those rare moments when we are loving rather than focused on on our own egos, we stop asking what dreams this person is going to fulfill for us, what intense extraordinary adventures he or she is going to provide.
But instead, you know, we begin to ask, you know, how can I fulfill your dreams? You know, what what it is that can you know, what what needs can I fulfill for you? So, you know, love begins by asking what it is that I how can I promote your happiness? And ends up with the dedication of actually trying to bring that about, in fact. Love alters our sense of importance.
Through love we see that the other individual has as great a value in the cosmos as our own. It becomes just as important to us that he or she should be whole, should live fully, should find joy of life as that our own needs be met. In the world of the unconscious, love is one of those great psychological forces that has that have the power to transform the ego. Love is love is the one power that awakens the ego to the existence of something outside of itself, outside its plans, outside its empire, outside its security. Love relates the ego not only to the rest of the human race, but to the soul and to all the gods of the inner world.
Thus, love, by its very nature is the opposite of egocentricity. We use the use the word love loosely. We use it to dignify any number of demands for attention, power, security, or entertainment from other people. But when we are looking out for our own self style needs, our own desires, our own dreams, and our own power over people, this is not love. Love is utterly distinct from ego’s desire, and power plays.
It leads in a different direction towards the goodness, the value, and the needs of the people around you. In its very essence, love is an appreciation, a recognition of another’s value. It moves a man to honor a woman rather than use her, to ask himself how he might serve her. And if the woman is relating to him through love, she will take the same attitude toward him. The archetypal nature of love is perhaps best nowhere better expressed than in the simple language of Saint Paul.
Love suffers long and is kind. Love does not envy. Love does not boast itself. It’s not puffed up. Love does not seek her own way, is not easily provoked, is not anxious to suspect evil, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails. But whether there be prophecies, they will fail. Whether there be tongues, they shall cease. Whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away. Here is a brief and eloquent statement of the difference between an ego left to its own devices and an ego under under the influence of love.
My ego is concerned only with itself, but love suffers long and its kind. My ego is envious, always seeking to inflate itself with illusions of absolute power and control, but love does not vaunt itself, is not puffed up. My ego, left to its ego centeredness, will always betray, but love never fails. My ego only knows how to affirm itself and its desires, but love seeks not her own ways. Love affirms all of life, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things.
Anyway, I think maybe we can finish. You can go away for Christmas with a Christmas present. Just a little bit more to the section on appealing love. You know, it’s like love takes someone else by the hand, and love love is that which reaches out to another. And so, you know, I want to understand you and what what it is that you need.
What what what what can I do for you? Because you’re important to me, and I care about you and your happiness, and I’m willing to do something for that. I’m willing to put myself out. I’m willing to work for that end. We really have to understand the person we want to love.
If our love is only a will to possess, it is not love. If we only think of ourselves, we know only our if we know only our own needs and ignore needs of others, we cannot love. We must look deeply in order to see and understand the needs, aspirations, and sufferings of the person we love. This is the real ground of love. You cannot resist loving another person when you really understand him or her.
So in in this quality of appealing love, we begin to pay attention to others. You know, these are these are our mothers. And just like a mother paying how she pays attention to her little child. You know, we try to understand them and what’s happening for them. You know, we begin to look beyond our own self centered concerns and our exaggerated self needs and so forth and and look deeply at the other person, our mothers, and just like this mother looking at her child.
You know, it’s like the and and and the child looks to the mother. You know? The mother looks to the child, and the child looks to the mother. And and when there’s their eyes meet, there is love. But if our love is only a kind of imagination that is not likely to have any real effect, it is the it is in the midst of our daily life, in our actual contact with others, that we can know whether our mind of love is really present and how stable it is.
If love is real, it will be evident in our daily life, in the way we deal with people in the world. The source of love is deep in us, and we can help others realize a lot of happiness. One word, one action, one thought can reduce another’s person’s suffering and bring them and bring them joy. One word can give comfort and confidence, destroy doubt, help someone avoid a mistake, reconcile a conflict, or open the door to liberation. One action can save a person’s life or help them to take advantage of a rare opportunity.
One thought can do the same because thoughts always lead to words and actions. If love is in our hearts, every thought, word, and deed can bring about a miracle because understanding is foundation of love, words, and actions that emerge from our love and are always helpful. Just I’ll just finish this section. Okay? Just the Buddha once was asked by a leading disciple, would it be true to say that part of our training is for the development of loving compassion?
The Buddha replied, no. It would not be true to say this. It would be true to say that the whole of our training is for the development of love and compassion. So we’ll stop there. Okay?
So if you’d like to get a cup of tea, we’ll talk about some of these feelings and ideas. I wish you a Merry Christmas. Okay.