DHARMA IN EVERYDAY LIFE

By Nhat Quan

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Nowadays, because of advanced information technology, the human source of Buddhist teachings is also spreading rapidly everywhere. It can be said that those who have faith in Buddhist teachings are those who know how to choose the most solid refuge because the Three Jewels are the safest support. So you are no longer disappointed, worried, or afraid of anything. And then, happiness and peace also arise from there! Only those who do not know how to choose a refuge will have disappointments, worries, and fears. That is why the venerable ones often teach:

- When you know how to practice, you will no longer be sad!

Indeed, when you practice no matter what method of practice, and whether it is other-force or self-help, the basic thing is to exert yourself. Whether this effort is more or less depends on each person, but it is necessary. Therefore, you should always remember that nothing is impossible to self-effort, because everything has been, is, and will move in the direction of good or bad because of you. Nothing is too late or early. If you don't start, if you're not ready, it's forever late, forever theory, and forever talk. And you should also remember that everyone has the intellectual capacity, everyone has the ability to liberate, and everyone has the ability to make dreams come true.

 Cultivating and no longer sorrow is an affirmation used by the Buddha to awaken Yasa from the delusions of suffering when this polite young man from Barànàsì fell into a mentality of boredom with life because of his cramped, boring lifestyle pale of the world of sensuality. According to the Vinaya of the Pali system, Yasa was the son of a wealthy family in the ancient city of Barànàsì, had an affluent life, widely socialized with people, and had a great reputation among friends. Yasa owns three castles suitable for three different weather seasons in India. His residence regularly receives many distinguished guests to visit and attend banquets. Despite living in luxury and full of pleasure, Yasa has a rather rich spiritual life.

It is said that day, after seeing the singers and dancers lying on the floor of the hall after a great banquet, they looked like corpses. Seeing that, suddenly young Yasa was fed up with the illusory life scene, so he left the mansion and wandered the streets. In his wandering steps, this young man got lost in the Deer Garden where the Buddha spoke the Four Noble Truths to begin his journey of teaching the Dharma to save sentient beings, at that time the Buddha heard the young Yasa mutter:

- Oh how sad; oh how dangerous!

Hearing this, knowing that this young man's saving times had come, the Buddha declared:

- Here there is no sorrow, here there is no danger,

Yasa awoke and quietly sat down to listen to the Master preach. After listening, Yasa begged the Buddha to let him become a monk to practice the path of liberation and then attain Arahantship, a fully awakened human being, no longer dominated by sorrow.

The Buddha awakened Yasa from the mentality of melancholy with the affirmation of the way out of sorrow. A soul that is deadlocked about freedom quickly finds the truth of liberation. There is no melancholy here, which is the awakening message, the door to liberation that the Buddha opened at the right time for Yasa to end the endless chain of confusion and melancholy.

Yasa lives in the world of lust, enjoys sensual pleasures, but finds no sweetness in sensual pleasures, and then realizes the danger of sensual pleasures. Young Yasa also began to realize that desires are impermanent, empty, false, of stupidity, but do not know how to get rid of them. This conflict caused him to become bewildered, so he left to wander the streets with words that were almost delirious.

Human history also shows that similar contradictions have occurred, causing some people to fall into a deadlock. Fortunately for Yasa when he was almost at the end of the road, he was saved by the Buddha. The affirmation of the Enlightened One awakened Yasa from the trance of melancholy.

It is worth noting that the Buddha in the past, when he was a prince, also fell into the same situation as Yasa, that is, imprisoned in the world of sensual pleasures with anxiety about the path of renunciation. Sutra documents said that before leaving home to seek the truth of liberation, Prince Siddhattha once pondered:

- Actually, this world is trapped in suffering, being born, getting old, dying, being annihilated, and being reborn; and from this place of suffering, do not know the renunciation, free from old age and death; from this place of suffering, do not know when to know the renunciation of old age and death?

Then he determined to leave home to seek the truth of liberation and reached full awakening, became an Enlightened One, ending the delusion of birth and death. He realized that everything that makes people happy or sad is a phenomenon of mutual birth, mutual destruction, imitation, illusory, no substance, no permanent existence. The joy and sorrow of human beings is therefore also a phenomenon of mutual birth, mutual destruction, fake union, illusory, no entity, and does not exist forever. It is only because people do not realize their illusory nature of arising and passing away that they fall into attachments to everything, embrace sorrow, and invite suffering. The Buddha was fully awakened from this melancholy delusion when he looked deeply into the sufferings of birth, old age, sickness, and death of human life and discovered their illusory, empty, non-substantial nature. He lives with a mind free from all dependence and clinging, not dependent on the arising and passing away of phenomena. He was completely liberated, ending all notions of yes-no, much-little, gain-loss, joy-sadness.

Yasa is in a melancholy mood for the sad reality, he tries to escape but doesn't know the way out. He has not seen dependent origination; has not realized the five aggregates are the phenomena of birth and death, composite, not theirs; have not yet realized that the bare senses are empty, having no substance. He was possessed by ego, so sorrow arose according to what his eyes saw, what he heard, what he smelled with his nose, tasted with his tongue, body-feeling, and mind-perceiving. Yasa did not know that melancholy and what gives rise to melancholy are only mutual phenomena of arising and passing away, without substance, without permanence, having nothing to do with him. He was gripped by a feeling of melancholy because he identified that feeling of melancholy as his own. In other words, he does not yet know what is liberated mind, or liberated wisdom is, according to which he himself: form, feeling, perception, mental formations, and consciousness are melancholy phenomena, but his mind is not melancholy. He was awakened by the Buddha from his mind of melancholy and began to learn how to awaken out of sorrow.

Then what do you understand: Cultivation Then No More Sorrow?

This is the affirmation of the dharma of liberation realized and proclaimed by the Blessed One, that is, the Eight Noble Paths or Precepts, Concentration and Wisdom, known as the Immortal Dharma (Amattadhamma), is the only way leading to enlightenment purity of sentient beings, overcoming sorrow and lamentation, eradicating suffering and grief, and attaining the righteous path. The Buddha's liberating Dharma is called no sorrow because it brings people out of sorrow, and is concretized through practice methods such as:

1- Do not do evil

Anyone who has followed the Buddha's teachings will no longer do evil deeds, if you do not do evil deeds, then you will have no debt, no wrongdoing, and no wrongdoing, and you will not be sad. The consistent feature of the liberating dharma preached by the Buddha is to say no to all evil and to accept no evil of any kind. The Buddha realized the principle of cause and effect and karma, so he taught his disciples not to do evil, not to create evil karma, and to avoid sorrow and suffering.

Melancholy is a feeling of sorrow arising from many causes, of which doing evil is considered the direct cause of sorrow. According to the Buddha's teaching, doing evil in any form, whether doing evil in the body, evil mouth, or evil thoughts is all evil karma that leads to painful retribution for the creator in this life or the next. For example, the Buddha once spoke of five sad results for those who do bad karma:

1- Loss of property,

2- Bad rumors spread far and wide,

3- Fear of crowds,

4- Mental confusion when dying,

5- Falling into the evil realm after death.

More specifically, if you create bad karma, wherever you go, you carry a heavy obsession with the evil karma you have done. Unlike the sad retribution due to bad karma, one who lives according to the Buddha's good dharma of liberation, body doing good deeds, speaking good words, and having good thoughts, this person receives beneficial results due to the way of doing good does not do evil. That person:

1- No property loss,

2- Having a good reputation from afar,

3- Confident in the crowd,

4- Mental clarity, not obsessive when dying,

5- After death, they are reborn in good realms.

In daily life, you will feel serenity and peace due to your lifestyle of doing good and not doing evil.

2- Know enough for life

When you know enough for life, you are no longer sad. This is one of the other methods of Buddhism to help you get out of sadness is to learn how to face the sad reality peacefully and know enough about life. Knowing enough means knowing the limits of life, and understanding the law: There is birth, and there must be a cessation of all existence. Firmly believe in the truth of living with enlightenment, and kindness, without anxiety and sorrow in the face of an unpleasant reality that comes to you.

          The Buddha came to this world not to change the law of birth and death and the unsatisfactory things of life. He came to awaken, to let you know the truth of the inevitable changes and destruction of human life. Helps you know how to calmly accept all events and sorrows that occur related to yourself. He clearly stated the law of birth and death of existence and pointed out two classes of people, the uneducated ordinary people, and the multi-literate saints, to emphasize the importance of living a clear life, having wisdom, and knowing how to uproot the evils arrows of sorrow out of your life.

          3- Seeing the illusory nature of melancholy

Another practice, which quickly dispels your feelings of sadness, is to use a calm mind to look directly at the reality of sadness and realize its illusory nature. This is called living with liberation in the present moment, that is, observing the phenomenon of melancholy occurring with a fully alert and lucid mind, clearly seeing the changing nature of sorrows arising and passing away. Without assimilating the feeling of melancholy as you or yours, the mind attains calm, without the shadow of melancholy. When you focus on looking deeply into phenomena with a calm mind, then you will see that they are clearly compounded, conditioned phenomena, empty, without substance, changing, dissolving nothing is worthy of being considered you or yours. This is seeing as it really is that leads to the liberation of mind, liberated wisdom, that is, the knowledge that knows that dhammas or phenomena exist entirely due to causes and conditions, constantly changing, without substance, without existence forever and not yours. Buddhism calls such a method of practice the only way leading to the purity of living beings, overcoming sorrow and lamentation, eradicating suffering and sorrow, achieving enlightenment, and realizing Nirvana.

4- Live in the present:

In the Sutta: A Night of the Holy One, the Buddha teaches you not to waste your time and energy on frantic memories where the past is gone, or fanciful fantasies of the future that don't exist. Only then will you have the right view: The rope is the rope, the snake is the snake.

The mind is motionless, no longer agitated by the favorable circumstances, the adversities, the ups and downs of the world. Time goes by very quickly, and death waits for no one. Knowing that you should make efforts, determination, perseverance in practice, enthusiasm, diligence, mindfulness, awareness, and practice the Four kinds of mindfulness day and night tirelessly.

5- Eat and sleep:

 Eating and sleeping are human needs. For some people, eating and sleeping are to recharge after a long time of hard work. But there are people who do not like to work but like to eat a lot all day, absorb a lot of good taste, sleep a lot, so the body is very full and fat, but on the face often shows an uneasy, cold, tense expression, hard to approach.

 While those who have practice sleep very little, eat very little, have moderate comforts, practice only to help others with the experience of practicing spiritual realization, and are always awake, with pure senses, the spirit is always cheerful, full of transcendent happiness, not melancholy but close to the commonplace of everyday life.

6- Taking care of the garden of the mind:

You strive to plow, cultivate your own field so that every time you work, every time the seeds of ignorance and craving buried deep in your mind are plowed up on the light of consciousness so that they are burned so that they are annihilated and your true happiness is steadily increasing day by day.

 In the sutta: The Plower, the Buddha taught a Brahmin named Kasibharadvaja about farming, plowing, and cultivating to get rid of weeds of ignorance, craving, and reap the seeds of peace. Harvest crops to relieve suffering for yourself and others.

 When there is sincerity, determination, effort, and perseverance in the practice, the results can be so small, so small that you cannot feel it, this may disappoint you, depressed, or disheartened. But make sure that it is still not lost, it is still accumulated every hour, every day to become a good condition for the next better and better results. Therefore, you have to be strong, confident, brave, keep your faith, and stand firm in the face of adversity, calamities, and sufferings of life in this world. Everything has and then lost, comes and goes, happy and sad, satisfied then dissatisfied, peaceful, and then falls back into adversity, obstacles full of anxiety and sorrow.

 You realize the nature of secular life is like that, it can't be otherwise. Because of such awareness, there is no sorrow.

When you realize this clearly, there is no anger or hatred when being scolded, slandered, no joy, or a happy mind when being reverent, respectful, and worshiped. You also no longer have worries, fears, lamentations, sorrows, anguish, discouragement, and despair in the face of difficulties, obstacles, failures, calamities, and tribulations. You also are not rejoicing, excited, complacent, egotistical, conceited in the face of advantages, and succeeding in worldly life.

 You have the Dharma as the most solid refuge, you have the Three Jewels as the safest support. Then why are you still disappointed, worried, or afraid of anything? then why are you not happy, peaceful! Buddha taught:

- Disappointment, worry, and fear only arise for fools!

Whatever fears arise, only arise for those who do not know how to cultivate, not for those who know how to cultivate. Whatever disappointments arise, those disappointments arise for those who do not know how to cultivate and do not arise for those who know how to cultivate. Whatever troubles arise, those tribulations arise for those who do not know how to cultivate but do not arise for those who know how to cultivate.

 You are a Buddhist, maybe you believe, take refuge in one Buddha, or believe in taking refuge in many Buddhas because of your own views, perceptions, and beliefs. Your beliefs are studied with wisdom to respect, revere, and sincerely follow the right path to practice and study.

When you believe in and take refuge in Shakyamuni Buddha or other buddhas, you need to live according to what was taught by Shakyamuni Buddha, or other buddhas. Practicing in accordance with the Dharma, with one heart and one mind throughout your life, steadfast and unyielding, with absolute faith in the Three Jewels, you will certainly have no sorrow and will have peace and tranquility, profound, magical, and long-lasting.

Because melancholy is a feeling belonging to the five aggregates, dependently arising, subject to change, without substance. It is a mental phenomenon that is caused by conditions arising and passing away, not yours, not related to anyone. Due to lack of understanding and lack of practice, you fall into the attachment of sadness, thinking that feeling is yours, that is, you invite suffering and sorrow to yourself. With understanding and practice, there is no attachment to sadness, if you don't consider the feeling of melancholy as your own, then you are free from suffering. That is the message of deliverance that the Blessed One has brought to this world, a message that clearly states that there is a fact of sorrow arising from ego-grasping, but that sorrow will end through letting go of self-perception. So the words:

- Here, there is no melancholy, or when you practice, you will not be sad, that is, there is a melancholy event that happens but there is no melancholy person.

So in the present life, when you cultivate the body, cultivate the precepts, cultivate the mind, cultivate wisdom. By cultivating the body, cultivating the precepts, cultivating the mind, and cultivating the wisdom, for the sutras that the Tathagata has spoken, are profound, luminous, difficult to see, difficult to understand, inconceivable, and can not definition of the sublime, the secret is the place of knowledge of those who know how to practice. That person hears and understands quickly and fully, hears what is said, joyfully practices respectfully, in order to benefit from renunciation.

 The Buddha pointed out that the cause of error and suffering is ignorance and craving. So, as a Buddhist, you have to practice getting rid of ignorance and craving right now, not in the future, much less in the next life. You cannot allow ignorance and craving to dominate and dictate to you any longer, because it is already too much to repeat, even once.

There are many sutras in the Sutras Pitaka that record the cases of monks, lay people, householders, and non-believers... making very serious mistakes, but when they realized their own mistakes, and sincerely apologized in front of everyone, the Buddha accepted the repentance, at the same time encouraged to make them happy, and taught them the true Dharma.

Likewise, when you stumble and make mistakes, if you honestly and sincerely realize your mistake is a mistake and repent and turn to good, you will be loved by the Buddha to accept true repentance. That is because the Buddha wants to see you overcome that fall, no more ignorance, and craving like that.

 The teachings of the Buddha are so great, so noble, so human, so superhuman, and so transcendent that no other religion can compare. You have the ability to control yourself, happiness or pain, bondage or not is up to you. Without bondage, the mind is completely free. So, when adversity, a miserable state comes to you, even if it's karmic, if you practice the body, you practice the mind, you will be liberated from the domination of the feeling of the force arising from adversity, suffering in that bad karma.

That's why the Buddha always advises you to practice so that your body and mind can be calm and free when you have to face birth, old age, illness, death, sorrow, compassion, suffering, and the sorrows of human life in the chain of cause and effect, karma endless duplicates.

No one can avoid bodily sensations due to karmic action, but mental sensations are not influenced by them, so the mind is not. If it is influenced more or less, it is due to the level of achievement of each person's practice.

 There is nothing more peaceful than when you ignore the criticisms of life. Because the mind is at peace, joy arises, from which happiness arises, concentration arises, and wisdom arises leading to liberation. On the contrary, when reacting with anger, discouragement, disappointment, and pessimism, the body and mind will suffer, and the mind will be scattered, so wisdom will be paralyzed. Since then unwholesome dhammas increased, so unwholesome body, speech, and mind arise, and unwholesome karma increased, leading to the suffering of being reborn in evil places.

In short, once you know how to practice, you will no longer be sad, and so throughout the practice, it may be very short or it may be very long, or very very very long, each adversity, each fall. Each lesson challenges you to look back and reflect on the state of your mind. To see whether you are good or bad, at what level you are, to see the results of your long practice time. By having the insight or seeing things as they really are. Buddhists know that worldly sensual pleasures are insignificant, lowly, unclean, instinctively happy, mundane, unholy, unworthy of the holy life, and always accompanied by sorrow and lamentation, suffering, affliction, and grief like a shadow that does not leave the picture, therefore, has the awareness that:

- Worldly people find happiness in sensual pleasures by being greedy, accumulating wealth, fame, gain, power, lust, eating, and sleeping, so they become entangled in melancholy.

- Buddhists find happiness by being bored, giving up possessions, fame, fortune, power, lust, eating, and sleeping to come to the very noble Present Happiness, so they are not entangled in sorrow and suffering.

Only when you know the sweetness of wisdom, and know the danger of sensual pleasures, the serenity of giving up craving. At the same time, you must practice giving up unscrupulous dhammas, then you will no longer be dominated by desires, no longer be controlled by the five attachments, no longer control your mind, then your mind will not be sorrowful.