The Quotable Thanissaro

A discussion on all aspects of Theravāda Buddhism
dhammapal
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:Generosity is not just a matter of giving things. You learn how to give of your time, to give of your energy, to give of your knowledge, and in doing so you’re changing your whole relationship to the world around you. You’re not just a being who’s eating and eating and consuming things and experiences. You’re finding that you’ve got things inside that you can share, things you can give, and there’s a sense of wealth that comes with that. If all you’re thinking about is consuming — “What can I get out of this? What can I get out of that?” — you’re poor. No matter how much you have, you’re poor — because there’s always a big lack. But if you come to every situation with the question, “What can I give?” you’re coming from a position of wealth. And you find that you do have reserves of energy and knowledge that you can share, and in sharing you gain a lot in return, a lot with more value.
From: Better to Give than to Consume by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:Secondly, the idea that just clinging to beliefs in general is a childish thing: if you’re going to act, which is something we’re doing all the time, you have to have a particular kind of belief. It’s not childish. With the teaching on karma there’s nobody up there looking out for us. If you want a consoling belief where you don’t have to be responsible, or where you can be complacent, you want to believe in an outside power. Karma doesn’t let you be complacent. The law of karma is not a parking law: a sign that says “No parking Tuesday afternoons, Thursday afternoons between 4:30 and 6”. Karma is 24/7, which means that you can't be complacent anytime. So it’s not necessarily a consoling belief or the kind of belief that you want to sort of curl up with at night.
From: War on Karma (51min mp3 audio) by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:As for gratitude, the Buddha starts out by saying, “There is mother and father.” This was in opposition to a belief that you didn’t have any real debt to your parents because, in giving birth to you and raising you, they just were acting under totally predetermined forces, so they had no choice in the matter. You came out, and that’s it. It was just a mechanical or a biological process.

But once you realize that your parents had choices — they had the choice to give birth to you, they had the choice to let you live, and in many cases they taught you how to speak, how to walk, raised you — you have a huge debt to them. Even if they didn’t raise you, even if they abandoned you at birth to be adopted by somebody else, at least they gave you the body you have. They didn’t abort the pregnancy. So there’s a debt to them, a debt of gratitude — gratitude here meaning an appreciation of the goodness that other people have done for you, the fact that the happiness you have depends on the skillful choices that other people have made.

There’s a debt that goes along with that. And there’s a lesson as well: that we depend on the goodness of others and the hard choices that some people have to make. If we want goodness to continue in the world, we’re going to have to learn to make hard choices as well. We can’t just assume that whatever comes easy is okay. Sometimes you have to make the hard choice to go out of your way to do something you know is really good, really helpful, even though it requires sacrifices.

So that’s how the Buddha introduced his teaching on kamma, on action: There is goodness in the world because people can choose.
From: The Truth of Transcendence by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:Again, regardless of whether you’re going to pick them up after the meditation or not, for the time being create a little freedom in here. It’s almost like you’re erasing your history, erasing any lines of communication or lines of connection with anything outside at all. It’s important that the mind have this space that’s really its own space, even though it may just be part of the day, where it can let go of all the responsibilities and worries and cares of the rest of the day. Remember that time, right now, is either a memory or anticipation. It’s just like regarding the world as just sights, sounds, smells, tastes, tactile sensations, ideas. Try to reduce things to a very minimal terms like this, so they’re easier to let go of.
From: Free for the Time Being by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:You can also think about the sensual pleasures you've had in the past: Where are they now? All you have left is the memory, and sometimes it includes the memory of the unskillful things you did around those pleasures.

But as the Buddha said, if you don't have the pleasure that comes from a well-concentrated mind, no matter how much you think about the drawbacks of sensuality, or the drawbacks of greed, aversion, and delusion, you can't let them go. You need another form of pleasure to replace the pleasure that comes with sensuality. This is why we have to develop the factors of the path, primarily right mindfulness and right concentration.
From: Lust by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:To tune into the Dhamma.... requires a whole set of skills:

One is to make sure that your intention is skillful in what you do, say, and think. This is why we recite those passages on the brahma-viharas every evening. It’s not that we’re praying to some god to make these things happen, that everybody be happy. And it’s not that we believe that simply by wishing it, it’s going to be so. As the Buddha once said, if things could be made true simply by wishing and praying, there wouldn’t be any poor people, any sick people, any ill people in the world. Actually, the good things there are in the world are there because people have had good intentions and acted on those intentions.

So that’s what we’re doing as we develop goodwill, compassion, empathetic joy, and equanimity: We’re working on our intentions to make sure that they’re straight in line with the Dhamma.
From: Pissing on Palaces by Thanissaro Bhikkhu (highly recommended!)
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:...if you have the idea that you're intrinsically bad by nature, something that's intrinsically bad can't make itself good. You would need an outside power to help you. This would discourage you from practicing. If you have the idea that you're intrinsically good by nature, you would need to explain how something intrinsically good could suffer or could cause suffering; also, if it could lose its original pure nature, then once you make it pure again, what would keep it from losing its pure nature again?

There's also the practical concern that if you believe you're intrinsically good, it gives rise to complacency. You believe that any intuition that rises up from a quiet mind is trustworthy. In this way, your idea of an intrinsically good self obscures your defilements. This is the opposite of what we sometimes hear — that our defilements obscure our intrinsically good nature — but if you believe your nature is intrinsically good, then when defilements arise in the quiet mind and you identify them as the wisdom of your innate nature manifesting itself, your belief in your intrinsic goodness has blinded you to what's actually going on.
From: Out of the Thicket and Onto the Path by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:So squarely face the fact that you’ve got a big project here: all these huge defilements of the mind. But they don’t come as an avalanche of huge boulders all at once. They’re little tiny things, one by one by one, as they come through the mind. And they come in lots of different guises. Anger for instance: There’s not just one reason why we’re angry, which means that when you work through one type of anger it’s not going to get rid of all the kinds of anger you may have. But your experience in dealing with one kind of anger will give you some ideas on how to approach other types of anger as well. Anger gets built up from lots of different narratives in the mind, and different narratives will get activated by different events. When you’ve seen through one kind of narrative — i.e., the way certain events recall a type of relationship you had when you were a child, and you realize that you’re not being forced back into the restricted place where you were when you were a child by this new event — okay, you’ve seen through that particular narrative. But there are many other narratives for anger just as there are many narratives for greed.

So there are lots of these things you’ve got to learn how to work through. Just because you see through anger once, don’t get discouraged when you find anger returning in another guise. Keep reminding yourself that this is a long-term project. There are lots of ins and outs. As the Buddha once said, you look at the animal world and it’s all so variegated: all the different kinds of animals, each with its own special little niche, its own coloring, its own peculiar tools and shapes and forms, its own ways of behavior. And yet the human mind is even more variegated than that. So we’ve got a lot to deal with here. It’s not an impossible task, but it does take time. Fortunately we have the time now. So make the most of it.
From: Overwhelmed by Freedom by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:A more useful way of looking at your sense of self is looking at where you do exert control. Ajaan Suwat once made a comparison between two of the passages we chant here regularly. On the one hand, there’s the passage we chanted just now: Anabhissaro: there is no one in charge. Assako loko, the world has nothing of its own, which means there is nothing of your own either, nothing worthy of calling you or yours. But we also have another chant, Kammassakomhi, I’m the owner of my actions. Your actions are yours. As Ajaan Suwat said, think about that. There’s a very useful teaching in that paradox. We do have the power to exert control over our intentions right now. And our intentions do shape our experience of the world around us, the world inside us, at least to some extent: enough to make the difference between suffering and not suffering.

What we’re experiencing right now is the result of past intentions, plus our current intentions, plus the results of our current intentions. Even though we may not have absolute control over things, and will ultimately have to let them all go, we do have some control over our actions now. And you want to make the most of that fact.
From: The Limits of Control by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:What the Buddha taught about karma is this: Your experience of the present moment consists of three things:
1) pleasures and pains resulting from past intentions,
2) present intentions,
and 3) pleasures and pains resulting from present intentions.
With reference to the question of happiness, this teaching has three main implications.
• The present is not totally shaped by the past. In fact, the most important element shaping your present pleasure or pain is how you fashion, with your intentions in the present, the raw material provided by the past.
• Pleasures and pains don’t just come floating by of their own accord. They come from intentions, which are actions. This means that they have their price, in that every action has an impact both on yourself and on others. The less harmful the impact, the lower the price. If your search for happiness is harmful to others, they will fight to undo your happiness. If it’s harmful to yourself, your search has failed.
• Your search for pleasure or gratification in the present has an impact not only on the present but also well into the future. If you want a long-term happiness, you have to take into account the way your present actions shape future events. And you have to pay careful attention now, for you can’t come back from tomorrow to undo any careless mistakes you had made today.
From: The Karma of Happiness: A Buddhist Monk Looks at Positive Psychology by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:In fact the first question you're supposed to ask when you go to meet a new teacher is: "What is skillful? What is not skillful? What, if I do it, will be for my long-term happiness? What, if I do it, will be for my long-term suffering?"

You take those questions, usually starting on the level of the precepts or generosity, and work down deeper and deeper into the mind. That's how the deeper levels of concentration are attained. The discernment that gives rise to liberation comes in as well, by learning how to ask the question "What's the skillful thing to do now?"

Now, in order to ask those questions from the very refined levels of the mind, you have to start by asking them from more blatant levels in your daily life. This is why the Buddha's teaching is not about how soon we can get the experience of Awakening, how soon we can get the feeling of oneness so we can go on with the rest of our life. That's not it at all. You have to train your whole approach to life. "What's the most skillful thing to do right now? What's the most skillful thing to say? What's the most skillful thing to think?" Learn how to keep asking these questions, looking for the answers, learning from your mistakes time and again, so that you gradually do become more skillful on the outer levels.
From: The Path of Questions by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:Buddhist wisdom famously focuses on perceptions of inconstancy, stress, and not-self, but the application of that wisdom grows out of the pursuit of what is relatively constant and pleasant, and requires a mature sense of self: able to plan for the future, to anticipate dangers, to sacrifice short-term happiness for long-term happiness, to consider the needs of others, to substitute harmless pleasures for harmful ones, and to develop a strong sense of self-reliance in the pursuit of a happiness that is wise, pure, and compassionate.
From: Merit: The Buddha's Strategies for Happiness: A Study Guide prepared by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:Right before you go to sleep is not the best time to meditate, for the mind will keep telling itself, "As soon as this is over, I’m going to bed." You’ll start associating meditation with sleep, and, as the Thais say, your head will start looking for the pillow as soon as you close your eyes.

If you have trouble sleeping, then by all means meditate when you’re lying in bed, for meditation is a useful substitute for sleep. Often it can be more refreshing than sleep, for it can dissolve bodily and mental tensions better than sleeping can. It can also calm you down enough so that worries don’t sap your energy or keep you awake. But make sure that you also set aside another time of the day to meditate too, so that you don’t always associate meditation with sleep. You want to develop it as an exercise in staying alert.
From: With Each & Every Breath: A Guide to Meditation by Thanissaro Bhikkhu (103 page pdf)
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:Doubt. This emotion comes in two forms: doubt about yourself, which is covered under Discouragement, above; and doubt about the practice. This latter doubt can be overcome in two ways:
• The first is to read about the example of the Buddha and his noble disciples. They were (and are) people of wisdom and integrity. They taught for free. They had no reason to misrepresent the truth to anyone. It’s rare to find teachers like that in the world, so you should give them the benefit of the doubt.
• The second way is to remind yourself that the practice can be truly judged only by a person who is true. Are you true in sticking with the breath? Are you true in observing when your mind is acting in skillful ways and when it’s not? Could you be more true in these areas? You’ll be able to overcome your doubt only if you’re truly observant and give the teachings a truly fair and earnest try, pushing yourself beyond your normal limits. Regardless of whether the practice ultimately will pan out to be true, you can only gain by learning to be more observant and earnest, so the energy you put into developing these qualities is sure not to be a waste.
From: With Each & Every Breath: A Guide to Meditation by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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Re: The Quotable Thanissaro

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu wrote:Many years ago, when Ajaan Suwat was teaching a retreat at IMS, I was his interpreter. After the second or third day of the retreat he turned to me and said, "I notice that when these people meditate they're awfully grim." You'd look out across the room and all the people were sitting there very seriously, their faces tense, their eyes closed tight. It was almost as if they had Nirvana or Bust written across their foreheads.

He attributed their grimness to the fact that most people here in the West come to Buddhist meditation without any preparation in other Buddhist teachings. They haven't had any experience in being generous in line with the Buddha's teachings on giving. They haven't had any experience in developing virtue in line with the Buddhist precepts. They come to the Buddha's teachings without having tested them in daily life, so they don't have the sense of confidence they need to get them through the hard parts of the meditation. They feel they have to rely on sheer determination instead.
From: Generosity First by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
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