So, after that, the theme for tonight's talk is ill-will.
Anger, ill-will, irritation, negativity.
This whole range of emotions, which basically goes from the
most serious and most terrible rage, all the way down to the
most slight irritation that we can have almost any time in
daily life. This whole range of emotions is
basically what I'm talking about.
When I say ill-will. And this ill-will, this
emotional state, is a very serious hindrance to one's
spiritual practice. Something which really comes in
the way. And for that reason, I think
it's important to talk about it. And also to be very pragmatic
about it. And to talk about how can we
overcome this ill-will. What can we do about it?
Practical ways of dealing with this particular.
This particular emotion becomes very important.
But before I go on to talk about the practicalities of this, how
to deal with it, I also want to talk a little bit about why it
is so important. What are the problems with
ill-will? And I think straight away, some
of these things will be very obvious to you.
Why it is such a bad thing with ill-will.
I think it's very, very clear. We all know from our daily
lives, if there is a problem with irritation or ill-will,
it's always going to be, disturbing for people around us,
our family, friends, acquaintances, and also for
colleagues and people you meet in everyday life.
There's always problems that arise from ill-will.
It's very, very obvious. But also if you look at society
at large, you see so many of the problems that we have in society
at large, whether it's wars, terrorism, ethnic cleansing,
genocide, all these terrible things that are happening around
the world. So much of that is happening
because of ill-will. Because of anger and because of
this particular emotion. So it is a massive problem for
society. And it's a massive problem also
in our private lives. That is the obvious reason why
ill-will is a problem. But much more subtle than that,
it is also a very big problem if you want to practice a spiritual
life. If you want to be a good person,
obviously ill-will is going to really stand in the way.
It's going to be a massive obstacle for you.
And the way that ill-will is an obstacle, now we're coming more
into the Buddhist context here, the first obstacle is simply
that ill-will in its own right is actually bad kamma according
to Buddhism. Bad kamma means of course that
it is, if you have ill-will, it has negative consequences for
yourself in the future. Ill-will is not some kind of
neutral thing which doesn't have any consequences.
Just on its own it has consequences.
And it ripens in suffering. It ripens in pain in the future
for ourselves and obviously also for others.
And of course ill-will is not as serious as acting on that
ill-will. If you act on ill-will through
speech and body, of course that is much, much more serious.
But it's still interesting that ill-will on its own is actually
bad kamma. And it ripens in problems in the
future. And you can see that for
example. Imagine if you die with a state
of ill-will in your mind. What happens when you do that?
What happens if you die with such a state?
Well, if you believe in rebirth, obviously that mind is going to
go to something which is equivalent to that ill-will.
It's just going to go to a bad state.
It's very obvious. And this is how we can see the
ripening of ill-will in itself as having bad consequences for
the future. That is one aspect why ill-will
is so problematic. Another aspect is simply that if
you have a mental state of ill-will, we all probably, many
of you probably know the very famous verse in the Dhammapada,
first verse and second verse in Dhammapada, which says that mind
is a forerunner. And just like, I don't think I
can do it actually verbatim, or anything like that.
But basically the idea is that mind is the forerunner of all
things. So that if you do something with
a bad mind state, then bad things are going to come to you.
And I think similarly something like just as the cart follows
the ox's hoof when you plough or something like that.
So the mind of ill-will is always the forerunner.
And one way this makes itself happen is that when you, in
daily life, if you tend to have, when you tend to have irritation
or ill-will in your mind, then your actions and your speech
will tend to be accordingly. They will tend to be negative.
And they will tend to be
influenced by that ill-will. And it's actually very, it's
very tiring and very problematic to always have to restrain
yourself from that ill-will. Because that is basically what a
lot of the spiritual life is about.
It is to understand that when you have a negative mind state,
then you have to hold back and you have to restrain yourself.
You can't allow these things to come out in action and speech.
Because if you do, you're going to be doing all kinds of stupid
things. Hurting people around you,
hurting yourself and whatever. So in a sense it's painful to
have this, to have ill-will. Because once it's there, or
irritation, then the tendency will be to act on it.
And you have to hold back. And that holding back in itself
is painful and is something which hurts.
So for this very reason, if we then can turn the mind around
and move it towards, away from ill-will, move it towards loving
kindness, compassion, empathy, even equanimity with other
beings, then you can see that you are, just as you are moving
the mind away from that, you will also be moving your other
actions of speech and body away from these things.
Because just as mind is forerunner when it comes to
these negative states, it is obviously also forerunner when
it comes to the positive states. So if you have a positive mind
state, then it's going to be very easy to do nice things.
It comes automatically. It's no longer a burden on you.
It happens on its own, so to speak.
And the spiritual life becomes much more automatic and much
easier to do. So you can see here the enormous
benefits of actually improving your mental state.
As it improves gradually, step by step, then gradually, step by
step, also, virtue, kindness, morality, all these other things
happen much more automatic to you.
And it becomes much more easy to practice this spiritual life.
And I think this is an enormous benefit, obviously.
And this is one reason why working on these kind of mind
states and trying to turn them around and move them into a
direction of kindness instead is so powerful and has so much
potential. But there is more than that,
because the other area in which having a positive mind is very
helpful is obviously from meditation practice.
Ill will or even slight irritation or even just
negativity is going to be incredibly problematic in
meditation practice because the mind is not pure.
You're going to find it's very hard to focus on anything, to
practice. Even to be mindful is going to
be difficult if you have these negative mind states.
And the more pure the mind is, the more free it is from these
negative states, and the more positive states you have
developed, the more powerful your meditation is going to be.
So it is very important. Actually, a very important
practice for those people who are serious about meditation
practice to try to reduce ill, negative states as much as
possible. So these are some of the
profound and very important benefits of reducing these
negative states. And it's interesting also to
note that the Buddha said something very interesting about
ill will. Those of you who have some
knowledge of the suttas, you may realize that the Buddha usually
talked about three types of root problems in the mind.
Now these three root problems are beside ill will.
There's also like desire or greed.
And the last one is delusion. Delusion basically means that
you don't know what's going on. You're looking at the world in a
way which is not conducive to happiness for yourself or for
others. That's basically what delusion
means. And the Buddha said that of
these three root defilements, the one which is easiest to get
rid of is actually ill will. That's the one which is easiest
to deal with. And for that reason alone, it
becomes very important obviously to deal with this particular
thing because it isn't that difficult.
And I think it's obviously, I should say relatively easy here
because obviously it's not that easy.
But it's more easy than, for example, greed or desire.
And you can see why. The reason why is obviously
because anger, or ill will, or irritation, it's painful.
It's something which hurts you before it hurts the person that
you may be angry at or the situation you may be angry at.
It's a bit like the ancient simile of picking up a piece of
hot coal to throw it at somebody else.
Now the person you burn first when you pick up a piece of hot
coal is yourself and not the other person.
And anger is in a sense exactly the same.
If you're going to be angry, you are going to hurt yourself
before you hurt the person or whoever it is who is the object
of that anger. So for that reason, because it
is painful, not only is it painful, but it's very clear
that the consequences are so negative, it becomes relatively
easy to overcome it. And there are of course also
some very good strategies to use to overcome these states.
By comparison, a thing like greed, for example, or desire, I
mean, first of all, if we just desire, it very often can be
fairly harmless. It doesn't necessarily harm
anybody else. And moreover, it tends to be
pleasurable. It tends to be, you know, if we
desire some food or desire to go to the movies or whatever, all
these are pleasurable objects. And for that reason, this desire
or greed is something much more difficult to give up because it
has this sense of something nice about it usually, something we
actually want to do. And the last thing, delusion,
well, delusion is really, really, really difficult.
And the reason is because delusion means not understanding
things properly here. And because you don't understand
things properly here, you will tend not to see that you don't
understand things properly here. You won't be able to see this.
It is a blind spot for you. You can't see what's going on
there. And that's why it's so hard to
give it up. And if somebody else tells you
that you should look at it this way, you will tend to reject
that because you are already looking at things in a certain
way. You are already looking at
things in a certain way which may not be good, which may
actually be conducive to harm and all kinds of problems.
So delusion is very difficult to give up.
So ill will here is the one which is easiest to give up.
And also, in addition to that, ill will is the one which is
most harmful. Just like I said before, it's
harmful for your spiritual life. It's harmful for harmony between
you and your family and friends. It is harmful for society in
general. So it's a very harmful emotional
state. So that's the other reason why
it is so. There is a lot of incentive
there to give it up because it causes so much trouble for
ourselves and others. Whereas greed, as I said before,
isn't that harmful. Delusion is very harmful.
But because it's so difficult to give up, it's probably not the
best place to start. So that is just to give you some
incentive there to practice this.
Once we have the incentive, the next aspect is to ask ourselves,
well, how, what are the ways, what are the strategies that we
can use to give up these negative emotional states?
And maybe before I go on to the strategies, I should talk a
little bit about the, because this is quite important as well,
the mechanism by which ill will arises in the mind.
Because it may seem obvious, but I think the Buddha made it very
clear in the suttas how ill will arises.
How ill will arises. How anger actually arises in the
mind. It's quite, obviously quite an
important topic. Otherwise, you wouldn't have
spoken about it. And when I thought about giving
this, talking about ill will, it occurred to me that a nice title
for this sort of talk would be Deal with Anger Before Anger
Deals with You. And the reason I thought that
would be a good title for the talk is because anger dealing
with you sounds, to some people, may sound a bit strange.
Because anger is not really something which deals with
anything. Anger is just something which
comes up in the mind. And for anybody who is not a
Buddhist and who doesn't have, if you like, a little bit of
introspection on how anger works, they won't really
understand what is meant by this anger dealing with you.
But if you have a little bit of introspection and you know how
the mind works, you know that if you are overcome by anger,
irritation, or negativity, then it's almost like you become a
victim of that anger. It's almost like you can't do
anything about it. Once it becomes strong in the
mind, it's like anger becomes the lord, so to speak, the
overlord which controls you. And it's very, very difficult to
do anything. And so this is why it becomes so
frightening in a sense. Because once we allow it to
arise, it becomes very hard to deal with it.
And the Buddha explained basically what happens with
anger. Basically what is happening with
anger and ill will is that the reason it arises in the mind is
because we are focusing on a repulsive object.
We are focusing on something which we don't like, something
negative, something which is unpleasant basically.
And when we see this repulsive thing or we hear something
repulsive or whatever, then ill will, irritation, etc. can arise
in the mind because of that. So this is basically what we
have to look out for. And this is a place where
mindfulness becomes very important.
Very often, there's so much said about mindfulness in Buddhism.
It's a very, very important concept in Buddhism, the concept
of mindfulness. It is useful in all kinds of
areas. But very often it is talked
about together with insight. And understanding.
But actually, mindfulness is important already at this very,
very simple level of just being able to understand how the mind
works and to be able to see what is going on in the mind in terms
of these negative states. Already at this point,
mindfulness is powerful and very important.
Because if you are going to catch yourself about to get
irritated or about to get angry, then you have to see what is
happening inside the mind. And if you are going to catch
yourself about to get irritated or about to get angry, then you
have to see what is happening inside the mind.
And if mindfulness is powerful, you will actually be able to see
that, OK, if I continue focusing on this object, if I continue
listening to what this person is saying, it's only going to be a
matter of seconds before something starts happening.
I start to get irritated or I start to get angry.
So you can catch yourself very, very early on and you can see
that something is about to happen which is not good.
And of course, that is very important.
And it is very important because, as I said before, once
anger is established in the mind, then you become a slave to
it and it's almost impossible to do anything about it once it's
established there. It's not impossible, but it
takes time then. It's not going to go away very
quickly. It takes much more time and it's
much more difficult. The sooner you can catch it, the
more effective is going to be the antidote that you put into
place to get rid of it. So this is an important point.
An important power of mindfulness to actually catch
these things early. But still, we might be...
You might see that something is going on wrong in the mind.
We may see that, well, if I continue focusing on this, then
something bad is going to happen inside of me.
We might be able to see that. But that is obviously not in
itself enough because just sitting there and seeing anger
arising, anger arising, it's not going to do anything.
We also have to put an antidote into place, to do something
about it. And that is the next...
So that is the next step then. What, how can we deal with these
negative states? What are some effective
strategies for dealing with anger and negativity?
And these strategies, in a sense, they work on two levels.
The first one is that if you catch yourself, and you see that
you're about to get angry, bang, in comes a strategy, and you use
it to stop it just there, just before it arises.
But of course, being realistic, we also have to realize that
very often we just won't be able to catch it in time.
It's going to be too late. And then these strategies also
can be used to overcome the anger which has already arisen.
Even though that's more difficult, obviously it is
something that we also have to do.
So it has this two-pronged, two-pronged thing that we can
use it for. And the first of these
strategies is what you might call the strategy of seeing
things as the way they are. The way it is.
The way it is is a fairly well-known book by an American
monk called Ajahn Sumedho, which probably many of you have heard
of. He is one of the senior Western
disciples of Ajahn Chah. And he lives in England.
And he wrote a book many years ago called The Way It Is.
I can't remember the content very well anymore because I read
it about ten years ago or something.
But the essence, as I remember, of that book is that the world
basically works in a certain way.
This is the way the world is. And because the world works in a
certain way, then basically we're going to have to accept it
that this is the way the world works.
And the point here is that so often we get angry and we get
upset and we get irritated about things that we can't do anything
about. There's nothing we can do about
things. We meet people who say stupid
things, who say irritating things.
But that's just the way life is, isn't it?
You're not going to be able to get away from meeting people who
say stupid or irritating things. It's impossible.
This is the nature of being a human being, is that you're
going to meet stupid people. So unfortunately, but that's the
case, isn't it? And sometimes they're not even
stupid. Sometimes it's just we who
perceive them to be stupid. That's the other thing here.
So because of that, because this is the way it is, basically what
you have to do is say, well, I can't do anything about this.
I just have to sit back. I'm going to have to accept.
I'm going to have to just let go, basically.
There's nothing else to do here. That's all I can really do.
And it can be this. I know many people who have used
this sort of technique. And they're not Buddhists.
They're not even religious. They're ordinary people in
ordinary life. Because they have realized for
themselves that, well, this life is like this.
Reality is like this. It throws up all these painful
and negative situations. And it's just most of the time
it is completely, actually all of the time, I should say, not
most of the time, all of the time, it is senseless to react
with anger because it is not going to change anything.
The world is like this. Things are like this.
There's nothing I can do here. So what this means is that when
you, in your life, and you see that something is happening,
somebody is saying something which is irritating or negative
or bad, and you see that if I continue focusing on this, then
anger or irritation is going to arise in my mind, then
straightaway I tell you, well, this is life.
This is what I have to expect. This is the way people are.
And because people are this way, because this is the way things
are, there is no reason to get irritated.
There is no reason to get angry about this.
I'm going to have to accept this.
I'm going to have to let go. And then there already you have
a very, very powerful technique for overcoming these unwholesome
things. So that is the first strategy or
technique, if you like. The second one is what you might
call giving people or giving things situations, but
particularly people, giving them the benefit of the doubt.
And this is another very, very important thing to do because it
is so easy to judge situations and to judge people and to think
that we understand where they're coming from, what they're doing,
and why they're doing what they're doing.
And because we think we understand what is happening, we
have the right to be angry. We have the right to become
upset and to get irritated with these people.
But so often we just don't understand.
So often we judge people in the wrong way.
We take the situations wrongly, not really understanding what is
going on. And basically we get upset and
irritated for nothing because there wasn't really anything
there to get upset with. For example, we may feel that
somebody is acting in a way which is strange and wrong and
irritating. But then we actually realize
that it's not, it's got nothing to do with us that they're
acting this way. This is the way they are.
This is the way this person is. And they're like this to
everybody. It is a very, very powerful
technique. It's just one of their habits.
And it's a completely impersonal thing.
And because of that, you just have to give that person the
benefit of the doubt. They're not coming from anger or
ill will or from negativity or trying to harm us or trying to
be stupid or trying to do anything wrong.
It's just the way they are, just the way they have been
conditioned in life that they do this particular thing which
happens to irritate us. So we have to give the person
the benefit of the doubt that they're not doing anything
purposely to make us irritated or angry.
And there is a, I think there is a nice saying, I think it's a
French saying originally, which I really like.
And this saying goes something like this, that to understand
everything is to forgive everything.
And I'm sure you can relate to that from just what I just said
just now, that if you understand everything about yourself, if
you understand everything about other people, if you understand
the way they are conditioned, the way, the reason why they act
the way they do, if you understand their sufferings, if
you understand their sorrows and their pains, if you understand
everything about a person, then you can forgive them because
you, in a sense, can put yourself in their shoes and you
understand exactly why they're doing what they're doing.
So to understand everything is to forgive everything.
And it becomes very powerful because it means that if you
don't forgive somebody, if you can't let go of their anger, it
means that you're not understanding them.
It means that you are not, there's something there you're
not seeing. If you had seen it, you would
have been able to forgive. So this, again, the second
method, giving people the benefit of the doubt, again, can
become very powerful. And again, as I said before, you
can use it at the moment when you think anger is about to
arise. You say, wait a minute, I don't
really understand this person. I don't really know where
they're coming from. Why should I judge them?
There is no need to judge them. Much better to let go and to
give them the benefit of the doubt.
And again, if anger has already risen, then again, it can become
a very useful way of thinking about what has already happened.
So both of those techniques can be very powerful and can be very
strong. But they're very kind of
non-religious. They are just ordinary
psychology, which probably any psychologist could tell you.
There's ordinary common sense, really, to look at things this
way. But now I want to move on to
some methods which are more like Buddhist methods of overcoming
anger. And the first of these methods
is to use the laws of kamma, to help you overcome these negative
states. And there's two ways we can use
the laws of kamma. The first one is to think that
there is no need for me to take revenge or to get angry with
this person. Because if this person really
has done something wrong, really has been nasty in some way, then
they will get retribution through the laws of kamma.
I don't have to deal with them. The laws of kamma will deal with
them on their own. And besides, I don't really know
anything about if they have been nasty anyway.
So either way, there's no point in actually being angry with
them or being upset with them. And the laws of...
What is important here is maybe to have some understanding of
how powerful these laws of kamma are.
If you accept the laws of kamma, then the Buddha said that the
law of kamma is not like a one-to-one retribution.
You do something bad, and you get exactly the same thing in
return. It doesn't work like that.
The law of kamma has this incredible multiplier effect.
So a person does something bad, and they get something in return
many, many, many fold over because of that.
And this can be frightening. It can be scary.
Because you get the sense that doing bad things is actually
something which can cause so much suffering and so much harm
for yourself in the future. So when you see something doing
something which you think that they are doing it for the wrong
reason, they are being nasty or something, then think about how
much suffering they are creating for themselves.
They may be creating a little bit of suffering for you because
you have to go through the situation, but they are creating
far, far, far, far, far, far more suffering for themselves in
the future. And this way you can turn the
attention a little bit away from yourself.
Forget about yourself for a minute.
It's so easy to be self-centered.
I think that's one of the human conditions.
We always tend to be self-centered.
We look at ourselves and think, oh, I'm really hurt.
And it's obvious because we can feel our own pain.
So it's quite natural to be self-centered to some extent.
But in this case, it's very wise to turn the attention away from
yourself and turn it towards the other person instead and realize
that the pain that they are creating for themselves is just
so enormous and so bad. And the results for them in the
future are going to be very severe.
And then you can actually turn potential irritation, potential
anger into empathy and compassion instead.
Because that's what compassion is all about.
Compassion is about seeing the suffering of others.
And when you see the suffering of others, well, often you tend
to feel a sense of... You feel something there.
You feel that, oh, this is terrible that this person or
this animal or whoever has to suffer so much.
When I say ill-will. So if you're not blinded by
anger already, then you might be able to give rise to that sense
of compassion, empathy, What can we do about it?
to this other person. Because you see what a terrible
state they are in. And again, I think, personally,
I feel this can be a very powerful technique.
It's obviously a Buddhist technique, but it's something I
think everybody should try to use.
Because it can turn something potentially unwholesome into
something wholesome. And that is obviously what we
are really trying to do, is to eliminate the unwholesome so
that we can give rise to the wholesome instead.
So if you can do everything in one go, great.
Go for it. That's the way to go.
The second way that we can look at kamma and make use of kamma
to overcome these negative states is to realize that if
something bad happens to us, then very often it is because of
our own bad kamma in the past. We are probably deserving of
this. It may not be true, but it is.
It may not be a nice thought. But the point here is not so
much that we have done anything specific in the past that we
deserve now to suffer for that. That is not so much the point I
want to make. Because a lot of the things, a
lot of the problems that we encounter in daily life cannot
often be traced to a specific cause, to a specific action that
we have done before, either in this life or in a previous life.
Rather, it is much more useful to think about it, as having bad
consequences for the future. to look at this as the result of
kamma or having been born into the human state.
Because the human state is a state of mixed happiness and
mixed suffering. There is a little bit of each.
And being born as a human being means, as I said before, that
you are going to meet all kinds of people.
You cannot avoid people who are going to irritate you.
They will tend to be negative. You cannot avoid accidents.
You cannot avoid troubles with the government or with whatever.
These things are going to happen.
Because that is basically what a lot of the spiritual life is
about. And this is just the way it is.
And you are going to have to accept it.
And it is, if you like, the kamma, the result of having been
born as a human being, basically.
A human being means there is going to be a fair share of
suffering in your life. You are not going to get away
from it. Obviously, you are going to have
more happiness than suffering, most of the time anyway, because
that is also the result of being human, is that you get mostly
pleasant states. But you are not going to get
away from those negative states. So again, when you look at it
that way, you say, OK, I am a human.
What do I expect? I have to expect these things.
So you don't get so upset when they happen to you.
Now, I want to say a little bit more about this, because what I
just said may sound very deterministic.
It may sound like, well, I should just sit back and accept
whatever happens to me and never really try to deal with it,
never try to do anything about it.
And that is not really what I am saying.
What I am saying is just that if something bad happens to you, is
so powerful and has so much potential. which is always a bad
solution in almost all situations, I am not going to
try to speculate whether there are good situations to get angry
in, but I would say it is always basically a bad response.
So because of that, it is useful to think that I am human, these
things happen to me, and this is the way it is.
But, and then comes the next step, to do something about it.
When you realize that to be human, there is a lot of
suffering in being a human being, then you ask yourself,
well, what can I do about this? What should my strategy be to
reduce this suffering in myself? And here comes in another
beautiful simile, which is taught by the Buddha in the
suttas. And this is the famous simile of
the lump of salt. Which you may have heard before.
And what this simile essentially says is that if you have a lump
of salt, now this lump of salt is a simile for the amount of
bad things that you have done in the past.
If you have a lump of salt, about ill will. and you stick
that lump of salt in a glass of water, then that water is going
to become undrinkable. Now the water in the glass of
water is the amount of good kamma that you have made.
So you have made a small amount of good kamma, only a glass of
water, I'm talking about something quite substantial now,
not one of those tiny grains of salt we normally see here.
That's the one which is easiest to deal with.
You put that in a glass of water, it becomes undrinkable.
That is the result of the bad kamma.
It tastes terrible. It becomes undrinkable.
And that is, that taste, that bitterness of that taste, The
reason why is obviously because anger,that is the experience of
the bad actions that you have done..
It becomes bad. It's something which hurts you
before it hurts the person Because you have done a small
amount of good kamma, and a fair amount of bad kamma, And anger
is in a sense exactly the same., like a lake or a river.
In the sutta, the Buddha says, you stick it in the river
Ganges. And of course, if you stick that
lump of salt in the river Ganges, and you stir it up
really well, you won't be able to taste it anymore.
Or maybe you will taste a very, very tiny, tiny bit, there
obviously will be salt in there. So there should, at least in
theory, be a tiny taste. But the taste will almost have
disappeared. It tends to be, you know, if we
desire some food or in the large lake that you are putting your
salt in, that is like the good kamma you have made.
You have made an enormous amount of good kamma in your life.
Because of that, the results of the bad kamma will hardly be
noticeable to you. You will hardly know that they
are even happening here. So this then becomes a strategy.
This becomes the right way of dealing with unpleasant things
in life. things properly here. But the right way is just to
realize that if I make good kamma in this life, then I will
experience the negative results of my past bad kamma will become
much less painful. And that becomes a very powerful
incentive to do good. Now obviously, to make a whole
Ganges river of good kamma is not easy.
I think the river Ganges is something like if you are an
Arahant, you have made a river Ganges of good kamma.
There is a lot of incentive there to give it up because it
causes so much But at least you can make much more than a glass
of water. You can maybe make a bucket of
water of good kamma, or a small puddle of good kamma, or a basin
of good kamma, or maybe even a small lake of good kamma.
You can make a lot. And the more you make, the more
diluted that taste of salt is going to be in that body of
water. So that is the way to do it.
Don't be fatalistic. This is not the fatalistic
religion. It is about dealing with things
in a skillful way, in a wholesome way, and not in an
unwholesome way. The other thing about this is
that sometimes you may come across situations which are so
difficult to deal with that you don't really know what to do.
And when I thought about giving this, talking about ill will,
For example, there may be a situation where somebody is very
irritating over a long period of time.
And you realize that even though you use these skillful
techniques, you try to use them, you can't actually make them
work. And fair enough.
We have to be realistic about spiritual life.
Spiritual life is about both being idealistic, but also
realistic. Don't be so idealistic that you
try the impossible in your spiritual life.
Otherwise, you are just going to get frustrated.
And frustration is another form of anger.
So then you have a problem again.
So the thing to do is sometimes if you come across a situation
which is really, really difficult, sometimes it is best
maybe to try to avoid that situation.
Avoid the person or avoid the situation to the best of your
ability so you don't have to deal with something which
essentially you don't feel up to and which you feel you can't do
basically. This is realism in the spiritual
life. Sometimes these things happen
and it's okay. Maybe you feel that, well, if I
just walk away, that will have a negative impact on me or a
negative impact on the other person.
But the point is that if you find it very difficult, then the
impact of that negativity or irritation is going to be much,
much worse than the impact of sometimes just staying away and
staying aloof. So because at least when you
stay aloof, you don't have to do it with a mind of negativity or
ill will. You just do it because you
realize that this is what I have to do in this particular
situation. So again, it's not about being
deterministic in spiritual life. It's not about accepting
everything as it is. It's about making the best out
of the situation and sometimes even avoiding situations which
are too difficult or even finding ways out of situations
which are neither avoiding nor anything else, but using your
imagination and intelligence to find a way of dealing with it
which is not unwholesome. So that is the kamma aspect and
using kamma to overcome ill will.
The last thing I want to talk about for overcoming these
negative states is I want to bring up a simile which Ajahn
Brahm wrote about or has written about in his book, Opening the
Door of Your Heart. And it's a very profound simile.
And I must say that this book which Ajahn Brahm has written,
Opening the Door of Your Heart, on the surface it may seem like
a very simple book. All the stories are very easily
read and they are very easy to take in on the superficial
level. But some of these stories are
really profound. So this is an important point.
And if you look at them carefully, you will see that
there is a lot of profundity in these stories.
So often it's worthwhile reading this book many times over to
actually allow the stories to sink in properly and to
understand the deeper aspects of them.
And one of these stories which actually has a very deep aspect
to it is the story which you may remember.
It's in the chapter of anger and forgiveness, I think it's
called, something like that. It's the first story there.
It's about a simile of the red light.
And this simile which Ajahn Brahm brings up, and he doesn't
explain it in that much detail, so you have to be quite
perceptive to understand the full depth of this simile here.
But the point of this simile is that what Ajahn Brahm says is
that sometimes we also have to realize that very oftene driving
along, they are in a hurry, they have a meeting they want to get
to, there is something important, somewhere important
that they have to get to. And just as they are approaching
a light, it turns red. And they get angry.
They get really, really upset at this red light.
They start shouting, you terrible light!
And he lives in England. You got angry because you saw me
coming around the corner. You knew I was coming around the
corner. You terrible, terrible light!
grab hold of the, what was it called, you just did this on
purpose. And of course the point here is
of course that who say irritating things. if other
people see you do that, and they see you starting shaking a red
light because they get so angry with it, they will think that
you are a bit funny, a bit crazy even.
And fair enough, you know. You are acting in a slightly
crazy way if you start shaking a red light.
You actually, you are, you are treating this light as if it has
a will of its own, as if it is deciding to do something, which
of course it isn't. And the point here is of course
that a red light has an electronic circuit in it, after
three minutes you become red, after another two minutes you
become green again, and after another three minutes you become
red again. So it is absolutely silly to go
to a red light and shout at it and scream at it because there
is absolutely nothing that a red light can do about that
situation. A red light is completely
without any decisions. Yes, I am going to get red now
when that person comes. It doesn't do that.
A red light just becomes red of its own.
It is very obvious, isn't it? But the point of this simile,
and I don't know how clear it is when you read it, is that people
are in effect just like red lights.
When you come across somebody who does something, which is not
nice, come across somebody who does something you feel is a bit
nasty or negative or something which you don't like, then in
effect you can see them as a red light.
Why is that? Because this person is doing
this, not because they are thinking, ha, I am going to get
this person. They are doing it because some
kind of condition which has arisen, some kind of cause which
has happened inside of them. giving them the benefit of the
doubt. Remember in Buddhism we teach
the doctrine that there is no self.
So there is nobody sitting in there thinking, ha, I am going
to treat this person badly. There are just conditions and
there are causes arising in the mind.
These causes and conditions make this person do these things in
exactly the same thing as causes and conditions make a red light
go red every five minutes or three minutes or whatever.
It is a very powerful simile and it is very difficult to actually
grasp it fully. You can only grasp this fully I
would say. to get upset with. Because to understand non-self
fully is only a person on the path to enlightenment which can
understand these things. But it is very useful still
nonetheless if you can grasp the general idea of what is going on
here. That a person is like a red
light because they are conditioned by causes and by all
kinds of things around t em. Then you will start to
understand It's just one of their habits. much more about
Buddhism understanding of what runs people around you.
But because it is difficult to understand, because it is
profound, you will not always be able to make this work because
it is just too much basically. But still it is something that
you can play around with and see if you can make it work.
Okay, so those are the five ways that I want to talk about, about
ways of overcoming these negative emotions.
And I have the way that you should use these five ways.
I should say a little bit about that.
First of all, it is not necessary obviously to use these
things just as I have been mentioning them now.
Very often the most effective way of using something is
bringing your own understanding and your own wisdom into the
picture. Because it is when it is your
own understanding and your own wisdom which uses a particular
technique, it becomes much more powerful for you.
It is not something which you are using automatically, but it
is something which you really feel that you understand in your
heart. you would have been able to forgive.
And that is what makes it powerful.
So don't use these things automatically, but think about
them and reflect and see if there is a way that you can make
them real in your own life and make them powerful in your own
life. And you can even use completely
different strategies. If you have your own favourite
strategy which works for you, then you can use that as well.
Basically, these strategies, And again, if anger has already
risen, or not, ell. . fe. s it powerful. see that so is by the
results they give. It is the result which is the
important factor here in whether these strategies are good or
not. And the way to use them is that
don't wait with using these things until a situation happens
when you actually need it. Try sometimes to reflect on
these things. Reflect on whether any of these
techniques make sense to you. Reflect, maybe bring up a person
which sometimes irritates you, maybe even a colleague or maybe
even a family member. You know what it is like if you
have lived together for a long, long, long time.
Then there is always a tendency that there are small things then
they will get retribution It comes up and it is like they are
pushing a button and irritation comes up.
So when you are by yourself, see if you can think about this
person or that situation and bring up one of these techniques
and see if you can overcome it. You can overcome that problem by
using this technique. So in a sense you are building
up some muscle before the situation actually happens.
And you are making these perceptions, these are basically
perceptions or ideas, you are making them work before the
situation occurs so that when the situation happens you have
some power there, you have some muscle that you can use.
So this becomes important. The one thing which I haven't
talked about at all and which may surprise some of you, is I
haven't talked about metta practice, or loving-kindness
practice. Because this is a very powerful
technique that we use in Buddhism.
And the reason I haven't talked about it is basically because I
wanted to talk about how to deal with anger just as it is about
to arise or when it has already arisen.
Now loving-kindness is something that you should use not when
anger is already there, but you should use it when you are
feeling good, when you are feeling happy, when you are
feeling good about yourself. You don't have any particular
irritations or angers to the people around you.
That's when you should develop it.
Because if you already have a mind which is negative, it is
very difficult to make loving-kindness work.
It just doesn't come up in the mind.
So build up loving-kindness, certainly do loving-kindness
meditation or even just loving-kindness practice of any
kind. Do that because it is a very
powerful technique to overcome anger.
But do it when you are feeling good, when you are feeling
happy. And then as you practice this
loving-kindness, as you start to perceive the good in people
around you, this is what loving-kindness essentially is
about, it's about perceiving the goodness in people around you.
As you do that, then this is again another powerful waythen
you might be able to give rise of counteracting anger.
Because seeing goodness is the opposite of getting angry.
And the more goodness you see, the less likely it is that you
will become irritated or angered by anybody or by any particular
person. So definitely use it, but don't
use it when you are angry already.
Okay, so the last thing I should maybe say is that like all
things in the spiritual life, Practice these things over long
periods of time. Test them out.
And don't look for results straight away.
Look for results after maybe a few months, That is not so much
the point I want to make. And then you will start to see
that these things actually work. I always like to, I always, one
thing I always do in my monastic life is I, I always look back at
myself and look at what was I like when I started out as a
monk. And what am I like now?
And I always, that makes me very happy when I do it that way.
But if I look at all the flaws we are still to get dealt with,
then it can sometimes be a bit more depressing.
But you have to have that long perspective.
And you have to have the perspective of maybe 10 years
even, which I have as a monk now.
It doesn't have to be that long. But that is very helpful because
you can see a lot of progress in 10 years' time.
So don't be impatient. And this is just the way it is.
And one thing is absolutely sure, the results will happen.
Okay. Thank you.
So... Any questions or comments or
anything anybody wants to say here?
is t at you get mostly pleasant states.g hu Right.
Very open. You become rigid and angry.
Right. Yeah.
Right. Exactly.
Yeah, that's true. And this is one of the places,
that's why you will find resistance.
You can use these techniques which I just mentioned.
But you're going to find resistance in there often.
And often they won't work. And very often that is
precisely, as you say, it's the ego, it's the self which gets in
the way. They have hurt me.
I am upset. Right?
It becomes a personal thing, you know.
And one of the ways of actually countering that is, one of the
ways which I sometimes use as well, is that to think that,
well, this person, this is actually not a personal thing.
does something wrong, and you have made The reason they do it
is because, if it is directed towards you, it is some kind of
aspect within you, which has triggered that particular thing.
Now, if that aspect had been present, if it wasn't in some
other person, it would also trigger that thing here.
So it is an impersonal thing. It has nothing to do with you,
basically. So you have to think of this
thing in impersonal ways, and you can start to take it away.
But I think you're quite right. In all situations, this is never
going to be perfect. You're never going to be able to
overcome anger 100% like this. So you're just going to have to
gradually reduce it, and reduce it, and reduce it.
And until you become an anagami, almost fully enlightened,
there's always going to be a residue there of anger, or at
least potential anger left. You have made an enormous amount
of good kamma in your life. is as you practice and as you go
along this path, you will find that your sense of ego is going
to get reduced, slowly and surely.
As you become more virtuous, you find a sense of internal
happiness inside you. But the right way is just to
realize that if I make good kamma in this life, That sense
of internal happiness is independent of the causes
outside. You don't feel that you have to
do anything. You don't have to defend
yourself so much anymore, because you have something
powerful inside of you, which works instead. and you can leave
these things behind gradually, step by step.
So the spiritual path itself, with all the various factors
that it actually employs, will slowly but surely reduce that
problem as well. Anybody else have anything they
want to say? Okay.
Thank you.