Our Real Home (Part 2)

Anyone can build a house of wood and bricks, but the Buddha taught that that sort of home is not our real home, it’s only nominally ours. It’s home in the world and it follows the ways of the world. Our real home is inner peace. An external, material home may well be pretty but it is not very peaceful. There’s this worry and then that, this anxiety and then that. So we say it’s not our real home, it’s external to us. Sooner or later we’ll have to give it up. It’s not a place we can live in permanently because it doesn’t truly belong to us, it belongs to the world. Our body is the same. We take it to be a self, to be ‘me’ or ‘mine’, but in fact it’s not really so at all, it’s another worldly home. Your body has followed its natural course from birth, and now that it’s old and sick, you can’t forbid it from being that. That’s the way it is. Wanting it to be any different would be as foolish as wanting a duck to be like a chicken. When you see that that’s impossible – that a duck must be a duck and a chicken must be a chicken, and that the bodies have to get old and die – you will find courage and energy. However much you want the body to go on lasting, it won’t do that.

The Buddha said:

Aniccā vata saṅkhārā

Impermanent, alas, are all conditions,

Uppāda-vaya-dhammino

Subject to rise and fall.

Uppajjitvā nirujjhanti

Having arisen, they cease.

Tesaṃ vūpasamo sukho.

Their stilling is bliss.

The word saṅkhārā refers to this body and mind. Saṅkhārā are impermanent and unstable. Having come into being they disappear, having arisen they pass away, and yet everyone wants them to be permanent. This is foolishness. Look at the breath. Once it’s gone in, it goes out, that’s its nature, that’s how it has to be. The inhalations and exhalations have to alternate, there must be change. Conditions exist through change, you can’t prevent it. Just think, could you exhale without inhaling? Would it feel good? Or could you just inhale? We want things to be permanent but they can’t be, it’s impossible. Once the breath has come in, it must go out. When it’s gone out it comes back in again, and that’s natural, isn’t it? Having been born we get old and then die, and that’s totally natural and normal. It’s because conditions have done their job, because the in-breaths and out-breaths have alternated in this way, that the human race is still here today.

As soon as we are born we are dead. Our birth and our death are just one thing. It’s like a tree: when there’s a root there must be branches, when there are branches there must be a root. You can’t have one without the other. It’s a little funny to see how at death, people are so grief-stricken and distracted and at birth, how happy and delighted. It’s delusion, nobody has ever looked at this clearly. I think if you really want to cry it would be better to do so when someone’s born. Birth is death, death is birth; the branch is the root, the root is the branch. If you must cry, cry at the root, cry at the birth. Look closely: if there was no birth there would be no death. Can you understand this?

Don’t worry about things too much, just think ‘this is the way things are.’ This is your work, your duty. Right now nobody can help you, there’s nothing that your family and possessions can do for you. All that can help you now is clear awareness.

So don’t waver. Let go. Throw it all away.

Even if you don’t let go, everything is starting to leave you anyway. Can you see how all the different parts of your body are trying to slip away? Take your hair; when you were young it was thick and black. Now it’s falling out. It’s leaving. Your eyes used to be good and strong but now they’re weak, your sight is unclear. When your organs have had enough they leave, this isn’t their home. When you were a child your teeth were healthy and firm, now they’re wobbly, or you’ve got false ones. Your eyes, ears, nose, tongue – everything is trying to leave because this isn’t their home. You can’t make a permanent home in conditions, you can only stay for a short time and then you have to go. It’s like a tenant watching over his tiny little house with failing eyes. His teeth aren’t so good, his eyes aren’t so good, his body’s not so healthy, everything is leaving.

So you needn’t worry about anything because this isn’t your real home, it’s only a temporary shelter. Having come into this world you should contemplate its nature. Everything there is is preparing to disappear. Look at your body. Is there anything there that’s still in its original form? Is your skin as it used to be? Is your hair? They aren’t the same, are they? Where has everything gone? This is nature, the way things are. When their time is up, conditions go their way. In this world there is nothing to rely on – it’s an endless round of disturbance and trouble, pleasure and pain. There’s no peace.

When we have no real home we’re like aimless travellers out on the road, going here and there, stopping for a while and then setting off again. Until we return to our real homes we feel uneasy, just like a villager who’s left his village. Only when he gets home can he really relax and be at peace.

Nowhere in the world is there any real peace to be found. The poor have no peace and neither do the rich; adults have no peace and neither do the highly educated. There’s no peace anywhere, that’s the nature of the world. Those who have few possessions suffer, and so do those who have many. Children, adults, old and young … everyone suffers. The suffering of being old, the suffering of being young, the suffering of being wealthy and the suffering of being poor – it’s all nothing but suffering.

When you’ve contemplated things in this way you’ll see aniccaṃ, impermanence, and dukkhaṃ, unsatisfactoriness. Why are things impermanent and unsatisfactory? Because they are anattā, not-self.

Both your body that is lying sick and in pain, and the mind that is aware of its sickness and pain, are called dhamma. That which is formless, the thoughts, feelings and perceptions, is called nāmadhamma. That which is racked with aches and pains is called rūpadhamma. The material is dhamma and the immaterial is dhamma. So we live with dhamma, in dhamma, and we are dhamma. In truth there is no self to be found, there are only dhammas continually arising and passing away as is their nature. Every single moment we’re undergoing birth and death. This is the way things are.

When we think of the Lord Buddha, how truly he spoke, we feel how worthy he is of reverence and respect. Whenever we see the truth of something we see his teachings, even if we’ve never actually practiced the Dhamma. But even if we have a knowledge of the teachings, have studied and practiced them, as long as we still haven’t seen the truth we are still homeless.

So understand this point. All people, all creatures, are preparing to leave. When beings have lived an appropriate time they must go on their way. Rich, poor, young and old must all experience this change.

When you realize that’s the way the world is you’ll feel that it’s a wearisome place. When you see that there’s nothing real or substantial you can rely on you’ll feel wearied and disenchanted. Being disenchanted doesn’t mean you are averse; the mind is clear. It sees that there’s nothing to be done to remedy this state of affairs, it’s just the way the world is. Knowing in this way you can let go of attachment; you can let go with a mind that is neither happy nor sad, but at peace with conditions through seeing their changing nature with wisdom. Aniccā vata saṅkhārā – all conditions are impermanent.

To put it simply, impermanence is the Buddha. If we truly see an impermanent condition, we’ll see that it’s permanent. It’s permanent in the sense that its subjection to change is unchanging. This is the permanence that living beings possess. There is continual transformation, from childhood through to old age, and that very impermanence, that propensity to change, is permanent and fixed. If you look at it like this your heart will be at ease. It’s not just you who has to go through this, everyone has to.

When you consider things in this way you’ll see them as wearisome, and disenchantment will arise. Your delight in the world of sense pleasures will disappear. You’ll see that if you have many possessions, you have to leave a lot behind. If you have a few, you leave few behind. Wealth is just wealth, long life is just long life; they’re nothing special.

What is important is that we should do as the Lord Buddha taught and build our own home, building it by the method that I’ve been explaining to you. Build your own home. Let go. Let go until the mind reaches the peace that is free from advancing, free from retreating and free from stopping still. Pleasure is not your home, pain is not your home. Pleasure and pain both decline and pass away.

The great teacher saw that all conditions are impermanent and so he taught us to let go of our attachment to them. When we reach the end of our life we’ll have no choice anyway, we won’t be able to take anything with us. So wouldn’t it be better to put things down before then? They’re just a heavy burden to carry around, why not throw off that load now? Why bother to drag these things around? Let go, relax, and let your family look after you.

Those who nurse the sick grow in goodness and virtue. The patient who is giving others that opportunity shouldn’t make things difficult for them. If there’s pain or some problem or other, let them know and keep the mind in a wholesome state. One who is nursing parents should fill his or her mind with warmth and kindness and not get caught up in aversion. This is the one time you can repay your debt to them. From your birth through your childhood, as you’ve grown up, you’ve been dependent on your parents. That you are here today is because your mother and father have helped you in so many ways. You owe them an incredible debt of gratitude.

So today, all of you children and relatives gathered together here, observe how your mother has become your child. Before you were her children, now she has become yours. She has become older and older until she has become a child again. Her memory goes, her eyes don’t see well and her ears aren’t so good. Sometimes she garbles her words. Don’t let it upset you. You who are nursing the sick must know how to let go also. Don’t hold onto things, just let her have her own way. When a young child is disobedient sometimes the parents let it have its own way just to keep the peace, just to make it happy. Now your mother is just like that child. Her memories and perceptions are confused. Sometimes she muddles up your names, or asks you to bring a cup when she wants a plate. It’s normal, don’t be upset by it.

Let the patient bear in mind the kindness of those who nurse and patiently endure the painful feelings. Exert yourself mentally, don’t let the mind become scattered and confused, and don’t make things difficult for those looking after you. Let those who are nursing fill their minds with virtue and kindness. Don’t be averse to the unattractive side of the job, cleaning up the mucous and phlegm, urine and excrement. Try your best. Everyone in the family give a hand.

She is the only mother you have. She gave you life, she has been your teacher, your doctor and your nurse – she’s been everything to you. That she has brought you up, shared her wealth with you and made you her heir is the great goodness of parents. That is why the Buddha taught the virtues of kataññū and katavedī, knowing our debt of gratitude and trying to repay it. These two dhammas are complimentary. If our parents are in need, unwell or in difficulty, then we do our best to help them. This is kataññū-katavedī, the virtue that sustains the world. It prevents families from breaking up, and makes them stable and harmonious.

Today I have brought you the gift of Dhamma in this time of illness. I have no material things to offer you, there seem to be plenty of those in this house already. And so I give you the Dhamma, something which has lasting worth, something which you’ll never be able to exhaust. Having received it you can pass it on to as many others as you like and it will never be depleted. That is the nature of Truth. I am happy to have been able to give you this gift of Dhamma and hope it will give you the strength to deal with your pain.

(The Teachings of Ajahn Chah)