Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - 437: Unseating the Inner Tyrant | Ajahn Sucitto

Episode Date: April 11, 2022

Often, we are our own worst critic.In this episode, Buddhist monk Ajahn Sucitto explores ways to unseat the inner tyrant and make peace with the nagging voice inside of you that seems to always demand perfection, but never offer praise. Ajahn Sucitto was raised in the United Kingdom and became a monk in 1975 in the lineage of the Thai forest master, Venerable Ajahn Chah. In 1979, he helped establish Cittaviveka, also known as Chithurst Forest Monastery, in West Sussex, England where he still lives. In this episode we talk about: Strategies for addressing our inner criticWhy we shouldn’t operate at 100% The foolishness of turning our minds into courts of lawThe Buddhist precepts (or ethical guidelines)And the essential nature of sangha/communityFull Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/ajahn-sucitto-437See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Hello, my fellow suffering beings. One of the most problematic aspects of many of our lives, and certainly my life, is the inner critic, or as my guest today calls it, the inner tyrant. A friend of mine once remarked to me that if anybody else in his life said to him the kind of things that he says to himself,

he would punch that person in the face. He was getting, of course, he's nonviolent. Anyway, this kind of self-laceration is, in my opinion, culturally enforced. I definitely participate in capitalism often very happily, but there are aspects of capitalism that are pretty noxious, including the parts that seem to want us to feel a creeping sense of always-behindness and never-enoughness.

And social media that non-stop, FOMO machine, ceaseless engine of social comparison certainly does not help. So today, in the words of my guest, we're going to discuss strategies for unseeding the inner tyrant. My guest is Ajahn Sucito, who was raised in the UK, became a monk in 1975 in the lineage of the Thai forest master Ajahn Cha. Sucito later helped to establish a monastery in England, in West Sussex, to be exact. And he was the abbot there from 1992 through 2014. He still lives there while traveling around the world to teach. He's also an incredibly prolific author at deliverer of Dharma talks.

In this conversation, we talk about the strategy of addressing our inner critic in the second person, you instead of me. We talk about our bodies, intelligence, a capacious definition of the word heart, you instead of me, we talk about our bodies, intelligence, a capacious definition of the word heart, which for me at least is a little controversial, why we often hear the advice to feel our feet in meditation circles, why we should not operate at 100%,

he's quite funny about this actually, the foolishness of turning our minds into courts of law, the Buddhist precepts or ethical guidelines and the utility for regular folks, and the essential nature of Sangha or community. This is a fascinating interview with a very interesting man, and we will get started with Ajahn Sucito right after this. Before we jump into today's show, many of us want to live healthier lives,

but keep bumping our heads up against the same obstacles over and over again. But what if there was a different way to relate to this gap between what you want to do and what you actually do? What if you could find intrinsic motivation for habit change that will make you happier instead of sending you into a shame spiral? Learn how to form healthy habits without kicking your own ass unnecessarily by taking our healthy habits course over on the 10% happier app. It's taught by the Stanford psychologist, Kelly McGonical, and the great meditation teacher, Alexis 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. Hey, y'all. It's your girl, Kiki Palmer. I'm an Okay, on with the show. Listen to Baby, this is Kiki Palmer on Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcast. Ajaan Sujito, welcome to the show. Thank you, that's it. You know, I was preparing to do this interview with you and there are so many things I could talk to you about. And I had a whole list of things and I'm kind of just throwing a dart at the wall and picking a random place to start. And here's what I've chosen somewhat

randomly. You've written many books and also booklets. One of the titles of one of your booklets stuck out to me and the title is Unseeding the Inner Tyrant. What do you mean by that? It's amazing, isn't it? Everybody immediately gets it on some basic level. That we have this program in our minds. It's continually criticizing us, attacking us, putting us down, complaining about us. Can't give us any congratulations. No warm heartedness towards ourselves. Then it's always demanding we get better. We should be better than we are.

It's a performance, driven thing. You can never appease it. Every time you do something, you could have done better, somebody else has done it, or you did it for the wrong reasons. It is something good because you're such an ego maniac, or you didn't do it good enough because you're really half-hearted, or you do it really, you really stuck up in your self being so self-obsessive, it's always put you down or criticizing you and demanding you do something better, which you can never achieve. So that's the end of time. So the book lets about clearing this thing, acknowledging it and clearing it.

That's the nature of the book because Because it's so insidious, you know, whatever I teach retreat doesn't matter what it is. My mindfulness of breathing, loving kindness, spacious awareness. It always comes back to people basically experiencing obsessive thinking of self-criticism. So why don't we just deal with that? I'm surprised that you handle that in a booklet instead of a book or a series of books or the encyclopedia Britannica How did you tackle that in a booklet? I think originally came from a talk you see one talk I gave which we sort of took out and fluffed up a bit So I just tried to refer to essentially

cultivating the qualities of good will towards oneself. And if you can't start with that, then your meditation is never going to work. If you're starting to use a meditation as a performance, you know, to get somewhere, then already you're off on the wrong foot. So I tried to keep it brief because basically nowadays I don't know if people read long books, you know, people really like to pick up some who they get through its purr-sized, you know, that's what we find. So I tried to keep it brief. How does one cultivate goodwill towards oneself?

You start off feeling connected to the ground and to the space around you. Because we live in such a dislocated condition, we don't feel we're connected to anything. Naturally, you know, you're connected to your job as long as they don't sac you. You're connected to your partner unless she leaves you. You're connected to something else because you're good enough. You're not naturally connected. You're not innately connected. You have to work to get connected, you have to be good to get connected, you have to be nice to get connected, then you get the

connections because of your efforts. What's necessary is to realise the connection, you don't have this given, it's given, you do breathe, you do sit, you can sit on the ground and you can just getting that and if you don't have to do anything apart, acknowledge and feel the sense of connection in your body. So you've got to get to your body. Basically, most of your mental stuff is very programmed, psychological programmed into performance and into trying to be somebody who's good enough, but your body isn't. So if you get into the feeling of your body just sitting with nothing to do apart from your sit and feel the ground beneath you and recognize, hey, this is a gift. I don't have to do anything

to be here. And then around me, space, I don't have to put on a costume, I don't have to put on a face, I don't have to shield myself against other people's intrusion, views, opinions, looks, I can just let it be. And so those two are given, you don't have to do anything. In fact, you do something, you block it, just open up to that sense of the given. And then it's amazing. We're pretty soon, some quality of innate benevolence arises because why shouldn't you? You know, half feels good when it's benevolent. If it can return to a natural state, the heart's nature is benevolent. It's getting to return to the natural state is a significant thing.

So the heart state is naturally benevolent and empathic, sympathetic. Oh, how does it feel to be here? It's okay. Enjoy, enjoy. And then you can start. Can you remember when somebody was good to you? Oh, yeah. How did that feel? Oh, yeah. Do you remember when she gave you that? Oh, yeah, that was really sweet. That was very nice.

Do you remember when they didn't do that? They forgave you for that. How was that? Oh, that was wonderful. You remember when you really lost it, you blew it all together and somebody said, never mind no problem, how did that feel? She started catalyzing certain perceptions or bring up the sense of being loved, not harmed, forgiven, accepted, and you start to linger in those. And so when she started to get the channel was open and enjoy it, then it begins to open up because it's natural. If this process was not natural, there would be no real awakening. Let me go back to the instructions you delivered there of you sit and notice that the mere fact of occupying a few square feet on the planet and breathing

in the air that we all share and that it's the same air particles, you know, breathed in by the Buddha and Aristotle and everybody who ever walked on the planet, you are without having to do anything connected. I'm imagining that a lot of people will hear that and say, okay, but as soon as I sit down, all of these intrusive thoughts come rushing in. This nice stuff about people who did nice things for me or the fact that I'm innately connected, et cetera, et cetera.

It just gets blotted out over and over and over again, and I get tired. Yeah, well, I mean, I think skip the stuff of the Aristotle and the Buddha because that's a mental construction. You really got to get pretty physical with it. I mean, what helps so much is to develop the body's own awareness. The body has intelligence. Now, the simplest way to understand that is when you stand up and you try to balance,

you can't do that through thinking it. Only a body knows how to do that. As things are called bodily intelligence, it knows how to do that. It knows in its own way. So the body is naturally intelligent. Now, you know, we can go to just sitting and feeling, say, if you're sitting on a chair or in that traditional meditation position, but I wouldn't make it to contrived, just feeling the weight of your body resting on the earth and letting the muscles relax in your legs. And you can start to visualize. So you can visualize the tree. That's one example of the Buddha you sitting at the root of a tree. So you imagine you are a tree or you're sitting underneath a tree, you get the sense of shelter, you get the sense of the roots of the tree, you get

the sense of the timeless quality of the planet, and just resting there. and then around me space, no intrusion, no obstruction, nobody bothering me. I understand that mental stuff will come flooding in. First things keep your eyes open, that always tends to diminish the torrent of mental occupations, keep your eyes open. And you even try to have a mental picture. You have to use your mind to do something. What's happening in my thighs? What's happening in my knees? How does it feel to be resting on the earth?

So you really gotta get the mind to listen up to the body. Now often, what might work better is to do it standing, because standing is much more deliberate than sitting. When standing, your body has to wake up, otherwise you fall over. Just standing on two feet, softening your knees and feel the earth is carrying you. It's a little more full-on than sitting. Sitting, you can more or less disappear. It's very passive. Stand is a little more active.

You've got to actually be there, otherwise you lose your balance. So that again helps to upgrade the bodily aspect of it. Staying with the inner tyrant for a second, what is the attitude you recommend we have given the relentlessness of discursive thinking, given that we are going to get carried away, often by obsessive self-assessment or self-criticism. It's been very simple calling you rather than me. It's a demon. The tyrant is a demon.

I think it's a demon. So otherwise this internal program. Yeah, yeah, you call it internal, but all you know is it's demonic, it possesses people, it drives people, it corrodes people, it sucks people's energies out, it doesn't know good. This one sounds exactly like me, this team is a really smart character because he's taken my voice. But as a particular incessant quality to it, it's attacking something. It's okay, if it's two of us here, the attacker and the attacker, they can't both be me. So I'll call the attacked one me because that's the suffering.

The other thing I call, will you? And what I say then you say, what do you want, Tyron? What do you want? So I'll talk into it. I think it gives you a strategic counterbalance to the domination of that phenomenon. I should deliberately differentiate between your heart and this program and you address the program full-on, somehow that some of the power is diminished. I notice in your tone of voice when you're in this process of unseeding the talent, you're

not meeting from what I can hear, the aggression, the attack, with more aggression. You're meeting it with a playful mockery. Absolutely. Absolutely. If you give them anger, they feed on it. You give them good will, they starve. They can't feed on good will. So you start playing with it. Don't pick up the same language that the tyrant's using. Stand apart from it. This way compassion starts. You said there's a difference between the you here, the tyrant that you're calling you and me, and I think you referred to the me here as the heart. That's a term that's always tripping me up a little bit because it sounds a little like something from a hallmark

card. So what do you mean when you say heart? I mean the place that hurts, the place that rejoices, the place that he was terribly frightened, the place that wishes and aspires, that seeks truth, the emotional center and also the center of our intentions, center of pleasure and pain on the mental level is the heart, center of good and bad intentions, impulses is the heart, the sense of the frightened is the heart, the courageous is the heart, the compassionate is the heart, the distraught is the heart, the enlightened is the heart. I'm hearing it's kind of a sub-intellectual. It's everything that's not the discursive

thinking. Correct. It motivates discursive thinking because it's desperate and confused. So it's seeking some certainty, give me some ground, give me some security, give me some happiness. So it triggers off all its thinking stuff, the idea that we do it. So it's called chitta, the Buddhist word for its chitta, chitta. And the intellect is another word, manas. So you have this double act between Chitra and Manas. And I call it like the boss and the secretary.

The boss is stuck in the office. The boss is saying, hey, I'm hungry, I'm hungry, I'm hungry, I'm hungry, I'm hungry, I'm once I'm so secretary, rushes out, gets some burgers, runs back in. I don't like burgers. Okay, rushes off, gets some ice cream, cause it's wrong-flavor ice cream. It knows basically instincts of hunger and desperation

and tries to get the intellect to rush out and get something to satisfy it. And it doesn't because what the Jitter really wants to find is itself, that's the only thing that satisfies it when it sits in itself. When it finds itself, when it sits in itself, what does that look like? What does that mean?

It means instead of attention going out to science and sounds, instead of intentions going out to doing and making and arriving and challenging and defeating and becoming and avoiding, intentions relax, attention turns back to the quality of heart, which is then just pure knowing or awareness. So, intention is that directive that imposes that searching that goes on. We want to do something, an intention happens.

If it's even just the scratch in my head, there's an intention to get rid of that pain, scratch the head. That's an intention. Some volitional message gets sent down the nervous system, get rid of the pain, give me the pleasure. And that's happening all the time, in various forms, that's intention. Now as we know, you know, okay, you scratch your head, but then it comes up somewhere else. So, you know, it gives a temporary appeasement of restlessness, but it's not, it changes. So then, okay, we're going to have something else now, so you intention us to go and find something else to arrive at this quality of the goal from finding something else to arrive at this quality of satisfaction, freedom, stress. And all these strategies are circumstantial and temporary. The more they cultivate meditative

practices, what happens is your intentions starts to shift towards rather than scratching my head. I'm just fine myself being at peace with it? I'll try and work with that. I'll think of people I know and send forth loving kindness. See, intention turns back to the heart, which is going to provide a lot more richer and more satisfying food because you don't need to go anywhere for that.

You can sit on a bus and develop the quality of loving kindness Doesn't cost anything You can be with your breathing direct your intentions in certain ways to aim this way aim this way And as you do so you begin to recognize certain kinds of intention have a better result if I'm forceful and impatient that doesn't work If I'm kind of our can't be impatient, that doesn't work. If I'm kind of, I can't be bothered with this, doesn't work. First things to be steady and keep at it and keep not worrying about success and failure. Just keep gently trying to get, yeah, gently, gently, gently rest in it, encourage it. So you begin to soften the quality of intention.

it, encourage it. So you begin to soften the quality of intention. And you become gentler, and gentler, and intention then is arriving at a place where its own quality is much more satisfying and pleasant. And gradually that quality begins to suffuse the heart, and your intention begins to be less and less and less because you don't need to do very much. You are becoming satisfied. So the intention eventually just kind of can drop away and there's just abiding in something blissful and peaceful. And that's jitta, jitta, remove or jitta released from these outgoing, compulsive reflexes, which we call that release

we call enlightenment or awakening. This is not lightweight stuff. It's decades of practice, but you realize even just generally getting your intention to be going the right place and sustainable and making you feel sense of dignity and comfort and hold your head up and getting a little bit less reckless, less feisty, less grumpy, you know, this is good. This is good. 10% happier. It's beginning of 11% happier. 11% goes to 12%. You know, you keep adding it up. it's going to fill that glass, realize, you know, if every moment counts, it's only a moment you're going into kind of irritation negativity, that's a moment of your life wasted. Anytime you can turn it around with compassion, equity, good humour, then there's a little bit of your life has become valuable. And it's just simple arithmetic, you know, keep adding up the value and take away the

negative points. Coming up, Ajahn Sucito explains the seemingly ubiquitous advice in meditation circles to feel your feet. And he argues with no small amount of good humor that we should not be trying to operate at 100% all the time. That's after this. Celebrity feuds are high stakes. You never know if you're just going to end up on page 6 or Du Moir or in court.

I'm Matt Bellesai. And I'm Sydney Battle, and we're the host of Wonder E's new podcast, Dis and Tell, where each episode we unpack a different iconic celebrity feud. From the buildup, why it happened, and the repercussions. What does our obsession with these feud say about us? The first season is packed with some pretty messy pop culture drama, but none is drawn out in personal as Britney and Jamie Lynn Spears. When Britney's fans form the free Britney movement dedicated to fraying her from the infamous conservatorship,

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App. Isn't it also true that the more moments of mindfulness, equanimity, friendliness, your conditioning, even more of that, whereas if you're training the mind toward irritation, it'll will, you're conditioning more of that. Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, I think the problem is, of course, people don't necessarily decide they want to condition their mind to be well, they just get locked.

It just gets through reflex, you know, something annoys me. I'll blast them. I've got no choice. That's what I do. It's all reflex. So with mindfulness, you're building in a non reflex. Just give yourself 10 seconds. Take a breath. Now, really, what do you want to put your mind on? Do you really want to do that and go down that route again? Well, would you like to just try to go this way? Let go, yeah. Breathe in, breathe out. Don't miss your heart up with that corrosive stuff. And then, all right. Okay, one minute. Thank goodness I didn't do that. That's it. And it's really realizing you do have a choice.

You do have a choice. We have habits, but habits can be broken. But it does mean that stop, remember you have a choice and make it even as just as simple as just feel what's happening in your feet. Sometimes I recommend people say that. You know, they can't find anywhere in their mind. It's not seething, worried, anxious, negative. So, okay, what's happening in your feet? Your feet are negative, are they? No, fine. I'll just be there for a while. Feel your feet. What's happening in your feet? It's getting into your body. it's simply the most direct way possible because this is, this stuff, this negative stuff is deeply corrosive and deeply ingrained. Deeply ingrained, deeply corrosive. You do have a choice. Now you might as well, I can't bring up

lovely flowery thoughts or loving kindness, but I can feel the salt in my feet. Okay, we'll start with that. You just need to first of all unplug, find a way of unplugging it simple and direct. You don't have to have a particular emotion associated with it. You just have to sheer shift of attention and then linger until you feel that wave of emotion, that wave of hostility, fear, agitation, just feel that wave of rise and surge through and move on. You've brought us back to the body and looking at some of the titles of your talks, that you've, you're many, many talks you've given.

You really do dwell on this. There's a whole talk about standing meditation, which you reference. You've given a talk called Advice on Walking. Maybe it would make sense if you're up for it to get a little granular about your instructions for tuning into the body in meditation and in life. First of all, you've got to recognize that what you see is just your visual impression of your body. Right?

So that's one body, that's the visual body. Then you probably got an idea of what you look like, which probably isn't very complimentary. That's your mental body. That's probably a suffering body. And you can recognize, say, when you're really angry, you've got a heart body, or you've got a body that's really bulging up in the head, and your legs have gone. And when you depress, you've got a sun-conscious body, right? And when you're frightened, you've got a tight gut body. And the different bodies are the different experiences you're looking at direct experience. Rather than the general idea we have of here I am, I'm 5'10", I'm way, whatever, 180 pounds, whatever it is, that's an idea. Yeah, it'll work, but it's not where you live.

Your living direct experience is the feeling body, isn't it? That feeling body isn't just about physical sensations, which, yeah, that's part of it. I love it. It's very emotional and psychological pressures occurring where you feel compressed. You feel tense. You feel relaxed, you know. So that's the body I'm talking about. You could say, if you like, it's neurology, neurological body. So let's just start to recognize, okay, well, how is it when I stand?

What is this body when I stand? Sensations and something I call feet, like you don't need the visual appearance at all, almost completely relevant. Sensations, okay, you get the sensations, those two pretty clear areas of sensation which you call your feet, you know, how is that there kind of slightly vibrant impressions, okay, and anything else, when you can feel maybe okay, the sense of the back comes in, you've got a spine, upright, here you're upright, and what else? So now just simplify as much as possible, so you've just really got that upright axis, upright sense, and you've got the

sense of the ground beneath you. Okay, right? Now, that's direct. You could be anywhere, you could be Hawaii, New York, it doesn't matter because it's exactly the same. In that sense, so you get stability and it's, how does it get more comfortable in itself? I can feel those shoulders dropping. I don't need them to be tight. I don't need my face to be tight. So you begin to simplify until you get a very cohesive bodily impression and then there's some space around it. There's that.

And why don't I just relax into allow myself to fully experience the space, which is a wrap around this form? The space means the absence of pressure, no pressure, no intrusion, no achievement, nothing to become. Oh, breath has got stronger. It's that call it breath. It's that rhythmic tide I recognize flowing through. And that rhythmic tide, which I call breathing, has become more rhythmic, more steady and perhaps it's slowed down a little. And how is that? Is that a thing? Agreeable, disagreeable. How is that? How's it feel? What's it like to be with that? Figuity mind. Well, okay, just invite the Figuity. You can be part of this. You come into the steady piece.

Come on in, you're welcome. Let me breathe into you. Let me breathe through you, and then you might notice several things like how long should I do this for? Am I supposed to do this for half an hour? Would it be difficult? That's worry. Feel the energy breathing in, breathing out. So use this body as a grandmother and just inviting, including, inviting, including, including, inviting, including, studying, all inner agitations and unevenness to settle in. That is that. I think that that is a recipe for unseating the inner tyrant, at least temporarily. Yeah, he finds ways back in, but that certainly throws him off guard for a while.

After a while in my own experience, sometimes I can notice the whiliness of my inner tyrant, or maybe it's inappropriate to even call it mine, but the inner tyrant as I experience it, I can notice the wildingness and just be impressed and laugh at it. That was clever. Well, whatever is necessary, really, but just to get some perspective on that, I think the other element to just keep a kind of fundamental tool is, how do you feel with this? Just that question itself is already loving kindness. How do you feel? How is that for you?

That already is a movement of good will rather than, yeah, the idiot. And then once you do that, you see a thought and develop relationship, which again is a huge area in everybody's life. you do that, you see, you're starting to develop relationship, which again is a huge area in everybody's life. And a lot of it is really messed up. To be clear, you're talking about a relationship with yourself here. You name it, start with yourself because that's your working model where you can do your workshop. And then of course you can start it, then you can work with other people. It's very important to get that relational sense with yourself and with others. Because it means I care, I do care for yourself, and you're a good friend to yourself,

or you're just trying to make yourself jump through hoops, and win a race, you know, or defend yourself against other people's views and opinions. Can you be a good just a good friend to yourself? And how does it feel? Because you view a copy, a good friend to yourself. Who else is gonna do it? And it doesn't mean you have to say everything you do is wonderful.

And you start to investigate, but always that sense of, this is for our welfare to only understand where we lose it. How does an ignorant person get on ignorant by asking questions? This attitude of inner and outer friendliness that we've been talking about, which I think is phenomenal,

and you talk about it in such a compelling way, there's a phrase that I read from you, that was something that you said that I later read, that strikes me as being in the same spirit, but I could have been reading it incorrectly. So I'll give you the phrase and you'll tell me if I'm making an appropriate connection here. Here's what you said. You said 80% is the new 100%. I'm taking it down to 75. I've taken it down to 75. Some people just got to be lower than that.

Just over, over, over, over doing, over doing, they've been set. The nervous system, the psychology of being set to continue performance and fast and quicker and stronger and got to get it right sooner, not later, immediately, full energy, full energy to set with Pat and strain. Has become the norm, the norm is strain. They don't even notice it, really become normal. You see the thing is, if you're 100% full on, your receptivity is about zilch percent. You're just so full on, you're not really receiving anything at all.

And you see people bulldozing their way through life, follow their program, you know, often trying to do good things, but got no time because it's so busy trying to get things right. And they're maybe even very nice people in their own way but they can't receive because the receptivity is being obscured by its constant volition to do and make and become. You know receptivity is essential, so just even receiving your own body. So often when we go into full intention, our focus, our awareness becomes a narrowed to only only focus only on what we're doing and so on doing becomes the important thing. Now if there's receptivity, we widen to, you

know, I'm doing something, also listening, listening, I'm tuning in, what's happening, how is this? So you've got something that moderates your intention. And this particularly, I mean, it stands out like a sore thumb when you're in a group of people. If people are not tuned into the presence of others in a community, it's very unpleasant. But it's not pure about being a nice person, it's about resetting your psychology to one of openness because in receptivity, there's no goal in just receiving, there's no particular I want to receive this and not that, no you're just enjoying the quality of right now. Then within that you can select, okay this particular frequency, if you like, this is where

it feels more comfortable, tune into that. This particular frequency feels more aggressive and harsh. Relax that one. So you begin to tune in to the frequencies in which your mind, your psychology is operating. For the results oriented, I don't wanna talk about those people like I'm not one of them. But for those of us who want 100% who have goals and believe in those

goals, I would imagine you would argue that aiming for 75, aiming for 80 is actually more likely to be the winning strategy. But in other words, how should we do the math on this and still feel good about aiming for 80 or 75 rather than 100. Well, I mean, this is just a little phrase of slogan. So you start to think literally. I'm like, 75 or 76, I don't know. I'm not very good at math, you know, in a time- I can relate having named a book 10% happier and now doing a lot of math discussions.

Subsequently, I can relate to this problem I've just created for you. Yeah, it's just just the slogan. It means that there's a little bit something a little more playful. It's a tone slightly lighter and more playful. You can feel your whole body. Now, when you're and your body feels comfortable, now, when you're on the kind of big target, often you go into your head, drop your body all together, or your body all together or your

body becomes tight or you just numb out but to maintain holistic awareness body is there and the heart is there I'm receptive I'm responsive I can decide I can determine where I go and I'm clear there's some clear mental faculty there. So the whole thing is there. To keep the whole thing, keep the whole thing as you sit, as you walk, keep the whole thing. And then you'll find as a balance that occurs by itself, it's natural. There's a balance. When you get the whole thing, a system balances itself. When we go into imbalance, what happens is one aspect, generally the thinking aspect takes over and it becomes 80% thinking. No, you don't need 80% thinking to walk on down, you eat 5% thinking.

So yeah, you can think a bit, but 5% is plenty because all you can do is walk up and down. So yeah, you can think a bit, but five percent's plenty. Because what you can do is walk up and down. You know? So give the whole thing. Body, space around you, the earth beneath you, that's part of walking. You can't walk because the earth beneath you. Feel the space around you, you can't walk.

There's no space around you, so be aware of that. Body moving through the space around you, the ground beneath you. Okay? That's the most important bit. The heart, interested, receptive, gentle, work on that, just a little, you know, steering. And, you know, I've emphasized the body

because until you got into the body in some likely that you'll really have the heart. And this is deeply sad. It's not that people don't have hearts, but they shut off. Because their heads take over. You've got to calm into your body before you can shake off the domination of the thinking mind. And then the heart starts to peak out. Peak out, how are you doing?

I'm feeling, you know, I always say, you know, is it okay to be here? Yeah, it's okay to be here. You know, you don't have to be that good. Just show up. You don't have to get anywhere, just show up. Nobody's going to blame you or ask you for results, to show up, show up in your life. You won't regret it because that their heart always tells the truth. It tells the your friend, tells you your desperate person and says to you comfortable truth, we will tell you straight and you're thinking about it and say

no, it sounds so, it's because of that therefore and it sounds so never respects me and off we're right down and then we go again, you know, and you will say look all that stuff, look, get it down to one word and that was straight and straight to your heart. What's the one word? Fed up. Angry. Okay, you got it. You nailed it in one.

Forget all the details. You're angry, you're upset. Okay, how's that? Not very nice. Okay, how's it like to be with that? It's a bit difficult. So what's necessary now? It just take a breath. Tell me more.

Nobody ever has been yet. Yeah, tell me more. Tell me more. Whereas you could spend hours going into your head, tribunals, mother, father, boss, friends, family, wife, partner, husband, whatever, the wrongs they've done me, the wrongs I've done them, the mess the world's in, and you can be there forever, and you can be tribunals and executing people and blaming people and blaming yourself, cursing God, whatever. You just spent I mean, in that law court, dishing out punishment, but you wanna live in a law court? Oh. Hahaha. I'm laughing because I've been living in a law court

a lot recently. So seeing how foolish that strategy is. It's challenging. Not to get depressed and angry. Anything, okay. Right now, is this going to do you any good? What's needed?

Take your precepts about harmlessness, determining harmlessness, determining honesty, stand on it, breathe in, I am harmless, I mean no harm,

breathe in, breathe it out, embody it, I mean no harm. Breathe in, breathe it out. In body it, I mean no harm. Ah, true, true, true. I would tell the truth. I would try to tell the truth. True, true. Okay. Take a stand on something you've got some say over and feel it, you know, and feel it. These are not just ideas, you know. Harmlessness is a sense of the urge to revenge, trash somebody, get even, this is ugly, paying for stuff, feel the quality of harmlessness. Just that one precept alone would save this planet. We really, really took it seriously.

Coming up, Succio explains the Buddhist precepts, and he makes a case for the importance of Sangha or community right after this. Can you describe the precepts for people who might not know what you're referring to? Well, okay, well, I mean, you know, Buddhism anyway, you've got five basic precepts, which is to avoid taking the life of other living creatures, breathing creatures. You can eat plants and stuff, you know. And taking anything that isn't given, so it's no sort of sard汁ous dealing, swindling fraud, even taking up people's time, you know,

make sure you're always, I've got time, it's okay for you, yeah, don't abuse people, don't take a free ride of somebody. Like, sexual abuse, sexual respect, not just using people, it's gotta be mutual, consensus, your heartful, refraining from harsh speech, cursing, swearing, lying, gossiping, backbiting, slander, mindless babble, at intoxication, intoxicants, alcohol, and narcotics. whole narcotics. So these aren't like commandments, these are training rules I aspire, I undertake to train myself. It does the harsh word, does slip out, and I've got that standard I begin

to, hmm, I wasn't saying, yes, what did that happen? So you're looking at some of these things, rather than just condoning them. And a spire, a spire to fulfill that, because then you become someone who people couldn't rely upon, and you can rely upon yourself. If you wouldn't realize this guy's not going to do a deal on me. This guy's not going to badmouth me, but on my back, this person is not going to cheat on me. And that makes everything much more steady, much more secure, you know, seeing settle down.

We know where we are. And it's not that complicated. What I hear in there, and when I often hear when people bring up the precepts is you said not commandments, it's not necessarily some set of externally imposed rigid rules. It really is pursuing these trainings is in the spirit, if I understand it correctly, of friendliness and compassion towards yourself because you feel better when you're within these guidelines. Absolutely.

Absolutely. When they're given, there's a kind of phrase that is used after them saying these precepts of vehicle to happiness, a vehicle to fulfillment, a vehicle to liberation, because they make you happier, you're freedom from regret and you have dignity and you have self-respect, you don't have bad memories, you don't have things you have to hide. So does the Sun happy? And also for you, you can do it. You know, you think, okay, well, I couldn't solve the world's problems, but I could actually today, you know, somebody's really unpleasant, and I didn't attack them verbally. I let them one pass.

Good, yeah, okay. Hearts getting a bit freer from these powerful, aggressive reflexes that we have as human beings. Powerful manipulative, we're manipulators, we're monkeys, we're aggressive with baboons. So we can hit that aspect of our psychology can easily take over any one of us. It's why I didn't say so you know you begin to go to another set of values that helps the energy

to shift into I hold and bear this conscience and conserve my welfare for your welfare. bear this conscience and conserve my well for your well-being. You do not need to fear me. I will not slander you. I will not put you down. You do not need to fear me. Therefore, trust can arise between us. This is beautiful. This is open.

This is where we can really enjoy each other. This is happy. I want to be sensitive to your time. Let me just ask you a few questions, and this is kind of open-ended. Is there something that you were hoping I would ask that I failed to ask? There's a few things I'm glad you didn't ask. That's the best answer to that question I've ever heard, because I've asked it many times. No, it's probably getting to the point really.

Let's talk about getting honestly human being. It's about community. I think I like to mention that, you know, one of the, what's called the triple gem in Buddhism. You've got Buddha, who means basically the quality of your awakening and enlightenment, Dhamma, which is the teaching, and Sangha, which is the community of those who cultivate and practice.

This is an essential, so essential, this word, Sunga, because this is our workshop, really, is the workshop of community. How are you going to see your blind spots and someone compassionately points them out? How else are you going to get your support and as somebody else listens to you? How else can you enjoy your life except you're having agreeable friends? How else are you going to get on without some sense of cooperation harmony?

Sound is an enormously important. It's not just the kind of classical Buddhist monk thing, it means the spirit of cooperation and community in right endeavor, in right precepts, in right attitude, the community of true practice in that respect. And just think, if you had like,

how many billions of people around us, planet seven, come up eight, hey, what about if we like cooperated? Just like, hey, we humans, can we cooperate? We all suffer, we up eight. Hey, what about if we like cooperated? Just like, hey, we humans, can we cooperate? We all suffer, we all struggle, we'll get fried, and we'll get annoyed, we'll get angry. Yeah, we wouldn't just be happy, we want to look after our kids. Let's get down to it, you know, just get on and stop chopping it up into bits and pieces that wrangle with each other. Who's best? You know, once you get into supremacy, you're deadly.

You know, and that's one of the bains of human beings is to think we're supreme. Because once you get supreme, then you've got to say, who's more supreme? You know, I'm more supreme than an earthworm. No, you're not. Earthworm is much more important to the planet than you are. The bumblebees, much more important to the world from the planet of human being. Human beings are pretty useless really, and all this stuff that goes on in different religions of the supreme, and it always creates murder and abuse, and so could you just give up the idea of supremacy and just say, look, I'm just a worm like you and let's get on. And this is a really powerful thing because you just really have been so attuned to the

best, being the best, getting on top. And this is deadly stuff. And it's so pervasive. It just corrodes the true beauty of the heart to embrace compassion, embracing, enjoying each other for what we are. One last question for you. If people want to learn more about you, read your books, booklets, listen to your talks, maybe go on retreat with you and retreats her back in action in a more robust way, where can they look? Well, they can look at my website, adjernsensichito.org. That's my website. That's where I put things where I'm going and being.

And really, you know, you know, it's important they know more about themselves. They don't really know too much about me, but if I can help them to know themselves, that's a privilege. Well, it's been a privilege to spend some time with you. I'm very grateful to you for making yourself available. Thank you. Okay. Wonderful, Daniel.

Great. Well, let 10% must have gone up to 11 or 12th by now. Keep working at it. You're getting there. But 80's definitely good enough. You don't want to get too happy. I promise you, it's not going to go north of 80. Thanks again to Ajahn Sucito. Really appreciate that. Thank you as well to all the people who work so hard on this show. I promise you, it's not going to talk about a really deep approach to time management.

Hey, hey prime members, you can listen to 10% happier early and add free on Amazon music. Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and add free with Wondery Plus in Apple Podcasts. Before you go, do us a solid and tell us all about yourself by completing a short survey at Wondery.com slash Survey.