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Accompanying the Dying
When a child gets angry, parents and children are encouraged to discuss two specific questions: what the child wants the parent to do when they are angry, and what a parent should do when a child is about to do something harmful or dangerous. Establishing a peace treaty or pact during moments of harmony allows families to agree on how to handle these situations. Hugging Meditation serves as a deep practice for reconciliation and healing, requiring one hundred percent of one’s being and mindfulness of breathing to remove obstacles and communicate sincerely.
True happiness in the present moment is possible by perceiving the nature of emptiness and the illusory nature of concepts. Suffering arises from wrong perceptions, such as being caught in a single idea of happiness or an idealized image of others. To be empty means to be empty of a separate self and full of everything in the cosmos. This is the nature of Interbeing: a rose is made only of non-rose elements like sunshine, clouds, and earth. To be is to inter-be, as nothing can exist by itself alone.
The insight of no birth, no death reveals that birth is merely a continuation and death is a transformation. Like a sheet of paper becoming smoke, heat, and ash, nothing is ever reduced to nothingness. Reality cannot be grasped by the four categories of:
- To continue to be.
- To cease to be.
- To both continue and not continue.
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To neither continue nor not continue.
The Discourse to Be Given to the Sick details how to support the dying by practicing the recollection of the Three Jewels—the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha—and the meditation on emptiness. This involves recognizing that we are not caught in: - The six sense bases: eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind.
- The six sense objects: form, sound, smell, taste, contact, and thought.
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The six elements: earth, water, fire, and air.
Realizing that “this body is not me” and that we are life without boundaries liberates us from fear and allows us to touch nirvana, the extinction of all concepts.