Why Practice Is Essential for Every Life

This practice is deeply necessary for every life, because we live under the control of three natures. Only the wholesome (kusala) nature can bring benefit, understanding, and what is right and good. Every other nature offers no benefit at all — and if that nature is unwholesome (akusala), it brings a great deal of suffering. We must therefore learn to understand how to abide within the wholesome nature.

The Verse That Turns an Ordinary Person into a Noble One

The Buddha taught us to develop right mindfulness in order to progress toward right concentration, saying: "Monks, you should clearly know body, feeling, mind, and dhamma, in order to remove craving-attachment and grief from the world." A single short sentence — yet one capable of turning an ordinary person into a noble one. We must memorize it and understand each word he spoke. The essence of this sentence divides into three parts, each carrying a deep significance: the hidden mechanism operating behind everything.

The Layered Analogy: From the Body to Unseen Energy

Everything has a mechanism working behind it. Take our own body: from the outside we see only eyes, ears, nose, mouth, hair, teeth, skin. But behind that are the internal organs — lungs, liver, spleen, kidneys, heart, stomach, intestines, the nervous system, and countless complex systems. Deeper still is the mind — the workings of body, feeling, mind, and dhamma, which cannot be seen. And behind that mechanism lies energy itself — merit, demerit, and neutral (abyākata) energy — operating behind the workings of all beings. There is a still deeper background controlling all these mechanisms that we do not know. If we come to know even a little of it, we understand a little more, practice a little more correctly, and life becomes lighter and easier.

The Inner World Is the World of Cause; the Outer, of Effect

There are two worlds: the inner and the outer. The outer world is complex, full of conditions requiring much knowledge and understanding. The inner world is even more complex — an unseen world. The outer world is the world of effects; the inner world is the world of causes. The Buddha therefore taught us to learn and understand the root cause of a flourishing life: developing right mindfulness, so as to abide within the correct system, which brings benefit. To abide within an incorrect system, by contrast, brings a great deal of suffering.

Part One: Clear Knowing — Mind-Liberation and the Mind as a Generator

To abide within the wholesome system, we must first learn and understand precept, concentration, and wisdom, then determine the role and function of the human body. If we do not determine it ourselves, other natures will step in to direct what we determine — bringing no benefit at all. To determine is to specify, to fix a point, to mark a place; wherever we mark, the mind is placed there — this is called "putting the mind in." All dhammas can only arise in one place: the mind; nowhere else. When we place the mind there, mindfulness — a wholesome mental factor — appears, taking the form of a bright, clear sphere. Once mindfulness arises, it draws in the pure energy of merit. One could say the mind is like a generator that can draw in energy, but which kind of energy depends on the "software" installed — dhamma or non-dhamma. If wholesome, it draws in wholesome energy — merit — to drive the wholesome system, elevating the mind and purifying our elements. If unwholesome, it draws in the energy of demerit to drive the unwholesome system, dragging the elements down. This is the first part of the teaching: how developing right mindfulness leads to right concentration, allowing continuous and easier entry into the inner dimensions, to purify the elements at each finer level.

Part Two: Body, Feeling, Mind, Dhamma — The Three Characteristics and Wisdom-Liberation

The second part teaches us to clearly know body, feeling, mind, and dhamma, so we understand the mechanism behind the three natures that control all beings — the law of the three characteristics (tilakkhaṇa). The three natures — the wholesome, the unwholesome, and the neutral — compete to become the "master of the house" of a being's mind. Whichever nature wins takes possession, superimposing its own body, feeling, mind, and dhamma onto the human's, matching each situation. The body reflects behavior, manners, coarseness or refinement in speech and action. Feeling is how the mind experiences whichever nature has taken possession — comfortable if wholesome, suffering if unwholesome, neutral (but not equanimity) if abyākata; equanimity itself perceives both pleasure and pain but holds the mind balanced. Mind and mental factors are our thoughts and feelings: if the wholesome nature possesses us, thoughts are good, positive, refined, bringing physical and mental ease; if the unwholesome nature possesses us, thoughts turn toward greed, aversion, and delusion, aiming to drag our elements down. Understanding this mechanism, we realize that no thought truly belongs to us — and that we cannot be angry at anyone, since each nature is simply performing its role. All we can do is correctly abide within the wholesome system. Understanding the law of the three characteristics through body, feeling, mind, and dhamma gives rise to wisdom-liberation.

Part Three: The Law of Karma, and the Spheres of Merit and Demerit

Our life operates under two laws: the law of the three characteristics, which governs how we create causes, and the law of karma, which governs how results are delivered. The control center sits within the sphere of dhamma, containing spheres of merit and demerit. Whichever sphere is larger dominates the other, releasing a current that draws in the elements needed to deliver its result in each present moment. If the merit sphere is larger, it attracts good people, kind words, good opportunities, good moods — the result being joy and satisfaction. If the demerit sphere is larger, it attracts bad people and bad circumstances — the result being sorrow and dissatisfaction. Certain kinds of joy that the unwholesome uses to provoke greed are called craving-attachment (abhijjhā); the suffering it uses to provoke anger and resentment is called grief (domanassa). Both greed and anger draw demerit in, creating new karmic results and binding us to endless rebirth in unfortunate states.

Where to Rest the Mind: The Seventh Base at the Body's Center

Our teachers guide us to rest awareness at the seventh base at the center of the body — a vitally important point, the gateway toward the middle path within, leading to nibbāna. Every life must aim toward the path to nibbāna, but reaching it requires guidance from those who have already gone there and returned. The gate stands at this point; resting the mind there and refining it allows us to enter the dimension at this very spot. The sphere of mindfulness that arises there draws merit in to purify this point, freeing it from what clings and binds it to the unwholesome. We are then released from this coarser dimension into a finer one, continuing on, for as long as we have not yet attained arahantship.

Entering Refinement: The Center of the Center

The finer dimension within means not going left, right, forward, back, up, or down — but going into the center of the center. Within the center of the body is a small, clear point; settle still into the center of that point, and it expands — a thousand-fold, ten-thousand-fold, a hundred-thousand-fold, a million-fold — becoming a sphere, becoming a body. Then settle still into its center again, and repeat. This is liberation through mind-liberation. Liberation through wisdom-liberation, meanwhile, requires knowledge and understanding — the Dhamma Eye — which itself depends on mind-liberation. Light, vision, knowledge, and wisdom all depend on mind-liberation. Wisdom-liberation has several levels: wisdom born of learning, wisdom born of reflection, and wisdom born of meditation — each supporting the others toward liberation.

The Practice Compared to Seeing a Doctor

Practicing dhamma means bringing body and mind to be corrected by the wholesome, like going to see a doctor. The doctor has us simply sit comfortably and relax; then the doctor examines, diagnoses, and treats us — whether by injection or surgery. Practice is much the same: we simply stay aware without forgetting, and the wholesome dhamma will correct and refine our elements to purity. The principle of the wholesome is that it must be easy, light, and simple to understand — the opposite of the unwholesome, which keeps us from understanding, or leads us to misunderstand, so as to make things difficult. Understanding this principle, we can check whether we are practicing correctly, and whose system we are currently in.

The Goal: A Full 100% Proportion of Wholesomeness

As the stream of merit flows continuously, we come to abide within the Triple Gem; the Triple Gem appears bright within us, and we appear radiant within nibbāna. The stream of merit from the deepest, most refined part of nibbāna continually pours into the center of our body and mind, purifying our elements. The proportion of wholesomeness increases while the unwholesome and the neutral decrease. Once the proportion of wholesomeness reaches a full 100%, we attain arahantship. This is the essential goal of practice: to bring about purity and liberation through both mind-liberation and wisdom-liberation.

Extending Loving-Kindness Across the Universe

Having created good causes for ourselves, we then create good causes for others and all beings, by developing loving-kindness (mettā) — love filled with genuine, pure goodwill, like a mother's love for her young child. Loving-kindness takes the form of a bright, clear sphere; once determined, it arises and can dispel resentment and irritation from the atmosphere until it vanishes. We extend this heart filled with loving-kindness to cover our home, our village, district, province, country, and eventually the whole world, making it a crystal world — radiant, cool, clean, and pure. May the beings of the world — earthbound devas, sky devas, celestial beings of every heavenly realm, form-realm brahmas, and even beings in hell, the asura realm, and the animal realm — be free from suffering and find happiness. We then extend this further, across the universe, the ten thousand world-systems, the countless infinite universes.

Dedicating Merit and the Closing Aspiration

Having radiated loving-kindness, we dedicate this merit to all people and beings, including our ancestors, parents, siblings, grandparents, benefactor-teachers, the devas who help and support us, and all our karmic counterparts — may we forgive one another and all receive a share of this merit equally. We then settle the mind still within the center of the Triple Gem and the great teacher-preceptors, merging ourselves as one with them, and make the aspiration, sealing our resolve within the bright sphere of merit. May all this merit gather together into sacred, powerful merit, dispelling misfortune, demerit, and karmic obstacles, granting us the Eye of Dhamma, penetrating thoroughly into Vijjā Dhammakāya — attaining the three knowledges, the eight higher knowledges, the six supernormal powers, the four discriminations, the eight liberations, and the fifteen conducts in full — together with good health, long life, and the strength to build perfections throughout life until reaching the end of the Dhamma.