Practicing Dharma: The Only Way to Let Wholesomeness Take Root

Phra Ajarn Suraphong opens by stressing that practicing the Dhamma is essential for every life. Without it, we simply let our lives drift according to whatever karma brings, because our lives are dominated by three natures constantly competing to become "the ruler of the heart": the wholesome side, the unwholesome side, and the neutral side. We can choose which one to cooperate with — meaning we can, in effect, design our own life. But if we let life drift, we have no real basis to hope for progress, because we don't know what we would even be hoping from.

When Goodness Rules the Heart: The Triple Gem and Nibbāna Take Their Seat Within

When the wholesome side becomes the ruler of the heart, the Triple Gem appears bright and radiant at our center, and nibbāna settles layered within us. The refining of our inner elements by the Knowing Ones of great power then begins, and we can rightly hope for happiness and prosperity both now and in the future. As defilements are purified, life stops declining and stops growing dim; it steadily improves, and good fortune arises — because the Buddha Jewel already oversees the system of wholesomeness. We only need to let that system take hold.

Mind, Mental Factors, and the Three Forces That Shape Them

Practice is not difficult — it is simply staying aware of dwelling with wholesomeness, which has two parts: feeling/mental-state (cetasika) and thought (citta). Both are shaped by three competing forces: the wholesome, the unwholesome, and the neutral. This gives rise to "mind within mind" and "dharma within dharma." In the moment, we can tell which force has taken the throne by observing feeling itself: if the feeling is suffering, accompanied by pressure, constriction, and wrong views, the unwholesome side has taken over. When wholesomeness enters the mind, ease and good thoughts arise instead. The neutral force produces indifferent feeling — neither good nor bad — driving us only toward eating, playing, and wasting time without benefit. These three forces govern our lives around the clock, so we must learn to recognize and choose which one to dwell with.

A Simple Test: Being Present in the Body Versus Being Absent

He teaches that we can test this immediately. When we are present — aware of our own body — we feel balanced, in control, able to manage our thoughts and feelings. When we are not present, letting the mind drift wherever it goes, we can control nothing; our mental strength weakens, and whoever wishes to lead us astray can do so. Being present is dwelling in equanimity (upekkhā): it means the wholesome sphere has arisen and is drawing in pure energy, keeping the mind from wandering, restless, and unstable. Once present, we settle into our chosen meditation object — reciting "Samma Arahang," a mental image, or the breath — and the mind gradually grows calm.

The Grooves of the Mind: Old Wrong Teachings That Imprison Us

Staying with a familiar meditation object makes practice easier, but that familiarity must not itself be a wrong habit. We can tell whether it is wrong by observing the results: does the feeling before and after sitting improve, worsen, or stay the same? If we have drifted onto a wrong path, then every time we practice the mind flows right back into old "grooves" that the unwholesome side has already prepared as a prison for us. These grooves were carved by mistaken teachings from teachers in the past, which shaped wrong patterns in the mind. Following those grooves without ever questioning them, the mind slides straight into that dimension and is held captive there. We cannot free ourselves by our own effort — release comes only when the wholesome side takes the seat as ruler of the heart. It is goodness itself that unlocks the trap.

The Method: Reciting "Samma Arahang" Until It Becomes Second Nature — Never Losing Awareness

He instructs us to recite "Samma Arahang" repeatedly, training it to sit naturally on our lips and in our hearts. In the beginning our strength cannot match the other forces, so lapses are normal; when we lapse, we simply begin again — no harm done — as long as we keep up steady effort and diligence, staying aware without lapsing. When we maintain this awareness, the sphere of knowing — the sphere of mindfulness — arises, and the sphere of not-knowing, ignorance, falls away. This arising sphere is a wholesome sphere; all 84,000 sections of the Dhamma are, without exception, spheres of light. Dhamma can only arise in one place: the heart. The longer we sustain it there, the more the heart is refined into clarity and brightness.

The Sphere of Knowing Draws In Merit and Purifies Defilement: The Straw-in-Water Simile

When the sphere of knowing — the sphere of mindfulness, a wholesome sphere — arises, it draws in pure energy to purify the defilements that create every kind of obstacle and hindrance, the very things that make practice difficult and life burdensome. As defilements lighten, obstacles lighten too, and hardship gradually becomes ease. The pure energy called merit continually bubbles up through the center of our being — like dipping a straw into water and blowing through it, producing an unbroken stream of bubbles — forming a stream of merit flowing continuously through us. Within this sphere of merit, refined treasures are also stored, treasures that draw worldly, coarse wealth to us. Our task is simply to keep watchful awareness unbroken, resting in whatever meditation object suits us.

Dedicating Merit to Ancestors and Karmic Counterparties

As the sphere of knowing continues drawing in pure energy along with these refined treasures, he has us dedicate this merit to our ancestors — recalling our parents, relatives, grandparents, and all our teachers and benefactors, the devas who watch over and help us, our caretakers and guardians, and all the beings we may have wronged, our karmic counterparties. We ask that all forgive one another mutually and share equally in this merit.

Radiating Loving-Kindness Across the World and the Cosmos

He then has us generate goodwill toward the world and all beings: may those with much suffering have less, those with little suffering have none, those with little happiness have more, and those with much happiness have ever more. We expand this loving-kindness-filled heart outward, covering our home, spreading across village, district, province, Thailand, neighboring countries, and finally the whole world, until it becomes a radiant crystal sphere, clean and pure — through the special quality of loving-kindness that dissolves resentment and irritation from the heart. From there it expands further still, across the countless stars and galaxies of the boundless cosmos, resting the mind at the center of the Triple Gem, at the center of nibbāna, the boundless knowing and empowered ones.

Closing Aspiration

In closing, Phra Ajarn leads an aspiration for success to be established in us, now and in all lives to come. May the merit and blessings of our teachers and our own accumulated goodness since beginningless time combine into sacred, potent merit. May we be freed from misfortune, karmic results, demonic obstruction, and obstacles of every kind; may greed, hatred, delusion, lust, ignorance, wrong view, and clinging come to an end; may we gain the eye that sees the Dhamma and penetrate the knowledge of the Dhamma body; may we be strong in health and steadfast in spirit as we build perfections toward nibbāna. He closes by asking that old wrongdoing be forgiven, and that new merit bear fruit successfully for us all.