Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - 283: The Buddha’s Foundational Listicle | Phillip Moffitt

Episode Date: September 16, 2020

Way before Buzzfeed, the Buddha was creating listicles: The Seven Factors of Enlightenment, The Three Jewels, The Eight Worldly Winds... I could go on. He wasn’t using these lists as clickbait, obviously; they were teaching tools -- ways to understand how the mind works, and how we can work with the mind. The first and, many believe, most important list promulgated by the Buddha was the Four Noble Truths. And today, we're going to take a stroll through this list with Phillip Moffitt. He’s got an interesting resume. He’s a deep dharma teacher who studied in the Thai Forest tradition for years, and was a Co-Guiding Teacher at Spirit Rock Meditation Center for most of the last decade. But he’s also a former editor of Esquire Magazine who has run workshops and done one-on-one counseling on the subject of personal life changes and transitions. As I mentioned in the last episode, we’re dedicating this whole week to the subject of managing change in a chaotic world. Monday, we spoke to Bruce Feiler, who takes a more journalistic approach to the subject. Today, it’s a Buddhist approach. Not only does Phillip walk us through the ways in which the Four Noble Truths can help us manage transitions, but he also layers in another list -- a listicle within a listicle. Don’t worry, it’s not confusing or complicated; it’s incredibly interesting. So interesting that Phillip actually wrote a whole book about the combination of these lists, called Dancing With Life. Where to find Phillip Moffitt online: Website: http://dharmawisdom.org/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/dharmawisdom Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/therealphillipmoffitt/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/Phillipmoffitt1?feature=watch Book Mentioned: Dancing With Life by Phillip Moffitt: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781594863530 Other Resources Mentioned: After the Ecstasy, the Laundry by Jack Kornfield: https://www.amazon.com/After-Ecstasy-Laundry-Heart-Spiritual/dp/0553378295 Ajahn Sumedho: https://dharmaseed.org/teacher/10/ Additional Resources: Ten Percent Happier Live: https://tenpercent.com/live Coronavirus Sanity Guide: https://www.tenpercent.com/coronavirussanityguide Free App access for Frontline Workers: https://tenpercent.com/care Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/phillip-moffitt-283 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Santos to access the course. Just download the 10% happier app wherever you get your apps or by visiting 10% calm. All one word spelled out. Okay on with the show. to baby, this is Kiki Palmer on Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts. From ABC, this is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Hey guys, quick ask. If you find this podcast to be at all supportive to you and you're looking for a way to support us as we do our work here on the show, One simple and deeply awesome way to do that is to subscribe to our app. We here on the podcast are constantly working with the folks over at the app.

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we really think you'll like the app as well. So you can check it out for free. You can get a 30 day free trial at 10% dot com slash try. 30 days for free. If you don't like it, dooses. That is 10% all one word spelled out dot com slash try. Hey guys, way before Buzzfeed, the Buddha was all about creating listicles. The seven factors of enlightenment, the three

jewels, the eight worldly wins, I could go on. He created a lot of lists. Obviously, the Buddha was not using lists as clickbait. He was using them as teaching tools, ways to understand how the mind works and how we can work with the mind. The first and many believe most important list promulgated by the Buddha was the four noble truths. Today we're going to take a stroll through this list with Philip Moffitt. He's a dude with a very interesting resume.

He's a deep Dharma teacher who studied in the Thai Forest tradition for years and then served as the co-guiding teacher at Spirit Rock Meditation Center. But he's also a former editor of Esquire magazine who has run workshops and done one-on-one counseling on the subject of personal life changes and transitions. As I mentioned on the last episode, we're dedicating this entire week of episodes

to the subject of managing change in a chaotic world. On Monday, we spoke with Bruce Filer, who takes a more journalistic approach to the subject. Today, it's a Buddhist approach. Not only does Philip walk us through the ways in which the four noble truths can help us manage change,

but he also layers in another list, a kind of listicle within a listicle. Don't worry though, it's not confusing, it's not complicated, it's incredibly interesting. So interesting, in fact, that Philip actually wrote a whole book about the combination of these two lists called Dancing with Life. So here we go with Philip Moffitt. Philip, great to meet you. Thanks for doing this. Well, thank you for inviting me. So you come at this moment from a variety of really interesting standpoints. One is you've been doing this one-on-one coaching, helping people through changes and transitions

in their life. And the other is you've for several decades been studying and practicing and teaching the Dharma. So just a general question, what's on your mind as you watch the world endure these various earthquakes in our lives? First of all, like most of us, my heart goes out to the people who are on the edge of the suffering, those who have to carry the largest burden of the suffering. And I think it's important that we all acknowledge that there's a disproportionate allocation

as to who has to most experience the suffering. And it can give us a perspective for our own disquiet, whatever that may be that any given person is having during this time. So really an acknowledgement of that. And then the thing that I guess most I've been dismayed by is the reactive mind states. We would call them from a Buddhist perspective, reactive mind states around the uncertainty that is present in so many different aspects right now, and live really across the globe, and that reactive mind state is leading to such

delusion again from the Buddhist perspective of there being one of the three characteristics of that this kind of that, this kind of, that can come, the delusion that comes, the hindrance of delusion, kind of showing up, because of the way our minds are put together, so that this reactive mind state leads to a lot of unnecessary kind of suffering, both in a practical way of implementing policies, and in an internal way of getting disoriented and losing any sense of a ground where our feelings can be contained and related to with wisdom and compassion. So on an individual level, your sense is that many of us, and I'm just picking up on your last point, many of us get stuck in our fear,

our aversion, or greed, or whatever that's coming up in the face of all the tumult around us, and as a consequence, make bad decisions that can cascade out in pretty profound ways. Right. So we can make bad decisions for ourselves. We can be reactive to others in ways that cause harm. Just think of the mask wars. Who would imagine that in our society, people would literally cause physical harm to one another, over whether or not someone is wearing a mask for their own sense of safety. We can cause harm to others in all sorts of ways, and then we can add to the general feeling of unease that exacerbates everything, it amps it up.

Marissa, our producer in consultation with you and me had the thought that one way to sort of get at some of these larger issues would be to go through the foundational listicle of the Buddha, the four noble truths. And, you know, I think we've been doing this show for four years, I don't know that we've ever taken a detailed stroll through the Four Noble Truths, which I now realize is kind of a form of malpractice

on my part. So you have a really interesting way of talking about this list from the Buddha. And I wonder, before we dive into your dissection of the list, maybe you could just give us some overview on on how and where from a historical standpoint, the Buddha is said to have promulgated this list. Well, soon after the Buddha's enlightenment, for he spent time just dwelling in that liberated feeling, and then it dawned on him according

to the story that this is worthy of sharing the four noble trusses. These understandings were worthy of sharing, but then he asked, but then who would understand it? And he was thinking about that. And he realized there are those people who have little dust in their eyes, it's said, little dust in their eyes, who would understand. And so he walked for a few days to where the people he had been practicing with before he went off to practice on his own, these five companions he had. And he walked back and they saw him coming in a distance and they could, they could, who is the stranger that's got this bearing about them, this bearing of having achieved this kind of liberation.

And then they were amazed to discover it was their former practice companion. And so he sat down with them and told them the four noble truths. And that's referred to as the first turning of the wheel. The beginning of Dhamma and all of the different schools, the different Yamas in Buddhism, all agree that the four noble truths are the fundamental teaching. They then have different ways of describing it and so forth and putting it in different contexts, but that's just the fundamental teaching and that all the other teachings are really an elaboration

of the four-nobal truths teaching. So let's go through the four-nobal truths and your take on them, especially with the, we don't have to restrict ourselves to this, but let's keep in mind the emphasis on how to navigate ourselves to this, but let's keep in mind that the emphasis on how to navigate change and transition, which is a universal issue at this moment in human history. Really is universal right now, and we're all going to be going through changes of our own making,

and then changes because the world has changed. because the world has changed. Always in my own gratitude, I learned this particular teachings of the Four Noble Truths from the Vendor-Vol. Ajahn Somato, who now lives in Thailand, but for many years was the head abbot and the largest monastery in England. And it was sitting in a dharma hall hall having many times heard the teachings of the four noble truths. I'd been so impressed with him as a teacher and he announced for these ten days we're going to be studying the four noble truths and I go, oh, you know, at

least he's a great teacher, but the four noble truths, yeah, again, and I was amazed to hear these twelve insights of the four noble truths, which I'd never despite having gone through, I mean, at that point I'd probably practiced 15 years or so in the tradition. I'd never heard them described in this way and they're from the oldest of the Theribauden text, the Samutian Akhaya, and they take the four noble truths as a practice rather than a philosophy or a description of reality alone. Each of the four noble truths is to be practiced, and there's three insights that are cultivated, and this is what brings onward leading in terms of having freedom from breed hatred and

delusion, breed aversion if you prefer that word and delusion. So it's kind of a listicle within a listicle and it takes the four noble truths out of the realm of philosophical and makes it really practical. Yes, and it brings it into your life because you actually witness your own life. Your own life is teaching you the Dhamma

because you're seeing it with Dhamma eyes. Another way I describe that, that has had a big impact in our community, is I ask people to cultivate being available to the Dhamma or Dhamma, some people pronounce it. You know, you've got the two different pronunciations, Dhamma and Dhamma. So I asked people to be available to the Dama and it has had a kind of startling impact because they had not so many people think of practicing as doing and being available is much more somewhat knowing and even more still being. So

you're being available, you're not like figuring it out, but you're being mindful, you're using the mindfulness practice in such a way in your daily life to see of what is suffering and not a suffering. It's interesting, huh? So I will say to people on retreats or working with small groups or whatever it may be, that the first thing to do is to be able to see what is duke and what is not duke. So what is suffering and what is not suffering? That's the first thing is to recognize, oh this is suffering. Because oftentimes, as the Buddha said, a way often think that what is happiness is actually suffering,

and what is suffering is actually happiness. So to recognize, in this moment, I am in some way participating and causing duke to myself suffering, or again, this suffering has a much wider use of that word than we use it in English. It's unsatisfactory, it's stressful, it is negatively contributing, it's reducing, it's flattening, all of these different kinds of things. Big, big implications about our basic attitude and motivation. So the first of these three things I'll tell people to do is to recognize, oh, this is suffering. So right now I'm experiencing suffering, or the way I've gotten all tied about being right in relation to my espouse, this is suffering. I'm suffering and I'm causing my spouse suffering here and now You know, it's not like some philosophies here and now and then to say do I have any choice? That's the second part of this as a living these four noble truths is do I have any choice?

Because sometimes we're so determined. We're right or we're so mad or we're so whatever that we can see we don't have choice and that alone is the beginning of an awakening, right? Like, I don't want to live in a way that I don't have choice. I don't want to let my mind get into states where I don't have choice. So that's the second part is do I have choice. And then the third is to say, and I choose, I will apologize, I will stop the argument, I will not continue with these negative thoughts or confronting someone or speaking in politics in terms of hatred.

No, I've stopped. And if I'm present when someone else is doing it, I'll leave the room so that we start to have a living relationship with our practice rather than it being something we do over there and then we live our life over here. So that's the, that's the, but that is a backdrop. Then when you look at the first noble truth, where the first noble truth states that there is duke, and the way that's understood and the three insights is the Buddha is giving you a philosophical statement there. This is where you can use the old head, the coconut to think about things. Was it true that there's suffering in my life or not?

Do I know anybody whose life doesn't have suffering? You think the way we Westerners like to think. So you examine that as a supposition and go, that's probably true. There is duke, there is stress. And then the second of the insights is that duke is to be known. It's to be penetrated. The instruction is to fill the out so that you actually feel that yes, this is duka. This attitude I'm carrying is duka. And so forth, when I speak this way, this is duka. I'm supporting these people that are doing this thing, and this is duka.

This is duka. And so that we have that recognition. And then the third insight of the first novel truth is that, yeah, I really do know Duke of now. I do know it. By knowing it means that we know, we know to the degree that we can integrate it in our decision-making about life. So let me just see if I can recap a little bit.

Just to go all the way back. This is a four-part list, the four Noble Truths, and under each part, there are three insights, and that's the innovation from your teacher, Ajahn Sumedo. So we've just done the first Noble Truth, which is life is suffering, which sounds quite pessimistic, but what the Buddha meant by that life is suffering is that, or one way to construe it is if given that everything's changing all the time, you are clinging to things

that will not last, you are going to suffer. And then the Sumerdo, your teacher, is then saying saying there are three things you can do with this first noble truth. First is to now remind me here know it. Know it, recognize it and then you feel it and then on that basis you respond. Know it, feel it, respond. Yeah, so and this again the teachings come from the Sam Mutinakaya, the oldest of the teravodin Buddhism texts. So it's Somato is the one who has built his whole teaching life around this, the Bentebosomato. Gotcha. So that's not his innovation. I mispoke there. It's his emphasis in the teaching based on the texts. Two things to say about the first noble truth

is that the Buddha was not saying that all of life is suffering He did not say that in fact for lay people There's places where he gives a long list of happiness the kinds of happiness. Souka. It's called the kinds of Souka that you can have in life And one of those that he mentions is being debt-free by the way Which I thought was really funny. So he is saying that life is bound with suffering, that there is Suka and Dukka and they're bound together, and you don't get one without the other. So that's the nature. You will hear Buddhist teachers particularly, monastics talk about the nature, understanding the nature of this realm.

So this is the nature of this realm. It's pointing to the dual nature of our life. So being born, we can see as joyous, then if we see that as joyous, then we can see old age sickness and death as the duke. That's why that is the fundamental teaching that's used to describe the nature of duke because it kind of most easily understood by people. But every moment there's this inner play of sukan duke because everything is changing. There's three kinds in the samyutra nakaia version that duke as scraps three kinds of duke, the duke of emotional and physical pain. That's alch, right? And then the duke because everything is always changing. So you can never get it right in its days. You can't

wash your hands once and say, Oh, I've really got clean hands. I'm through with that. How many times right now are we all needing to wash our hands over and over again? You can't wash your hands once and say, oh, I've really got clean hands. I'm through with that. How many times right now are we all needing to wash our hands over and over again? You can't rush your teeth once. My partner and I have the perfect relationship. We're so happy right now. But then there's go come moments of unhappiness. It's everything changes.

So that's the second kind of duke. And then the third kind of duke, as described, is a little more subtle, which is that because we are compounded, we're aggregated, where bodies made up of parts, being a human being is made up of parts, it's perplexing to find a there there, where there's a true self that is unchanging in our identity. And that again, that's much more subtle, but that's unnerving to our ego, our executive functioning systems, because we want that they are there. And so that's the third kind of duke.

So just taking this to a really practical, O. Kurant level here of our lives right now. How would we operationalize this first noble truth in the three subsequent insights in a moment where I don't know, I see some news about the possibility of coronavirus reinfection, or I see some news about another police shooting of an unarmed black man, or I'm locked up with my kids and they're driving me bonkers. How could I really integrate this into my life on a momentary basis? So the first noble truth is about recognition, and then the second noble truth is more about responding to what you recognize. But we're going to stick here with the second noble proof is more about responding to what you recognize.

But we're going to stick here with the first noble truth. You recognize, oh, this is suffering. And in recognizing that it's the stress of it, the unsatisfactory nature of this, even while you love your kids, they're driving you bonkers, but you love your kids and you love your country and your country is enabling something being horribly wrong now for hundreds of years to hold segment of the population. You see and you feel the painfulness of that, but rather than becoming identified with it as a kind of thing where it leads you to quit on yourself, turn to hatred.

You don't take it personally in that way. The idea is that this is the nature of this realm, that this duke, these things that are unsatisfactory occur. It's the nature of the realm is, if I may, it's duality. This is the nature of the manifest is, if I may, it's duality. This is the nature of the manifest world in which we live. This manifest universe, as far as we know, is everywhere made up of opposites. It's a dual realm. The Buddha called them the eight worldly winds of gain and loss, pain and pleasure, fame and overpute, praise and blame. This is the nature of our world.

And then when we understand that, so it's not about us, it's about, this is the nature of this, and it's how we then get to relate to this. And so that would be the first level of it. And once we accept that it's impersonal, we see how we can in some way respond out of compassion, love, if you will, and out of wisdom, so that we, in so far as we have

choice in our individual lives and in our roles, that we are not adding to the suffering, that we realize I don't want to contribute more to this in so far as I have choice. So knowing it, well I'm gonna just see if I can put it into the three insights as you've just done just to restate it just to make sure that I've got it because it's all really interesting and I can see how I could apply in my own life. So just something is happening that's clearly causing suffering for me and others, something in the news, something in my family life.

And just to know this as suffering and that suffering is not unnatural, it's natural. It's the reality of this world in which we live. This realm is to use it your term. The second is to feel it. And this is where meditation can become useful to sit and actually become familiar with what this feels like in your body and in your mind. And the third is to once you've taken the beat to part of this experience in this realm is the duke.

And there's also much suka. I mean, seeing nature in its beauty is suka. Being out here in the fires in California as I am right now is duke. That nature that's so beautiful where we want to live out in nature, being surrounded by nature, we don't get one without the other, if you see what I mean. The duality of duke and suka, what's pleasant and unpleasant it's referred to in the four foundations of mindfulness. This is the second of the four foundations of mindfulness, the existence of pleasant and unpleasant, and in a worldly way. There's a second aspect of that foundation of mindfulness, which is unworldly pleasant and unpleasant. So we're seeing this dance, I call it the book Dance with Life, for that

reason. See, we're in this dance of life with the ever-changing. It's always changing of pleasant and unpleasant. And so we're not going to stop that change, but we can dance with it in a more wise way. When I say, why is not it, we should, but what actually brings well-being to us. And what's in that second noble truth then describes quite is that we have an unwise relationship to life if we're without practice, without exploration. Much more of my conversation with Philip Moffitt right after this.

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You can listen ad-free on Amazon Music or the Wondery app. Before we get to the second noble truth, I just want to, in the theme of the title of your book, Dancing with Life, I've heard this sometimes described as, you can talk about Dancing or you can talk about surfing or you get to get pummeled by the waves or you're going to surf the waves. Whatever, pick your analogy, but let, or you're gonna get pummeled by the waves, or you're gonna surf the waves. Whatever, pick your analogy, but let me give you an example for my own life and see if, because this is what came to mind

as I was listening to you speak, and I was see if this strikes you as an appropriate operationalizing of what you're trying to teach us here. I've been dealing with my parents and their aging for the last couple of years, and I mean, that's filled with all of its own sadness and horrors.

And especially in the beginning, I was kind of caught up in that part of it. And a friend of mine, a very wise friend of mine, not a Dharma teacher, but just a very smart guy and also a meditator. He had taken care of his mom in his 20s when she was dying of cancer. And he is advice to me when he was listening to me talk about what's going on with my parents was try to find the sweetness in it. And I noticed that that is very doable. That is actually quite doable.

This is really sad and can be horrifying to have a role reversal with your parents in this way. But also, there's a lot of sweetness in it, especially since they were great parents and taking care of them doesn't scan for me as a burden, et cetera, et cetera. So anyway, that's a lot of personal stuff that maybe is irrelevant, but it came up in my mind as being relevant.

It really is relevant, and I've actually said that it's very words to a number of students to find the sweetness in relation to both with parents and with children that are that have major challenges that they have children that are dying or have really major challenges they will live with as long as they do live. There is always some place within us where we can have a soft relationship and not a pollyanna kind of relationship, you know, the best of all possible worlds kind of interpretation. That's delusion. But that, oh, in the nature of all of this, there is some place of peace, some place of caring.

So like with my mother, if she was in a coma for a long period of time, and in some ways, I could see how that coma was a kind of resting, that my interpretation of it, because of my attachment to being, you know, functional that I was I was ascribing to her experience something that I had no way of knowing was her experience and that I could celebrate her as herself in that this is the way her life is unfolding and if we don't celebrate a person's life as it's unfolding, then we're not really honoring their life. And it's particularly true with kids who have challenges like that is their life. They don't have some other life.

So if you actually treat them as though somehow they're less, you can see that it's creating a wrong kind of relationship. Likewise, if you are going into a kind of resentment or a collapse around your parents and you start suffering because they are suffering, then you're adding to the suffering of the universe. So now there's more suffering in the universe. But if those parts of you that are carrying parts of you are present and you're finding that sweetness in this and the honoring, the celebrating the life they had made easier if you've had great parents Your instance then there is less suffering. There's more joy in the universe

Just in a mathematical way and again, this isn't some syrupy thing if the Buddha said that people who were truly happy Would not pass suffering to others that people who were truly happy would not cause suffering to others. One could make all sorts of references from there, but I don't think we should. I think people will be able to read into that pregnant pause. I just say for my own part, I can just think about the times when I've caused suffering to other people. It's generally made me unhappy in doing it, but it's also more to the point come out of some unhappiness on my end.

So this is great. Let's go to the second noble truth. Okay. The second noble truth states that there is a cause of suffering, of cause of duke, and what the Buddha means by, the cause of suffering is how we're relating to suffering, that our experience of suffering is based on how we're relating to it. So there's physical and emotional pain in life, but it's how we relate to it, that constitutes must of our suffering. So, and he says that the way we relate in the untrained mind is through what's called tonja or thirst, that we cling to what we want,

that we grasp, that we're trying to stop change, as you said earlier in our conversation, we try to stop change when change is inevitable. You know, when a child is at the perfect days that you're enjoying the most, they grow up and become a bit more challenging or whatever it may be in your life that you love being a runner.

And then one day the knees won't support that anymore. And if you're clinging to no, I want to have my knees support me. I don't want to ever have to stop running. Then that clinging is in the way of you're finding a graceful way to relate to what's true now. So the reflection, the first of those insights, is that true? Does it really matter how I relate to things in life that I don't like, or even still the things in life that I want that I don't get.

How am I relating to that? Makes a real difference in my interior experience. That's easily proved by everybody for themselves. Take ten minutes and watch your mind, and you can see that how you're relating makes so much different. Life is the way it is in this moment, you know, and we can have goals for the future about changing it, but in this moment are we contracting as our mind turning to a version, are we called in greed? And so often we do, you know, we get caught in small ways. And sometimes really, really large ways. And some ways that's a times that affect many, many, many people everywhere. So that's the philosophical, except first insight that you, again, you

think about that. You go, no, it's not true. How do I think about this? And, you know, you can talk about it with your friends or whatever. And then the second insight of the second novel truth is to release that cause of suffering, release clinging, release of grasping, release this thirst. You momentarily release it. Just this very moment, can I not be caught in this? I may get caught all over again in the very next moment, but I am so upset about the way they are doing the going back to school for the kids. People have such strong views about this

in every direction around the pandemic. So, and there's this kind of, there can be a going into hatred around that, like making somebody an awful being because they have a different view than you about whether or not kids, you know, should be going back to schools where you're opening. And like, seeing, oh, no, that's just suffering in my mind. And then, and it's distorting my view of another person. There can be different views about this. Usually that is a simple example

because of the time and place we are right now in the pandemic. So the practice is releasing and it's it's momentary because in that momentary moment, only by releasing our brass bin, you know, I want this, my spouse wants something else. I want to move. My spouse doesn't want to move. My spouse is a terrible person because they don't want to move. Whatever it may be, the moment we release it, we can see that our grasping is distorting the totality of our experience. And oftentimes in a way that takes out the better part of us, the better parts of us, the more caring parts of us, the wiser parts of us, get shut out in that grasping,

that clinging. And so, and the value of that is you know it's true because you watch it when you let go. That's why it's a more difficult practice than just recognizing suffering. It's a whole step up in practice. And boy, can you do this in everyday life? step up in practice. And boy, can you do this in everyday life? Over and over again, that where you in traffic, you know, or Chris, we don't have that much traffic right now compared to usual, but often ask people to do traffic practice, where they are in traffic and watch their mind states while they're driving in heavy traffic. And what way is that mind state serving you,

or is it helping you be a better driver, is it making you a safer driver, so on and so forth? And why do you think everybody else is in your way? Because you're traffic, you know, to release this whole set of perceptions that come what our term is reactive mind. We're not getting what we want, or we have something we don't want and we get really reactive to it. And the second level of truth practice is to let loose of that

reactivity. Very simple and you can recognize your reactivity really fast. But you have to train, you have to care, you have to say it's possible that what the Buddha was saying actually would make a difference in my life. So I'm gonna find out you don't have to believe Buddhism's not a belief system, but you have to say it's possible. You have to have enough faith to investigate and what is the faith in the faith is in your own capacity of your mind heart. the faith is in your own capacity of your mind heart. And did we get to the third insight of the second episode? Yeah, I was still there, the second of the releasing. Because it's people, you have to really commit to releasing.

I mean, it's not like you're going to, the recognition of the first novel, which is there is Dukka, releasing this, my reactivity to the Dukka is like a whole let's why spend so much time on it with you. And then the third insight of the second novel truth is that, oh, I know this is true. Now I've experienced it over and over again because I'm momentary released it. And so I know that this is true and I know that I know this is true. I'm going to live this way. I'm going to shift my way of living. I want to live the Dharma in daily life.

Let's just drill down on releasing, clinging, craving, thirst in a moment. I've always understood this. In my mind, we're talking about the concept of letting go, which for me initially, I thought, huh, that sounds easier said than done. But another way to phrase it is letting be. So there's not much actually to do. It's just to see clearly, oh yeah, yeah, I'm feeling a homicidal urge vis-a-vis the person in the car in front of me on the highway

is going indefensibly slowly. And just to see it clearly, you don't have to feed it or fight it, that is the releasing. Am I saying this correctly? Yes. So, what the releasing is that there's ever more subtle levels of that. But that is correct. It's the recognition of that you are grasping, that you are clinging, you're contracting. And then as best you're able to put that down.

So it's like if you pick up something that's hot, your nervous system will release it immediately. You'll drop it even, and then have it break, rather than keep burning you, for you to recognize in the same way that certain thoughts, words, and actions are burning you. So you don't, the pot that you, the pot that you didn't realize was hot,

when you start to touch it, you release it, you don't throw away the pot. You need the pot for cooking So you just put it down. You putting it down. It's and so of The second noble truth is all about desire desire of wanting This sense pleasure and mental thoughts and all to be the way we wanted wanting to become and not wanting to be This is again listed in the Samu to Nakhaya, those three kinds of things. So the venerable tomato describes them as natural energy of this realm that desire is a natural

energy of this realm for it to arise, but our relationship to it is what we can change. And so we just put down, yes, you don't have to get rid of the pot. So you can, that you have, that you have a sense of what should be, if there's nothing wrong with that capacity, because that's your moral compass in the end. But then you realize that my judging other drivers,

because they are in my way, it's not a wise use of that capacity. One critique I've heard of this mental move is that, and I think this is a misunderstanding, but it's nonetheless a compelling critique, is that this idea of dropping our anger or greed or whatever it is that this, specifically actually the critique has to do with anger,

is that it can lead to a passivity or a quietism in the face of the injustices of the world. Are you just telling me like my anger is invalid? I should just let it go and let structural racism continue or let people and politics I disagree with, to have their way. So that is a misunderstanding. And I just refer to the fact that you don't want to let loose of your moral compass. So you can have a very strong feeling this is not right and I must do what I can to change this and it is not the passion that's the problem it's when the passion is distorted by this wanting mind. Martin Luther King is a great

example of someone who was anything but passive, but he did not let his anger turn into a kind of hatred, but rather to a larger kind of love, and we all benefited from it, you know, in a very obvious way, and that's what makes him such a remarkable person to have lived. And was he perfect as a human being? No. But this idea that people are supposed to be perfect is, again, a kind of robbing life of the duality of it.

We're not going to be perfect beings. And the way he was relating to a real outrage that is still going on was a very effective way of relating to it in his time and space. And so that would be an example to that. So let's do the third noble truth. So the third noble truth is the one I tell people to pay less attention to in terms of practice because one evolves into this. The third noble truth is that there is a state of being in which our relating to the world of Dukha and our clinging is transformed. And to me, it's a gradual path. And I take it as meaning that, although, and you might have a big moment when you are free,

but then it all comes back unless you do all the work. So by the way, in terms of describing that Jack Cornfield has this wonderful book called After the X to See, the Laundry, because people have had big spiritual experiences. Well, think, oh, now I'm beyond this. And no, now you go back. And so that there is an end, what does the end look like? The way I have understood it, and my own practice experience, and from the teachers I've

must respect it, it's the end of the mind being filled with greed or aversion or delusion. That there is a clear relating to our experience with wisdom and compassion. And that the experience, therefore, of what the mind would be in its full form is that you would have the brum vaharas of loving kindness, metta, corona, compassion, medita of happiness for the happiness of others, and then equanimity. I used to think that was impossible. I'm still very doubtful about that for me, but I don't consider it impossible that a human being's mind gets so free of conditioned reactivity that that's possible. And so that's the statement, that's the first insight to realize, oh, at least to some degree, that's true. Oh, I can imagine myself being more like that than I am

now, which is the motivation to keep you practicing and then being inspired by those who clearly have done that more than we have. We're in our society right now around the world we use the Dalai Lama as an example of that. I would use Nelson Mandela as an example of that too. It's not the Buddhist thing, it's a Dhamma thing. And the truth, Dhamma means truth. And so that's the dumb thing. And the truth, Doma means truth. And so that's the first insight.

The second insight is that it's to be realized. Realized as I would understand, it means that your ego is not going to accomplish it. Your ego cannot accomplish it. There's things that the ego can achieve in terms of discipline and practice and so forth. And after that, it's attainment. It happens because the conditions were right and it happens. We create favorable conditions. The Venables made us say the personality never gets enlightened.

And people carry this around with them. They put it on their refrigerator door. People would stop me and say thank you, thank you for bringing this out because people think that our ego with all of its sparks, right, and its challenges, if we're supposed to do this. But now we practice, we create the conditions and then these insights build and then they take on their own momentum. So that's the realization.

And then realization has been understood. The third insight would be that at each level you realize, well, I am different person than I was. And you know that you know this so that you let the fruits of it come in because you can actually have a capacity to be a better person than you're being and not realize you've got that capacity. I go into this a lot with people. The around changes a lot of times just people don't realize the strengths they have. They think they're more caught in something than they are. This is what I'm going to do a small thing. We're not

talking about the third noble truth here, and it's largest, but just that every day life about people's capacity. So that's the three insights. And again, that is a more surrender kind of practice. I emphasize the first and second in the fourth noble truth in terms of how we're going to each dance with whatever life we're given from genetics to the parents to the conditions in which we were born and raised and so forth. There's not a fair distribution of that. The Buddha is not saying there's a fair distribution, but that the whole thing is lawful and a manner of speaking. in this manifest world, this whole array of conditions manifest. And it's how we're gonna relate to them from wherever we are. And then that's how the inner liberation happens that then affects how we are to other people, how we are to ourselves.

So, I think all of that brings us quite nicely to noble truth number four. So the fourth noble truth is that there is a path of practice that leads to the end of the suffering. And it's made up of wise understanding and wise intention. And it's made up of right speech, right action, right livelihood. So that's one is like the way we internally organize ourselves, seconds in the world, and third is practice of right effort,

and wise effort, and wise mindfulness, and wise samadhi, wise concentrate, and being concentrated. And the path is, so that's the description, the second, the practice part of it's the second inside is always practice in each of these four, is the practice is to practice the eightfold path. And then the realization is the third inside is oh, this path actually works. I know it works. And therefore, I practice it more. Oh, it works even more. So that we, the, there's no one you know. If you don't know, you know, people go on retreat and they are happier than they are in their daily life. But somehow,

they don't know they know in a way that changes their daily life. You don't have to be on retreat, to be on retreat. Daily life can be a retreat. It's a practice retreat. So just to go over that. So first noble truth, life is suffering, again with all of that's a comp, that is a problematic translation, but let's, we've already issued the caveats there. So first noble truth, life is suffering, second, Noble Truth, the cause of that suffering is thirst, craving, the third, Noble Truth. It's possible to end that suffering.

And again, the caveat that may not happen for all of us, but you can generate some faith that it is possible for a human and that one can, even regular, mortals can progress on that spectrum toward a decreased suffering. And then the fourth noble truth is actually a listicle within a listicle, within a listicle which is the eightfold path. There is a path of practice. It's got eight parts, sometimes every word on the part,

every part of the eight is preceded either with right or wise, so like right speech or right livelihood, right mindfulness. There is an external life like speech and livelihood. And then what are the other two? So one is practice like with mindfulness and concentration. Yes. And think of concentrations. Have your mind collected and unified in daily life.

And then the third is understanding, which is wisdom and intention. Gotcha. So the difference between what's called wise view and wise intention is wise view is your aspiration. Wise intention is this very moment. In this very moment, am I going to manifest my values or not? Am I manifesting my values? Not in this very moment. Here, now, this is the immediacy of practice is wise intention. I've asked so many different teachers in Thailand about this, my understanding of this, because I

asserted so strongly, I wanted to know that I was reflecting at least the top forest tradition view of that. And it is, the immediacy, this is where in your own life for everybody, let's hear listening to us, why is intention is here now for you? And just as you are,

you don't have to have a better version of you. Right now, I know what I value in this moment, I wish to value this, I wish to implement in my speech and action my values the best time able. And it may not be great, but at least I'm going to do whatever is available to me. There's that makes sense to you to the degree that it's available. People lose the thread of their own aspiration because they find themselves unacceptable. But who we are as we are, so we do as best as we are able, as we are. We start where we are. It's been painful for me to watch people defeat themselves because if they have some conceptual idea and it's not a

Buddhism's not a conceptual idea. It's an actual lived experience It's not a religion in the usual sense of that word of a beginning and an end, you know an ontological eschatological story, it's not that it's here and now here and now It's really changed me, you know. So. So when you talked about these self-limiting stories, let me just see if I can give you a personal example and yet again see if this is on point. I have a sometimes a self-limiting story around my motivations are fundamentally rotten and selfish.

My wife is sometimes pointing out to me that can get in the way of my seeing any positivity in what I'm doing in the world. Would that be an example of what you're just talking about? There would be an example. Yes. So the Buddha was talking about intention in one of the suitors and this text called the Majuman Nakaia, which is the middle length discourses. And he says there's three kinds of intentions, wholesome intention, which brings wholesome results.

There's unwholesome intention, which brings unwholesome results. And then there's mixed intentions that bringolesome results. There's unwholesome intention which brings unwholesome results. And then there's mixed intentions that bring mixed results. And I was very happy to discover that Suta because it is true that we will have mixed motivations. So you can be doing something quite wonderful to help others. And also, you're actually liking the people that admire you for it. If you try to deny that you're liking it, then you're giving it more power. You have a kind attitude towards this, oh, you're liking this, Dan, you're liking doing this. And so you're treating that, the Dan that likes this is kind of a childlike in a certain way.

So you're loving him to death You're not fixing him, but you're understanding and loving him and gradually through seeing the Because of people like and you go but then there if you do it wrong They're not gonna like you if you mess it up or some of these people are not go think you did it the right way Then you start to see oh it's all about the suka that I was enjoying about being admired to see, oh, it's all about the suka that I was enjoying about being admired also has the duke in it. So there's the suka duke again. So stay away from it. That doesn't lead anywhere. And then you just stay with the well intention. It might take 10 years in relation to a particular aspect of your life where you are being quite helpful. But gradually the amount of selfing that's

involved in that is really reduced. And you enjoy it more. That's the irony of self-being that's involved in that is really reduced. And you enjoy it more. That's the irony of this. It actually feels better with less self-being. It's paradoxical, that's the way I can explain. You have to experience that for yourself. A.E.Postico comes seed for yourself, the Buddha said. You just have to experience this stuff.

And it's a way of relating, I keep saying this, it's not about you're not being asked to believe something, but to have an experience. And of course, this shows up everywhere in relation to change your bodies in this, as we were saying at the beginning. And we're in a time of great change and to see how you're responding to change,

to see are you focusing on the the fact the duke of it, the unsatisfactoriness, or the stress of it, or the physical pain, or the emotional pain of it. Are you relating to that in a way that's making it worse? Do you have any choice? If you do have some choice, are you willing to make that choice? Because sometimes in our anger, our bitterness, we actually take birth and we're deliberately keeping it going without realizing it.

Because we've gotten used to it, we think that's us. I am such an angry person about that. Is that really serving you? Is that changing what you're angry about? You're being an angry person. We're not going to be giving up your moral compass here. The moral compass lasts. And for you to devote your whole

life to social justice is a high profession. That's wise livelihood. Nobody is going nihilistic or hedonistic or anything like that. That's the dance. When we come to change to realize that we are capable of change, that we can respond to change without clinging. And that our whole life anyway is based on change. We're always changing. When we're little children all the way through every stage of adult development, there's all these adult development stages. And we're always going to be changing. So the more we develop a wise relationship to change, and relations of the four noble truths about the seeing, the duke, and the change, somebody's forcing us to change. We don't want to change and relations of the four noble truths about the seeing the duke and the change somebody's forcing us to change

We don't want to change, you know someone says I don't want to stay married to you. I'm laying you off. That's duke That's duke but then how we respond how we relate to that are we be in responsive or reactive Responsive is coming from our values and that allows wisdomactive is we beat ourselves up or hate them or something. And so with a change, it all applies all the way through. And you can count in your life that you're going to have a series of changes as an adult. It's natural, it's biologically built in and utilizing these insights for this purpose

is making your life a practice. Once life works better as far as I've been able to determine, having now seen thousands of people's lives, it works better as a practice that it does is thinking, you know, I'm going to result all of this. Life works better if you approach it as a moment to moment practice as opposed to something that's etched in stone. That's right. I tell people, you're practicing practice, you're not practicing resulting.

You use the results to help you fine tune your practice, but you know, good luck on resulting. We know about set points of happiness and I could go off into all these psychological things that I don't think is helpful, but we know from psychological study, the grasping after happiness and an identity of self that's going to go after happiness has turned out so well. But don't we need to have results like I'm writing a book right now, I'm trying to get myself to enjoy the process as much as possible. That's my only episodically succeed there. But eventually I need to produce a result in the form of a book. Yes, yes.

So, but if you sit down and write, I don't know if you're taking an hour or a day, you know, in my old life as editor-in-chief at Esquire, I actually sat in people's attic where it is where their riding room was and sat there and helped them outline their thing too right. I know all about being frozen as riders and so many things like that. But so you ask yourself, if I sit down for an hour and ride, I don't let myself do anything else.

So it's either I will choose to write or I'll sit there, then you're creating the conditions since you can't distract yourself, you're more likely to get it done. So you're practicing being available for writing, your intention in this very moment is to touch those keyboards. Sometimes you can't, sometimes you stare off into space. But you know that that's what you're committed to. I'm being available for writing to happen. It's either going to happen or not. But I'm not doing anything else. My practice is showing up and doing this or that you say, okay, I think I've got to have it all worked up. First of all, I'm just going to start writing things.

Whatever it might be for you, whatever adjustment, but your commitment is I write a book will result, but I write. And even after a result, which will come and go, I'm still practicing something. You're still practicing. So you're practicing when you get up in the morning, I talk about starting the day with clarity, you're lying there and bad. Even before you get up and meditate and talk about starting the day with clarity, you're lying there in bed, even before you get up and meditate, and you open to this day with clarity. This is who I wish to be this day. Oh, I'm going to be doing these different tasks during these days. I'm going to put on different hats. I'm going to have different identities during the day. But this is who I wish to be no matter what identity, I will use different skillful means to accomplish

different goals in my day, but my intentions, my basic values, I'm going to be the same intentional person. I have an intentional life, and that's going to be the same, whether I'm with my children, whether I'm at work, whether I'm riding, whatever it is I'm doing, I've used different means, but who's there is a person that I've practiced cultivating, so that I have the choice to choose to live my values. Very empowering. You used a pair of words at rhyme earlier, Sukaduka, and then another rhyme came to mind, Wabi Sabi, which is the Japanese term for beauty and imperfection. Yes.

And it seems like if you can see the truth of and accept the truth of Sukaduka, then you might get to Wabi Sabhi. Yes. Because this is the world we live in. This is our realm. And it's not a mistake that the realm is like this. You know, the Buddha described it as the most precious of all births. I have to take his word for that. But, you know, that nature is beautiful and nature is cruel.

I remember one time in the New York Times, and a not bad thing, they described that nature being evil, and I was going, what do you mean, nature can't possibly be evil. It can't be cruel. It's not a personality. It's not got motivation. It just is. This realm is We are in a dual realm. Once we accept that then how are we going to relate to that? And like it's not personal, but we have a personal And like it's not personal, but we have a personal relationship. In a reactive mind, you react like a puppet on a string of pleasant and unpleasant. If it's pleasant, you want it, you want to justify why you have it and others don't,

and you want more of it. If it's unpleasant, you want to get rid of it, or you want to avoid it, or you want to blame yourself for someone for having it. That's a reactive mind. It's based on that pleasant and unpleasantness that have low v in kind of existence. A responsive mind comes from having set of values, the same pleasant and unpleasant arises,

but you have choices how you're going to relate to them. You don't relate because they're pleasant and unpleasant. You relate to those same circumstances based on your values. And more and more that gives you a deeper sense of satisfaction than the actual pleasant and unpleasant. Again, you just have to take that as an invitation to look at that. So we're moving from a reactive mind, where you're defined by conditions, to a responsive mind, where you are not defined, but you're characterized by conditions. So we're always going to be characterized, no matter what. Let's be grown up here, but we do not have to be defined. And that's freedom. That's the Buddhist

happiness. That's the dance. That's the beauty. That's the Wabi Sabi. That's the dance with life. Yeah. Phillip, thank you very much. It's just been a pleasure. Well, I appreciate being here with you and thank you for your good work. Thanks again to Phillip. And big thanks as always to the team who work incredibly hard to make this show a reality. Samuel Johns is our senior producer. Marissa Schneidermann is our producer. Our sound designers are Matt Boing and Ania Sheshek from Ultraviolet Audio.

Maria Wertel is our production coordinator. We get a ton of wisdom from our TPH colleagues, such as GentPoint, Nate Toby, Ben Rubin, Liz Levin, and as always, big thank you to my ABC News comrades Ryan Kessler and Josh Kohan. We'll see you all on Friday for a bonus. Hey, hey prime members. You can listen to 10% happier early and ad free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and

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