Latest / Buddhistisches Tor Berlin Podcast / Energy & the Stupa as the Buddhist Path

Transcript

Energy & the Stupa as the Buddhist Path · Buddhistisches Tor Berlin Podcast

0:04
Welcome to the Buddhisticious Tour Berlin podcast.
0:08
Here we share talks and reflections from our Buddhist
0:11
centre in Berlin, exploring themes such as meditation,
0:16
ethics and the path of awakening in everyday life.
0:20
We are part of the Sri Ratna Buddhist community and our talks
0:24
are offered freely in a spirit of generosity.
0:29
We hope this episode supports your practice and your life.
0:41
OK, so it looks like this is all of us and a new appearance in
0:48
the room. It's already making a difference
0:52
because I have to stand up to give the talk because I can't
0:55
see everybody. So just the appearance of this
0:59
in the room is changing the atmosphere to a usual Saturday
1:03
morning or just after the morning.
1:08
So for most of us in the room, we'll never have seen this in
1:11
here before. It has been in here before on
1:14
special occasions, but for most of us, this is a first.
1:19
And yeah, if you're here for the first time this morning, this
1:22
doesn't usually happen. So something has appeared in the
1:26
middle of the room and it's a stupor.
1:31
So I think probably, you know that, but maybe not because we
1:36
don't see many of these around, at least in the Western or the
1:41
so-called Western part of the world.
1:43
If you went to Buddhist countries in the East, you'd see
1:46
these all over the place. Sometimes they're small,
1:52
sometimes they're really small, sometimes they're kind of tiny
1:55
things on clay molds, and sometimes they're absolutely
2:00
huge and massive with flags coming off them and people
2:05
walking around on the steps. So obviously we don't have that
2:08
here, but you can imagine how big they are if people can walk
2:13
around on the steps. Sangarachita, who's the founder
2:18
of our community back in the 1960s, he gave a talk in I think
2:22
1971, early 70s about stupas. And he said in that talk that
2:28
they're probably the most important Buddhist symbol that
2:32
we have. But I think in in Western
2:37
Buddhism, let's call it that. In Western Buddhism, the stupor
2:40
is kind of peripheral. If at best we very rarely see
2:46
stupas, maybe in retreat centres, but you would probably
2:50
never go to a tree Ratna Buddhist centre somewhere in the
2:54
in Europe or in the UK and see one of these instead of a
2:58
Buddha. So the classic image that we
3:01
have, the classic symbol is the Buddha image, this less known.
3:07
So I wanted to bring it into the room and bring it into our
3:11
awareness and into our. Yeah, into our minds, just so
3:19
that we can give it some thought and see maybe there's something
3:22
important in this. So the appearance today, this
3:25
morning, of this stupor, it echoes the appearance of a
3:31
stupor in one of the most widely known Buddhist sutras, which is
3:37
known as the White Lotus Sutra. Anybody read that?
3:42
A few people. Yeah.
3:43
OK. It's an interesting one.
3:46
There's copies in the library, so do feel free to have a look.
3:51
About halfway through, after several different stories and
3:54
parables, halfway through the Buddha Shakyamuni, so the
3:59
historical Buddha of our time, he is about to give the teaching
4:04
of the White Lotus Sutra. So he's gathered there with lots
4:08
of his followers, and they're all really excited because the
4:11
Buddha's about to teach the teaching of the White Lotus
4:14
Sutra. But then all of a sudden, out of
4:17
the ground, this massive stupor just shoots up.
4:23
And it's really massive. And it's not made of steel and
4:27
cloth. It's made of seven precious
4:29
substances. It has flags all over it and
4:32
banners all over it and umbrellas all over it.
4:37
Really kind of spectacular appearance.
4:40
And everybody in the assembly is like, whoa, what's happening?
4:44
And if that wasn't miraculous enough, then the stupor starts
4:49
to talk. And it says, excellent.
4:53
It's excellent that the Buddha is about to teach the White
4:56
Lotus Sutra. So just listen.
5:03
So it might seem like our stupor here has has appeared, but it's
5:08
not talking. But it is talking, Yeah.
5:13
So it's talking a different sort of language.
5:15
It's not speaking English, it's not speaking German, it's not
5:20
speaking in words, but it is speaking to us by it's presence.
5:26
Yeah. So our task over the next half
5:28
an hour or so is to see if we can listen to the stupor.
5:34
I'll be trying to do some mediation and and communicate
5:39
something of what it's saying to us.
5:41
But it's using the language of symbols.
5:45
Yeah. So it's speaking a symbolic
5:47
language. So that's what we need to learn
5:51
for the next half an hour is to listen to the language of
5:54
symbolism that this is speaking and the White Lotus Sutra is
5:58
speaking. So I'll come back to that later.
6:01
The White Lotus Sutra itself is speaking symbolically, even
6:05
though that is now printed in books that you can read in the
6:09
library. OK, so we've got a stupor.
6:14
We're listening to it. Our next task is to ask, well,
6:19
what is it? Yeah.
6:20
So what is this thing and why does it appear in this
6:25
particular form? And a good way into that
6:29
question is to ask, well, where does it come from?
6:33
Yeah, so not from the basement, but where does it come from
6:38
historically? How did this develop?
6:42
And one of the earliest stories about stupas goes right back to
6:46
the time of the Buddha and the Buddha at the time of his death.
6:50
So in his last days, people start to ask him, how should we
6:56
remember you? What should we do after you're
6:58
gone? It's a massive concern for them
7:01
because the Buddha's been enlightened and teaching for 40
7:05
years or something, and they know he's about to die, he's
7:09
sick, he's very old, he's in his 80s.
7:12
And they're wondering what are they going to do when he's gone,
7:16
when their teacher's gone and they still need him and they
7:19
still need his teaching, what what are they going to do?
7:23
So they're concerned about how they can keep him in mind.
7:26
How can they remember him? And the Buddha tells them that
7:30
after he's gone, they can take the relics, the remains of his
7:35
body, and they can put it inside of a stupor.
7:41
So he takes his robe, which was probably not anything like this,
7:47
but this is the prop. So he takes his robe, or his
7:51
outer part of his robe. He folds it up into a square.
7:54
And then he takes his begging ball, which again, was probably
7:58
nowhere near as big as this. And he says, you can place the
8:03
bowl on top of the robe and put my relics in something like
8:08
this. And that's how you should
8:10
Remember Me. Yeah.
8:13
So in a sense, that became the first Buddhist stupor.
8:17
It was a way of remembering the Buddha and keeping the Buddha in
8:21
mind through his relics in some kind of form like this.
8:27
And then again, if any of you have been to countries in the
8:31
east, in India, you'll have seen that this shape exists as
8:36
monuments, but again, massive. So the stupor at Sanchi, have
8:42
you been there? You've been there.
8:45
OK. And some of you might have been
8:46
there. How big would you say is Sanga
8:48
Dashmi? It's probably up to the Windows
8:54
Live. Yeah.
8:55
So these massive domes begin to be built and they spread
9:00
throughout India, northern India and Pakistan as the Buddha and
9:06
the Buddhist Sangha grows. So always containing relics of
9:13
the Buddha or significant people, significant teachers,
9:17
these, these monuments begin to spread and are there to, in a
9:23
sense, always represent the Buddha.
9:26
Yeah. So this was at a time when we
9:28
didn't have images of the Buddha like this.
9:32
The first images of the Buddha, the first things that help
9:35
people recollect the Buddha were these stupas.
9:40
Or you get sometimes depictions of the Buddha's footprints.
9:45
There are probably some at the Humboldt Forum, I can't
9:49
remember. But you get some of these
9:50
earliest Buddhist symbols or ways of representing the Buddha.
9:55
Yeah. And then that develops into
9:59
actual images of the Buddha, but the stupor takes its own track.
10:03
So the stupor starts to develop as well from this simple Dome
10:07
shape to something more like this, more stylized.
10:15
So you could say then that the stupor, or what the stupor is a
10:19
symbol of, quite simply, is the Buddha a way of remembering the
10:26
Buddha, even if it has evolved from the original design.
10:32
But then why would we remember the Buddha?
10:34
Well, we would remember the Buddha because of his life and
10:39
what the Buddha did in his life, which was what we describe as
10:44
being a life dedicated to and a life in which he realized
10:49
enlightenment or awakening. Yep.
10:53
So all the limitations that we feel as human beings, all the
10:59
restrictions, all the suffering that we experience as part of
11:06
the human condition, the Buddha is said to have resolved.
11:11
Sometimes it's said he transcended that suffering, he's
11:14
free of it. He's realised in his life the
11:19
end of his own suffering. So that in a sense is what the
11:25
stupor is telling us. It's telling us that the Buddha
11:30
achieved that or realised that, but also that we can also
11:35
achieve and realise that. So it's a symbol of the Buddha,
11:39
it's a symbol of his enlightenment, but it's also a
11:42
symbol of our own potential to realise that too, because we're
11:46
no different from the Buddha in that respect.
11:49
The Buddha started from a position of suffering and
11:53
wondering what the hell could he do about it, and nothing else
11:57
that he encountered seemed to work.
12:00
So he dedicated his life to discovering a way out of
12:04
suffering or a way to end suffering and enter something
12:09
completely free and blissful. And we can do that.
12:14
We're in the same position. I'm assuming everybody in the
12:17
room suffers in some way. I'm assuming everybody in the
12:20
room also experiences some glimmer of freedom from that, or
12:26
the potential for freedom from that, or you wouldn't have come
12:29
to a Buddhist centre in the 1st place.
12:33
And there's something here perhaps that you think might be
12:35
of help. And the stupor is saying, yes,
12:40
there is something here that might be of help.
12:43
Here's your potential. So the stupor then is a symbol
12:49
of the goal. You could also say it's a symbol
12:52
of the path. So a lot of the symbolism here,
12:56
if we can listen to it and hear what it's saying to us, it's
13:01
also telling us how to do that, how to move towards
13:06
enlightenment and freedom from suffering, how to move away from
13:10
the suffering that we experience in life.
13:15
So how is it doing that? This is where it gets a bit more
13:20
specific, let's say. Yeah.
13:22
So just just bear with me. The the stupor is disturbing me
13:31
because, like I say, I'm standing up, which is unusual.
13:35
I also have some notes today which I don't normally do but
13:40
it's affecting me so I'm going to look at my notes this time.
13:49
Yeah. OK, so let's let's just look a
13:52
bit more closely at the stupor. So this this was made, wasn't
13:56
it, by a woman in Essen, was it? Claudia, is that?
14:00
Yeah. And apparently she was an
14:03
engineer. Lalita Ratner was telling me.
14:05
So it's very precisely made. The the different pieces of
14:08
steel, they line up perfectly. I can see them underneath.
14:14
And what she's done very skilfully is created this kind
14:17
of step, step structure. But that itself is an
14:23
elaboration of a simple cube. So usually the base of a stupor
14:29
or, or what this evolved out of once it had gone beyond this is
14:33
from the robe that was folded up, we got a cube.
14:37
So just imagine that the bottom part is a simple cube shape.
14:41
Yeah. And then here again, this is
14:45
slightly more stylized, but this is an elaboration of a sphere or
14:51
a ball shape. And then on top of the ball is a
14:56
cone. Again, we've got the addition of
14:59
this piece here, which is another later development.
15:03
But imagine just a cone here. So that's three things, the
15:07
cube, the sphere, the cone, and then on top, originally there
15:12
was just this piece which is a kind of Crescent, like a moon or
15:17
an upturned bowl. I think this part is a kind of
15:23
umbrella, stylized umbrella, which they would put on stupas
15:27
for kings or monarchs leaders. But just this part is what we're
15:34
interested in. And on top of this part is a
15:38
jewel drop, which is on fire, which is this flame.
15:43
So we've got five key shapes, the Q, the sphere, the cone, the
15:49
Uptown Crescent, and the jewel drop.
15:54
And those five shapes are representations, are symbols for
16:01
what Buddhism regards as the five great elements.
16:06
Yeah. So the five great elements that
16:08
make up the whole cosmos. So when we hear elements, we
16:14
probably think of material substances, like in the I'm
16:22
rubbish at science. But you know, that big table,
16:26
the periodic table of elements, That's it.
16:28
Thank you. We think of that.
16:31
So what are the different material substances that make
16:34
things up? It's not quite like that in
16:38
traditional Buddhism and Buddhist cosmology.
16:41
So the five great elements are a way of describing, if you like,
16:46
what what is out there. So Buddhism doesn't make this
16:53
distinction that we might make in Western thought between mind
16:58
and matter. Where, where, Where?
17:01
We might traditionally say, well, there's mind inside, and
17:06
then everything outside is matter.
17:08
Buddhism doesn't really go in for that, so there's no
17:10
distinction of that kind. Instead, what Buddhism might say
17:15
is that there's perception, so there's awareness, there's
17:20
consciousness, and things have been perceived.
17:24
And in that perceptual situation there is part of it that seems
17:31
to be objective stuff that we perceive out there, and part of
17:38
it seems to be subjective. Yeah, but all of that is
17:44
mediated through our senses. So our sense of touch, taste,
17:49
smell, seeing, hearing, and the the sense of mind.
17:55
Yeah. So the 6th senses in Buddhism,
17:57
mind is a sense. So all the mental content we're
18:02
perceiving through mind. So for example, I think I'm
18:08
standing on the floor and I know exactly what the floor is
18:12
because I can feel it through my feet.
18:14
Yeah. But really, I've just got some
18:18
touch sensations. You can all do this little
18:21
experiment yourselves. You've got the touch sensations
18:24
beneath you. You can see it, and you have an
18:29
idea, a concept of what floor is.
18:32
Yeah. So not only is this the floor,
18:35
it's the shrine room floor. It's wood or laminate, I'm not
18:40
sure. I'm not a builder either, as
18:43
well as a scientist, so I've got ideas about it.
18:49
And I've got these sensations, both tactile sensations and
18:53
visual sensations. But do I really know what the
18:57
floor is? Yeah, that's that's a good
19:00
question, isn't it? Because if we really started to
19:04
look more deeply, it's like, well, what are those sensations
19:07
that I feel under my feet? Yeah.
19:10
Are they stable? Are they changing?
19:13
Are they moving? Yeah, they're kind of moving.
19:16
There's some temperature that's changing.
19:21
What are my visual impressions of the floor?
19:23
Well, it's made-up of light. It's made-up of color.
19:30
It's covered in other things that I have ideas about.
19:33
Where does the floor of the shrine room begin and where does
19:37
it end? And then I've got my ideas and
19:41
where have they come from? And I'm using the English
19:45
language to communicate to myself that this is the floor.
19:48
Some of you might have different words for it.
19:51
So you see how we build our experience from the impressions
19:58
that we're getting through the senses.
20:03
So no mind versus matter, the elements, then the elements
20:08
become ways of describing the qualities of that experience.
20:12
So we've got the objective aspect, the subjective aspect,
20:17
but in terms of the objective aspects, the elements are ways
20:21
of describing the qualities of what's going on.
20:23
We don't really know, but we can say there are certain qualities.
20:28
So the first of those qualities is represented by the cube at
20:31
the bottom of the stupor, and it's the quality of Earth.
20:36
Yeah. So we can say that in our
20:38
experience, there's this quality that is Earth like.
20:43
Yeah. Or even more helpfully, perhaps,
20:50
we can say that there's a quality of stability.
20:54
Yeah, there are things in our experience that are stable or
20:59
there's things where we experience resistance.
21:02
So under my feet, I'm experiencing some resistance or
21:06
I just fall through it. And it's helpful to have these
21:11
concepts. So if we go outside and we cross
21:16
the road when the person is red and there's a bus coming, it's
21:22
no good me starting to philosophize about how the bus
21:26
is not really a bus because it's just the concept.
21:29
Because at some point I'll experience, I'll have quite a
21:32
strong experience of resistance or the Earth like quality and
21:38
then you'll be putting me into a stupor in a couple of weeks
21:42
time. So resistance is one of the
21:44
qualities we go around and we experience.
21:47
Yeah. And that's represented by this
21:49
cube shape of the stupor. Another quality is the quality
21:55
of water. Yeah.
21:57
Water or water is a symbol for the fluidity in our experience.
22:04
Yeah. So you can experience that.
22:05
Now you can feel in your mouth. You have the tongue, but there's
22:11
also a fluid sense. Yeah.
22:14
There's something water like inside the mouth or on the film
22:18
of the eyes, but there's this quality, we could say also of
22:22
fluidity and of things being able to move, take the shape of
22:28
other things. Yeah.
22:31
So that's another quality of the objective part of our perceptual
22:37
situation. On top of that, we have the
22:39
cone, which is a symbol for the element fire.
22:45
And fire is that aspect of our experience that has temperature.
22:50
And so the quality of temperature we could include hot
22:54
and cold. So sunny day today, we're all
22:59
wearing T-shirts because something in our experience this
23:02
morning said it's going to be warm.
23:06
Sanga Dashni was really happy about that earlier.
23:10
So it's warm. Great.
23:11
We can just wear AT shirt. We don't have to worry about
23:14
having more clothes. So we read that quality of our
23:18
experience. Then at the top of this upturned
23:23
Crescent is the element air, symbolising the element air.
23:30
But again, it's not something material.
23:33
It's not oxygen or anything like that.
23:36
The quality of air is more a quality of movement.
23:40
Yeah. So we see things in our
23:42
experience and like my arms now have the quality of being able
23:47
to move. We go outside and we look at the
23:51
trees and the leaves are kind of moving in the wind, we say, or
23:57
in the air. And then right on top that
24:01
flaming jewel drop is the quality in our experience of
24:06
space, which is a little bit more difficult to describe, but
24:12
the sense that all the things that we can experience, there's
24:17
some kind of openness within which resistance happens, within
24:23
which things flow, within which things have a temperature,
24:29
within which things move. So space is quite mysterious,
24:34
but that is represented by this jewel drop.
24:42
OK, so the, they're the five qualities of our experience,
24:46
let's say. So if you like the stupor is
24:49
saying, as Buddhist practitioners, can we really
24:54
look at our experience and can we see how these qualities are
24:59
there and they're helping us build a sense of our life and
25:06
our experience of life. So it's a way of looking is
25:12
another way of putting it. It's a way of helping us to
25:15
look, to really see beyond the ideas we might form that are
25:21
helpful to some extent, but not helpful beyond a certain point.
25:26
Yep. So if I get too attached to my
25:28
ideas of how things are and then like this has appeared,
25:33
something of reality just appears to upset my ideas about
25:36
how things are, that's when I start to suffer.
25:40
So if I want to suffer less and be more like the Buddha, I have
25:44
to really look at how experience happens and how it unfolds and
25:49
let go of my ideas about things and let go of my fixing and and
25:55
grabbing hold of things. OK, I didn't expect it to be
26:01
that technical. So where to go next?
26:08
It's interesting, the arrangement.
26:10
So the stupor has this particular arrangement, stacking
26:13
the elements one on top of the other.
26:16
Earth, water, fire, air, space. Apparently that emerged in the
26:22
Vajrayana phase of Buddhist development.
26:26
So some 100 years after the Buddhist death, the Vajrayana
26:30
and the tantric tradition became very interested not just in
26:37
metaphysics. And yeah, we've got this idea of
26:42
the elements, very interesting idea and map.
26:46
But they would ask, well, where do we find those in our actual
26:50
experience here? And now that was their big
26:54
concern. And one of the things they did
26:56
is they took the elements and incorporated it into the
27:00
symbolism of the stupor. So then we get this stack of
27:05
cube, Earth at the bottom, sphere on top, fire on top of
27:10
that, air on top of that, and space on top of that.
27:14
So that's an interesting question.
27:15
Why did it develop into this particular shape?
27:20
Yeah, so the way they might talk about it is in terms of energy.
27:30
So I wanted to talk about energy today because there is something
27:34
about this even before I start to explain some of the symbolism
27:38
further. Like I said, having this in the
27:41
room has changed something energetically, at least for me.
27:46
Maybe for you, maybe you walked in the door after the break and
27:49
you were kind of, well, there's something else appeared.
27:54
So it has an energetic effect, just looking at it.
27:59
And the way that might be described in terms of the
28:03
tantrum, in terms of the Vajrayana, is that the bottom
28:07
shape, the cube or Earth, could reflect a sense of energy being
28:12
quite static and even a bit stuck and even a bit blocked.
28:18
Yeah, a bit like an ice cube. Yeah.
28:20
We get ice cubes, don't we? When the water has frozen and
28:24
become hard and solid. So in that sense, we could say
28:31
that when we're in states of real suffering, we feel that,
28:36
don't we? A kind of contraction,
28:39
stiffening up, not feeling like we can move, not really wanting
28:43
to move sometimes, Yeah. Or just anytime we experience
28:48
resistance. Yeah.
28:51
There's a kind of blocking of energy, holding of energy.
28:56
We feel something is not moving, and that's how we know
29:01
something's not OK. Yeah.
29:04
So out of that, if we could free ourselves a little bit from that
29:08
sense of being stuck and blocked, something more fluid
29:13
can emerge, which is represented by the water element and the
29:18
sphere. So things begin to move.
29:21
It's not complete freedom because water can't just go
29:25
wherever it likes. Water takes the shape of other
29:28
things, doesn't it? It moves downwards as opposed to
29:35
upwards, so water is a bit more fluid.
29:38
Again, if our ice cube were to melt, then we'd have a little
29:41
bit of water instead. But then the fire element
29:46
represents how that energy, once it's been freed to some extent,
29:51
can begin to move up. And we could take up as being a
29:56
metaphor for more inspired rising, more energetic, more
30:05
free. So the fire element kind of
30:09
represents that growing inspiration and energy and
30:14
uplift, feeling uplifted. We say that, don't we?
30:18
I don't feel stuck anymore, actually.
30:20
Things have melted. I feel a bit more free and
30:24
actually now I feel more uplifted.
30:27
So these become kind of progressive stages of spiritual
30:32
life. It's a way of describing how
30:35
spiritual life can unfold through practice.
30:40
And then above the fire element, we have the Crescent and the air
30:45
element. And that, I guess, is an
30:51
experience or a state in which we're not just going up, we can
30:55
actually go anywhere. You have the freedom to just
30:59
move and be free and to move anywhere.
31:04
And then the space element at the top, again, it's a bit
31:08
mysterious, but if that's a rainbow, flaming drop, rainbow
31:13
coloured drop, I mean, rainbows very strong symbolically, aren't
31:19
they appearing and disappearing, not being held by any kind of
31:25
form or anything at all? In the lecture Sangarachita gave
31:30
on this that I mentioned earlier, in the 70s, he used an
31:35
image of it's like being a person kind of stuck in the dark
31:39
at the bottom the cube. But then suddenly you realise
31:43
actually you're not just completely stuck in the dark,
31:46
you are in a little room. So the water element is you
31:50
starting to walk around in the room.
31:52
You can't go very far because there are walls, but at least
31:55
you can move around. The fire element is like making
31:59
a little hole in the ceiling, pushing it out and then seeing,
32:03
oh, there's some sky up there. Then the air element is you
32:08
levitating and floating up and out of the room.
32:12
You're free, you're not bound by the walls anymore, you're just
32:15
in the air and you can maybe fly around.
32:19
And then the space element is more like you've disappeared
32:22
altogether and there's just some consciousness or awareness.
32:30
So for the Tantra, the the stupor then starts to symbolize
32:35
this is the path, this is what 1 can expect or what 1 can aim at.
32:40
As you move closer towards the goal of enlightenment and become
32:44
more like the Buddha is this progressive release and
32:48
liberation of our energies, which I I have to say I find
32:54
quite an inspiring prospect to become more and more free
33:00
flowing in energy. That's great, isn't it?
33:03
When that's happening, I feel good.
33:07
Of course, it doesn't mean and it's not saying that if you
33:11
practice Buddhism, it will be this wonderful ladder into
33:16
heaven in which you'll just feel more and more free and have more
33:21
and more energy. In fact, it could feel the
33:25
reverse sometimes. As we practice, we also get to
33:31
know the cube a little bit more. Yeah, We get to know the water
33:36
state and how we move between opposites.
33:39
Sometimes I'm happy, sometimes I'm sad.
33:41
I don't really understand that, but that's what happens.
33:45
And then, yeah, sometimes we do feel the inspiration.
33:49
Sometimes the fire of inspiration can even burn us.
33:53
Yeah, and the movement and moving around, but that's very
33:57
free but also challenging, particularly if this lower
34:02
dimension returns at certain times.
34:05
So I don't think it's saying this is a very clean, easy sweep
34:09
and thing to do. But yeah, I think it's good to
34:13
look at what Buddhist practice is all about through the prism
34:17
of energy and liberation of energy.
34:23
I thought I'd just say a few things about I'm not using these
34:27
anywhere, so I thought I'd just say something about the the way
34:32
that we practice specifically here.
34:35
And yeah, maybe with a particular view to what?
34:39
Sorry, I just rang the bell with my notes.
34:44
I thought for a moment the stupor was talking, but it's
34:46
not. I thought I'd say something
34:49
about our approach to practice and particularly the system of
34:52
meditation, how it might fit with some of this, because that
34:58
was the tantra's other great concern that, OK, we can have
35:01
the stupor, and now we've got this nice image of how energy
35:06
unfolds and how spiritual life is this progressive unfolding of
35:10
energy. But again, where is that in my
35:13
actual experience, Yeah. So the Tantra begins to look at,
35:20
well, where's the cube in this, My psychophysical being?
35:26
Where's the sphere? And they come up with this map
35:30
of how these elements and the different shapes map onto the
35:35
human body. So for them, the the cube is
35:41
right in the root chakra, right at the bottom of the torso where
35:49
where we touch the ground when we're sitting in meditation.
35:53
That's where we experienced the earth element.
35:57
The water element is here around the solar plexus in the guts.
36:03
Let's say the fire element is here in the heart, the air
36:08
element in the throat, and the space element in the head or on
36:12
the crown of the head. So for them, this wasn't just an
36:16
abstract thing, it was also something that could be explored
36:20
internally as well. And I was thinking about our own
36:24
practices and how they correspond to some extent to
36:28
that. So right at the beginning this
36:31
morning, Sanga Darshanali definitely did it.
36:35
I'm sure the other people leading the sits too, they did,
36:38
they would have done some kind of what we call a body scan or
36:42
just bringing our awareness into the body.
36:46
It's probably the first thing you all did when you went to a
36:49
Buddhist centre. Somebody gave you some kind of
36:53
pointer towards more body awareness.
36:56
So for me, that's like our way of doing the earth element
37:02
stability, bringing awareness to the quality of stability in our
37:06
experience is to bring awareness into the sensations of the body.
37:15
And that's really important because often we experience
37:21
ourselves as being in the head or being in thoughts and being
37:25
taken away from thoughts. It's not that we're not in our
37:29
bodies when that happens. We're we're quite embodied all
37:33
the time. Like, let's not worry about
37:36
that. As we said before, there's no
37:38
distinction between mind and matter in Buddhism.
37:43
But the problem is we're not conscious of our bodies.
37:45
We're not aware of our bodies and that can create attention
37:51
because because the mental part of us is off somewhere and the
37:55
body's kind of left behind and gets a bit like a cube.
37:59
Yeah. For example, I start, I start to
38:07
become a cube when I'm checking if my team have got to the
38:12
playoff final at Wembley this afternoon, which they have
38:17
anywhere. I had to get that in somewhere.
38:24
So we are embodied all the time. But if we bring awareness to the
38:27
fact that we're embodied all the time, then the energy comes out
38:33
of the cube and starts to move a bit.
38:37
So we do the body scan at the start of meditations to make it
38:41
more clear that mind and body are just appear as two aspects
38:45
of our experience. But our completely intertwined.
38:51
Then I was thinking about our other practices.
38:53
So we did the mindfulness of breathing in here this morning.
38:57
We also do the metabarfner and alternate the 2.
39:01
I had a case for the sphere being more mindfulness of
39:04
breathing and the fire element and the cone being more meta
39:09
because of the heart element. Actually, I think both of the
39:13
practices are working in these areas.
39:16
So the mindfulness of breathing, as we all know, we start to
39:20
become aware of the breath and then we notice how difficult
39:24
that is and how many distracting thoughts come up or
39:28
traditionally what's known as the five hindrances.
39:31
So we experience restlessness, we experience sleepiness, we
39:36
experience doubt, we experience desire for sense things, and we
39:43
experience and aversion to things and are pushing away.
39:47
So those five patterns can emerge in meditation and we
39:52
might flow between them and states have been a bit more
39:55
absorbed. So there's a kind of fluid
39:58
experience in the meditation. And what we're trying to do with
40:02
the practice is become more and more together and coherent.
40:07
It's a practice where we're trying to get to know ourselves.
40:11
It's a practice where we're more aware or opening up more
40:16
awareness to what's going on in the depths, what's going on in
40:21
the guts of our experience of our lives.
40:25
What are the things that we miss a lot of the time?
40:30
Yeah. So this, this sphere, this
40:32
watery sphere, it's like we're plunging into that, going for a
40:38
swim in that when we do the mindfulness of breathing and
40:41
really getting to know ourselves in that sense, I think we're
40:46
doing that in the Metabarbna as well.
40:47
Because as soon as we bring other people to mind or bring
40:51
ourselves to mind for more of an emotional point of view, we also
40:56
get to know ourselves. So both the practices are
40:59
helping us develop that self-awareness, self knowledge.
41:06
And then the, the fire element. I think when we're doing the
41:09
meta Bardner, to the extent we are a bit more together, a bit
41:13
more self aware, something of, of uplift can come or something
41:20
of positive aspiration and intention and inspiration can
41:26
start to come through. I mean, it's an intense thing to
41:30
do, isn't it? To sit for 40 minutes and wish
41:37
ourselves and other people well, That's quite, there's a fiery
41:42
quality to that. It's not passive.
41:46
It's it's quite active. Obviously there are different
41:49
ways of doing the practice, but every time you say one of those
41:52
phrases to yourself, like may I be well, may I be happy, It's
41:58
like we are lighting a bit of a fire.
42:00
Even if we don't feel it, even if we feel like a cube or a bit
42:05
cold, like ice. It's like we're just putting a
42:09
bit of heat, adding a bit of fuel to the fire of our heart,
42:14
let's say. And that can start to have a
42:17
real effect, particularly if we do that regularly and over time.
42:23
I think mindfulness of breathing helps that as well because the
42:26
more we have awareness, the more we can notice our own responses
42:32
and and really kindle that fire. All good.
42:40
OK, OK then. Then the air element and this
42:47
upturned Crescent. I was thinking about that in
42:50
terms of our practice here, in terms of ethics and the ethical
42:54
precepts. So not just meditation, but how
42:57
do we actually take this body awareness, getting to know
43:02
ourselves, being more aware, wishing others well, it's OK
43:07
doing that in a shrine room or on a meditation cushion, but how
43:10
do we actually spread that in the world?
43:13
Because we want that to influence the world, presumably
43:18
for ourselves and our own benefit, but also for that of
43:20
other people. So through the five ethical
43:25
principles that are common to the whole Buddhist world and
43:29
that we're trying to encourage in the community here, loving,
43:34
kindness, generosity, contentment, truthfulness,
43:39
mindfulness, that's really us activating the principle of the
43:44
air element and allowing our Buddhist practice to really
43:48
spread and affect our life, people's lives in our life, and
43:55
people all over the world. And then the space element, I'm
44:01
not sure I keep coming back to the mystery of the space
44:06
element. You could say that we have this
44:10
other practice that that we call just sitting.
44:15
And sometimes we introduce that just at the end of a meditation.
44:18
So all right, we've done the four stages of mindfulness of
44:21
breathing. Now we can relax all effort and
44:24
just sit. But what are we just sitting in?
44:30
So often we just sit and maybe the distractions come back or
44:36
the things that we're going to do next start to come back.
44:39
But also in the just sitting, we could say something else is
44:43
present, which is just that free open awareness that is in a, in
44:49
a sense always there whether we recognise it or not.
44:54
So when we just sit, even if it's just for 5 or 10 seconds,
44:59
if we just stop doing what we're doing and we just open up to our
45:03
experience, it's a bit like we're at least mimicking the
45:08
space element. We're stopping being the actor
45:12
and the person moving around and doing things in our lives.
45:16
And we're just stepping back and being the container and noticing
45:20
how well the whole of our lives, the whole of our experience, a
45:25
bit like a rainbow is appearing and disappearing.
45:30
And it's got the diversity of different colours and different
45:34
people and different tones and emotions and all the rest of it.
45:39
But it's all coming from the same source, let's say.
45:43
And it's all dissolving, appearing, dissolving.
45:47
So that's always there too. So let's just go back to the
45:58
White Lotus Sutra, maybe a finish on this.
46:02
So we've got the appearance of the stupor and the fact it
46:06
starts to talk. So the stupor comes and it
46:09
starts saying excellent, it's excellent that the Buddha is
46:12
about to teach the White Lotus Sutra.
46:16
And you can imagine, can't you, that everybody around there is
46:20
shocked and intrigued. So one of them says to the
46:26
Buddha, why is that stupor talking?
46:30
Why is it that it's appeared and started to say, it's great that
46:33
you're about to teach the White Lotus Sutra?
46:36
And the Buddha says, ah, yeah, way, way back in time, like
46:44
unimaginable stretches of time ago, there was another Buddha
46:50
whose name was Abundant Treasures, And he made a vow
46:56
when he passed away, when he entered into the para Nirvana,
47:00
which is how we talk about the Buddha's final passing away, He
47:05
made a vow that whenever anybody in the cosmos was going to teach
47:11
the White Lotus Sutra, his stupor, where his relics were,
47:16
would appear there. And that's what happened.
47:21
So again, this is all, this is the language of symbols,
47:24
remember? So there it is, the the stupor
47:27
of abundant treasures appears. And you can imagine, can't you?
47:32
Again, what then people thought next, which was, do you think
47:37
it'd be possible to have a look inside and see this Buddha,
47:43
abundant treasures from all those incalculable eons ago?
47:49
And the Buddha says, ah, well, there's another part of his vow
47:53
that said that that would be possible.
47:56
But first all the Buddhas throughout the entire cosmos,
48:01
throughout all the space and time, they have to come.
48:06
So then the Buddha shoots a ray of light from a curl of white
48:10
hair in the middle of his forehead into the sky, and it
48:16
illuminates the whole cosmos and all the Buddhas in all the
48:20
different places all over the cosmos.
48:22
They realise, ah, that's the Buddha Shakimuni calling us to
48:28
appear in front of the stupor of the Buddha.
48:31
Abundant treasures. So then they all appear and
48:35
gather around in the sky. Space element.
48:41
That's like a rainbow, isn't it? So just countless numbers of
48:47
Buddhas all around in the sky. So that's happened.
48:52
And then the Buddha knows it's time for him to reveal and open
48:56
up the stupor and show everybody the Buddha abundant treasures.
49:01
So because he's a master of the air element and all elements, he
49:06
floats up into the sky, goes to the stupor, pulls aside this
49:12
huge locked gate, opens it up, and sure enough, inside is
49:19
seated the Buddha Abundant Treasures.
49:23
And then he starts to speak. In fact, it's him who's been
49:26
speaking. So he says it's wonderful.
49:29
It's wonderful that the Buddha Shakyamuni is here opening my
49:33
stupor, and he's about to teach the White Lotus Sutra.
49:36
And it's wonderful that all these Buddhas from across the
49:39
cosmos have gathered to hear it. And then he invites the Buddha
49:45
inside. So the Buddha Shakyamuni goes
49:49
inside the stupor, and they sit down together inside the stupor.
50:03
Yeah. So it's a, I mean, that's
50:10
typical of Mahayana sutras, this whole cosmic drama of
50:15
enlightenment. And it might sound weird.
50:19
And if yeah, it does. And if you take that literally,
50:24
the, the, the White Lotus Sutra is some kind of historical
50:28
account. Maybe we're missing the point.
50:32
But if we dismiss it as well as just being a load of nonsense,
50:36
maybe we're missing the point. But it's trying to speak this
50:40
language of symbols. So inside the stupor, all of a
50:44
sudden you've got a Buddha who doesn't belong in time if it's
50:50
unimaginable, and so far back in time.
50:53
It's so far back that he is outside it.
50:57
Yeah. Not bound by time, not bound by
51:01
space. When we're stuck in the cube, we
51:03
feel like we're bound by time and space.
51:07
Yeah, the Buddha, abundant treasure is completely free of
51:10
that. And yeah, he sat next to a
51:13
Buddha that we know was a historical person and historical
51:18
figure. So it's saying on the one hand,
51:21
enlightenment is completely outside of all our categories
51:25
and concepts, and yet it manifests somehow in our
51:30
experience, either through the encounter with a Buddha or
51:35
through our own, and more importantly through our own
51:39
realisation of what that is all about.
51:42
So we cannot say that being a Buddha, enlightenment is somehow
51:47
outside of our experience. It's kind of there all the time
51:52
running through space and time, but it has to come through a
51:57
person historical figure erupt in time and space like the
52:03
stupor itself erupt within a particular space in a particular
52:09
time like it has this morning. So I hope that has been
52:17
interesting. Some of some of the orders order
52:21
members on the team here. When we put the blurbs in the
52:23
WhatsApp group saying what we're going to talk about, we do a
52:27
kind of lycometer. And how many emojis do different
52:32
talks get just to say like what kind, what kind of subjects of
52:37
people interested in, though I'm not offended, but there were not
52:41
very many for the talk about the stupor.
52:47
And I was not surprised really, because it's a bit alien to us.
52:51
Like I said, we don't go around Berlin seeing these everywhere
52:55
like we would if we were in Nepal.
52:58
So it's a bit strange and obscure, but I think that's a
53:04
shame. And personally, I mean, I've,
53:05
I've thought that for a long time, but personally, I've been
53:09
getting more and more interested in what is this all about.
53:13
And it's not just cultural Buddhism, it's speaking a
53:16
universal language that is relevant to all of us, whether
53:21
we consider ourselves Buddhist or not.
53:24
I I truly think it's communicating something profound
53:30
about our experience and also about our potential as well.
53:35
So do keep the stupor in mind. It will disappear like a rainbow
53:41
shortly, but it will reappear downstairs in the basement.
53:47
And I believe now there will be an announcement about next week
53:51
in the basement and you'll see the stupor there.
53:54
So although it's the end of the stupor for this morning, it will
53:58
be reappearing soon. So I'll finish there and then
54:02
hand over to the announcement. Thank you for listening.
54:20
If you enjoyed this talk, you are warmly invited to visit
54:23
Buddhisticious Tour Berlin in Kreutzberg.
54:26
We offer meditation, Dharma talks, and courses that support
54:30
practice in everyday life. You'll find more information in
54:35
the episode description.