Good evening everyone.
Welcome to our live broadcast.
Today we're looking at the Anguttar Nikaya Book of Fours, starting with Sutta 17.
Another fairly brief teaching, but one that I think is important.
It's important to know.
I translate as inclinations.
But it's a simple, the word is simply going or coming.
Agati.
The four agatis.
Agati is like partiality.
It means being predisposed for or against something.
I think it's important because this sums up the
concept of our reactions being most important that the big shift that has to come about is not in the experiences we encounter but in our reactions to them we don't come to meditate to try and
change the experiences we have.
We come to meditate to change the way we interact with them, change the way we look at them, first and foremost.
Those things we think of as problems, those things we think of as desirable, our ambitions,
our dearest possessions and friends and enemies, all these things we were inclined in certain ways, predisposed towards these things in certain ways.
Spiders, so many people are strongly predisposed towards spiders.
Snakes,
On the other hand, flowers, cigarettes, the naked body, urine, feces, we're predisposed to so many different things.
And it's not even predisposed because we cultivate dispositions, we cultivate inclinations, we cultivate the four agati.
they're habitual, they're habits that we cultivate.
You might desire something a little bit or you might think, oh that looks interesting and then when you obtain it, sure enough, it's pleasant and that's the reinforcement of the desire for the object.
So the next time you have an actual substantial desire for it and then the next time and the next time and the next time it becomes an addiction
So it's quite scary actually how strong these predispositions can become but it's quite encouraging on the other hand that they're simply constructs.
They can be done away with simply by changing your habits.
So the four agatthi are
Chanda, Chandagati, inclination or being inclined because of desire.
Dosagati, being inclined or predisposed because of anger.
Mohagati, being inclined out of delusion.
and bhāyāgati, being disposed out of fear predisposed, inclined I mean, these are most clear in their relation to our relationships with other people We're partial towards other people out of our attachment to them We
This is how we distinguish between friends and enemies.
We help our friends, we try to hurt our enemies.
When we're partial to certain individuals, when we're partial to certain experiences, we treat them differently.
Favoritism, this idea of favoring people, certain people over other people,
Generally when you see people of the same race as you, the same color skin for example, this is where racism and bigotry come from.
When you see someone who's different colored skin, you're generally predisposed in certain ways towards them, maybe out of liking them, maybe out of hating them, maybe out of fear of them, mostly out of delusion.
delusion because somehow you think it's meaningful.
On the other hand, you can be predisposed out of wisdom.
Not predisposed, but disposed, inclined out of wisdom.
You can be inclined to avoid certain things.
For example, a snake.
You see a snake on the side of the road and you know that that snake is poisonous.
It's not wrong to be inclined to stay away from it.
But it's wrong to be inclined out of these four things.
It's not wrong to be inclined.
You can be inclined to meditate.
That's good.
Dhammachanda, desire to practice the Dhamma.
It's an inclination of sorts.
But when you're inclined out of lust or inclined out of hatred, inclined out of delusion or fear,
We tend not to make the rational choices that would bring you peace and resolution.
We react hastily out of fear and out of anger, out of desire.
We have a hard time discerning what is in our best interest.
This is people eat too much or engage in constant entertainment or
They're constantly bickering or fighting or harming others, complaining.
They create conflict and enmity.
Or they ruin things through delusion, confusion, arrogance, conceit.
You can think of it like being bent.
inclined in a certain direction is like being bent out of shape.
Our minds are crooked.
We use this word in English, crooked.
Someone who's crooked is not honest.
It's not straight up.
It's not upright.
There's something weaselly about them.
And a weasel is slippery and not straightforward.
Meditation is about cultivating rectitude, straightness.
Ujju.
There's actually a word for it.
The Sangha has said to be ujju, straightforward.
They don't act out of desire.
They don't act out of hatred.
They don't act out of delusion.
They don't act out of fear.
So we try to be objective.
This is really the key in the meditation practice.
Don't worry about what you experience.
Don't try to fix things.
Even your reactions, don't try to fix them.
Just try to be straight about everything.
If you're angry, just know that you're angry.
Say to yourself, angry, angry.
Remind yourself, that's anger.
If you experience something that you like or you would normally want, well, try to just see it for what it is.
It's just seeing.
It's just hearing.
If you feel happy about something, pleased by something, try and see it just as pleasure.
Don't be partial or cultivate favoritism.
Your mind becomes straight and like a straight tree, your mind becomes strong.
It's able to grow.
You're only able to really grow and reach the sky if you're upright.
When the mind is crooked like a crooked tree, it can't grow and it fails and falters and withers and dies.
So, if you remember these four, it's kind of like the, it's actually just the first three, greed, anger, and delusion, but they add fear in here because it specifically, or the Buddha adds fear because it specifically, I think, relates to dealing with people.
This is applying to favoritism towards people, but it's quite useful to know these types of partiality, how we're not straightforward and objective, how we treat people and experiences differently based on our inclination.
These things color our judgment.
They color our experience.
We have a Pali verse here.
If through desire, hate, fear or delusion one transgresses against the Dhamma, one's fame diminishes like the moon in the dark fortnight
This is the half of the moon where the moon, the half of the month where the moon gets darker and darker every day.
So it's specifically relating to people.
It has to do with fame, your reputation.
When you have a reputation for favoritism, when you don't treat people objectively,
you don't think of what's most helpful to people spending lots of time chatting with people when there's no benefit coming or dismissing people when they want to and they have questions and concerns about the Dhamma partial to certain experiences
partial to certain mind states partial to certain feelings for and against basically the thing is don't relate to things try not to relate to things with greed or anger don't let that be the defining feature or delusion where you make decisions based on your emotions rather than what's
right and what's wrong, what's actually good for you.
Because these things won't tell you that.
These are habits.
They're not based on reality.
Because when you start to see reality for what it is, your habits change.
You develop habits based on wisdom.
And then your inclination is all based on experience, knowledge, knowing that, ah, this is actually not good for me, this is good for me, that kind of thing.
So that's our little bit of Dhamma for tonight.
How are we doing?
Robin, you're way over on the left-hand side of your screen.
Why is that?
Oh.
You know why I ask?
Because when I put you in our screen, I've cut off the sides.
Oh, okay.
And then it cuts part of you.
It kind of cuts you off.
I probably just moved the webcam.
It's a separate webcam.
Is that...
That's better.
Better?
Sort of.
I think I've actually adjusted.
Are you now in the middle?
Yeah, I don't see what you see, so.
Oh, you don't?
Well, you're in the bottom right corner.
If you click on your picture in the bottom right corner, it should come up big, and you can see it.
OK. Now you're centered, sort of.
See, but now I've got you off center.
OK.
Are you ready for some questions?
I'm ready for some questions.
Yesterday I asked about Kama Yoga and practices outside Satipa Khana to assist in furthering a wholesome state and wasn't specific.
What would your advice be for someone who has cut off a bond with a person and, despite the rightness of the decision, is struggling with the craving and attachment that comes from second guessing and loss?
Are there any additional practices?
More specifically, despite the mindfulness, noting, and meditation, the mind isn't letting go.
To be even more specific, it's mostly...
I mean, you can't force your mind to let go, which is what you're seeing.
It's not just simple like that, where you say, okay, let go, let go.
And that's part of the, it's an important lesson for you, is to see that the mind doesn't work the way you think it does.
I mean, sure, there's lots of things you can do to help yourself, but none of them are really going to be
None of them are really going to be sufficient.
Surround yourself with good people.
Find a community of like-minded individuals that help you get over it, help you, remind you of good things, that kind of thing.
But in the end, there's no trick.
You've just got to slog through it.
There's no way to make it easy or comfortable.
It's like withdrawal, and it's way worse than any kind of drug, because it's something we've held onto for a long time.
In the end, it's just meditation that's going to help you.
But it won't suddenly turn these things off.
It's just helping you to understand and to let go.
And let go means let come as well.
Let be.
Don't react.
Don't give it energy.
Don't feed it.
Hi, Monthe.
My introduction to meditation and Buddhist books was quite young in my teens, but I've come to think that it played some detrimental effect on me.
Recently, when I was young, I had the impression that Buddhism taught that thinking is not good, so I feel I had not done enough reflecting and introspective critical thinking when it should be done.
Even now, I don't quite understand every time I read about Buddhism.
It always says to note thinking as thinking itself.
as if we should reduce our thoughts in our life.
When I feel wise, people in history are known for lots of deep contemplation in their lives.
Thank you.
First of all, when you know something as thinking, when you know thinking as thinking, there's no part of that that even hints or implies that you should reduce your thinking.
That's not at all what it's saying.
Maybe you should read it again.
But I guess the implication is, which is still part of what you're saying, I suppose, is that you're not reacting or acting out on it.
You're not inclining your mind towards it.
But as far as people in history known for lots of deep contemplation, I mean, the fact, the idea that they're wise is certainly up for debate.
If you want to follow their lead, go ahead.
But the Buddha didn't follow their lead.
Not on everything, anyway.
So you have to decide.
If you think that it's better to think a lot, then go ahead.
But you know how our Buddhism stands, that thinking is not
Thinking is not the answer.
Thinking isn't a solution.
There's no reason why thinking should benefit you or enlighten you.
Not substantially.
It's funny how people think and then somehow think that they're going to come up with an answer.
If you read Descartes' meditations, it's quite interesting.
I mean, obviously, I don't believe with, I don't agree with many of the things Descartes said, but he really did meditate, you know.
He tried to, you could say he thought, but he was really trying to observe his experience and see what was real.
It was a valiant effort without the Buddha's wisdom, but, and he failed, but
He certainly tried, and it gives you an idea of the sort of difference.
Because he wasn't really interested in his thoughts, he was interested in what was real about him, or about reality.
Of course, then he started thinking about it, and he came up with some good ideas.
But he never became enlightened.
I guess I mean to say that the best part of his meditations was when he was actually looking and saying, hey, this is all there is.
Once he started thinking about it, oh, he got all mixed up.
I mean, not mixed up, but he added things that weren't actually there.
They say that he was under duress because anybody who... What he was really trying to do was be able to separate the body and the mind because the mind had free will and the whole idea of God, he had to separate God out from the body because otherwise he couldn't talk about the body as being deterministic.
So he was just sort of...
Anyway, he still got in quite a bit of trouble, I think, for...
expressing his views.
So he kind of had to include God.
Anyway, it's not your question, but it does relate to people in history because they're not as wise, I think, as you're making them out to be.
They were conventionally wise, but not like a Buddha.
I note all my emotions with feeling, feeling.
Any problems with that?
We kind of had this question last night, and the problem is that you don't really experience them as feeling, feeling.
If you're angry, you don't think of it as a feeling, you think of it as anger.
If you want something, it's not a feeling, it's wanting.
I mean, arguably it is kind of a feeling in a general sense of the word, but
It's not all that helpful.
You're not really going to be clear about what you're experiencing if you don't use the right word.
So it's one thing to get obsessive about finding the right word, but it's another to be lazy.
My mind started to rebel even to the thought of meditation.
It's hard to be focused with annoyance, impatience, and a wanting mind.
I do note these feelings, but right now I might have to experience them a little longer.
I see why I'm annoyed, distracted, but I would be happy to hear your thoughts on this.
Perhaps you have some info on how to get through this.
Well, the thought of meditation is just a thought.
I mean, it's interesting that you've gotten averse to it.
It's common because meditation is tough and the mind doesn't like tough.
But meditation doesn't exist.
It's just a thought you have.
Now, the whole idea of insight meditation is to figure out how to overcome that, how to be free from the influence of your suffering.
So it's stressful when you think about that meditation, but not because of the thought.
The thought and the meditation aren't the problem.
The thought is the annoyance, what you say, annoyance, impatience, and wanting minds.
So that's what you're meditating on.
You're learning to see them clearly and let go of them.
If you don't like meditating, well that's just one more thing you don't like.
And that's what you should meditate on.
The thing and the disliking.
Because otherwise you suffer.
If you're always playing or following your emotions,
You may be a slave to them and you just reinforce them.
They become stronger and they cause you more stress and suffering.
I have a tendency to escape into meditation and the Dhamma talks.
Well, there's no trick to it.
As with everything else, there's no trick, you know.
You just have to do it.
You have to learn to be mindful, learn to see things as they are.
Nobody's going to do it for you.
I can't fix your problems with my answers.
I mean, there's much there.
I mean, whether studying is actually beneficial, you might eventually decide that studying is not in your best interest, but when it's something you have to do, you have to look at your mind and you have to learn how to let go of your attachment to, in this case, watching YouTube videos.
If it's something that pleases you, you have to say, you know, wanting, wanting, or
Pleasure, pleasure.
Happy, happy.
If you're averse to studying, there you go.
Just averse to meditating.
Meditate on the aversion.
It's still there?
Yes, but I couldn't hear you for a moment.
Uh-oh.
I'm not sure if I disconnected, or you did, or it was just an internet glitch there.
Well, I heard myself.
Okay.
At the end of one of your Dometalks maybe last night, the audio cut off completely.
I could hear you, but it wasn't coming through on YouTube.
So a little something going on with the audio.
Something happened yesterday and I felt immense pity for myself.
I tried to note but I was working with someone and found it difficult.
About an hour later I sat and meditated and noted the immense sadness for a while.
After an intense period it went away.
I was surprised but jubilant.
The sadness came back several times over the next hour or two.
And each time I did a mini meditation and each time I felt the sadness was less and less.
But then things got worse.
I acknowledged feelings over and over, but it got steadily worse.
In the end I was so distressed I thought it would be good to die.
Not going to, just thoughts.
I stopped meditating until this morning.
I'm still distressed, but am now doing short bursts of meditation, getting a lot of practicing and noting thinking.
Is there a way of better managing when there are overwhelming emotions?
No, I mean, all of this is inside.
This is habits.
And as soon as you start to try to change your habits, your mind rebels or reacts.
Because it's like trying to stem the tide.
It really can overwhelm you.
Or, you know, trying to...
It's not comfortable to change.
That being said, you have to be careful not to get caught up in the disappearing of things.
It's good that you see that sometimes when you know that your mind is clear for a moment and the problem disappears, but it's important not to get stuck on that.
You have to come back to the present moment and be mindful of what's next because there might be stronger emotions.
But the point is that no matter how strong the emotion gets, it's only an emotion.
That's the difference between these two approaches, practicing to get rid of things and practicing to be invincible to them.
It's quite different.
When you focus on the pain, there's two approaches.
One is thinking, how can I get rid of this?
And the other is thinking, how can I stop reacting to it?
So no matter how distressed you get, or no matter what kind of thoughts you have, thoughts of killing yourself, thoughts of killing other people, thoughts of doing the worst of worst things are just thoughts.
Even your emotions are just emotions.
it's when you react to them and get upset about them that you cause them you could turn them into a problem so there's no I'm distressed distress arises just remind yourself okay this is now forget about the past sometimes you say to yourself it worked before why doesn't it work now or you start to doubt because hey it's getting worse but getting worse is just an appeal to the past and the future it's not being in the present in the present things can't get worse they just are what they are
And then at that point, no matter how bad it gets, it is what it is.
It's not better or worse, more or less, stronger or weaker.
It's all relative.
And relative is just past and future.
It's not present.
So I guess that the key is don't be overwhelmed by your emotions.
Then they won't be overwhelming.
Someone wants the live stream.
It's funny, this app was supposed to have the live stream, did it?
Click on live stream.
Live stream currently offline.
Oh.
You know what?
I wonder if I'm broadcasting to the...
I am.
I'm broadcasting to the wrong place, I think.
No.
Where am I broadcasting to?
Huh.
I think I am broadcasting to the wrong place.
Oh, I'm not broadcasting at all.
Shoot.
That's funny.
This is just going nowhere.
It's funny that it's not telling me about it.
Just a second, let me fix that.
I have to figure out the port.
Sounds like everything on YouTube.
It sounds like everything was coming out fine on YouTube, though.
Yes, now it's broadcasting to the new server.
Why did it turn off?
That's interesting.
I know what it is.
When I type an M, I bet.
No.
Shift M. No?
Is that a shortcut from you?
I think it is.
I think there's things.
Yeah, A and D. That's what's turning it off.
That's probably what happened last night.
I set up some shortcuts and it works even when I'm not in the window.
Let's get rid of those.
We don't need shortcuts.
I was wondering, because earlier as well, I'm like, I thought I turned that on.
Why did it turn off?
Hmm.
Okay, so here's the thing.
There is a live stream and it's at a new location.
So go to the app in the menu and then click on live stream.
And then as to where it is being saved, it should be saved in our new subdomain.
Yes.
share.sirimongolo.org front slash broadcast so here's where they should be the new this recording right now which just started a few minutes ago should be here at this new address share.sirimongolo.org front slash broadcast we should add that link to the live stream page it should actually say here's where the the
Here's where the archive is.
I'll do that now.
I'll open an issue.
Any more questions?
How are we doing?
Sort of questions.
Did you intend to have no chat on the YouTube today?
Yes.
The chat was disabled.
That was intentional.
And then Meg was asking about the old talks and I didn't
I know there was a page on the old site that had all the old talks.
Well, they should still be at the old location.
I wasn't able to access them, and apparently Meg wasn't.
Oh, because they're at meditation.
Yeah, I think since the changeover to the website.
Right.
Let's see if I can fix that and provide access to those again.
But they're going to all be old ones now.
The new ones aren't going to go to that place.
Let's see.
There's nothing there.
Oh, there we are.
Okay.
Now I've just got to find a place to put these.
Okay.
I've just moved them.
So they are now...
Should be at audio.sirimongolo.org, right?
SiriMongolo.org.
Let's see about this.
Oh, no.
That didn't work.
Why doesn't audio.siri... Oh, wait.
No.
Didn't we have an audio.sirimongolo.org?
It was static.seriemongolo.org directaudio.com that one.
Yeah, but wasn't there a...
Shoot, there was, but it's gone now, I think.
I thought I had an audio page that's some PHP work.
Oh, you're right.
Yeah, you're right.
Yeah, it's like on my web blog.
There's a link to that.
And of course none of them are there.
It doesn't actually work anymore.
And I can answer.
Where can I buy your book in Belgium?
You can't buy Bante's books for sale, but we do give them away for free.
And actually, our volunteer group is right in the process of setting up a system where right now we have a lot of the extra booklets that are in Sri Lanka, which is where they're printed.
And they're being sent to a couple of well-placed volunteers, one in Europe.
one in India and one in the United States.
And from there, we'll have something on the website where you can request one, and our volunteers will send one out to you.
It's going to take a couple of weeks because I think the estimate was about four to six weeks from Sri Lanka to the destinations before the volunteers get them to mail them out.
So check the website maybe in about a month from now.
I don't know what's wrong there, but I don't have time for that.
So what are we going to do?
We'll go here instead.
Does that work?
Yes, it does.
Okay.
That should work.
Not ideal, but where are we?
So I put on my web blog a new link to the audio, which is here.
So if you go to that, which Robin pointed out, you'll find a directory and you should find a new subdirectory called live.
And the live subdirectory is where all the old live streams are now.
Thank you, Bunthe.
Are we done?
We're all caught up on questions.
Alright.
And that's all for tonight, then.
Thank you all for tuning in.
Thank you, Robin, for your help.
Have a good night, everyone.
Thank you, Bunthe.