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Karma of Beauty & Ill

Good evening. I believe it was last Monday I talked about the topic of beauty in the Dharma. This topic of beauty has been on my mind quite a bit since I discovered that it's much more prominent in the Buddhist teachings than the English translations had shed light on. And so, maybe it's natural that in thinking about this topic of beauty, I'm reflecting on it also in relationship to the mass shootings we've had in this country for the last eight days or so—one here relatively nearby in Gilroy, and El Paso, and elsewhere.

I'm struck by the statistics that come out in the wake of these. Depending on what the criteria is for how to measure mass shootings, one of them is that there have been 21 mass shootings this year so far where four or more people were killed. There have been 31 mass shootings where three or more people have been killed. But if you only consider how many people have been shot in mass shootings just this year, and the criteria is four or more people have been shot, either wounded or killed, there have been 250. There haven't been 250 days of the year yet. In other words, there's more than one shooting in this country every day. It's kind of mind-blowing.

There's a non-profit that's been counting these. I went on their website, and it's all documented. They're very strict about what they accept as being counted; there has to be clear evidence and reports from the police. There have been 250 shootings where four or more people had been shot in this country in the first 216 days of the year. So I think it's on many people's minds, or in their hearts, that we live in a country like this. To me, it's certainly a little bit mind-blowing that I live in a country where so many people get shot and so many people are shooting each other.

I think this kind of situation deserves a response from every single person. I think the greater the tragedy is, the more as individuals we do ourselves a disservice—or maybe we should say it stronger, we do ourselves a kind of harm—if we're not somewhat changed by it, if in some way we don't respond. Not that we can fix all the problems that exist, but to somehow be changed by it, and be a person who responds in a different way in the world, so that we become a force for good. The greater the magnitude, the more I think that if we don't somehow let it affect us, something inside of us goes numb or shuts down.

I had a very strong feeling of this right after 9/11, a good number of years ago now. In the wake of that, I didn't fix 9/11. I didn't have the presumption that I was going to go out there and try to stop terrorism. But what I did was start a Buddhist chaplaincy training program. Now it's been going on for its fifteenth or sixteenth year. It's not addressing terrorism, but it is a form of compassionate care in the world. It's something I dedicated myself to doing because I wanted to contribute in some way. I've been very happy for these many years of doing this, and for the tremendous amount of good that has been done through the hundreds of people we trained. They go off into all kinds of settings where there are trauma victims and people going through tremendous tragedies—in hospitals, ERs, hospices, and all kinds of places.

To be changed by this, and to become a force for good... so then we come back to the topic of beauty. Why would I talk about beauty in the wake of tragedies like this? It turns out that the Buddha's teachings on karma were couched or presented in the context of teaching about beauty. So what does karma have to do with beauty, and what does the beauty of karma have to do with mass shootings in this country? The teaching of karma is a teaching, first and foremost, that we are supposed to take responsibility for ourselves—for what we say, what we do, and not only that, but also what we do with our minds or what we think.

There's an amazing expression in English—or in American English at least, and maybe some of you have used this expression: "I couldn't help it." Wow, what an admission! "You couldn't help it." This is like being an absolute slave to habit, acting on powerful forces inside of us that we have no control over or can't take any responsibility for.

The clear antidote for this, a laboratory for exploring and understanding this, is when we meditate. To sit and meditate is to choose not to go along with some of the impulses that arise. It can be as simple as having an itch while you meditate, and thinking, "I couldn't help it, so I scratched." Or, in meditation, you don't scratch. You sit there and don't give in to the impulse, even if it's strong. There can be very strong forces inside that scream at you to scratch the itch. It can feel like you're going to die, but it's just an itch. Or there can be a strong justification that says, "I don't deserve to sit here with an itch. I deserve pleasure. I've had a busy day and I should just relax." And so then, "I couldn't help myself, but I scratched." But to sit still and not give in is to help yourself.

It is to learn how not to respond with habit, not to allow very strong impulses inside to have control over you, but to learn how to be free. Maybe the consequence of that meditation with the itch is that you go to work the next day, and people say, "How was your meditation yesterday?" And you say, "It was awful." And they ask, "Well, why did you do it? You should do something else. There are TV shows to watch." But you might say, if you were wise, "Well, it was awful, but I'm actually a stronger person in a particular way. I'm stronger at not giving in to my impulses. I have a stronger ability now to not have to excuse myself and say, 'I couldn't help myself.' I can now stay balanced and non-reactive. I can choose not to give in to forces that in the past I always gave in to."

An itch is not such a big thing in and of itself, but what we learn with the itch is actually a big deal for how it applies to other places in life. In meditation, all kinds of things happen like this. There's a pain in the knee. Do you automatically shift your posture, or do you sit there and just not give in to the impulse right away, and rather meet it with mindfulness? If you don't give in to an impulse, but instead meet it and look at it with mindfulness, you're exercising your ability to be free. You're also exercising your ability to help yourself, because some of the impulses, ideas, thoughts, and feelings that come up are not really healthy for you.

For example, with thinking. I imagine that a huge percentage of your thoughts—if it should happen that you had some thoughts during a sitting—are stellar, ethical, beautiful, and exemplary. The kind of thoughts that saints have, that beautiful, wonderful people have. Thoughts you would have been proud of if we had broadcast them on the wall here so that everyone could see exactly what you were thinking about. It would have been inspiring and enlightening for all of us. But occasionally, it happens that people have thoughts which are not so exemplary, thoughts they're not so proud of. If they actually saw them on the wall, they would turn red or wish they weren't there. Maybe they're unethical, or whatever you make up—I don't have to give you examples.

Maybe it's a thought you have repeatedly, a certain theme. Maybe it has to do with your boss, and you're just really annoyed with them. You go through these scenarios of how you're going to really lay into your boss, or how you're going to make sure you get the last cup of coffee at the coffee machine so the boss can't get it, just to get back at them. And you're doing a whole planning of how you can figure out the timing so you can get that coffee in spite of him, out of anger at him. "I couldn't help but have these thoughts about revenge on my boss without coffee. I couldn't help it." Okay, well then you're not free.

But you're sitting, meditating, and those thoughts come up, and you say, "Not now. I'm not going to do this." You drop them. You shift your attention away from those thoughts and the planning, and come back to be with your breathing. The thoughts come back, and you exercise your freedom, your ability to not give in to them. You exercise your ability to help yourself, because you've learned that when you spin out on those thoughts of revenge, it harms you. And so you're helping yourself by coming back.

After a while, perhaps you begin to stay on your breath. You start to relax, you forget about your boss, and lo and behold, you find that you're relaxed. It actually feels kind of comfortable and nice to be here, as opposed to the tightness and the heat that was there with the boss and the coffee machine thoughts. You're helping yourself in that moment. It turns out every moment that you're alive, you can help yourself. Every moment you have a choice of whether you help yourself or you don't. What direction do you go? What do you want? What do you do in the moment? Mindfulness is a very powerful way of helping yourself.

Mindfulness doesn't mean that you can stop certain impulses, thoughts, and feelings, but it means that you step away from them. You put the energy of your mind into noticing them, into seeing them, rather than being caught in them, absorbed in them, or obsessed with them. It could be as simple as noticing, "Wow, I'm obsessed." The moment you say, "Wow, I'm obsessed," in that little moment you've helped yourself. In that little moment, you're not obsessed. You're at a kind of distance, just seeing yourself in it. You're not caught in it.

Exercising this capacity to help ourselves is something we get stronger and stronger at. That's what meditation is about. Some people associate meditation with getting calm, relaxed, and having blissful experiences. But a huge part of what Buddhist meditation is about is getting better and better at helping yourself—better at being free, not giving in to impulses where you're caught, stuck, or attached, and then choosing something else to do to exercise your capacity for choice.

If you ever hear yourself saying, "I couldn't help myself," I think there should be some follow-up statement that you make. I don't know what the best one is; you can decide for yourself. But what occurs to me in the moment is something like, "I'm sorry that's the case," or "I'm going to try to do better next time," or "That was unfortunate." This is as opposed to gleefully saying, "I couldn't help myself but to have a second donut." Add some wisdom to the end of it: "I couldn't help myself, and I'm sorry," or "I'll do better next time." Or, "I couldn't help myself, and that meant that I didn't help myself. That meant that I was not free."

Exercising this capacity for helping ourselves comes directly into the Buddhist teachings about karma. The karma teaching emphasizes that you have the ability to help yourself. What you do makes a difference. It isn't really a complicated theory about multiple lives and past actions explaining that everything going on for you today is because of your past karma. The associations for this teaching have gotten kind of complicated. But having studied the Buddhist teachings repeatedly, I see that the whole karma teaching is an emphasis to be careful what you do now. Be careful, because what you do now has consequences.

One of the common ways of talking about karma is people talk about "good karma" and "bad karma." I've heard this language for decades. People say the Buddha said you should avoid bad karma and do good karma. I heard it so much I just went along with it. It turns out that the words "good" and "bad" have connotations of ethics, of what you should and shouldn't do, of being moralistic. You're a "bad" person if you do the bad; you're "really good" if you do the good. That was the soup I was swimming in until a week or two ago when I looked up the word that the Buddha used for "good" karma. It's the word that I talked about last week, called kalyāṇa^[1].

The first definition in Pali-English dictionaries—and also in Sanskrit-English dictionaries, like the famous Monier-Williams dictionary^[2]—for kalyāṇa is "beautiful." So, beautiful karma. We're not talking about good karma; we're talking about beautiful karma. What does that do to the whole teaching of karma?

And then this word "bad" is an unfortunate translation. Sometimes it's translated as "evil." Those of you from India might recognize the word pāpa^[3], which most people translate as "evil." I just can't get myself to be enthusiastic about it because of my European religious heritage, where the word "evil" has so many associations with sin. If you've sinned, you're unredeemable. If you sin, you go to hell forever, and God gives up on you. It's a pretty heavy thing. This idea that "evil" has that meaning in Buddhism doesn't fit. And "bad" is so vague, it doesn't really say much. Right now, I'm proposing to call it "ill."

The reason for that is "ill" means sick, but it also means it's bad, wicked, or maybe even evil, but it doesn't have the same strong connotations as the word "evil," nor the vagueness of "bad." Also, something that is ill is ill in and of itself; in addition, it might cause problems in the future. So the karma teaching is about what are beautiful actions and what are ill actions. Doesn't that change the connotations from "good" and "bad"? The Buddha used the word kalyāṇa, which should be translated as "beautiful", and it works really well.

If you look up dictionary definitions for beauty, one definition is "what pleases the aesthetic sense." That's nice. But another definition is "what pleases our moral senses." In English, the word beauty sometimes has an association with ethics, what is virtuous or ethically beautiful. Inner beauty is often associated with being really ethical. Another connection—and this comes from Wikipedia. It's nice sometimes to look at Wikipedia because you get a sense of the popular view of what something means. It says something like beauty is connected to the harmony or natural order of nature. To bring this into Buddhism, kalyāṇa relates to a kind of ethical beauty, and it relates to the harmonious order of nature. The karma teachings are part of nature. Whatever actions you take, whatever choices you make, you're going to reap the consequences. That's just a natural order. It's kind of like if you drop a ball from your hand, the natural order of gravity is that the ball falls.

In the simplistic teachings of karma, if you do something which is ill, you will reap something ill. If you do something beautiful, you'll reap something beautiful. Here's a verse by the Buddha: "Whatever kind of seed is sown, that's the kind of fruit you will reap. A doer of beauty reaps beauty, the doer of ill reaps ill." So how is it that when you do something beautiful, you reap beauty? One of the things is that you reap the benefits of the beauty of the here and now. It feels really good. It's inspiring and nice to do something that's beautiful. And where does it feel nice? It feels nice internally.

You do something "good", and you might just be following the rules. You get the ethical rulebook and it says, "Thou shalt." "Okay, I'm gonna do that. You're supposed to be generous. Okay, I don't feel generous, but I'm gonna do the right thing." But if you're going to do the beautiful thing, you can't do it in an ugly way. Because it's the inner beauty that we're looking for. So to act in the world in a beautiful way, we benefit from that right away. It feels good.

We also benefit from it because it becomes conditioning in the mind; it trains the mind. If in meditation you choose not to give in to the itch, you're strengthening and training your mind not to give in to impulses. It's a minor issue around the itch, but if you train yourself not to give in, you might come to a situation in life where it's a matter of life and death whether you yell or not, or whether you punch someone out or not. You're so grateful that you know how to control yourself, that you don't have to say, "I couldn't help myself, officer, when I hit him." "Oh, you couldn't help yourself? That's okay. I'm fine with my bloody nose. Have a nice day." [Laughter]

You are conditioning yourself. You are training and developing yourself. If you do things that are ill, it is a kind of training, a kind of reinforcement. The more we do things which are ill—or if I can use this language, the more we do things which are ugly—we're actually creating the conditions for more ugliness.

This is where we come back to the topic of the mass shootings. If we want to be changed by it, if we want to try to be a force that does better for the world, you can instead do things which are ill. You can just go around and be more angry at any number of people, and just be furious, angry, and critical. You can figure out how to make sure that certain individuals don't get any more coffee, because you're angry, you know, that's your way of doing vendettas or resetting the order of the world. But you're just doing ugly things. You're doing ugly things with your mind, you're speaking ugly things, you're planning ugly things. And so we're contributing to more of this ill in the world. First and foremost to ourselves, but it spills out. It travels beyond us.

I've told this story a few times, and especially when I tell it now, I feel kind of embarrassed. But I think it's a powerful lesson. I raised two boys, and the older one was what they call a "high-spirited" child. It's a very polite, beautiful way of talking about a certain kind of behavior. When he was really small, he was a handful. He was always pushing boundaries, and we tried to be wise about how we raised him. We probably did well enough so that our mistakes in parenting he'll correct for himself when he's older. Anyway, there were some times when I felt like, "This has to stop." And so I used what I called my strong voice, and it worked. It wasn't something I was going to use very often, but wow, okay, it worked. The behavior stopped on that occasion. Then one day at home with his younger brother—who was maybe two years old, and he was maybe six or seven—I heard him use exactly the same voice on his younger brother. And I said, "What have I done? What have I created?" I was horrified. I thought it just worked for that moment and that was it. But I was teaching him something. I was teaching him what people do when they're frustrated. I was passing my ugliness on to him.

So where does our ill or ugliness ripple out, and how does it come back to us? Where does it live in our conditioning? When does it rear its head so that out of the blue, ten years later, that old conditioning to do something in a harm-creating way is there and you "can't help yourself"? It just comes out under stress, and then you feel horrible. Or the opposite: because of all those times you've done the equivalent of not giving in to the itch, you did it with a tremendous sense of care, reverence, and respect for yourself. Saying to yourself, "I know it's hard to sit there with an itch, but I really care about you. I want you to be free and be prepared to do the wise things when things get really difficult." Staying here and not giving in to the itch is training for ten years down the line when a challenging situation arises, and you feel like, "I can't help myself." Then you think, "Oh, the itch. I think I can help myself. I can choose not to give in to it."

Or perhaps because you keep saying nice words like, "I care about you and want the best for you, and I'm not going to give in to the itch," you find yourself speaking kindly to yourself at a time when you feel furious. You feel like yelling and swearing at someone, and you say, "Wait, wait, wait. I care about you. I care what goes on. I care about your inner beauty." That comes back unexpectedly. It's almost like you hear a voice. The idea that you reap what you sow is that in a variety of different ways—some that are mechanical and obvious, and some which are unseen in the byways and highways of our psychology—if we do beautiful things, we will reap beauty. If we do ill things, we will reap ill.

To simply give up responsibility for what you choose—if you don't exercise this ability of choice—I'm afraid that what you don't want will take precedence. It will take over the places where you "can't help yourself," and will grow and develop. As we train ourselves, do the mindfulness practice, and learn to do what's beautiful, then that grows and develops. As it grows, it grows with a clearer sense and perception of something that's here—maybe within you, maybe in the awareness itself—that feels really beautiful. We start living in beauty.

If you give in to rushing, it's not a sin. It's not a crime, usually, to rush. I don't want to say it's "bad" to rush, and tell you instead of doing the bad rushing you should do the good. But when you rush, there's no connection to what's beautiful. We lose touch. What is it to start learning to be in touch with, to be perceptive of, and experience your beauty? To establish a sense of psychological beauty, a heart beauty, ethical beauty, a beautiful mind, a beautiful heart, and stay close to that? If you're committed to staying close to that, you won't rush unless it's an emergency. Or, to say it differently, you might rush, but you'll never hurry. Hurrying is when you lose your presence and self-awareness. You can do things fast; you can do things with awareness.

I'm giving this talk today as my own reflections on this topic. Once I discovered that the word "beautiful" is such a big part of the Buddhist teachings, and no one's been talking about it, I felt like, "Wow, this is a gold mine for trying to understand our life in a different way." To live a life that is focused on beauty rather than focusing on "good"—that seems like more fun. That seems more inspiring. And maybe if you do what's beautiful, the good will come as a byproduct. But you get so much more when you do the beautiful thing.

What happens if you live and do what feels beautiful, what has some aesthetic sense of beauty in the variety of ways that inner beauty can be experienced? Maybe it's ethical beauty, virtue, maybe it's a sense of the natural order of things. What if you are much more beautiful than you allowed yourself to know? What if your capacity for being a beautiful person, a beautiful being, is just sitting inside waiting for you? That feels much more nice and inspiring than if I said, "You're a good person, your capacity for being really good is just waiting inside." That might inspire some of you, but aren't you at least a little bit intrigued by what this beautiful thing is? How does that change how we think about life and ourselves if we are oriented around beauty? Being oriented towards beauty is not selfish, it's not indulging in pleasure. When we talk about Dharma beauty, inner beauty, we're talking about something very, very profound—something that's more profound than just "the good."

So you are beautiful; please show it to us. If you can live in a beautiful way, in the way you touch people you meet, maybe you'll have occasion to offer such kindness, generosity, love, and care to someone that, directly or indirectly, you prevent some future mass shooting. If we don't care for each other and let the ugliness prevail and not be countered, there's not much hope. So may you be the agent of change simply by being beautiful. Thank you.