Outside Your Conditioning

When you meditate, you’re asserting the primacy of the mind. That’s in line with the very first verse in the Dhammapada: “All dhammas are preceded by the mind, ruled by the mind, made by the mind.” The mind is the big cause of things in the world. As the Buddha said, the causes of our suffering are in the mind, but the potential for putting an end to suffering is in our mind as well. If the mind weren’t able to make choices in the present moment, and if those choices didn’t make a difference, we wouldn’t be able to practice. As the Buddha said, we’d be left unprotected, We’d feel that whatever urge came up inside, we’d have to follow it. Whatever was our conditioning, we’d have to follow it.

But if that were the case, the Buddha would have stayed home, because his conditioning was very much aimed at keeping him home. But he saw that, No, he had the right to say No. He wanted something better than that. And it was through training the mind that he found what was better.

So focus on your mind, focus on your awareness, focus on the thoughts that you’re thinking. These are important. Remember that you have choices, and they make a difference. You could go down certain alleyways, certain rabbit holes, but you wouldn’t want to go down those holes, would you? What would you find down there? Usually in a rabbit hole there’s just a lot of dirt.

You want to stay up in the world outside where you can step back from your conditioning and see which parts of your conditioning are skillful and which parts are not. You have the right to choose which ones you’re going to follow. So accept that right. Make the most of it.

Although people have the ability to make choices, many of them just fall in line with their own old ways. They keep going around and around and around, like King Koravya. When the facts of aging, illness and death, inconstancy, stress, and not-self were pointed out to him, and then he was asked if he would want to come back and conquer a few more territories, would he do it? He said, “Yeah, of course.”

That’s just giving in to your old conditioning. Ideally, you want to release yourself from your conditioning, and the Buddha said you can do that. This is why this teaching is something universal. It’s not just for Indians or Asians. It’s for human beings, even divine beings, no matter where you are, no matter what your past conditioning is.

The Dhamma is all about stepping back and getting perspective. The Buddha’s view is counter-cultural. It was counter-cultural in his time and it’s still counter-cultural today. Look where the culture is going. Everything is falling apart. Yet the Buddha says you can step out. You can follow the customs of the noble ones, in terms of being content with your food, clothing and shelter, and in terms of finding joy in abandoning unskillful qualities and developing skillful ones. That’s the way out.

So join the culture of the noble ones. Step out of your old conditioning as much as you can, because that kind of conditioning just goes around and around and around. Whereas the Buddha’s conditioning takes you out, to places better than you can imagine.

So keep that thought in mind. That’s why we’re here. Don’t get involved in issues that will get in the way of the pursuit of true happiness, because it’s a happiness that causes no harm to anyone. It’s a happiness that’s not going to disappoint.