Just Sitting

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Speaker: Hong Wen Liang
Arr. by Liu YingXiao

These days, much of the study of Buddhism is intellectual, which has no

relation at all to liberation.
What genuine Buddhism points to is that the origin of distress for all living
beings lies in the thought "I am listening, I am alive, I am practicing". The
average person feels that if they don't have these self-referential thoughts,
then they have nothing; they are afraid of having nothing to hold on to.

After his own realization, a Chan monk once said "

?
!

The five hindrances of greed, anger, dullness, restlessness and doubt seem
like five fingers covering the eyes, rendering one's scenery unable to appear.
Many people practice desperately, using a variety of methods; reading
sutras, chanting the names of the Buddha and other mantras, eating a
vegetarian diet, and practicing moral conduct, hoping to remove the five
hindrances and cultivate tranquility. However, these hindrances have no
reality to them, being entirely empty; what would you do to remove it?
Furthermore, even if you were to remove the hindrances and cultivate a
clean mind, the fundamental ignorance would still exist there! When this
fundamental ignorance is shed away, the hindrances are like leaves without
a root; incapable of growth, they naturally wither. Worrying about how to
dispel the five hindrances is precisely the root of ignorance , which is without
origin.


Our mind was originally very vast, with boundless application. The six senses
see color, hear sound, smell scents, taste tastes, feel bodily sensations, and
know thought, all happening as movement, as Dharmakaya. The senses are
originally without worry and free from love and hate, viewing all phenomena
equally in accordance with the way of life, naturally liberated. The reason
why we feel there is an object is because there is an "I" . Thus, the realized
Master can say that "in this moment there are no things", because although
he does see things, he does not have the deluded thought of "I see". "I" is a
delusion that has arisen, and if this delusion falls off, we will be very clear
about this state of "no thing". Only when there is the unwarranted thought of
"me", will we see independently existing objects. That is the meaning of "In
this moment there are no things." Awakened beings have no "I", as
everything is Dharmakaya. Seeing you, seeing a flower, hearing sounds, it's
all Dharmakaya. That which encounters karmic circumstances, which is born
and dies, changes and is empty. We hold this body and mind, composed of
the five aggregates as being truly real, using this attitude to study Buddhism.
By using "I" to try and confirm this Dharmakaya, you've already gone down
the wrong path from the beginning. As it is said, "Because the earth is not
real, the fruit is full of twists and turns".