Meditation is like a gym in which you develop the powerful mental muscles of calm and insight.
How many times have you tried to solve “the problem”? you’ll be trying to solve it not just until you die but for many more lifetimes. Instead, understand that this world is just the play of the senses. It’s the five khandhas doing their thing; it has nothing to do with you. It’s just people being people, the world being the world.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the idea that life's problems are endless, and encourages a perspective shift to view life as a sensory experience rather than a personal struggle.
Ajahn Brahm's quote conveys a profound philosophical insight about the nature of existence and the human experience. He suggests that the challenges we face are not personal failures or burdens to be solved, but rather part of the natural unfolding of life. By recognizing that the world is just a play of sensory experiences and not a personal struggle, we can find greater peace and understanding in our lives, as it allows us to detach from the incessant desire to control or solve every 'problem'.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a motivational speech about stress management, to illustrate the importance of perspective.
More from Ajahn Brahm
All quotes →When you have abandoned all past and future, it is as if you have come alive. You are here, mindful...the nature of all types of consciousness reveals itself.
When life is good do not take it for granted as it will pass. Be mindful, be compassionate and nurture the circumstances that find you in this good time so it will last longer. When life falls apart always remember that this too will pass. Life will have its unexpected turns.
Love, oneness, is no separation between you and life. It is a progressive letting go, a progressive not fault finding. Just do nothing and love this moment. Its very beautiful and very deep.
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No reference is truly direct — every reference depends on some kind of coding scheme. It's just a question of how implicit it is.
Angels and ministers of grace defend us.
There is no kind of framework within which we can find consciousness in the plural; this is simply something we construct because of the temporal plurality of individuals, but it is a false construction... The only solution to this conflict insofar as any is available to us at all lies in the ancient wisdom of the Upanishad.
The new American finds his challenge and his love in the traffic-choked streets, skies nested in smog, choking with the acids of industry, the screech of rubber and houses leashed in against one another while the town lets wither a time and die.