Being in the Stream Basil 1 06 14 24

Video

Transcript

Dhammarato: All right. So, Basil, it’s good to meet you.

Basil: Yes, it’s a pleasure to meet you, too.

Dhammarato: All right. And that what we are discussing today is going to be what the Buddha taught and how to do it. Now, the first thing that we can start with is, is that the Buddha says he only teaches one thing, both formerly and now. I teach only one thing, he says, and that is dukkha, dukkha nirodha. Now, most people misunderstand that in the sense that they say, oh, we’re supposed to study the dukkha. We’re supposed to see that this dukkha leads to that dukkha, and that there’s a string of pearls of dukkha, and one thing after another after another, and pretty soon, I’m in real unhappy state. And that. And that is how many people practice the teaching of the Buddha, where, in fact, what he actually says is, dukkha, dukkha nirodha, which means, all we need to know is, is this situation, is this thought, is this attitude, is this feeling dukkha, is it dissatisfying? And if it is, make a change into it being satisfied. So this statement of the Four Noble Truths is actually all packaged up into one statement, Duka, duka naroda. And that statement unpacks into the Four Noble Truths. So the first thing is, the first noble truth is dukkha exists. Now, dukkha actually does exist. It exists in the minds of people. It’s not a situation. So if somebody yells at you, you have a choice. You can either feel bad or not feel bad. Most people choose to feel bad, but it’s their choice to feel dissatisfied when they’re being yelled at. They don’t like being yelled at.

Basil: Yep, that makes sense.

Dhammarato: But the one who is yelling is not creating the dissatisfaction. He’s already got his own dissatisfaction. That’s why he’s yelling. And he’s trying to give you his dissatisfaction. But he can’t do that. That only you can give yourself dissatisfaction. And you do it because you’re in the habit of being dissatisfied when you’re yelled at. We learned that behavior when we’re children. The children don’t like being yelled at. That’s why the parents yell at them, is because they’re supposed to teach the child, you do it my way, or I’m going to yell at you. All right, so being yelled at and not liking it is learned behavior. So what we. You’ve got an echo, actually, quite loud. You just started it. Okay, so now I don’t hear it now. It’s back to normal. So this point about Duca is, is that if we can recognize dukkha as dukkha, we don’t have to have a PhD in Dukkha. All we need to do is to see it. And if we can see it, we can stop it. And so the skill that needs to be developed is the ability to recognize dukkha. Now, there is a cause for dukkha, and that cause is related to liking and not liking as feelings. But more importantly, it’s ignorant or stupid or deceitful or delusional liking and not liking. So if we don’t like something, we think that it the cause of the not liking is outside, like for instance, getting yelled at. And we don’t like it. And so the delusion is he yelled at me, he calls me dissatisfaction, but the reality is he yelled at me. And that’s all that happened. Everything else I manufactured, I created my own dissatisfaction. All right, so if we can understand that, then we can begin to see the dukkha as self created, which means now we have a choice to change that dissatisfaction into being satisfied, which would be the third Noble Truth is to just be relaxed and satisfied. There is nothing magical or high pollutant about the teaching of the Buddha. And yet because of Western civilization, being so Christian oriented, are so religious oriented. Not the fact that each person goes to church, but is built into the culture, a lot of magical thinking. And so people learn the culture and they learn from that culture that the dissatisfactions come from the outside. And that’s delusional. The reality is that all dissatisfactions are created in the mind of the one who is dissatisfied. And when we can see that, we can make a change from being dissatisfied into being satisfied. Simple as that. Okay, and so then the fourth Noble Truth is the method by which we’re going to do that. Now, it’s a bad translation. There’s many, many words in Buddhism that are badly translated. You use the word suffering already. Suffering is not a good translation of the word Dukkha. Dissatisfaction is a much better word.

Basil: Or discomfort, discomfort.

Dhammarato: Discomfort, unsure, fear. Any kind of feeling that is a negative feeling almost always comes out of fear. And that when you are satisfied, that means that you’re not afraid, you’re comfortable. And so this is the practice. So the eight Full Noble Path then has fairly interesting steps. And that is number one thing to do is to remember to look at what you’re doing. Remember to look for the dukkha, remember to see the dissatisfaction, because if you can see it, you can do something about it. The Pali word for this is called sati. And that word sati actually is generally translated as mindfulness. But that’s not a very good translation. A much better translation is to remember and to remember to look at what’s going on, remember to come to the present moment. But in fact, most of the dissatisfactions we have is the things that we already dissatisfied with or something that we want in the future, rather than just being satisfied with what we’re doing right now. So if we can remember to look at our dissatisfaction, we can make a change. These are three steps on the Eightfold Noble path is to remember to look and then to change, to remember, to look and to make a change. All right, so that’s the whole thing is to remember, to look and to make a change. So we apply that to the four foundations of mindfulness, or we, what is called the satipatthana. The things that we’re going to remember to look at, we’re going to look at the body, we’re going to look at the feelings, we’re going to look at the mental attitude, and we’re going to look at the mind’s objects or the mind states or the thoughts that we have. And so this is a good place to start, is by looking at the thoughts that we’re having right now and to make an improvement to change them. Another way of saying it is, is that we can change our attitude by changing our thoughts. We can actually gladden the mind or brighten the mind or change the mental attitude of the mind with words, thoughts, wholesome thoughts. And in fact, the reason why we are not in a bright mind, that we’re not in a good state is because of the thoughts that we have over a long period of time that bring us to an attitude. And that attitude that almost all humanity has is the attitude of a victim. What is the attitude of the victim? Something out there is making me feel bad.

Basil: But something within could also make you feel bad. Like internal blaming yourself for your loud.

Dhammarato: Your mic is not very loud. Can you plug it in better or something? Get it closer.

Basil: Can you hear me better now?

Dhammarato: Yes, now I can hear you.

Basil: So what I was saying. So victims could also have internal blames as well, where the internal blames are like feelings of shame when they blame themselves. So.

Dhammarato: Right. But almost always those feelings of shame are about something that happened on the outside.

Basil: Yeah. In the external world. So those are external blames is how I understand them.

Dhammarato: Yes. And we all were born as victims. A tiny young infant. Take care. Cannot Take care of itself. Can’t walk, can’t talk, can’t feed itself. And so we start off as a victim who needs to be taken care of. As we grow up into childhood, into latency, when we start school, we are still victims because we’re told to go to school. No child wants to go to school. They may be excited about the first day, but the second day and the third day, it gets ornery and they don’t want to do it.

Basil: Yes.

Dhammarato: Forced to do it. All right, so that means that we become victims of school. Mom says, clean up your room, pick up your toys, do what you’re told to do. Hold my hand. And children are generally ordered around, which makes them then getting firmer and firmer into that establishment of being a victim. And so then people grow up, they go to school, they go to graduate school. They continue the victim’s mentality, oh, I’m not good enough. But I’ve had a. But I have a bachelor’s degree. I’ll be better off. Oh, I’ll have a PhD. I’ll be better off. But there’s still victims. And so they’re out looking for a job, they’re looking for a wife, they’re looking for a house, they’re looking for a car, they’re looking for a career because they’re all still victims.

Basil: Yeah, it’s. It’s like those. It’s like whatever the victim’s narrative story is, those are the negative emotions that arises from those. Whatever the narrative story is, that the victim is experiencing the form of discomfort.

Dhammarato: Yes, that’s right. And so one of the things then that we’re going to start to practice is we’re going to start practicing being okay. We’re going to practice not being a victim anymore. We’re going to practice having thoughts that lead us into a state of joy, happiness, and satisfaction that in fact, a victim is automatically not satisfying. We want help. We want somebody to fix it for us. We want mommy to fix dinner. Right. And so we remain victims our whole lives. We need accountants, we need doctors, we need preachers, we need a government. We need all kinds of things because we have the mental attitude of being a victim. And when we change that attitude from being a victim into being a winner, then we. Very little is needed. That we’re already okay. That often people are victims, say to bicycles and motorcycles and cars and transportation items and whatnot like that, because they think that they are better off if they had it. And if they don’t have it, they want it, thinking that they’ll be better off if they do have it to. In fact, the reality is that they’re already okay. That’s the reality. The reality is that we’re just fine. You’re still alive, you’re still breathing. That’s all we need.

Basil: I think that’s how I see it too.

Dhammarato: So all of the dukkha, all of the suffering then, comes from our being dissatisfied because we want something, because we don’t like being the victim. And we think that anything that happens on the outside then is either going to contribute to us being more of a victim, or it’s going to lessen our victimhood. But the victimhood is still an attitude. And so what we can do is we can start brightening our attitude, telling ourselves everything is okay, everything is fine, you made it this far. So far so good, Everything is all right. That in fact, I may not be sure about all of that stuff that I want to know. I’m still having doubts about it. But the doubts are coming from the victims. Men talented, thinking that he would be better off if he knew all about it. And the reality is, is that, no, you can feel good and don’t have to know anything about it. All you need to know is I can change my mentality from being a victim into being satisfied with what I have. What knowledge I’ve got is all right. It’s already good enough.

Basil: Yeah.

Dhammarato: That’s what makes the teaching of the Buddha so profound is because it turns everything upside down. All of the whole world is out there wanting to get this and wanting to get that and wanting to fix this and wanting things to be better. And the reality is that everything is already okay. And all we have to do is practice that, because we have been practicing being judgmental. We have practiced finding what’s wrong with things our whole lives. We were taught to do that by the culture. So in fact, what we are is victims of the culture. And the way that we can get away from that victimhood is start to get away from the culture. The Buddha was actually quite big on seclusion, to get away from all of the stimulus that all these people in all this culture has to offer, only to find out that when we went into seclusion, we brought that culture with us. And so now there’s a second kind of seclusion that we have to go through, and that is to begin to seclude our mind from all the cultural baggage that we brought with us because we’re dissatisfied. The reason why people want to know about Buddhism is because they’re dissatisfied. Anybody who is already completely satisfied. He doesn’t want to know anything. He’s already. Okay.

Basil: Okay. Yeah, yeah. And so there’s nothing more you need to know.

Dhammarato: There’s nothing you need to know. Just be happy. Just sit down and stop being a victim to all of that stuff that you don’t know. Because knowing it is not going to change that victimhood, is it? The victimhood is actually a habit. And we’ll move that victimhood from one topic to the next to the next.

Basil: Yeah, yeah, Makes sense. It never ends. It’s just a continuum of wanting and not wanting.

Dhammarato: Well, it never ends by getting what we want, but it does end when we just simply stop it.

Basil: And just being the present and accepting in the present and moment.

Dhammarato: And accept the present moment as the way that things are. So we’ve talked about three items of the teaching of the Buddha, and that is to remember to look at what’s going on right now and to make a change. One of the ways that we can make that change is by being happy that we saw our misery. Now, that’s not generally what we do. We are unhappy when we see our misery. An example of that would be, oh, I haven’t practiced meditation in so long is the victim’s mentality. But yeah, winner’s mentality is right now. I can do it.

Basil: There could actually be many examples. It just depends how you want to narrate it. Narrating.

Dhammarato: Yeah, exactly.

Basil: Yeah.

Dhammarato: So. So the number of ways for us to be dissatisfied. The number of ways for us to be victims is endless.

Basil: Mm. You can blame and judge various things. Yeah, right.

Dhammarato: You can blame the religion, you can blame what the religion believes. You can blame the religious people. You can blame the people who are religious.

Basil: Yes.

Dhammarato: Yeah. But the reality is, is that we can change our attitude and stop blaming because there’s nothing wrong. We can stop blaming ourselves. In fact, that we can actually learn to become satisfied and happy. That we can see our dissatisfaction and unhappiness. Because how else are we going to change our dissatisfaction and unhappiness unless we see it? But most people are in a state of denial. They’re not supposed to be brokenhearted. They’re not supposed to be angry. They’re not supposed to be involved with wrongdoing. So what do we do? We lie to ourselves. When we lie to other people, we deny. People who are angry will almost always deny. I’m not angry. When in fact, everybody in the room can see they’re angry, except they themselves.

Basil: They don’t have a self awareness of their own Thoughts and feelings.

Dhammarato: They’re in the state of denial because they have a rule they’re not supposed to be angry. But we can start to develop that into, yes, I’m glad that I can see that anger because I can come out of it if I can see it, but if I can’t see it and I deny it, then that means I’m going to be stuck in it.

Basil: Yeah. As long as an individual can change their, their attitude, which they have control over. Because an individual is the only one who can change their own perception. Yeah. And attitudes in their own mind, they’re.

Dhammarato: The only one that can do that. So we need to practice doing that so that we can develop the skills to do that. And so this is why we want to take time throughout the day rather than being stuck in the things that hinder us from being in a positive happy state. We spend most of our time just rehearsing the old habits, nursing and rehearsing the old habits, and we wind up having quite a destiny of being unhappy. But if we start to practice on a regular basis, often to start changing that mind state from being unhappy to being happy, we can brighten the mind. There’s a lot of things that we can say like, everything is okay, not a worry in the world, I’ve got it made, got no problems, no worries. The job that needed to be done has just been done. And what job was that? To stop having things to do. Having no job to do is the job that we’re looking to do. When you’re at work, what is your goal is to do a job and get it finished. The only job that we really need to do is to stop having jobs to do. And if we have no jobs to do, then we are finished with doing jobs. So we need to practice being that in that state of right now, I’ve got nothing to do right now. All the jobs that needed to be done have been done right now. Now my mind will in fact go back into the hindrances, back into the dukkha, back into wanting to do stuff later. But right now I can be in a state of I’m okay.

Basil: Yes.

Dhammarato: And so this is what we need to practice. And if we keep practicing this over and over again, we’ll begin to spend more and more being satisfied with the way things are.

Basil: But could one be satisfied even when they are actually doing something? Like, you know, when you’re saying absolutely you’re doing something, that’s.

Dhammarato: That’s part of the goal, right. Is to get yourself satisfied and then do anything you want to do, but remain satisfied while you’re doing it. Have fun doing what you’re doing, make it a game, stop looking for getting stuff done, stop having goals, and just do what you like to do.

Basil: Makes sense.

Dhammarato: Even if it’s writing code or changing a flat tire or cooking a meal or giving a speech. You don’t have to be in a state of need in order to do that. Any of those things, you can be happy while you’re doing them.

Basil: Yes. As long as you don’t have those, you know, negative thoughts that arises. Fine.

Dhammarato: So this is how we practice these three things of keep looking at our dissatisfactions, keep looking for them, keep remembering to look. And when we see them, we have a choice to change. Like, I’ve got so much to do. Wait a minute, right now, I don’t have to do any of those things Right now. I can just sit and be happy. And so we want to take time out of our day probably five or six times. You’ve heard, many times, I think, that people say, oh, you should practice meditation for an hour. And so they sit down. You get bored spending an hour. What is better for them is to take it in short little burst, like six or seven times a day, spend five or 10 minutes just being happy, just being satisfied, just taking all of those random thoughts and chucking them out one after another, and come and substitute them with everything’s okay. Wow, I’m all right. Yeah, I can change my attitude. Yeah, I’m not a victim. I’m a winner. I can do anything I want to do, which is basically nothing at all. Because that’s really what we want to do. We want to do nothing. And so we go around doing all of this stuff to get it done so that we can rest and relax. Why not we just rest and relax right now and do the doing later.

Basil: Yeah, it makes sense.

Dhammarato: Yeah, just start to relax. So spend about five or 10 minutes at a time. A good time to do it would be when you wake up in the morning instead of waking up with, oh, I’ve got to go do this, and oh, I’ve got to do that, and oh, I don’t feel like getting up and all of that. We can actually practice right then and there to see those unwholesome thoughts and say, wow, right now I don’t have to get up. Wow, right now I can just lay here and feel good. Right now I don’t have to plan the day. The day is going to be marvelous all by itself without me planning anything. And I can Take five minutes and just relax. Whoa. I’m so glad I don’t have anything to do. I can just relax and be okay right now. And after we get ourselves into a really, really good state, then getting up is easy. And then when we go to sleep at night, getting into bed, a lot of people say, oh, I’ve got to get to sleep. Oh, I’ve got so much stuff to do tomorrow. And a better way of doing it is just to lay there for five minutes saying, oh, I’m so glad I’m in bed. I got no place to go and nothing to do. Even if I don’t go to sleep. That means that I’ve got eight hours here to just do nothing but relax and feel good. Wow, what a relief it is. I can just relax. And that’s a good way to go to sleep, is just to relax. Wow. I got no place to go and nothing to do. Everything is feeling good. And in the morning I’ll wake up and I’ll have that relaxed oar. Everything is all right, not a problem in the world. And then we’re at our desk in the middle of the morning. We can stop whatever we’re doing and just close our eyes for a moment and take a deep breath and say, wow, everything is all right. Everything is fine. Not a problem in the world. And we keep doing that over and over again throughout the day. We’ll begin to change our attitude about life itself.

Basil: And you’ll be able to sort of be able to be in that, like, meditative state all the time where, like, if you’re doing any type of activity, even if it’s like, let’s say, a stressful activity, like if you didn’t want it to go to work, you not have that attitude anymore because you’re bit. You’ll be able to notice it and you’ll be able to. To be able to work while still being in pleasure, I guess, is the way to put it.

Dhammarato: Yeah, you’re getting the attitude. Yeah, you’re learning. That’s. That’s exactly right. So this is what I would recommend, that you go off and practice this practice over and over and over again. Everything is okay. No worries, no dangers, no problems, no job to do. Just relax for a few minutes. Wow, what a relief it is. Got nothing to do right now.

Basil: I do have a question. Now that I understand how to go and approach this. I’ve never actually meditated before, like actual sitting or, you know, maybe just doing walking meditation. I’ve heard too, like, these type of things. I’ve never actually done the traditional meditation.

Dhammarato: Well, this is not traditional meditation. This is actually ultimately the traditional meditation. But for a thousand years people have been practicing wrongly. They’ve been practicing meditation to get something. And right now we’re going to learn to practice that. I’ve already got everything I need. I don’t need anything. There’s nothing to get and no place to go to.

Basil: Yeah. If I keep that mindset in mind. Yeah. I really don’t even need to meditate then.

Dhammarato: Yeah, you don’t need to meditate. Just be happy.

Basil: There’s no experiences of discomfort or anything. It’s just states of happiness.

Dhammarato: This is why we call it practice rather than meditation. I’m not a fan of the word meditation. I do not claim to be a meditation teacher.

Basil: Makes sense then.

Dhammarato: In fact, what I would claim to be if I needed to, would to be a friend. I’ll be your friend. I’ll help you. Have fun. To be happy. To answer our questions by throwing the questions out. We don’t need the answer to questions. We just need to sit and enjoy life.

Basil: Yeah. Then. Well, maybe you’re gonna say maybe just don’t think about these things. But they are part of within Buddhism’s like the idea of stream entry, sotapanna and all these enlightenment stages. I’m just curious, like if I know, if I, if I now understand most of these concepts and.

Dhammarato: All right, so let’s talk about it like this. What is a stream integral? Well, we’re actually talking about practicing getting into the stream. That’s what you’re actually practicing is to getting into the flow, getting into reality as reality flows, as opposed to working on the bank as a victim. The stream entry is actually quite easy. Now there’s, there’s different kinds of stream entry. Putting our toe in. And that’s where you’re going right now. You’re beginning to put your toe in. Just getting started.

Basil: Okay.

Dhammarato: Right. And then there is jumping right in, there’s waiting out into it, there is swimming across the stream and then there’s just floating on your back in the middle of the stream, having a lazy easy day. So when they say stream entry, there’s a lot of different stream entries and a lot of different ways of doing it. But most of the way that we really want to look at it is that if you are in the flow, if you’re in the stream, if you can see all of those unwholesome thoughts and throw them out and just be here. Now that’s being in the stream is being in the here now and just enjoying the paradise that you’re in. So if you’re in paradise, you’re in the flow, you’re in the stream.

Basil: And then how do you get to the next stage?

Dhammarato: Don’t worry about the next stage. You can’t.

Summary of this Dhamma Talk

In this introductory Dhamma talk, Dhammarato explains the Buddha’s core teaching of dukkha (dissatisfaction) and its cessation (dukkha naroda). He emphasizes that the Buddha only teaches one thing - how to recognize dissatisfaction and transform it into satisfaction. He explains how people develop a “victim mentality” from childhood and carry it through life, creating their own dissatisfaction through their reactions and thoughts. The solution is to practice being satisfied in the present moment, taking short breaks throughout the day to cultivate happiness rather than long meditation sessions. He emphasizes that traditional meditation isn’t necessary - what’s needed is the practice of being happy and satisfied right now.

Outline of this Dhamma Talk

The Buddha’s Core Teaching

• Buddha teaches only one thing: dukkha, dukkha-nirodha
• Common misunderstanding vs actual meaning
• Recognizing dissatisfaction and making changes
• Four Noble Truths packed into one teaching

Understanding Dukkha

• Exists in the mind, not in situations
• Example of being yelled at - choice in response
• Learned behavior from childhood
• Self-created nature of dissatisfaction

The Victim Mentality

• Origins in childhood helplessness
• Development through school years
• Continuation into adult life
• Cultural reinforcement of victimhood
• Examples of seeking external solutions (degrees, jobs, possessions)

Practice of Transformation

• Changing from victim to winner mindset
• Practicing being satisfied
• Importance of seeing dissatisfaction when it arises
• Short practice sessions (5-10 minutes) throughout day
• Key times for practice:
  • Upon waking
  • Before sleep
  • During work breaks

Stream Entry Discussion

• Different levels of stream entry
• Starting with “putting toe in”
• Being in the flow of reality
• Focus on present moment happiness

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