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brushjw
USA
191 Posts |
 Posted - May 30 2008 : 1:03:33 PM
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A sensation appears, and liking or disliking begins. This fleeting moment, if we are unaware of it, is repeated and intensified into craving and aversion, becoming a strong emotion that eventually overpowers the conscious mind. We become caught up in the emotion, and all our better judgment is swept aside. The result is that we find ourselves engaged in unwholesome speech and action, harming ourselves and others. We create misery for ourselves, suffering now and in the future, because of one moment of blind reaction.
But if we are aware at the point where the process of reaction begins--that is, if we are aware of the sensation--we can choose not to allow any reaction to occur or to intensify. . . in those moments the mind is free. Perhaps at first these may be only a few moments in a meditation period, and the rest of the time the mind remains submerged in the old habit of reaction to sensations, the old round of craving, aversion, and misery. But with repeated practice those few brief moments will become seconds, will become minutes, until finally the old habit of reaction is broken, and the mind remains continuously at peace. This is how suffering can be stopped.
S.N. Goenka, The Art of Living
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Suryakant
USA
259 Posts |
Posted - May 30 2008 : 2:17:39 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by brushjw
A sensation appears, and liking or disliking begins. This fleeting moment, if we are unaware of it, is repeated and intensified into craving and aversion, becoming a strong emotion that eventually overpowers the conscious mind. We become caught up in the emotion, and all our better judgment is swept aside. The result is that we find ourselves engaged in unwholesome speech and action, harming ourselves and others. We create misery for ourselves, suffering now and in the future, because of one moment of blind reaction.
But if we are aware at the point where the process of reaction begins--that is, if we are aware of the sensation--we can choose not to allow any reaction to occur or to intensify. . . in those moments the mind is free. Perhaps at first these may be only a few moments in a meditation period, and the rest of the time the mind remains submerged in the old habit of reaction to sensations, the old round of craving, aversion, and misery. But with repeated practice those few brief moments will become seconds, will become minutes, until finally the old habit of reaction is broken, and the mind remains continuously at peace. This is how suffering can be stopped.
S.N. Goenka, The Art of Living
Excellent quote, thanks for posting it!
In this fleeting moment, you witness a tree on a distant hillside bend gently in the breeze.
In the same fleeting moment, you witness your physical body typing on a computer keyboard.
And in that same fleeting moment, you remember that on the most microscopic, subtle, quantum level of matter and energy and spacetime, there is no permanent absolute boundary between your physical body and that tree.
And on the most microscopic, subtle, quantum level of matter and energy and spacetime, both that tree and your physical body are nothing more than successive unique one-time-only configurations of energy that vanish forever in each fleeting moment, being replaced by new unique one-time-only configurations of energy in the next fleeting moment. The apparent persistence of their forms on the macro-level from this fleeting moment to the next fleeting moment is a hypnotically persuasive sensory illusion.
The witness persists, but not the witness as an object of consciousness - only the witness as the omnipresent subjective Self - here language ends. |
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This Fleeting Moment
