Friday, January 16, 2015

Don't stop thinking

Every practice is a medicine for a specific ailment.

Letting go is the medicine for clinging and grasping to things as solid and permanent.
Too much letting go, you'll lose your hygiene and community.
Crazy wisdom is a way of testing your attachment to conventional social "reality".
Too much crazy wisdom and you'll become an unethical monster.

The thinking mind's discrimination and planning are essential and wonderful.
Prajna is the discriminating sword, cutting the false from the actual.
But the thinking mind, disconnected from senses and heart, can fall into distorted perception.
Mind, heart, and senses are meant to work together.
The mind thinks it's the highest and believes it's in control -- obviously not so -- just lay your hand on a hot stove and the body will take charge.

Don't abandon any of your faculties.
Look into all perceptions and discern the false from the actual.
Learn to feel when the mind is racing and distorted, and bring body and heart back into awareness.
Beware ideas or emotions that tell you to abandon sense or sensitivity.

First, do no harm.
Second, intend to do good.
Third, purify perception.
This is the teaching of the Buddha.