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Guided Meditation: Centered in the Body

Hello everyone, and welcome.

One of the ways that the Buddha talks about realization, or about the depths of possibility in this practice, is that it's something to be known and experienced through the body. The emphasis on embodiment, or the body, is quite strong in these early teachings of Buddhism. So, we begin with our body and assuming a bodily posture that might support bodily awareness, the process of coming maybe home to your body, or settling into your physical experience here and now.

I think of our physical experience as adding full dimensionality to our life. If we live in our thoughts only, it's like living in two dimensions, and with the body, it becomes three dimensions. Maybe something like that.

So, assuming the meditation posture that you choose for this period of time, and gently closing your eyes, attuning yourself to your body, kind of from the inside out. Not from your mind so much as thinking about it, but feeling and sensing. There can be an intimacy in sensing and feeling our bodily experience. And maybe this allowing ourselves to feel and sense the body is a little bit like someone putting a gentle hand on your shoulder, a reassuring hand or a loving hand, something reassuring, making that connection with our body, touching it and being touched.

And then from the depths of your body, whatever that means, deep inside, gently arising from that depth, take a deep, full inhale. Arising from the depths, stretching outwards into the ribcage, the shoulders, a kind of stretching and expanding of the torso. And as you exhale, a settling, a calming, a returning to the depths within.

And then letting your breathing return to normal, and relax your body on the exhale. Relaxing the face. Softening the shoulders. Softening the belly.

And then settling in now to the body's experience of breathing. As if in this body of yours you will find the path of meditation. You will find the path for where to place your attention, where awareness can be awakened in the body, breathing mindfully.

Feeling the vitality, the aliveness of the physical body, the hum of the body's aliveness. And to relax and settle more deeply into an embodiment of the body here. The body is always in the present moment, here in this body. Gently, quietly feeling the embodiment of the body breathing. Just here, the body breathing.

Letting go of your thoughts. Maybe sometimes letting go of whatever you're thinking every time you exhale. Letting go of thoughts and letting go into the body, breathing in and breathing out.

Letting go of your thoughts, not navigating from your mind, but more navigating meditation through your body. Awakening the capacity to be present with your body.

And as we come to the end of the sitting, the more we are connected to our body, the more likely we are to be close to the source of love within. And what would it be like to let yourself become quiet and still, so that the place of tender care and loving-kindness is something that you can feel more connected to? Allowing something to settle and let go, and feel the place within where there can be a warm regard for others. Where there can be a generosity of heart, a willingness and capacity to appreciate other beings.

And from this place, perhaps to intentionally conclude your meditation with a wish for the welfare and happiness of others. May it be that others can be happy. May it be that others can feel safe. May it be that others can experience peace, a peaceful life. And may it be that others could wake up to freedom, to experience the heart free and unbound, unfettered^[1].

And may the benefit and goodness of this meditation this day, may those benefits be shared widely to the welfare and happiness of all beings. May all beings be happy and free.

Canki Sutta: Discovering the Truth

So this Sunday talk could be seen as a continuation of the last three weeks of early morning talks on greed, hatred, and delusion. Now, this is a theme that comes up repeatedly for the Buddha, and in some ways it's important because the goal of practice is to wake up, be experienced in the peace, wake up to the absence of greed, hate, and delusion, to wake up to the presence of the peace that's possible without it.

So what I want to do today is maybe a little different than usually on Sundays. I want to tell you a little bit about a discourse, an ancient text that purports to talk about the teachings and conversations the Buddha had. It's a sutta which is maybe one of my favorites, maybe in the top 10 if I had a list like that of ones that I value, and it's called the Canki Sutta^[2].

Why I like it is one of many reasons, but one of the reasons is how it talks about truth. It talks about protecting truth—and who doesn't want to protect truth?—and then discovering truth, or awakening to truth. And finally, it talks about the final arrival to truth. So what is a final arrival, a complete coming into truth?

I'm not going to tell you the full story of the text, but the basic idea is that a young, very well-educated brahmin^[3] comes to the Buddha and asks a simple question. He says that the brahmins in his tradition claim that their scriptures contain the only truth and no one else has the truth, and what does the Buddha think about this?

Instead of answering it directly, the Buddha says, "Well, do any of the brahmins in the present generation themselves say 'I know and I see this truth,' or is it the truth that they've just taken from the texts and they believe it because they have faith in it, because it's in the texts?"

The young man says, "Well, no one says that they have seen it for themselves or known it for themselves."

And the Buddha says, "Well, what about their teachers, and the teachers before them, and back seven generations? Has anyone said that they themselves have seen the truth, or they themselves have known the truth directly?"

And he says, "No."

And the Buddha basically then indicates—he's a little bit dismissive—that there's not much value in a statement that this is the only truth if, for many generations, no one has actually known it for themselves. It's a little bit challenging, I suppose, to the brahmin, because back then their religion was based on the ancient texts and they were taken on faith, I guess.

So the man asks the Buddha, "Well, how do we protect the truth?" And probably he asked the question because they thought they were protecting the truth by protecting those texts. Protecting meant memorizing them (there was no writing back then) and passing them down from generation to generation.

And the Buddha says, "Well, you protect the truth if, when you talk about what you think is true—like religiously true—you indicate a reason for why you take it to be true, the basis for that statement. So if you take it on faith, preface your conversation with, 'I have it on faith that this is true.' If you believe it's true because the tradition tells you so, then say, 'Based on the tradition, I take this to be true.' If it's because it's in your sacred text, say, 'Because of my sacred text, I take it to be true.' And if it's because of your reasoning and your logic, say that. And if it's just because you have some intuitive sense that this is true, say that, 'I have some intuitive sense that this is true.'"

So it's a very helpful thing for other people to know that if you make a truth claim, on what basis do you make it? Is it on faith, is it on whatever?

The young man says, "Okay, but can't you discover truth for yourself?"

And the Buddha says, "Yes, you can."

And so the man says, "How does one do that?"

And this is another wonderful part of the text: the Buddha then describes a process by which someone can discover the truth. He's just replying to the man's question, how does one discover the truth? The Buddha provides a means, a process. He doesn't directly proselytize, he doesn't really directly say what's important for him, what the Buddha's truth is, what he has realized. He just informs the man of a process. But indirectly, the Buddha's goal of the spiritual life is emphasized, and it's kind of a sleight of hand perhaps, or maybe you have to be really attentive to see what he's doing here, so I'll try to explain this.

I see you trying to spell the text, the Canki Sutta. It's spelled C-A-N-K-I, that's the Pali^[4] spelling, but it's pronounced "chunky," like with a "ch".

So the Buddha is going to describe the process of discovering the truth, and this is important for the Buddhist teachings because the Buddha really wants everyone to discover it for themselves and not rely on texts to know what's true, but to really know for yourself in some direct way. But it's a process for doing that.

You have to realize that in the ancient world there were no books, so you couldn't say, "Well, go to the library and read up on the teachings." If you wanted to hear and learn spiritual teachings, to learn about a process to discover the truth, you had to go find someone who would teach it to you. So the first criteria for this process has to do with the relationship we have to a teacher. The teacher teaches, and so the next part of the process is the relationship we have to the teachings. And the final steps of this process have to do with the practices we do, what we engage in, so that we can discover the truth. But these three areas are important: the teacher, the teachings, and then the practice.

The Buddha says that first you want to find yourself a teacher. To do so, go find the teachers in your area (I'm a little bit paraphrasing here) and investigate them. And then he goes into great detail on how you are supposed to check them out. It has to do with checking out whether in the teacher there's a presence of any greed, and any hatred, and any delusion, because of which they will twist the teachings. They will not quite give real teachings, or somehow influence the flavor, the texture of the teachings they give, because they're infused with the teacher's greed, hatred, and delusion. And you want to have a teacher who is not going to have any greed, hatred, and delusion that's going to influence what they say.

So there's this wonderful instruction: check out the teacher. To really check out a teacher, it takes time. Don't rush headlong into a teacher, but really tune in and pay attention, and see how they live their lives maybe. And to see, are they free of any greed, hate, and delusion that's going to skew the way that they teach, the simplicity or the clarity of what they have to teach? And so if you decide that they don't have that kind of greed, hate, and delusion, then have some confidence in that teacher, offer some faith, some trust in that teacher. Then the teacher is worthy of some degree of trust.

Trust enough so the next step is to go visit the teacher. In the ancient world again, you couldn't read the teacher's books, watch them on YouTube, you had to go find a teacher. It's important to be in the presence, especially back then in the oral tradition, and offer respect to the teacher. There's a long ancient tradition that some modicum of respect prepares the listener to listen well. It clears a certain degree of clouds or agitation. That kind of genuine respect or care is a willingness to be open and a willingness to listen well to what a teacher has to say. But remember, this is after having really checked out the teacher and decided, "Okay, this person is worthy of some respect."

And then listen to the teacher. Listen to what they have to say. In the modern world, we might say, "Read the teachings carefully, listen, read well, take your time." Back then there was only listening, there were no libraries, no books. So the process with the teacher is to investigate, to have faith and trust to some degree, to visit, to offer respect, and then to really listen to the teachings from the teacher.

Then as you listen, hear the teachings fully, take them in. As you hear them, memorize the teachings. That made a lot of sense back in the ancient world because you didn't have a book to refer back to, and people didn't know how to write so they didn't take notes when the teacher was teaching. You couldn't go to the library or something and check out a book if you wanted to review and read again and think about what was being taught, you had to memorize what was being taught. And people back then almost certainly had a much higher ability to memorize than we have today, because that was the medium for knowledge in a way that is not the case today.

And then having memorized them, examine them, reflect on them, think about them. Here again, just like with a teacher, you don't accept teachings blindly or quickly, but you really check it out. There's a process of checking it out, thinking about it, looking at it, not automatically believing the teacher or believing the teachings, but really reflecting on them, examining them. When one has examined and thought about them deeply, and if they really, from your best understanding, seem to be good teachings, then accept those teachings enough to be willing to begin the process of practice. So hear the teachings, memorize the teachings, reflect deeply on the teachings, and then have some modicum of accepting them as something that is accepted well enough that now you can practice with them. It's kind of like you've gotten the ingredients for the experiment, and now you have to run the experiment if you want to discover something.

So then comes the practice. The practice is first by understanding the teachings, by having faith in the teacher. This whole process is for there to spring up, to arise out of yourself, the desire to practice. Without some inspiration, some enthusiasm, some feeling of, "Yes, I'm going to practice," the experiment is not really going to work. So we want to listen to teachings, take them in until we really feel like, "Yes." And it might be that part of that "yes" to practice comes from having checked out the teacher. "Wow, if it's possible to live without greed, hatred, and delusion, this is a worthwhile path, this is good, this is inspiring." And so that inspires us to want to do it for ourselves, to discover how to do it.

Then there's preparing oneself. The text says "being fit to practice." So preparing ourselves to practice, whatever that means, getting ready for practicing, or getting established in practice.

And then once again the word "examine." When we are practicing meditation, for example, and it gets quiet and settled and we're really able to be in the present moment, there is a non-discursive, non-analytical way of looking, examining more and more deeply what our experience is, what's really going on in our direct experience. And so here again, examine the teacher, reflect on the teachings, and now we're examining and looking deeply at our own experience, because that's where the discovery of truth is going to be.

And then a person continues practicing, and endeavors, and makes more effort. As practice moves along, there comes a time when this becomes kind of like we give ourselves over to it. Give ourselves over to really see the experiment all the way through.

And then at some point, one realizes, one has a realization of ultimate truth with the body. One realizes with the body ultimate truth. And I believe the experience with the body is being said to emphasize the direct, personal way in which we see and perceive and experience the truth. This is not from a book, it's not ideas, it doesn't exactly belong to the mind of analysis and cognitive beliefs, or even a certain kind of cognitive understanding. But first and foremost, it's so obvious that, "Oh, this is this." So, you know, if you are really hot on a hot day and you go stand in the shade of a tree, that's what's cool, you know. You experience the coolness, the truth of that coolness, with your body. It's really a felt-sense experience. And this kind of realization of the truth with the body directly is called discovering the truth.

This young brahmin asks the Buddha then, "Is this the final arrival at truth? Is this the final, complete experience of truth?"

And the Buddha says, "No. In order to really arrive at it fully, be centered in the truth, then you want to do that process that he described before over and over and over again." I imagine you don't have to keep doing the checking out the teacher, and at some point you don't have to check out the teaching so much, but to do the practice part of it over and over and over again. And it's the repetition of basic practice, and repetition of coming back into the discovery of the truth, discovering this truth over and over and over again, that begins to expand and fill out and develop this capacity, so we become the truth. We arrive in truth in a full way.

And in this teaching, the Buddha does not say what the truth is. So the young brahmin does not ask the Buddha, "What do you teach, and what do you teach about the truth?" He really first and foremost asks about his own religion. And then he asks, maybe to understand his own religion better, "How do I protect the truth? How do I discover the truth? How do I finally arrive at truth?" And the Buddha just then answers in a kind of a generic way, perhaps, or a vague way, without specifying any particular teaching of his own almost.

But this is where there's a sleight of hand, maybe, or an aikido move^[5]. Because what the Buddha says at the beginning, the very first step is, "Check out the teacher to make sure the teacher doesn't have greed, hatred, and delusion." Well, this is the goal of the Buddha. The goal of the Buddha is for people to come to a place where they're free of greed, hate, and delusion. And so by having this young man first and foremost check out—you know, be told this is what you have to check out first—it does a number of things. It means that he's only going to study with people who have realized the absence of greed, hatred, and delusion. And because they've realized that, they know the value of that. Maybe they have all kinds of non-Buddhist ideas, maybe they believe in all kinds of things, but for the Buddha that's maybe secondary. What's really important, what's primary, is this freedom from clinging, freedom from grasping, that the freedom from greed, hate, and delusion represents.

Also, by telling a young man to pay attention, to check out the teacher in these states of greed, hate, and delusion, it's actually a beginning of attuning him to this possibility of being free of greed, hate, and delusion. And to really study someone else, investigate someone else, and really see the way that they are free of greed, hate, and delusion, that they have this amazing freedom from these kinds of powerful forces that are so big in our society, I imagine it's really inspiring. It inspires a possibility.

And also, I can't imagine that the young man, if he did this, wouldn't begin becoming more self-aware—having spent time studying greed, hate, and delusion, or the absence of it in another person—would start becoming more self-aware of one's own greed, hatred, and delusion. Seeing it more likely, and seeing maybe the unfortunate nature of it being there. And "the teacher is without it, but I have it," there might be kind of an inspiration that maybe it's important not to have it, to work through it.

And so I believe that the Buddha gets one of his primary messages through kind of a side door to this young brahmin who's talking with him. So that by the time you get to the full discovery of truth, the full attainment of truth, the idea that it involves the absence of greed, hate, and delusion is not very far away. Because if you want to become what the teacher has attained, that also has to be an absence of greed, hatred, and delusion, and that is what the Buddha was teaching.

And the idea of religious truths, doctrines, beliefs—they are maybe not that important for the Buddha unless they interfere with the possibility of this radical freedom. But this radical freedom perhaps can exist without too much concern about what people believe. If it's not harmful, if they believe all kinds of religious beliefs and ideas that come from their tradition, from faith, from their logic, whatever, may it be so, or let it be that way, provided that we discover how to live together on this planet free of greed, hatred, and delusion.

So protecting the truth, I think, is a generous thing to do, if we tell other people the basis upon what we know, what we believe to be religiously true, by faith, by tradition, from the texts, from my teacher, or whatever. And then engage in a process of discovering the truth for ourselves. This is a great thing to do.

And not only maybe we can't discover what that is while we are ourselves still involved in greed, hate, and delusion, because just like a teacher maybe skews their understanding by the influence of greed, hatred, and delusion, so we would skew our discovery of the truth by those forces as well. And so to cleanse ourselves, to learn to empty ourselves of these forces, is possible and it's worthwhile. And it's one of the great instructions from the Buddha to do so.

So, the Canki Sutta. Thank you very much. And I look forward to being here again with you next Sunday—no, I won't be here next Sunday, I'll be here in two weeks. This coming Sunday, Andrea Fella is coming to speak. She's my co-teacher here at IMC, a wonderful teacher, and I feel very happy that she's coming to continue with these teachings while I'm away, and you'll be in good hands. And I look forward to seeing you in a couple of weeks. Thank you.