Hey this is Ish and today I'll be talking to you about signs of progress on the spiritual path.
Now obviously there can be many things I can talk about but today I'll be going over two specific things and that is simplicity and emptiness.
So if you notice these qualities in yourself increasing then it's a good pointer that you're heading in the right direction.
So let's first take a step back and go over someone who doesn't have a very strong meditation practice.
So typically in those that don't have a strong meditation practice and they're immersed in the world you'll notice that their attention goes outside and their mind is constantly preoccupied by different things.
So you can say that their personhood is full of stuff or content.
Now this could be different views on different things,
Opinions on latest fashion,
Politics,
News,
Consuming a lot of media,
They may have a strong view of who they are,
Where they want to be in many years.
So their logical mind is always activated and engaged all the time and I think this is even more so true in today's world where we just have a lot of information coming our way through social media,
News outlets and all these different sources of input.
And you'll notice that for these non-meditators their presence hasn't fully developed yet so as a result they may be fully distracted by a lot of things.
So there is an overall sense of having too much thoughts going on in their minds,
Planning too much,
Thinking too much,
Basically using their minds a lot.
Now when we look into the spiritual traditions what they talk about is actually the opposite quality where we want to learn to simply be more and not project into the future and ruminate over the past but simply be in the present moment because that's all we have.
And Taoism talks about this where there is a return of coming back to simplicity.
In the Tao Te Ching which is the classical Taoist text,
Sage Lao Tzu says in the first two lines of verse 19,
Abandon wisdom,
Discard knowledge and people will benefit a hundredfold.
So what he's pointing to here is that even back then thousands of years ago during his time he noticed that when people have a lot of information in their minds and are constantly using their mind like I mentioned,
People tend to get very confused.
They're always striving to get ahead,
There's always more to learn,
Even if you learn a lot there's always the next step and their mind seems to just be going on a loop.
But when we learn to let go of these concepts,
To rest in emptiness,
To live a simpler life,
We find that our life becomes a lot more simple,
It becomes more clear and we become very peaceful.
And all the spiritual traditions have different angles where they try to tell you the same thing but just through different modes of expression.
So in Zen for example,
Which also has Taoist influences and Zen Buddhism,
There are many koans or riddles told throughout time where you have an eager Zen student talking to his Zen master and he's trying to get an answer or try to figure something out logically and the Zen master says something ridiculous or something that doesn't really make any sense or you know does something crazy and this isn't just to shock the student but to remind the student,
Hey get back to the present moment,
Don't try to use your mind so much.
And in fact this spontaneous expression expressed by the Zen master really points to the fact that being spontaneous and in the moment,
Although it seems illogical to people and doesn't make any sense,
It's actually an expression of the present moment because when you're spontaneous you're simply just responding to what the moment accounts for even if it doesn't make logical sense.
So this is why a lot of Zen masters are seen as very crazy or eccentric,
This is just because they're expressing themselves naturally in whatever the moment calls for and this is to snap the students out of their logical mind and get them back into the present moment.
And a lot of Satori or enlightenment experiences actually have happened from these very spontaneous and strong reactions from the Zen master.
Now when we look into the practice aspect of things,
The commonality of all those spiritual traditions are this idea of simplifying your lifestyle and also renouncing from the world and your engagement with the world as well and at the same time replacing it with the exploration from within.
And you can see this in both yoga for example where you have these qualities of abhyasa which is your practice and vairagya which is detachment.
So again you are detaching your attachment in the world through various things and also at the same time developing your meditation practice.
So having the combination of both.
In Buddhism you have renunciation which is talked about a lot and how over time as you practice you let go more and more of various attachments of material possessions and you become happier with a lot less.
So you can actually learn practically as you continue to practice that you can be happier with less and less in the world as your meditation practice grows and you also appreciate certain qualities that are revered in spiritual traditions such as gratitude or contentment.
And if we even go a step further to look at these what we call spiritual qualities such as gratitude or contentment or peace or joy,
The commonality between all these qualities is that you are happy with what you have now.
There isn't any inclination of getting somewhere in the future but you are grateful and appreciative of what is already present in your life.
So you don't need more.
You can actually do well with a lot less.
And from a meditative standpoint as you continue to practice you also let go of certain mental defilements or irritations or what the Buddhists would call hindrances.
And these hindrances are mental qualities that not only hamper your meditation progress but also your happiness in life.
And when you learn to let go of these hindrances you'll actually notice a lot of peace and happiness.
And from a practical standpoint when you are trying to as a meditator get into meditation absorption states known as the jhanas for example,
The prerequisite to get into these very blissful and otherworldly states of being is to let go of these hindrances of desire,
Of aversion,
Of sloth and torpor,
Of restlessness and doubt.
And you notice when you get rid of these hindrances the mind becomes very bright,
Very clear and you also rely less on pleasure from the senses and you learn to cultivate something from within.
But we'll talk about that in a different talk.
Now let's look at the letting go aspect of things.
So as you can probably tell by now there is a letting go process as you begin to turn towards simplicity,
As you let go of excess in your life both materially and also from within,
As you let go of certain mental states that don't serve you and you live a more simpler life.
There is a process in which you start to let go more.
And this is something that the spiritual traditions point at is letting go is very important.
Ajahn Chah,
A very famous Buddhist monk,
Once said,
If you let go a little you will find a little peace,
If you let go a lot you will find a lot of peace,
If you let go completely you will find complete peace.
So I really like this quote because it points at the peace that you feel as you let go more and you renounce things both in the world and also these qualities like I mentioned.
So when you let go there's a peace because you've let go of grasping and the grasping mind is actually what causes suffering according to Buddhism.
This attachment or grasping at things you'll find that the mind is not very happy but when you let go of this you'll actually feel very relieved and the more and more you let go and you're happy with less and you become a bit more empty in a positive way,
You'll become very peaceful,
More equanimous,
You become centered within and you become happy with a lot less.
Now I think this is a very good reminder to come back to this concept of letting go or peace when you're kind of stuck in your path because yes when you are starting your meditation practice you will have this beginner's mind what they call in Zen where you're very open you don't have many concepts already built in so you're just open and receptive and you actually do very well as a beginner but there's some some way along the path as you begin to read more you get to study different things you analyze different concepts and you have all these things circling around in your mind you lose this natural simplicity and this quality of letting go you instead start to favor complexity and you kind of go back to you know the way of the world or the way of people nowadays where we're very distracted and are using our logical mind a lot like I mentioned at the beginning of this talk and you're overly planning ahead so you're not in the present moment so again from that point you come back full circle of coming back to simplicity and remember that the path ultimately leads you to more simplicity you want to come back to that and let go more and more to find peace.
Hope you found this helpful,
Thank you.
