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The radical truth of impermanence.

Joseph Goldstein · Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge · April 2017 at IMS - Forest Refuge · 10 April 2017 · 54 min

0:02 The Buddha opens the Satipaṭṭhāna discourse, that is the four foundations of mindfulness, with a very bold and unambiguous statement. He says, this is the direct path for the purification of beings, for the surmounting of sorrow and grief, for the attainment of the true way, for the realization of Nibbāna. The highest peace. Namely, the four foundations of mindfulness. Suggest a fix

0:43 Pretty straightforward. This is the direct path. But an obvious question which follows is, how does this path of mindfulness, feeling our breath, feeling the body, feeling different sensations or thoughts and emotions, how in fact does it lead to liberation? The process by which it leads to the highest peace, to the highest freedom. I think this question has particular relevance these days when secular mindfulness is so widespread. Mindfulness is amazingly popular these days and to good effect. But in the more secular context, it's not really held With the aspiration necessarily of liberation, of freedom. So as we're practicing here following the Buddha's instructions, it's helpful to keep in mind what the purpose of doing the practice is. Suggest a fix

2:01 Now what are we learning from being mindful? Suggest a fix

2:09 We really want to be using the quality of mindfulness to understand how our minds are working and to free the mind From the deeply habituated forces of greed and attachment, you know, of anger and hatred and fear. To free the mind from the sleep of delusion and ignorance. Suggest a fix

2:43 So in order to actualize this potential, I think it's very helpful to remember that we're not practicing mindfulness as an end in itself, although... It has a very good beneficial aspect in and of itself, but it is also leading us someplace, leading us to someplace much deeper and much more profound. Suggest a fix

3:14 The Burmese side, our Uttachanir, he pointed to this when he said, awareness is not enough. It's the vehicle, it's the means, but by itself it's not enough. We need to use this Great power of mindfulness, of awareness, of being aware of what's arising moment to moment without grasping, without greed, to be aware of what's arising without resistance, without aversion, without pushing away. And we do this in order to investigate what is true. Suggest a fix

4:05 So we're using mindfulness as a skillful means for investigation. So it makes investigation possible. So one of the most accessible, one of the simplest, and most profoundly transformative aspects of investigation, avenues of investigation, which is really, investigation is really just another word for the wisdom factor of the mind. That's what it means. Investigational wisdom is what illuminates the mind so that we can see clearly. Suggest a fix

4:49 So one of the simplest and most transformative avenues for investigation, for developing this wisdom factor of mind, is a growing and increasingly refined awareness of impermanence. Suggest a fix

5:10 There's a little story that many of you may have heard of. A student of Suzuki Roshi's, who was a Japanese Zen master. He was the founder of the San Francisco Zen Center back in maybe the 60s. So the student said to Roshi, he said, I've been listening to your lectures for years, but I still don't understand. Could you please put it in a nutshell? Can you reduce Buddhism to one phrase? Okay, so you've been coming to the Forest Refuge. For years, perhaps. Okay, what's the one phrase of Buddhism that will reveal all? Everything changes. That was Roshi's response. Everything changes. The implications of that simple statement are enormous. Suggest a fix

6:13 You know, although we all know that everything changes, so this is not a hidden truth. This is not some Special, mystical, esoteric truth. No, we know. You can go up to anybody on the streets of Barry and ask them, do things change? Everybody will say yes. We all know this. But we need to go from an intellectual understanding of it to the level of a direct, ongoing, intimate, lived, Experience of change as it's happening. That's what our practice is about. Suggest a fix

7:05 Can we bring the awareness right into this flow of changes so that we know it from the inside? Suggest a fix

7:19 When we can do this, when we can really deeply and truly see the truth of change, Suggest a fix

7:31 It has great consequences over time from seeing the change, directly perceiving it as it's happening. As we're in this awareness of change, what happens is over time that our hearts and our minds relax. We let go of so many kinds of struggle and suffering. Suggest a fix

8:04 We can see this so clearly. with our aging bodies. Now, even though it seems like some of us are aging more quickly than others, we're actually all aging at the same rate. Some are just a little further along than others. If we're attached to our bodies staying a certain way, when they change, as they always will for everybody, whether they change through accidents, Whether they change through illness, whether they change simply because of aging, if we're attached to them staying a certain way, we suffer. It's so obvious. But it's quite different and often very difficult to see that these natural changes are not a mistake. Suggest a fix

9:19 We understand that they're not a mistake for other people. Suggest a fix

9:26 It's just so interesting to see our own relationship to our own changing, aging bodies and to see the changes that take place. Because even though we know on so many levels this is just how it is, deep inside this someplace, did I do something wrong? If I were really on top of things, it wouldn't quite be happening like this. Suggest a fix

10:02 So we have to be investigating and seeing and reflecting over and over again because this habit pattern of attachment to wanting things to stay the same, it just goes very deep. It's almost on an unconscious level. Suggest a fix

10:29 Obviously, we haven't done anything wrong. This is just the nature of things. This is the nature of life. This is the nature of the dharma. This process of change, of growth, decay, and death. This is just the normal cycle of what happens. It is the nature of things. It happens to everyone. It happens to everything. Suggest a fix

10:57 So if we can use mindfulness of what's arising in the service of Clearly seeing the impermanence. That's the point of being mindful. So that we can see, yes, whatever is arising, it's changing. And it's always changing. The more we see it, the more repeatedly we see it, about everything, gradually it deconditions that habit pattern of clinging, of attachment, of grasping. Because we're seeing The process of change so clearly and so deeply. Suggest a fix

11:50 What's particularly worth noting, and again I think I mentioned this perhaps last week, Suggest a fix

12:01 for some strange reason we're not only attached to holding on to the pleasant. We also have habit patterns of holding on to what's unpleasant. In some way we hold on to our suffering. How often do we justify to ourselves Feelings of anger or hatred or jealousy or envy or pride. We justify them to ourselves. Think, well, I should be feeling this because of whatever circumstances. Forgetting that we're the ones who are suffering in them. These mind states, they're like a burning in the mind. Why should we hold on to that suffering? The more we see, the more... Repeatedly, we see the impermanent nature of it all, the impermanent nature of all these emotions. They arise, they're like cloud formations in the sky, the conditions change, the clouds disappear. Suggest a fix

13:22 Mindfulness and investigation of what's arising shows us, with each experience that we're having, that we have a choice. And the Buddha used this quite famous example, I'm sure you're familiar with it, of the two arrows. You know, we may have some unpleasant experience arise. It could be an unpleasant sensation in the body, painful sensation. It could be a painful emotion, a painful external situation. So that's the first arrow. And that's a kind of dukkha. We're experiencing the unpleasantness of it. But the second arrow... Is how we're relating to that unpleasant experience? Do we hate it? Is there fear? Suggest a fix

14:17 Is there resistance? Are we adding suffering to suffering? The second arrow is up to us. No one makes us relate to our experience in a particular way. This is really important because as long as we think that someone else Is making us feel a certain way. And making us be with our experience in a certain way. We are handing over all our power. Suggest a fix

15:00 How we relate to what's arising. Whether it's in the body. In the mind. In the world. How we relate to what's arising. Is totally up to us. So that is tremendously empowering. We have a choice. So just as an example of a choice with regard to how we relate to thoughts. I was talking about that this morning. Thoughts come and go all day long. One choice, which is often made mechanically, unknowingly, is we just get carried away by them. We get lost in them. We create a whole little mind world, mind drama, until we wake up. So another way of relating to them... It was again expressed by Suzuki Roshi. I just came across this. I really liked his little example. He said, leave your front door and your back door open. Suggest a fix

16:06 Allow your thoughts to come and go. Just don't serve them tea. Suggest a fix

16:18 So can we remember that? Okay. Suggest a fix

16:27 You know, it's so amazing about the seductive power of the world. And it does, it seduces us again and again. What's so amazing is that when we look back at our past experience, we can see and feel so clearly the ephemeral passing nature of it all. You know, the experiences we had a year ago, or a month ago, or yesterday, or this morning, or five minutes ago, where are they now? In the midst of them, we get so caught up and so entangled that when we look back at all our past experience, we know, this is not theoretical, we know for ourselves, they're totally gone. Suggest a fix

17:35 But what's so amazing is that when we look ahead, even though we know that when we look back, it all seems so empty and so ephemeral and so insubstantial, but when we look ahead, We are so entranced by all the different possibilities, whether pleasant or unpleasant. We can be looking ahead with desirous anticipation or looking ahead with fear, forgetting that whatever experience that will come will soon be passed, just like all the others, and will dissolve into that arena of empty ephemeral phenomena. So why do we know this looking in one direction and forget it looking in the other direction? Looking back, we know it. Suggest a fix

18:33 Looking ahead, we forget. So this is worth noticing. Suggest a fix

18:42 And to notice how for most of us in our lives, we are continually looking ahead to the next, what I call the next hit of experience. You know, we're looking forward, leaning forward, anticipating. Thinking about it could be the next event in our lives. It could be the next day of work. It could be the next project, the next relationship, the next problem or difficulty that we might be facing. On retreat, same thing happens on retreat as in the world. The mind is, maybe it's looking ahead to the next meal or the next sitting or the next walking or even the next breath. We're just sitting here. Feeling the breath, we're with one breath leaning into the next one. Suggest a fix

19:37 Again, we forget that whatever it is that we're experiencing or want to experience will also soon be passed. There's nothing there really either to want or to hold on to. Now, the great paradox of spiritual life is that as objects of wanting, As objects of desire, all of these changing experiences of life leave us unfulfilled. And it's obvious, they leave us unfulfilled because they don't last. And so they are incapable of creating a lasting fulfillment. But these very same experiences, which as objects of desire leave us unfulfilled, As objects of mindfulness, the very same experience as objects of mindfulness are the vehicle of our awakening. Suggest a fix

20:50 So this is important because it means we're not, in the practice, not pushing things away. It's not that experiences are bad and that we shouldn't be having them. Rather, it's about learning deeply to not hold on, to not cling. Suggest a fix

21:19 Liberating insight into impermanence comes in so many ways and on so many different levels because everything is part of this process of change. You know, we can see it in science from the birth and death of galaxies, of clusters of galaxies, of stars. They also take birth, exist for some time, and pass away. All the way on the smallest scale to the subatomic particles, you know, physics. I want to read something about just how quickly things are changing on the most fundamental level of material existence. Suggest a fix

22:15 It said, capturing the motion of an electron within an atom seems like an impossible task. Not least because the shuffling, changing between orbits or escaping the nucleus takes just attoseconds. And an attosecond is a billionth of a billionth of a second. That's pretty quick. To put this in perspective, an attosecond is to a second what the blink of an eye is to 10 billion years. That's the difference. Unfazed, scientists have lighted on ways to operate on such infinitesimal scales. So, you know, we have this notion that the world is solid and stable and things are changing at Suggest a fix

23:23 the rate of billionth of a billionth of a second. Suggest a fix

23:31 Our quest for ultimate stability is doomed. It's not that we can't find a relative stability, so we all know that. But we really want to understand that on just this very fundamental, most fundamental level of physical world, material world, huge, huge, rapid changes all the time. That's what makes up our world. Suggest a fix

24:03 So obviously our perception, our ordinary perception, is not picking up change at that level of rapidity. Most of us, maybe. Some of you may. But I think we all know from our meditation experience that as the mindfulness and concentration get stronger, we do begin to perceive change on more and more refined levels. And so it's what I call NPMs, which are noticings per minute. And for beginning yogis, You know, the NPMs are quite low. You know, when people are just learning and training, you know, maybe there are, I don't know, 10 noticings per minute. But as we practice, those NPMs go way up. We can really begin to discern in a very refined way the rapidity of change. Suggest a fix

25:10 Even in the ordinary experiences of our meditation, in a breath, in a step. A sound. So many things are going on. So just when you listen to the sound of the bell, how Suggest a fix

25:37 quick are the kind of vibratory elements of that? Sound is not one thing. Very rapid changes, which we can perceive. We simply need to pay attention to it. Suggest a fix

26:01 Or think of times, perhaps, when you went to a movie. And got caught up in the drama of the movie and all the attendant emotions. You know, feeling happy or sad or whatever it is. Suggest a fix

26:17 But is there really anybody up there who's falling in love or getting chased or dying? No. All of that is an illusion created by the rapidity of change. All that's happening are pixels of light on the screen. Changing very quickly, creating an appearance, and we get seduced by the appearance because we're not seeing the change. Suggest a fix

26:49 So our practice and the point of developing mindfulness, the point of developing strong concentration, is to enhance our ability to see the changing impermanent nature of everything that's arising. So we don't get seduced. Suggest a fix

27:18 This is not to suggest that we don't engage with the ordinary aspects of life, because we do. You know, we relate to one another as human beings, not as infinitely rapidly changing aggregates, even though that's what's really happening. No, but we're relating in a conventional, hopefully harmonious way. But if we have also seen on a deeper level what's happening, and we can in our meditation practice, we can really see and feel that this whole mind -body is a rapidly changing energy system. And this doesn't take, you don't have to be a super, super yogi to feel this. It's just, it may take some time to drop into that level of stillness, but this is within the realm of all of our capability and capacity. Suggest a fix

28:27 As we settle and as the concentration gets a little bit stronger and mindfulness a little bit stronger, we do begin to feel this flow of changes. And because of that, even as we engage with the ordinary conventional world, we are less caught by it. Because we see, we have a deeper understanding. We don't so easily fall into suffering and reactivity. Suggest a fix

29:04 We can be developing our awareness of impermanence on so many different levels, and they all feed one another. So in retreat, we can develop it very clearly in our meditation practice, our formal practice, where we're watching things just arise and pass. But we can also develop and refine our awareness of impermanence really in very ordinary ways. It comes from paying attention to impermanence in ways that we already know but often overlook. Suggest a fix

29:50 When seeing impermanence becomes the Suggest a fix

29:57 perspective through which we're looking at our experience, everything around us is revealing it. We see all the changes in nature, you know, just the huge... Issue of climate change. Big. That's on a big scale. On a more daily scale. New England weather. One day it's freezing. Snowstorm. Next day it's 70 degrees. It's always changing. There's no stability. On a society level, when we look in a historical way, we can see impermanence and the rise and fall of whole civilizations. I think I've mentioned in different talks. Some years ago, I read a book. It was a biography of Genghis Khan. I think he lived in the 13th century. Suggest a fix

31:01 He ruled practically all of Asia. A completely powerful, dominant person influencing millions and millions of people. Suggest a fix

31:19 How many of you thought of Genghis Khan today? I'll bet none of you did. Suggest a fix

31:29 So even people with that enormous impact, whole civilizations rise in a powerful and pass away. It's wonderful, now that the weather is nicer, some of you may be walking in these woods. The New England woods are filled with these miles of stone walls and old stone foundations. They didn't just appear. People built those stone walls. And built the stone foundations of those houses. People whose lives were as vivid and compelling as our own. And now what's left? We walk through the woods and there are some stone walls and some old stone foundations. Where are all these people now? Where are all those stories now? You know, what remains? And then we look even closer. Suggest a fix

32:29 Not just externally, we look closer. You know, at the changing experience of all our relationships and our work and our bodies and minds, we see that everything on every level from galaxies to subatomic particles to historical events to the events in our own mind and body, everything on every level is disappearing and new things arising moment after moment. Suggest a fix

33:09 After the talk, a little experiment. When you leave the hole, just in the few minutes that it takes to go from where you're sitting to leaving the hole, see if you can pay attention to the enormous flow of changes that will take place simply in that short distance. The changes of sensations as you go from sitting to standing. The changes of sensation as you begin walking. The sensations of the movement. The different sights that appear and change as you move. The different sounds that are arising. Perhaps the thoughts that are passing through your mind. In this short distance, Suggest a fix

34:05 the NPMs can be quite high if you're paying attention. And it's not that these objects are so subtle. It's just that we generally overlook it. You know, it just becomes so ordinary. Oh, talk is over. Go out and do some walking. And we simply are not paying attention to this experience every single moment. Things are rising and passing, rising and passing, rising and passing. Suggest a fix

34:40 The more deeply we perceive impermanence, the more continuously we perceive impermanence, the less we cling, the less we suffer. Suggest a fix

34:54 So here's the Buddha's description. of the liberated mind. He said, in seeing impermanence, when we see, when we're really in the perceiving of impermanence, the mind doesn't cling. When the mind doesn't cling, it is not agitated. When it's not agitated, it personally attains nibbāna. So that's out of the suttas. So I think it's very helpful to hear those words. And for years, I read them. And I always took it as a description. Oh yeah, when the mind doesn't cling, it's not agitated. When not agitated, tains nibbāna. But it was only recently, in the last couple of years, when I thought of that phrase. Suggest a fix

35:50 And instead of a description, I took it as an instruction. Suggest a fix

35:58 So I began to look for myself. Not just to say, oh yeah, that's how the Buddha described it. But rather... Make the experiment for yourself when your mind is really seeing the flow of change. And it could be in something as simple as just taking a step. You're taking a step and you're feeling the changes. At those times when you are actually perceiving the flow of change, check to see whether your mind is clinging or not. So you're testing the Buddha's words. Is this true for me? And it was very revealing. When the mind is really perceiving the flow of changes, and I look back on my mind, it wasn't clinging because it was perceiving the change. Suggest a fix

37:00 And then I did the next step. Okay, it's not clinging. To look back on the non -clinging mind, the experience of it, and I asked myself, well, when it's not clinging, Is it agitated? Again, not something just to believe. We want to see in our own minds whether this is true. What I found was that when my mind was not grasping, it was not agitated. So we get a taste, right, in those few moments. We really get an experiential taste, experience of what non -clinging, you could say what non -clinging feels like. And then what non -agitation feels like. Because we've seen it. And then in non -agitation, we really can get the sense, it may not be Nibbāna itself, but we can get the sense that it's in the vicinity of Nibbāna. Suggest a fix

38:13 So Buddhadasa, who was a Thai monk from southern Thailand, he was, over the last century, he had a very unique Suggest a fix

38:28 A lot of his teachings are collected in a book called The Heartwood of the Bodhi Tree. Suggest a fix

38:37 And he put things in very simple, direct ways. Really quite a masterful teacher. So he talked about these moments of coolness, you know, of non -agitation, as momentary Nibbāna. And he used the example evidently in ancient India. The term nibbāna was used conventionally to refer to something that had cooled down. And so they used it, for example, you know, if the rice was cooked, and then when the rice had cooled, it was nibbāna'd. And what Buddha Das' point was that we can have many, many, we do have many, many moments of this momentary nibbāna, momentary coolness. Throughout the day, but mostly we're not paying attention. You know, we just miss it because we're not looking, we're not appreciating that non -agitation of mind. Suggest a fix

39:48 In the Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta, when it talks about the hindrances, it says that we should be aware of when the hindrances are there and when they're not there. Mostly we give emphasis to when they're there, you know, whether it's desire or anger or sleepiness, whatever. But it would be very helpful to check into throughout the day because many times the hindrances are not there. You want to recognize that coolness of mind. Oh, the mind is still there. The mind is calm. The mind is not clinging. The mind is not agitated. Don't overlook this. Suggest a fix

40:35 And this becomes very apparent and could be a signal for you to check in when you remember To take times to really be seeing the impermanence, the flow, and you're perceiving that, then all of these states will be revealed, the non -clinging, the non -agitation, the coolness. Suggest a fix

41:04 I cannot overemphasize how important this is. So Lady Sayadaw, who was one of the great Burmese masters, he lived around the late 1800s, early 1900s, and he was a great Meditation master and also a great scholar. He was an amazing, amazing monk. He said, not seeing arising and passing away is ignorance. So not seeing it is ignorance. While seeing all phenomena as impermanent, while seeing it, not just thinking about it, but actually seeing all phenomena as impermanent, Is the doorway to all the stages of insight and awakening. So this is not some little thing. Our refinement and our practice of seeing the changes that are happening all the time, on every level, inside and outside, we don't have to look far to see impermanence. Suggest a fix

42:20 We just have to be paying attention because it's already happening. That is the nature of things. So again, this is the Buddhist teaching from the Dhammapada. Fully knowing the arising and passing of the aggregates, the five aggregates, one attains joy and delight. For those who know, this is the deathless. So the instruction is very clear and very simple. This is not complicated. Suggest a fix

43:06 But very often, particularly in the midst of our busy lives, but it can happen here as well, On retreat, it's very easy to become complacent. You know, we've all established certain habit patterns in our lives and in our meditation. We kind of get into a groove of how we meditate. We just kind of follow along in that groove and we can get complacent, not actually arousing the interest, the investigation to be seeing the impermanence. It takes... It takes an activation of interest, an activation of energy. Suggest a fix

43:57 But there are some reflections and observations of some obvious truths which can help to jolt us out of complacency, that can really help to wake us up. Probably the most obvious and most ignored reflection, this Suggest a fix

44:24 is so obvious. The end of birth is death. The end of birth is death. Our life is just getting shorter and shorter and shorter and shorter. We are all in the queue. We are all in the line. And it's only going in one direction. But how often is this really alive for us? Suggest a fix

44:57 You know, in the great Indian classic, the Mahabharata, there's one of the sages. He makes the comment that one of the most remarkable things in the world is that we see people dying all around us, but we don't think it will happen to us. And again, we know intellectually that it will, but how vital is that understanding in how we live? Do we really have that understanding? Suggest a fix

45:36 How alive is the understanding of death? Suggest a fix

45:42 So this is a powerful reflection. Suggest a fix

45:48 And the Buddha gave some really very short and pithy instructions for how to reflect in this way. And they're ones that I have found really helpful. And again, it's like a jolt of wakefulness. He said to reflect like this, that what is subject to old age will grow old. And I am not exempt. What is subject to illness, will become ill. And I am not exempt. What is subject to death, will die. And I am not exempt. Suggest a fix

46:36 But what's so, even though it's so obvious, what I found in myself, it's so humbling to realize that in some deep part of myself, I think I am exempt. You know, I can be going along and all of a sudden there's a certain pain in my back or my knee or wherever. Oh, why did that happen? Well, you were born. You have a body. This is what's going to happen. But no, I should be exempt. We really need to take in. No, this is the nature of this whole mind -body process. It's the dharma. It's the law. Suggest a fix

47:24 So if we can reflect in this way, Suggest a fix

47:30 And often in my practice, when I'm on retreat and these things happen, I will just use this little tagline, oh, I am not exempt. And it's a very good reminder. It changes my relationship to the experience. So instead of fighting it or resisting it or thinking it shouldn't be happening, oh, this is just the nature of things. Suggest a fix

48:02 Sometimes people may think that all these reflections on change and death and dying and illness are morbid or something we should avoid. Why would anybody want to be thinking about this stuff? But really they are reflections on what is true. We're not imagining this. The Buddha was pointing out this is the dharma. This is the truth of our lives. So if we want to be free, we need to be in alignment with what is true. Suggest a fix

48:49 This is what our practice is all about. You know, I asked in the beginning of the talk, why be mindful? What is it that we learn from being mindful? It's not enough simply to be mindful. It's necessary. That's the tool. That's the view. But what are we learning from being mindful? Suggest a fix

49:16 In this one essential aspect that whatever has the nature to arise is going to pass. And we need to imbibe that very, very deeply. Suggest a fix

49:38 We really need to see that all of our experience is part of an endlessly passing show. It's like the water in a river flowing, or water over a waterfall. It's just phenomena. Of the mind, of the body, internally, externally. It's just this endless flow. Munindraji, my first teacher, he used the phrase which resonated for many years in my practice. He would use this phrase often, empty phenomena rolling on. So it's just empty, empty of self. Empty phenomena rolling on. That's what this mind -body is. That's what this world is. Suggest a fix

50:26 Seeing this clearly. Seeing this impermanence, this flow of momentary change or change on every level, seeing it clearly and repeatedly reorients our mind towards care and compassion rather than clinging and attachment. Suggest a fix

50:52 It reorients our mind toward letting go rather than holding on because we're seeing that there's nothing to hold on to. Suggest a fix

51:04 Deepening our insight, our direct insight, the direct seeing, deepening this, reorients our minds towards freedom rather than bondage, rather than being caught. Suggest a fix

51:23 So I'd just like to close with one teaching. It's from a Tibetan Rinpoche. His name is Zigar Kongchul. And I think he really expresses Suggest a fix

51:40 In some way the essence of what we're doing here. He said the potential for realization, for awakening, is universal and present for all of us. True benefit will come from your own efforts and realization. For your efforts to bring benefit, you must take your life into your hands and examine your mind and experience. From this point of view, nobody could be kinder to you Suggest a fix

52:17 Nobody could have a greater effect on you or actually do more for you than yourself. The Buddha said, I have shown you the path of liberation. Now liberation depends on you. This is really true. If you don't take your life into your own hands, not even the Buddhas can make a difference. It's up. So that's... Both our challenge and our inspiration. You know, we can do this. We're on the path. Suggest a fix

53:00 And we can take inspiration from that opening sentence of the Buddha, of the Satyapthana Sutta, this is the direct path to realization. Suggest a fix

53:14 Let's stay for just a few moments. Suggest a fix

53:42 Thank you for listening. To learn how you can support the teachers and Dharma Seed, please visit dharmaseed .org slash donate. Suggest a fix

Talk by Joseph Goldstein, recorded at Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge, 10 April 2017. Original at Dharma Seed: https://dharmaseed.org/talks/40301/. Licensed CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Transcript generated automatically and may contain errors; the audio is the authoritative version.

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