Passion for Dispassion

Years back, I was teaching a retreat, and one of the people on the retreat asked, “Why is it that the Buddha assumes that everybody is basically good?” I had to correct the question. The Buddha never assumed that people are basically good. As he said, the mind is capable of all kinds of things, and it can reverse itself very quickly, so quickly that even he, who was a master of analogies and similes, had no adequate analogy for how fast it is to change its direction. What he did assume is that we all want happiness.

But, as he said, on the night of his awakening, he surveyed the world with the eye of a Buddha, and he saw that everybody was on fire. We’re looking for happiness through our passion, through our aversion, through our delusion. In other words, we’re looking for happiness in the wrong places, and in the wrong way.

So he had to teach us that there’s an alternative way of looking for happiness that actually does lead to a genuine happiness, a happiness that doesn’t change at all. A happiness that once you’ve gained it, it’s there: It doesn’t turn into anything else. That’s the path we’re on as we practice—the path to genuine happiness—but it requires that we see the suffering in the ways that we ordinarily look for happiness.

After all, that’s the Buddha’s definition of the first noble truth: things we cling to, activities that we enjoy. We enjoy feeling and perception, and we enjoy fabricating our thoughts. We enjoy consciousness at the senses. The idea that we could find happiness by not being passionate for these things, not clinging to these things, goes against the grain, because we’ve been clinging for who knows how long? So there’s a lot in the message of the Buddha that goes against our expectations. The question is: Are we willing to change our expectations, to take him seriously when he says there is a cessation of suffering, and it’s the ultimate rest, the ultimate refuge, harbor, safety, total freedom?

Now, to get there requires that we become dispassionate for the things that we have been looking for happiness in. This is where it goes against the grain, because we look for feelings of pleasure. We enjoy having perceptions about the world around us, and making comments about the world around us. The mind’s running commentary is one of its pleasures in life.

You look back through history. In periods of time when people were really oppressed, that was their main way of countering the oppression: criticizing the oppressor, making fun of the oppressor. Maybe not to the oppressor’s face, but being able to criticize inside.

The problem is that so often the feelings we go for, the perceptions we go for, the ways we think, actually cause us to suffer. Think about our habit of making a running commentary on the world around us. “This is good, that’s bad. I like this, I don’t like that. This is right. This is wrong.” With everybody commenting on everybody else, no wonder we have so much conflict.

You don’t have to look anywhere else, just look at the kitchen in Wat Metta. Everybody’s commenting on everybody else—and everybody’s causing themselves to suffer.

So we have to look at the things that we’re clinging to, and to see that they’re not worth it. Our passion for these things is what makes us suffer.

Now, the Buddha’s not telling us to just dry up and not have any desires at all. He says to focus your desires on the path, be passionate for the path. It’ll give you something to work on. Given that the mind likes fabricating things, fabricate the path. Put it together—like right now, meditating on the breath.

The breath itself is a fabrication. There’s an intentional element in it. That’s what fabrication means. If you want to run a running commentary, comment on the breath. How does it feel? Where would it feel really good to focus on the breath? What parts of the body seem to be especially sensitive to a* *really comfortable breath?

Usually it’s down the front of the torso, but some people find it down the back. Other people find it going deep into the brain. There are very sensitive spots inside the head where, when you breathe in, it feels really good to get the breath energy all the way in there. So find your sensitive spots, and hold in mind whatever perceptions are helpful to get the breath really satisfying in those spots.

As you construct the path, learn to be passionate about this: trying to figure out your mind, because that’s what the big issue is. We want happiness, but we do things that lead to suffering, and it’s out of our ignorance.

Whereas Ajaan Suwat would say, “It’s out of our stupidity.” We should be able to see that acts we’re doing are leading to suffering, but we don’t. We tend to blame the suffering on somebody else, somewhere else, something outside. Why is that?

We’re here to figure out our own minds, and that should be interesting. After all, seeing how the mind lies to itself is like a detective novel: Who committed the crime? And how did they cover it up?

The irony here is that the mind is lying to itself, right to its face. It does things here in the present moment, and then it disguises them. So we should be interested in how this happens because, after all, our happiness is at stake.

There are some people who find the processes of getting the mind into concentration really interesting. Other people find concentration easy, not so much of an issue, but then they get interested more in the discernment side: figuring out where their attachments are, why they’re attached, what they can do to pry lose those attachments. But the important thing is you learn how to be passionate for the path.

The Buddha talks about six things that you can take delight in that help you along the path. The first, of course, is simply delighting in the Dhamma: a teaching that focuses us on where the real problem is, and how we can solve it. It’s amazing that such a teaching exists. What’s also amazing is how many people want to change it. Or to say, “Well, the Dhamma was just one person’s opinion. There are many versions of the Dhamma out there and none of them are totally true.” That’s delighting in the wrong thing. That’s delighting in non-Dhamma.

Delighting in the Dhamma means having a sense you have a reliable guide that’s been tested for 2,600 years now.

Then you delight in abandoning and delight in developing. When you recognize that you’ve got something unskillful going on in the mind, you figure out how to get past it—take delight in that. You’re freeing yourself from your self-imposed shackles, the bonds you place on yourself.

Then delight in developing. You focus on the breath, and after a while you find yourself wandering off. Well, you come back. The next time around, you try to stay longer. And you try to detect why it is that the mind leaves the breath. As a result, you find that you can get your concentration more stable, more solid. Take delight in that.

The Buddha talks about this in his instructions to Rāhula, saying that when you see that you’ve done something that didn’t harm yourself, didn’t harm anybody else, take delight in that fact and continue practicing.

Then the Buddha recommends delight in seclusion—which means both really liking it when you have some time by yourself, but then at times when you don’t have time by yourself, learning how to get some seclusion inside.

Again, take the kitchen as a test case: You can be with other people, but if you’re not commenting on things all the time, you can have a sense of peace inside. As the Buddha said, we tend to go around with craving as our companion. We talk about the committee of the mind, and that’s what it is—the different forms of craving. If you can clear them out, have some quiet time inside, some solitary time inside without your craving constantly making comments on things, you find you can be wherever you are, and you can be happy.

Like that old Zen koan about the sound of two hands versus the sound of one hand. I think that’s what the koan is getting at. Something happens, and we immediately slap a comment on it. That’s two hands clapping. No wonder it’s loud. But if it’s just one hand there’s no sound. In other words, the event can happen, but you don’t have to slap a comment on it. Your craving doesn’t have to get involved with it, and there’s no suffering. So delight in seclusion, especially this inner seclusion.

Then the Buddha recommends that you delight in what he calls the unafflicted, which is a name for nibbāna. You’re delighting in the that you’re on a path that goes to a place where there is no affliction. You’re not afflicted, you’re not imposing affliction on anyone else. True peace, true well-being.

This is why, when you think about the Buddha’s teachings, you should always think about the four noble truths, and in particular about the third noble truth, because it’s telling you that there is this opportunity, there is this possibility. If you learn how to have dispassion for your old ways of looking for happiness, there’ll be genuine well-being.

Finally, the sixth object of delight is to delight in what the Buddha calls the non-objectified. This is another name for nibbāna. This is where you’re not creating a sense of self around anything, and as a result you’re not creating any conflict. That’s where we’re headed, to a place where there’s no conflict. Genuine well-being, no conflict: It’s a good goal to have.

So these are things you can be passionate about. And even if you don’t get all the way to nibbāna, try to be unafflicted in the way you behave. Impose no affliction on anyone else. And try not to get into conflict with yourself, in conflict with others. Head in that direction.

Our society tends to be very poor at teaching people how to live in harmony, but this is a good thing to be passionate about: how to find a harmonious balance inside yourself and with the people around you.

So the Buddha’s not teaching you to be dried up. That’s the image a lot of people have about dispassion. He’s basically saying to focus your passion someplace else, focus your passion in a way that’s actually skillful, actually helpful, actually leads to a genuine happiness. And he points out the possibility of a happiness that lies beyond most of our imagination.

We’ve heard the four noble truths so many times that it’s good to stop and reflect that they really are radical. They go against the grain; they’re very counterintuitive. After all, the duties with regard to the truths are what? The first noble truth: learn how to have dispassion, that’s what comprehension means—the ending of passion, aversion, and delusion around your clingings, seeing that they actually do constitute suffering, and they’re not worth it.

The duty with the second noble truth: develop dispassion for craving, so that you can abandon it. The third noble truth itself is dispassion. So we focus our passion on the fourth noble truth, which comes down to virtue, concentration, and discernment. Although ultimately—as we complete the duty with regard to the truth and fully develop it—we have to let it go, too.

But we let it go not out of disgust or aversion. We appreciate it. It’s taken us to a really good place. It’s done its work. But we don’t need to do it anymore.

Passion is what drives all our actions, so focus your passion on doing the path. Take delight in the fact that you’re on a good path. It leads to a good place and—in the course of practicing the path, following the path—we do noble things.

Then when we get to the unbinding, there’s no need for passion because the happiness is totally complete in and of itself. That’s how you have passion for dispassion.

Let those thoughts energize you on the path.