The Three Natures and the Role of Determined Awareness

Meditation practice is essential and vital for every life, because every single moment of our life is a channel through which energy flows, as the three natures compete for control. Whichever nature becomes the resident of our mind draws in its own energy to drive its own system, controlling all beings. Only the wholesome system can give us real benefit -- knowledge, understanding, what is right and good, happiness, and fulfillment. The other natures give no benefit at all, and worse, cause suffering and harm.

The Buddha taught: "Monks, you should clearly determine and know the body, feelings, mind, and dhamma-objects, in order to clear away delight and displeasure regarding the world." Wherever, among these four domains, we direct our determined awareness, the mind is placed there -- this is called "attention." Attention is intention; attention in order to come to know is mindfulness, and knowing is clear comprehension. When we direct our attention somewhere and come to know it there, the sphere of mindfulness appears bright and clear, continuously drawing the pure energy called merit into the brightness of that sphere of awareness. This drives the wholesome system, refining and purifying the elements of our being, clearing away the defilement that causes life's problems and obstacles.

Where Defilement Comes From, and Why Only Purity Can Clear It

Defilement can only be cleared by purity -- nothing else can clear it, only the purity of the substance of merit. Purity and defilement are direct opposites. If we can draw in pure energy, the clearing of defilement occurs; without purity, defilement remains and continues doing its work. Defilement comes from unwholesomeness taking hold of the mind, bringing unwholesome mental factors that draw in defiled, unwholesome energy, driving the unwholesome system, pressing the elements of our being downward, forcing us to think, speak, and act wrongly. The unwholesome mental factors are greed, hatred, delusion, lust, and the hindrances. Whoever is to help us must have real power -- and only the wholesome nature has that power. On our own, with just two arms and two legs, we can accomplish little, and we are further led astray by the unwholesome or by the neutral, undetermined nature (abyakata), which offers no help at all, since that is simply its nature.

We Are the Sovereign of Our Own Body and Mind: Whatever We Determine, So It Becomes

Our teachers advise us to determine our awareness at the seventh base, the center of the body, relying on the recitation and the mental image together as a pair. Our revered Luang Pu taught that form and name always go together -- wherever there is form, there is name; wherever there is name, there is form. We simply determine the recitation "Sammā Arahaṃ" with deep, subtle awareness, and whatever we determine, so it becomes -- because **we are the sovereign of this house of body and mind, like the ruler of a nation, like a king, like a monarch, like an emperor. Absolute authority belongs to us**, because we are the owner of this house of body and mind. Whatever we determine, so it becomes. When we recite with deep, subtle awareness, saying "Sammā Arahaṃ, Sammā Arahaṃ," the sound of that recitation from deep, subtle awareness appears.

Sammā Arahaṃ is the descriptive name of the Arahant Dhamma body -- the one who practices well, practices rightly, practicing in a way that leads far from all defilements. It is a name born of its qualities: whatever qualities that being has, such is its name. When we utter this name, it appears in our mind. All dhamma -- wholesome, unwholesome, or neutral -- can arise in only one place: the mind. Nowhere else. When we utter the name, the form appears, because form and name always go together. That form is the crystal Dhamma body, radiant, cool, clean, and pure.

The Simile of the Blind Person: Sensing Presence Even Without Clear Sight

Whether we see it or not is not the important point at all, because the image already exists -- all we need is to know that it is there; the moment we utter its name, it appears. **We are, in this, like a blind person. A blind person lives in a world of darkness, without light. People and beings see because they rely on light; but where light has not yet appeared, nothing can be seen, whether in the inner world or the outer world.** While we cannot yet make the light appear, even though we utter the name and the image arises, we still do not see it -- just like a blind person in the human world who calls out a friend's name; the friend appears, but the blind person still cannot see them. **Yet even without seeing, a blind person still senses that the friend is there, because they can hear the friend speak.** As for the inner world, we perceive it through the mind, through feeling. All we need is to feel that the image is there, to perceive its arising through feeling -- sensing that the Buddha-image has appeared.

When we call its name, it appears in our mind, at a small clear point at our center. When it appears, it does not appear empty-handed -- appearing at the center of our mind, it takes the elements of our being -- seeing, remembering, thinking, knowing, earth, water, wind, fire, space, and consciousness -- and refines them, clean and pure. It does this because it is the guardian of the wholesome system. It is our true self, and a true self naturally acts for our benefit. What it wishes for is for us and it to become one and the same.

Seeing the Crystal Dhamma Body at the Center of the Body

Once it has appeared, it expands to overlap with our human body, in order to merge into one. Once we understand this, we merge with it by wearing the feeling that we are the Buddha-image, and the Buddha-image is us -- letting our whole body, from head, face, cheeks, shoulders, arms, and torso, merge into one unity. Our head becomes the clear crystal of the Dhamma body, with a lotus-bud crest, clear, glittering, and radiant. Our face becomes its face, eyes gently closed, lips curved in a soft smile. Forehead, cheeks, nose, mouth, chin, and neck all become the crystal Dhamma body, radiant, cool, clean, and pure. Both shoulders and arms down to the fingertips, chest, belly, back, hips, thighs, knees, shins, and soles of the feet all likewise become the crystal Dhamma body, clear, glittering, radiant, delicate, soft, and gentle. Each image rises and expands, overlapping one after another, continuously.

Stopping in Stillness, Resting in Rest, Aiming Toward Nibbana

Once we have merged our body with its body into one unity, we merge our mind with its mind into one unity as well. Normally the Buddha-image abides with us, cultivating the attainment of cessation, gathering the mind, stopping, and stilling. Whatever it does, we do the same -- gathering the mind, stopping, stilling, soft and light and at ease. Stopping within stopping, stillness within stillness, clear, cool, clean, pure, and radiant. We send the mind aiming directly toward the path of nibbana, along the inner middle way -- not left, not right, not forward, not back, not up, not down -- going ever more subtly, still, resting at the center of the center, knowing the center, stopping at the center, stilling at the center, soft and light and at ease. The mind is a substance of accomplishment: whatever we determine, so it becomes.

Faith, Too, Is a Wholesome Sphere That Draws In Merit

All we need is to abide with what we have determined. The sphere of awareness, mindfulness, recollects and knows, attaching and resting upon the highest, most sublime thing in life. Even people of the world who fix their minds upon something sacred they have faith in still receive results, because of that faith. This sphere of faith is universal; it is a wholesome sphere, a wholesome mental factor. Once it arises, it becomes a bright, clear sphere, drawing the pure energy called merit to flow into the brightness of that sphere of faith, driving the wholesome system, refining the elements of our being, clean and pure. Once defilement is gone, nothing holds us fixed to our present dimension any longer, and a subtler dimension draws us in toward itself.

Radiating Loving-Kindness to All Beings

Once we have done good for ourselves, we go on to do good for the people of the world and all beings, by cultivating loving-kindness. We simply set the sincere wish that all beings be free from suffering and find happiness everywhere. Our revered Luang Pu advised drawing on the mind of a mother, full of love and goodwill for her young child, and letting it arise in our own mind. This loving-kindness, shaped like a bright, clear sphere, once established, illuminates our mind, clearing away patigha -- irritation, a form of defilement -- completely. We then expand this heart filled with loving-kindness outward, covering our home, village, sub-district, district, province, the whole country, neighboring countries, until it covers the entire world, turning it into a crystal world, bright, cool, clean, and pure -- extending to earth-dwelling devas, tree-dwelling devas, sky devas, the heavenly beings of every realm, brahmas and formless brahmas, and beings in hell, hungry ghosts, and animals. May those with much suffering have little; may those with little suffering be free of it; may those with little happiness have more; may those with much happiness have ever more. We extend this further, out into the atmosphere of the cosmos, covering countless stars, extending to ten thousand world-systems and countless universes, without limit.

Dedicating Merit to Relatives and All Beings

The pure stream of merit continues pouring forth into the brightness of loving-kindness. We dedicate this merit to benefit all people and beings -- may all beings who are our companions in birth, aging, sickness, and death share in this merit we have sincerely accumulated. May our ancestors, parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts and uncles, companions, relatives, friends, teachers, and all who have shown us kindness, as well as all beings we may have wronged as karmic counterparts (khu-kam khu-wen), forgive one another and share equally in this merit.

Merging with the Triple Gem and the Great Teachers

We gather our minds, stopping and stilling, into the center of the Triple Gem -- the Buddha jewel, the Dhamma jewel, the Sangha jewel -- and into the center of our great teachers. We still ourselves into the refined Dhamma body of our revered Luang Pu, then of Luang Phor, and then of Khun Yai Achan. As we recall them, we appear bright at their center -- the center of the Triple Gem, the center of the great teachers, and the center of nibbana. Nibbana is like a great central station, watching over us at all times -- every Buddha, every Paccekabuddha, and every Arahant. Though they passed into final nibbana long ago, they still help people and beings just as before, only in a different form, holding all beings at their center throughout countless universes. Any being who abides in universal goodness has the pure stream of merit from the deepest, most refined part of nibbana pouring continuously into their mind, regardless of what religion they follow, or none at all.

Closing Aspiration and Setting the Blueprint of Success

Resting at the center of the knower, of boundless power, uncountable across incalculable aeons, we pay homage and ask for the blessing, setting the blueprint of success to remain fixed within this radiant sphere of merit, throughout our entire path of building perfections from this moment forward. May our lives change, carrying knowledge together with happiness and purity, and success in everything right and good. We ask for the blessing, the merit, the radiance, the power, and the absolute authority of nibbana throughout all elements and all dhamma, together with the blessing of Luang Pu, Luang Phor, and Khun Yai Achan -- may all this merit combine with what we have sincerely accumulated since our very first life, becoming sacred merit of boundless power, purifying our body, speech, mind, and the elements of our being -- seeing, remembering, thinking, knowing, earth, water, wind, fire, space, and consciousness -- making them bright, cool, clean, and pure. May we be freed from calamity, misfortune, karmic obstacles of every kind, and may greed, hatred, delusion, lust, ignorance, wrong view, craving, and clinging be extinguished without remainder. May we gain the Dhamma-eye and penetrate the Dhammakaya knowledge fully -- the threefold and eightfold knowledge, the six higher powers, the four analytic insights, the eight liberations, and the fifteen conducts, in full. May we have strong health and long life to build merit throughout our lives, with unfailing resolve toward nibbana, the end of Dhamma. Wherever we travel, may we meet only good fortune and safety, loved by humans and devas, with bright wisdom penetrating the Dhamma. In whatever work we undertake, may we prosper beyond expectation, gaining the wealth of a universal monarch to build great generosity and perfections without end. When the time comes to leave this world, may we be born in Tusita heaven, in the realm of the great bodhisattvas of the special merit lineage, and when we return to build perfections on earth, may we be born into a family of right view -- a crystal family, a Dhammakaya family -- complete with the finest form, wealth, virtue, honor, and the path and fruit of nibbana and the Dhammakaya knowledge. May whatever unwholesome deeds we have committed in the past be forgiven and never bear fruit again; may we commit no new unwholesome deed; and may all the merit we have sincerely accumulated combine into sacred, powerful, wondrous results, continuing without end until the very end of Dhamma, by the boundless power of the Lord Buddha, every Buddha. May all these good wishes come true.

*By the power attained by all Buddhas, by the power of the Paccekabuddhas,* *and by the power of the Arahants, I bind this protection entirely.* *By the power of all the Buddhas, by the power of all the Dhamma, by the power of all the Sangha,* *may you always be well and at peace.*