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THE BROAD DEFINITION OF AN INSIGHT

DELUSION JUDGES THE PRACTICE AS GOOD OR BAD

|Shwe Oo Min Dhammasukha Tawya 2018 Morning English Q&A 180116 (23:09-24:00)

Moha, it judges – it judges things as good, bad, advanced, slow and fast. That’s moha, but the practice is just the practice – one object is no different from the other. It’s only when judgment comes in that the mind starts to compare; it starts to give it a value like a grade (‘this is excellent grade and this is not’) and that is moha.

Once that judging comes in, then the greed and the aversion can set in. When it judges that this is preferable or better, that’s greed; if not good, then that’s aversion.

MEDITATION AND LIFE MUST BE TOGETHER

|Shwe Oo Min Dhammasukha Tawya 2017 Vassa English Interviews 170914 (41:26-42:41)

You need to practice in daily life – try to know your state of mind in whatever you do. You need to practice in your life because you don’t do them here in the center. Try to practice in any situation. The new yogi tries to maintain the awareness in every action, every moment and every posture. He learns how to be aware of the mind, how to be aware of the body moment to moment, trying, trying... making it into a habit.

You need to practice in the same way in your daily life. Then you can maintain your awareness in the job you’re doing. So, meditation and life must be together. Now, the practice is not in real life yet – you should practice there. Now you learn how to practice, now you know how to practice; then, you apply in your life.

HOW TO OBSERVE WANDERING MIND WITHOUT FOCUSING

|Shwe Oo Min Dhammasukha Tawya 2017/18 English Interviews 171229 (24:20-24:51)

If there is too much wandering mind, there is no need to watch the wandering mind; but you can still know that wandering mind is there. So, don’t focus on the wandering mind, but ground yourself on a physical object. If you know there is wandering mind, that’s enough; no need to focus on it. So, you’re busy watching the physical object – then wandering mind does its job and you do your job. Try to be aware of the physical object and also know that thoughts are already there. That’s better.

YOGI ASKING WHICH OBJECT TO BE AWARE

|Shwe Oo Min Dhammasukha Tawya 2018 Morning English Q&A 180117 (32:49-35:03)

You don’t have to choose an object; just know that you know all these objects. You don’t have to know any of them clearly; you just have to know that you do know all of them. Don’t know the object; know that you know.

Why are you able to know that you’re eating, drinking, looking, thinking and a lot of other things? You know because you’re aware. So, keep the awareness; recognize that it’s through the knowing that all this is known. Just try. All the objects that you notice are known by the mind. Actually, the mind already knows all the objects; you just have to notice that the mind is doing that work.

REMINDER: ‘WHAT IS THE MIND AWARE OF?’

|Shwe Oo Min Dhammasukha Tawya 2017 Vassa English Group Interviews 170903 (51:50-52:57)

Nobody teaches like this – if you remind yourself ‘What is the mind aware of?’ awareness becomes present. Everywhere you go, they only teach you to be mindful or to try to be aware.

If you remind yourself, awareness is already there. I too practice like this in daily life – I just think ‘What is the mind aware of?’ instead of try to be mindful. If you think the right way, awareness is already there. It is faster and better than trying to be mindful. It comes naturally; just reminding: What is the mind aware of? Already, awareness is present, naturally. That’s why I recommend to yogis to think about how to practice; just reminding themselves. That’s lighter and better.

FIND OWN MOTIVATION TO PRACTICE IN DAILY LIFE

|Shwe Oo Min Dhammasukha Tawya 2017 Vassa English Interviews 170914 (31:14-32:47)

When people cannot handle their defiled intentions, they use outside energy – they listen to dhamma talks or stay near the teacher – to help them stop the defilements. But when you’re on your own, you need to use a lot of your own energy – a lot of motivation, a lot of effort.

New yogis use a lot of outside energy from the surrounding to help them to meditate. If you’re alone in your room, the practice is not very strong because nobody cares and you may even sleep. If you come to the dhamma hall, your mind becomes stronger because external influence helps to boost your energy to meditate.

But in daily life where you’re alone, it is more difficult to practice. Your surrounding is not helping you; it is even undermining your practice. When you interact with everybody outside, there are lots of defilements because they have lots of defilements.

So, you need a lot of motivation, a lot of effort to maintain your practice in daily life. It’s the same with me – if I did not suffer so much, I wouldn’t have practiced like this. I suffered so much that I needed to meditate. Suffering helped me to practice. This is all due to conditioning.

If you don’t know your mind, there is no way it can rest

| Shwe Oo Min Dhammasukha Tawya Vassa English Interviews 17 August 2017 (30:05-31:04)

It is very good that you notice your craving and aversion. If you don’t see the craving and aversion, then your practice will be difficult all the time.

If you don’t know the craving and aversion – the liking and disliking – they will never stop even until you die. If you don’t know the mind, there is no way the mind can rest.

We’re interested in the thinking mind, not the thinking

| Shwe Oo Min Dhammasukha Tawya Vassa 2015 Oct. 13 English Interview (24:37-27:57)

Yogi: I know the reason why I’m upset.

Sayadaw: You pay attention to the storyline; you don’t know the mind process. We learn not from the storyline, we learn from the mind process – first mind, second mind. For example, anger comes because of craving – however strong the lobha, that’s however strong the anger when you don’t get it.

It is a process – before, you have expectation and because you cannot get what you want, anger comes.

We try to understand the mind process. We’re not trying to learn about anger from the storyline. Storyline is a concept; we try to learn from the mind process.

Anger is not present all the time. When anger arises, we try to find out what causes anger to arise. What idea, what thought leads to the next mind.

‘Why?’ means we learn from the process, not from the storyline.

If you find out the answer from the storyline, anger cannot go away. If the realization is from the mind process, then anger stops immediately.

Your responsibility is to have right view and watch the process. We’re not interested in the storyline; we want to know that thinking mind is happening. We pay attention to the thinking mind, not the thinking. We call thinking the storyline.

So, when you notice thinking mind is happening – that’s enough. Notice that the mind is thinking – we’re not interested in the storyline.

The mind is thinking. When feeling comes, how do you feel? Be aware of the feelings; be aware of the thinking mind and the feelings, thinking mind and feelings – that’s enough.

Learn from anger instead of sending metta

| Shwe Oo Min Dhammasukha Tawya SOM Malaysian Interviews 2018-01-09 (1:16:13-1:17:15)

Yogi: I want to send metta to somebody I don’t like

Sayadaw: Your objective is to learn from your anger, not send metta to that person. At that time, the person is not important; what’s important is the anger nature.

The persons you get angry with can change, but anger is the same. We try to understand the nature of anger. If you really understand anger, you won’t ever be angry with anybody. 

If you send metta, it’ll be only for this one person. If you understand the principle, the nature of anger, and use the principle, you’ll never be angry with anybody again. You have a chance to learn by observing anger, why then do you want to change to sending metta?

The tension and suffering you experience by watching anger is something for you to learn.

Yogis suffer because of the greed to get more results

| Kalaw Retreat Mar 2017 - Day 9 Discussion Group B (22:40-23:16)

Greed just wants something more. And this works out in our practice. We understand something and then what happens is we think this is not enough, we want to understand more. 

And we think that it’s a good thing; but often it’s greed that’s driving it. For some yogis, it’s very strong and they suffer a lot in the practice because of this greed to keep getting better and better.

There’s no need to stop the experience

| Kalaw Retreat Mar 2017 - Day 8 Discussion Group C (11:12-11:46)

Piti (rapture) can continue – just in case that people think piti must become equanimity. Sometimes people have a lot of piti and it continues, like it’s very strong and the strength of piti doesn’t stop.

So long as they can be aware of the piti without attachment; they make piti the object and they watch it neutrally. Then piti becomes the object and everything about the nature of things can be understood from watching piti as an object.

reality is actually principles

| Kalaw Retreat Mar 2017 - Day 9 Discussion Group B (24:27-26:11)

Reality is actually principles. When we understand one reality, when we see its truth, we begin to recognize the same principle in action although the object is not the same. You have understood the way greed works. Even though you’re not wanting the same thing anymore, you can still see greed at work. You’re recognizing it more.

Initially, yes, wisdom also prefers things – wisdom prefers things that are beneficial because it is understood, not out of craving. But you have to also be vigilant because it can turn into greed without your noticing it.