พระอาจารย์อธิบายว่ามนุษย์ถูกชี้นำโดยธรรมชาติ 3 ฝ่ายมาตั้งแต่เกิด เปรียบเหมือนลูกเต่าที่มีสัญชาตญาณนำทางโดยไม่มีใครสอน วิธีแยกแยะเสียงภายในคือให้ถามหาเหตุผล อกุศลจะตอบไม่ได้และใช้แต่อารมณ์ อัพยากตะจะตอบแบบขาดๆ เกินๆ จากความทรงจำเดิม ส่วนกุศลเท่านั้นที่จะอธิบายได้อย่างสมเหตุสมผลถึงคุณและโทษThe teacher explains that human beings are guided by the three natures from the moment of birth, just as a hatchling turtle is guided by instinct with no one to teach it. The way to distinguish these inner voices is to ask for reasons: unwholesomeness cannot answer and relies purely on emotion, neutrality gives vague, half-reasoned answers pulled from old memory, and only wholesomeness can explain, with genuine reason, both the benefit and the harm of a course of action.
A lay follower asked: he had listened to a clip in which someone shared their experience of listening to an "inner voice" — describing it as gentle and unpressured, stating something only once, while an "outer voice" was urgent, repetitive, and insistent. How can we know which voice is coming from unwholesomeness, and if we ask and receive only silence, what should we do next?
Every Being Is Guided by the Three Natures From Birth
The teacher explained this through the example of a hatchling turtle, freshly emerged from its egg with no memory or , no parent to teach it — yet somehow knowing to crawl straight toward the sea, knowing what can and cannot be eaten. This is , an innate inner knowledge. The Buddha taught that this nature genuinely exists, in three forms: wholesome, unwholesome, and neutral, each guiding and possessing beings through an inner voice that resembles our own thoughts. Every human being is guided automatically from the moment they wake, almost without realizing it — genuine, purely self-generated thought is rare. This can be proven by those moments when the mind goes blank, with no nature guiding it at all — we feel dazed or even frightened, unsure what to do.
How to Tell Which Voice Is Wholesome or Unwholesome
The teacher advised focusing on the underlying purpose and right view. Unwholesomeness aims to utterly destroy people, so it guides through pressure, urgency, relentless insistence, and pure emotion, since its s consist only of greed, aversion, and delusion. If we ask it why we should do something, it cannot answer, because it offers no real benefit to us. Neutrality aims neither to help nor to harm; it gives half-reasoned, roundabout answers, drawing only on old memories, because it is not wise. Wholesomeness, by contrast, is wise — it can explain, with genuine reason, both the benefit and the harm: what negative result follows from not acting, what positive result follows from acting. It resolves problems directly, without intimidation or bringing suffering.
Beyond asking for reasons, we can also observe the feeling that accompanies the voice. A feeling that is harsh, coarse, dominated by emotion, and selfishly self-serving usually comes from unwholesomeness. A feeling that is gentle, refined, marked by full and , and governed by reason usually comes from wholesomeness.
Every Thought Is Not Truly "You"
The teacher explained further that whenever a given nature possesses our mind, it overlays its own body, feeling, mind, and mental objects onto ours, so its thoughts and feelings appear within our own mind, as if we ourselves were thinking or feeling them. If we understand that no thought is truly "us" — that all of them are external natures overlaying our own — we can pause our thinking and instead examine and maintain awareness at the level of body, feeling, mind, and mental objects. A sudden shift in behavior — from pleasant to suddenly harsh and coarse — is itself a sign that another nature has taken over. Developing helps us remain grounded in the truth of each moment, making it easier to connect with nature.