If meditators lead lives based on selfishness, they are likely to bring
exactly the same approach to their meditation and will be
short-tempered, angry, uptight meditators. If their ambition is to have
a completely silent mind, and people close-by make noises, they will
think that all these people around them are disturbing their meditation
and taking away their peace of mind! Eventually, every noise will
become their enemy. When we think like that, we become very emotional,
and then where is our meditation? Therefore, if we notice that we are
becoming short-tempered, uptight and getting headaches, we should know
that we are meditating in a wrong way. Never allow yourself to meditate
like that!
`Noise
is a challenge. If we can make it part of our meditation, we will
really make progress. If we are able to somehow incorporate the noise
into our meditation, we will feel confident that we can literally
meditate in the middle of the traffic. Noise can no longer bother us.
While
meditating, some people get disturbed by what they see. They close
their eyes in order not to see what is in front of them, but then
something else will start disturbing them. They want to get rid of all
sorts of things and their sight becomes their enemy. Meditation should
not be an excuse to blame something or somebody for taking away our
inner peace. This is a wrong way of thinking, because if we accept
everything that comes our way, then nothing can bother us anymore and
our inner peace is there all the time. The point is that whatever
obstacle arises, if a meditator blames that for not finding inner
peace, then eventually every object becomes our enemy.
Let me
give you an example from my own life. When I began my long retreat in
Woodstock, New York, I had a nice house next to the monastery and all
the conditions were wonderful for practice, so I was very happy.
However,
soon after my retreat started, the monastery decided to start a major
building project right next to my house. The whole area became a
building site, full of heavy machinery, so my whole house was shaking.
They even cut off my electricity and water supply! I was very upset - I
felt that my retreat was ruined.It gave me so much trouble I could
hardly meditate.
Things got really bad and I was so upset by the
noise and shaking, but then my teacher came to see me and said: the
noise is your meditation. This really helped me. I stopped fighting it,
and began to accept it. This was a real turning point. It is very
important for a practitioner to accept noise. If you don't, if noise
becomes your enemy, then eventually everything will be your enemy and
you will be unable to practise. During your meditation if you are
bothered with noise instead of seeing it as your enemy, you should make
it your friend. So this was a very important lesson for me.
However,
maybe my noise karma was not yet exhausted, because when I did my
second retreat at Samye Ling in Scotland, I had a beautiful quiet house
with a porch, and then the monastery decided to rebuild the Purelands
Retreat Centre right on my doorstep. So again the whole place became a
building site! In fact, the workers began to pile up their tools and
dusty bags of cement right inside my porch! But it was okay for me. I
began to think, Lama Yeshe, you must meditate for them. They are
working so hard, they are building a retreat centre for others to
practise the Dharma. You must practise for them. So I encourage all of
you to work with noise and disturbance and not to feel that they are
obstacles. Then you can meditate anywhere and find peace no matter what.
Meditation
means simple acceptance. How can we talk about being non-judgmental,
non-grasping, if we have so many judgements in our mind, expecting
certain feelings out of our meditation and completely rejecting some
other experiences? People who adopt such an attitude are in a way like
boxers going into the ring. They are thumping and punching, but they
are the losers, because there is actually nobody to box! For a good
meditator, all mental activities are nothing more than clouds in the
sky. They come from nowhere and disappear into nowhere.
Many
people come to tell me that it's an easy thing to say, but that these
are real things happening! Real things are happening because you let
yourself think it is really happening! If you go on insisting that it's
really there, I ask you again, how big is it, what shape, size and
colour does it have? If you answer that it has none of these material
characteristics, then how can you call it a real thing happening? You
made it real!
We build up things like, for instance, friends. We
think we really like a person and start thinking of all his/her good
qualities. We build it up and that person gets better and better every
day! But when things turn sour, we start seeing faults and the next day
we notice more and more. Our belief in the reality of our feelings is
what causes so much unhappiness - unnecessary unhappiness.These
feelings may start as something very small but day after day we nurture
them and make them grow. Whenever you meditate and you think that real
things are truly happening, just investigate what is there. Instead of
running away, confront them and say, OK, I want to introduce myself to
you. I want to know you better. If you really approach it that way, you
will realise that nothing is actually happening.
