AT SO RARE AN OCCASION as this where we have chanced upon a buddha’s dispensation, what we laity and clergy mostly try to do is protect and preserve the dispensation and bear the weight of the dispensation. When you are ever so busy working around the clock on such things as paritta chanting events, dhamma talks, almsgiving, Sunday school, the upkeep and advancement of monasteries, religious ceremonies, or social work, the weariness that you feel you see as one that sets in from shouldering the burden, the weight, of the dispensation. This is an utterly wrong interpretation.

A buddha’s dispensation can’t be something you feel the weight of. It is something that unburdens you, something that brings solace. What we must resolve to do, rather than carry the weight of the dispensation, is to bear its lightness. As you tread the path of practice in the dispensation if you are feeling a weariness or an encumbrance, then you had better place a question mark before yourself. You have to be humble enough to think of the right path as against the wrong. But if it were a pleasure or a happiness in life that you sought, then you would indeed feel the weariness and the weight, for you are searching for something that doesn’t exist. Why we ought to be Buddhist practitioners or ordain as monks is to bear the lightness of the dispensation; for if you feel a burden, an exhaustion, when putting into practice the path of the dispensation, then we do not in the least need it.

When we laity and clergy engage in the materialistic side of practice in the correct manner, or make material offerings to Buddha in a grand fashion, as its rewards, gain and requisites will come pouring in towards the doer. This isn’t a miracle. Just an immediately ensuing wholesome karmic reward you get in return for the faith and confidence―saddha―you have in the supremely self-enlightened Buddha, in his faculties. This prosperity we can often see in society. But when prosperity arrives purely as a reward of wholesome action, we misconstrue it.

The reason you get this karma-result of prosperity is for you to further enhance the confidence in Buddha and, with conviction, make headway in the path of morality (sīla), concentration (samādhi) and wisdom (paññā) expounded by him. To give you certitude that if you did such and such a thing, you’d get such and such a thing as a result, is the role of this prosperity. At this point you ought to be skilful to change over from the materialistic side of the practice to the spiritual side. Still, to clutch prosperity to our bosom, we get bogged down in materialistic practice. Then a deluge of more and more requisites come flowing in. In the end, we are taken captive by those requisites. Then, rather than making headway in the path of morality, concentration and wisdom that is bound for enlightenment, you linger, you take up residence, in that place which you thought a pleasure. You see nothing wrong in this. Now you are intoxicated with receiving prosperity. You can’t see very far. You’ve become short-sighted. The path of wisdom lying at a distance isn’t perceptible to you, for you are going backwards.

Turning our backs on the light, groping about in the dark, what in the world are we looking for? Looking for a happiness and prosperity that doesn’t exist. The measure, the bounds, the contentment, the discontent, of the happiness and prosperity you go looking for lies simply with you. The arbiter, the judge, of these is but your arising-passing mind. Still, you’re seeking a happiness, a pleasure that can never be found in the world.

For you to receive as well as to let go, what tells you the way is the faith and confidence you have in Buddha. Here, it is essential that you be skilful. In what? In letting go of the ‘receiving’ and seeing the Buddha, who paved the way for requisites and gain and honour to be bestowed upon you. Although Buddha has afforded you an opportunity to see him, you just keep beavering away working day and night, looking for a non-existent happiness. To yourself who are weary and busy, put the question: Isn’t it the same non-existent happiness that you are seeking right at this moment?

Why does everyone utterly exhaust themselves 24 hours of the day? They thus wear themselves out for the sake of owning, increasing. For owning what? For owning, for gaining more and more, pleasure, happiness, responsibility, leadership. It is in search of pleasure that not just humans but animals, too, make every effort, exert themselves, or roam about. It is due to their thirst for pleasure that even the devas, having taken up residence in heavenly realms, wallow in celestial comforts and celestial nutriment. By chasing only pleasure, taking it to be permanent, what they, too, constantly accumulate is nothing but craving―tanhā. What craving begets is but an unwholesome karma. In this futile journey beings undertake to find pleasure, they are going to end up unknowingly falling into the fourfold hell and disconsolately wander, experiencing untold suffering. Even those brahmas living in brahma worlds who are of Wrong View and haven’t taken refuge in the triple gem are liable to tumble down to the fourfold hell again and suffer. Except for those brahmas in brahma worlds who are of Right View (sammā-diṭṭhi), all other beings, in their relentless quest for pleasure, will inevitably meet the same fate.

Celestial pleasures are ephemeral. The suffering of the fourfold hell, however, is not. It is incredibly long. Devas ensconced in heavenly worlds, forever indulging in endless sensual luxuries and hankering for those sensual riches more and more, steadily accumulate unwholesome karma from chasing sense pleasure with intense desire and from constantly developing craving. For this reason, celestial pleasures fizzle away pretty quickly. There’s a very high chance that devas would plummet to the fourfold hell again. So, celestial pleasures are ephemeral.

Beings languishing in the fourfold hell, simply due to the insufferable misery they’re living in, are always filled with anger and hatred. And so, at every passing moment what they accumulate is nothing but unwholesome karma. As a result, unwholesome karma proliferate and they fall from suffering to deeper suffering, becoming constituents of the fourfold hell.

 Brahmas living in the brahma world have the potential to attain full enlightenment the instant they perceive as impermanent the pleasure of the samādhi they are experiencing. But despite possessing this ability, in consequence of seeking evermore the happiness of samādhi by taking its pleasure as permanent, they lock themselves out of enlightenment.

In the planes of the brahma worlds, there also exist brahmas who are of wrong view. From having cultivated moral conduct and concentration to the utmost level in their past lives as humans, they [now] enjoy the pleasures of a brahma. But they are not a group who has taken refuge in the triple gem in the buddha’s dispensation. Not Buddhist practitioners. These brahmas have not cultivated wisdom. They remain in ignorance. Such brahmas as these would fall into the fourfold hell again. But simply owing to the rewards of having cultivated moral conduct and concentration to the hilt, they could enjoy the pleasures of a brahma for many eons. Some day, having made the acquaintance of and taken refuge in the triple gem and attaining stream-entry once wisdom has ripened, they have the potential to attain extinguishment in the brahma world itself. Until then, they too are a hapless bunch searching for a happiness non-existent in the world. Indeed, they have practised ‘letting go’ in human lives past. But they have done so not owing to wisdom but due to the hankering, the craving, for the pleasure of samādhi; they have done so due to the fallacy that, despite having let go of all other pleasures, the pleasure of samādhi though is permanent.

It is an ever-discontented journey that all these pleasure-seeking beings are thus going on. Take a look at your kuṭi. Does it contain comfy chairs, tables, comfy beds, bedclothes, floor mats, carpets, radios, foodstuff, beverages, milk powder, and medicines? All this is there for one’s self-respect, one’s comfort. That means you’re always with a second person. Not at all in solitude. Think for yourself: how far removed are you from the limit of ‘three robes and the alms bowl’? To that very extent, craving has become your boon companion that wipes out your solitude.

In the round of rebirths past, we had assumed the throne of a universal monarch who turns the wheel of righteousness, we had become kings and sovereigns and ministers and courtiers. Licking our lips, we had devoured that regal splendour. But due to unknowing, in the present we are [still] vying in quest of tastes and pleasures not experienced. Neither when you had gained the throne of a universal monarch in saŋsāra nor when you had abdicated that throne were you content with those pleasures. And purely as a result, while resenting due to craving, time and time again you lapsed into that quest for pleasures in saŋsāra. The path you’re on right now is the same one. What drove you into this path is nothing but your own ignorance-filled mind; your insatiable, ingrate, perverse arising-passing mind that drifts around looking to gratify the five senses. Due to this greed alone, so huge is the distance you’ve been made to traverse hitherto that it is utterly innumerable. As is the enormous distance it will haul you away even further. Whoever you may be, isn’t it to find pleasure that you thus toil and labour? You even started reading this essay because that mind of yours commanded you to do so, isn’t it? Is that particular mind still there now? It has become impermanent and changed away. That mind isn’t something that belongs to you, is it? It is a stranger to you. But at some point in the past, thinking it permanent, thinking it belonged to you, you acted upon that mind―put that thought into action. And through which, didn’t you accrue a wholesome or unwholesome karma? Won’t both those karma bear you over into the becoming (bhava)? If so, every single mind you neglect to perceive as impermanent will haul you away into the becoming, isn’t it?

At a certain juncture in the operation of extinguishment headed for final liberation, Lord Buddha will appear before you. That’s for sure. An absolute certainty. Having so appeared before you, Buddha will offer you a word of advice, a meditation object, for you to cross the final stretch of the path to enlightenment. It is simply Buddha himself who gives it, no question about it. The instructions he so gives you are: “See as impermanent the mind that has arisen.” Because it’s a word of advice coming from the master himself, you feel it strongly, understand it insightfully. That instant, you will at once behold as impermanent the mind that saw the Buddha. Buddha’s form, Buddha’s instructions―all this you will perceive as impermanent. With the wisdom that ripens in you, this is bound to happen. Here what you see as Buddha is the wisdom that is developing in you. Here, you will realize all too well that wisdom and Buddha are not two different things but one and the same. We don’t usually think Buddha and wisdom are one and the same. But when you are in full swing in the operation of extinguishment, this reality will dawn on you. Were Lord Buddha living today, the meditation object he would give you has to be this. Perceive as impermanent the mind arisen! Don’t let that mind, dampening it with craving, be put into action! What you’ve been doing so far, and are doing at present, is moistening the arisen mind with craving and acting upon it.

Look how lucky you are. Although over two and a half millennia have elapsed since the final passing away of the Buddha, if you’re skilful, you can obtain a meditation object from Buddha; can see the Buddha; have Buddha’s protection; and find solace in the path of the Dhamma he found solace in.

By making material offerings of oil lamps in the tens of thousands, fragrant flowers, incense sticks, or requisites, all you would see is opulent perceptions heralding deva and human worlds. Such perceptions lead to ‘becoming.’ But if you beheld that mind as impermanent, what you would see then is the Dhamma, the true nature of the world. If this ability, however, has not yet burgeoned in you, what you must do is let that ability develop in you by engaging in the above merit-producing activities. But you mustn’t be an inertial Buddhist who stagnates, who lingers, bogged down in the same place. You have to be a Buddhist practitioner who pursues insight knowledge while empirically facing and experiencing [things].

The puthujjana being loves to kill time. All that has been done throughout the past, too, was idly biding time. Even today, the preponderance of Buddhists hope to attain enlightenment in the dispensation of Metteyya Buddha by having heard the Dhamma from him. They wish for it. Be it laity or clergy, when you thusly wish, what you’re seeing is not Metteyya Buddha but ignorance. It’s just ignorance that you’re wishing for. But if you simply saw as impermanent the mind that called upon you to wait until the Metteyya Buddha’s dispensation to attain enlightenment by having heard the Dhamma from him, what you would see is the Metteyya Buddha himself, what you would see is the very Dhamma that Metteyya Buddha is going to teach. Look at the wonder of the Dhamma! Today, at this very moment, you can see, can experience, the Dhamma that Metteyya Buddha is going to teach. Yet due to the ignorance in you, you’re trying to venture farther into saŋsāra, enduring suffering for many eons. Look how much ignorance deceives beings. Despite having the opportunity to see at this instant the Metteyya Buddha as well as the Dhamma he is going to teach, our mind, greedy for the ‘becoming,’ is drawing us away into suffering itself. Promising to show us Metteyya Buddha, it instead shows us ‘ignorance.’

Be skilful to always see as impermanent the mind that arises; to see that the mind isn’t something that belongs to you; to see that it is a stranger to you; to see that it is your friend who gives you suffering. When you behold it this way, the fourfold establishing of mindfulness (satipaṭṭhāna) is what will develop in you; what you will penetrate insightfully is the five clinging aggregates (pañca upādānakkhanda); the continuum of dependent origination (paṭicca samuppāda); the seven factors of enlightenment (bojjaṅga). You don’t have to go looking for any of these. Nor do you have to study them. When you see as impermanent the mind that arises, these phenomena will, without being made to happen, spontaneously develop in you. You will have penetrated them insightfully. The one who won’t see the impermanence of the mind has to follow discourses or attend meditation classes looking for these phenomena. What they thus go in search of is a thing that exists simply within them. Call off all searches and search only about the arising-passing mind, which stirs this 32-fold impurity made of the fourfold element into action. Observe it. What you then search for, what you then see, is the Dhamma.

If you wanted to go to Kataragama, all you would have to do was go to the bus station, get on a bus for Kataragama, and get a ticket. The bus would then take you to Kataragama. On the way there, if you kept a keen eye on the surroundings as you went, you would be able to see the Kalutara bodhi tree, the Galle harbour, the saltern of Hambantota, and the great stupa of Tissa. But without boarding the bus if you endeavoured to find out details about the nature of the Kalutara bodhi tree, the saltern, the harbour or the sea from folks at the bus terminal or look for information on these by consulting a road map, you would end up missing the bus and getting lost. Likewise, you just watch over the mind. Then the fourfold establishing of mindfulness, the continuum of dependant origination, the five clinging aggregates, and the seven factors of enlightenment will heave into sight; will be perceived; will be insightfully realized. You shouldn’t go for tuition in search of them.

Behold the mind. Mind connotes: Impermanence. The world. Beauty. Ugliness. Pleasure. Misery. Loving-kindness. Hate. Becoming. Extinguishment. In short, the mind is the creator of the world. Mind means a welter of suffering. Yet he is your bosom friend, too. Your pet who speaks words of consolation to you. Also, the trickster who bars the right way and tells you the wrong way. But also, your liberator. So, recognize the [oxymoronic] mind with insightful understanding. Make the mind your wise and virtuous friend (kalyāna mitta). The only way to do so is by letting go of the mind. When you let go of the mind, the whole world, too, will be avoided.

Since ‘suffering’ is well aware that ‘pleasure’ becomes impermanent, it waits out the ‘pleasure.’ Why you’re unaware of the very thing that suffering and pleasure are both aware of is only because what gave rise to both pleasure and suffering is a mind that is a stranger to you; that doesn’t belong to you. You are oblivious of the mind. Aren’t concerned about it. Would go before the dressing table and inspect the hair, beard, eye, ear, tongue, teeth, face, pimples or skin on a daily basis. If there were any flaws, would take vitamin supplements or smear creams. Would inspect the ‘me’ in ‘me.’ Would beautify. But would not inspect the mind. Look in the mirror of wisdom for the mind that seeks pleasure and beauty. It wouldn’t be yourself that you would see, but only a great velocity.