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50 Verses
Thay’s teachings on Buddhist Psychology during the November 2-9, 1997 Retreat at Key West, Florida, USA, focus on the theme of Buddhist psychology. On Day 3, November 4, 1997, Thay teaches on the first eight verses of the Fifty Verses on Buddhist Psychology, exploring the nature of the flower and the garbage, the transformation of flowers, and the nature of Interbeing between pairs of opposites such as enlightenment and illusion, which do not exclude each other and are always present.
Thay discusses Dukka, or suffering, as the first of the Four Noble Truths, emphasizing the need to recognize ill-being and understand its nature. The teachings from the Fifty Verses include:
- Mind as a field in which every kind of seed is sown, likened to a gardener or the earth that holds and maintains everything together, highlighting the function of Alaya.
- The infinite variety of seeds, including those of samsara, illusion, nirvana, suffering, delusion, and enlightenment, and the transformation of samsara and suffering.
- Seeds manifesting as body and mind, realms of beings, stages, and worlds within our consciousness, known as store consciousness, including the six sense organs, six objects of the sense organs, six kinds of sense consciousness, the Eighteen Realms of Beings, the three worlds (form, desire, and non-form), and the ten stages of the bodhisattva.
- Seeds that are innate, handed down by ancestors, sown in the womb, or during childhood, questioning their origin and permanence.
- The nature of seeds as both individual and collective, transcending the pair of opposites, illustrated through metaphors such as a bus and its passengers, and a candle’s brightness, exploring concepts of self and non-self.
- The quality of life depending on the quality of seeds in our consciousness.
- The function of store consciousness to receive, maintain, and manifest seeds, likened to an ocean receiving many rivers, and the training of positive energy and habits.
- The perception of Alaya as a field within themselves, representations, or mere images included in the 18 realms of being, with teachings on the field of representation, the field of things in themselves, and the field of mere image.
The session concludes with a short teaching on suffering and relationships, addressing seeds of loyalty and betrayal and dealing with situations that are not to one’s liking.
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Part of the following collection
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