Shraddha – Confident Faith
We take in our life through our sense doors. We see what is there and we see what is missing.
When I contemplate my parents I know I do not see them anymore. What was visible disappeared. Where they lived changed and is gone. I no longer hear their voices or smell them or touch their bodies. My thoughts about them are distorted and irregular. If I ask my brother he remembers differently than my sister and I remember differently than both of them. Pictures stir up mirages.
My parents were born, appeared and rose up and then shrunk down and disappeared. Much of the trajectory of their lives I did not see or know about. It is a story.
When I meditate I sometimes can see into the living room – through the bay windows where my father sat in a kitchen chair in front of the TV. It was there. I think it was. Now it is gone. An illusion.
Soon enough it will be true of this place – this house- this body – the thoughts in this mind will vanish and the intellect will stop. What appears to be me will vanish. Name and form are not real.
You might ask what does this have to do with faith and confidence. Well when I have confidence in the apparent world of body, mind, intellect I suffer. When I remember it is fleeting, not real – I feel free of any fear. I let go of any worries or anxieties because I know the result – I know the body will vanish, I know the mind will stop cognition and the intellect will go quiet. Name and form don’t last. Never have.
And I also know that I will continue – there is a something that does not stop, does not vanish. I know that. In fact, the Source moves these fingers finding letters on the keyboard, putting together these words. All of this (I wave my hands in the air) is coming from that, the real deal. I know that.
I forget it though when I identify with the passing show – of body, mind and intellect – when I try to catch the fleeting world I get caught in the distraction of it. I think it is real and important and think there is something there. In a way there is something there but it is an illusion, a temporary distraction. If followed, the illusion causes some semblance of suffering.
Every name and form of the Source is laden with death, in clear words it is deadly. It helps me to remember that truth because it frees me from my stupid attempts to nail down something and try to make what is fleeting real. I stop taking things so seriously personal. LOL
An example of this freedom comes when I look at the fleeting world of politics as exemplified in the WH today and the recent news of sexual abuse reports regarding vowed celibate RC priests. These two situations confirm the same truth I see when I look into the living room where my father sat watching TV – both are part of the fleeting transient world and I don’t need to get involved with it at all. I see the suffering, and I see the root of the suffering I could get into if I begin to take either of them seriously real. That is ignorance. Knowing it is ignorance is not a condemnation, it is freedom giving greater capacity to listen and pay attention without dividing things up into good or bad. Either side of the division leads to suffering.
Ignorance leads to all sorts of suffering. Ignorance of the Source – ignorance of knowing the real you, the eternal nature that flows through all the forms and names continuously – I see the suffering’s root and open to offering what comes from the Source. My capacity to open to it is what is most important. To be clear of opinions and the three poisons.
We, Americans, and those who are Roman Catholic, need not be downtrodden by the ignorance – not afraid – because the Source is never and has never been contaminated by our ignorant shenanigans. I know this firsthand.
Now it does little for anyone who does not know except perhaps as an encouragement that others have gone before us who know the Source as a beacon of reassurance to continue seeking confidence in the Source.
We don’t rest our confidence in man-made stuff. When we do, suffering is sure to follow.
With great encouragement for you,
FLY
Author: FaShi Lao Yue
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