พระอาจารย์สุรพงค์นำนั่งสมาธิ อธิบายพุทธพจน์เรื่องการกำหนดรู้ในกาย เวทนา จิต และธรรม แล้วขยายความไปถึงหลักอนิจจังและอนัตตา สอนให้เห็นว่าพฤติกรรมของคนรอบข้างไม่ว่าดีหรือไม่ดีล้วนไม่เที่ยง ไม่ควรยึดถือว่าเป็นตัวตนที่แท้จริง จึงไม่จำเป็นต้องโทษตนเองหรือโทษผู้อื่นเมื่อถูกกระทำไม่ดีPhra Ajarn Suraphong leads a sitting built around the Buddha's teaching on clearly knowing body, feeling, mind, and dhamma, then extends it into anicca and anatta. He teaches that other people's good or bad behavior is never fixed or permanent, so there is no true 'self' in it to cling to — which frees us from blaming ourselves or blaming others when we are wronged.
Meditation practice is necessary for every life, because all of us live under the governance of nature itself. Only merit and wholesomeness give real benefit — , understanding, , and rightful success. Unwholesome nature gives nothing of value; it only brings suffering and harm. That is why we must learn to understand this, and train ourselves to dwell continually with what is wholesome.
The Buddha's Foundational Teaching: Knowing Body, Feeling, Mind, and Dhamma
The Buddha taught: "Monks, clearly know body, feeling, mind, and , in order to remove longing and grief regarding the world." Phra Ajarn Suraphong says this single sentence deserves to be memorized, because it is the sentence capable of turning an ordinary person into a noble one. Its meaning unfolds in three parts, each of which we need to understand clearly.
Part One — Fixing Attention on the Breath and the Arising of Mindfulness
The first part is about "determining" — placing the mind deliberately. When we fix our attention on the breath, the mind settles at the nostrils. As the in-breath and out-breath touch the walls of the nostrils, the nerve cells register the senon, and when the mind continuously registers this signal, the "knowing orb" — — arises. Once mindfulness, a , arises, it continuously draws pure energy into the brightness at its center. This pure energy works to remove the defilements that are the root cause of life's problems and obstacles.
Giving, Precepts, and Meditation: The Tools for Purifying Defilement
If we do not purify these defilements, they will keep creating trouble and hardship in our lives. The only remedy is to dwell with wholesome nature through giving, keeping precepts, and meditating fully. Only merit can lighten and eventually dissolve these defilements — we ourselves are not the ones doing the purifying; our role is simply to keep mindfulness arising, while dhamma itself does the work of cleansing.
Part Two — Body, Feeling, Mind, and Dhamma Under Wholesome or Unwholesome Occupation
The Buddha taught us to know body, feeling, mind, and dhamma clearly because both wholesome and unwholesome nature can come to occupy them. When wholesomeness occupies us, the body behaves politely and properly, feeling becomes happy and calm, and mind and dhamma are lifted to something finer. But when unwholesomeness occupies us, feeling and mind are pressed down into coarseness, producing unpleasant behavior and a suffering that is hard to bear.
Impermanence: Applying Anicca to Other People's Behavior
For this reason the Buddha said: sabbe sankhara anicca — all conditioned things are impermanent. They are sometimes wholesome, sometimes unwholesome, never fixed. A person's behavior is exactly the same. Someone may act well today and poorly tomorrow, or act poorly today and turn around for the better tomorrow. Everything is in constant flux.
Non-Self: Releasing Blame of Ourselves and Others
When someone treats us badly, Phra Ajarn Suraphong teaches that we should not cling to that behavior as a fixed, true "self" belonging to them. What we witness is not their real, unchanging identity — it is simply nature operating together with kamma. Their unwholesome behavior is not who they truly are either; it can always change. When we stop clinging in this way, we stop blaming ourselves, and we stop blaming others. We simply accept that a natural law governs all beings, and let go.
The Fruit of Letting Go: Less Anger, Less Grief
Once the mind can rest in this understanding, when we meet with behavior that is wrong or unpleasant, we no longer feel as resentful or as heartbroken as before. Unwholesomeness thrives on finding fault and dwelling on grievance, and it will only drag us into doing things we shouldn't, which then brings blame back onto ourselves.
Liking, Disliking, Greed, and the Habit of Blaming Others
Phra Ajarn Suraphong also speaks of liking and disliking as roots of suffering. When something good comes to us as the fruit of our own past deeds, if we are not content and want more than we have earned, greed arises. And when misfortune strikes, people who don't understand kamma tend to blame this person or that person rather than the results of their own actions — and the more they blame others, the more unwholesomeness they create for themselves.
Calm and Insight Must Work Together
Confusion and turmoil in the mind arise from not seeing clearly, so both calm () and () must be developed together. Insight is the deliberate noting that lets us understand clearly what is arising in the mind, while calm settles the mind. Both depend on continual mindfulness and on gradually dispelling .
The Practice: Visualizing the Crystal Buddha Image and Its Light
For the sitting itself, he guides practitioners to recall the bright, crystal-clear kaya image at , keeping the mind gently fixed there. Whether the image appears vividly or not doesn't matter — stay relaxed, and train gradually, without forcing.
Radiating Loving-Kindness and Dedicating Merit
With the mind settled and even, he leads the radiating of , wishing all beings freedom from suffering and happiness, expanding this goodwill outward until it fills the entire universe. He then dedicates this merit to parents, grandparents, teachers, guardian devas, and all karmic counterparties (khu-kam khu-wen) we may have wronged, asking that all forgive one another. The sitting closes with a resolve that the whole path of building perfections be filled with knowledge, happiness, and , followed by a closing chant of appreciation.