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Monastics Organize Study and Practice Scientifically
Where does the fire come from that keeps burning in the East… Namo Bodhisattva Sweet Dew.
Today, we speak about the practice within the Sangha, beginning with the five days marking the end of the winter retreat. In the monastic tradition, practitioners occasionally enter a retreat to deepen their practice, resolve personal difficulties, and pierce through the “veil of consciousness” before returning to the Sangha. The Sangha allows for retreats of
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seven days, fourteen days, twenty-one days,
one week, two weeks, seven weeks, or three months, depending on one’s needs. Solitude is not only living alone physically, but also living alone in the mind—letting go of the past, the future, and all distractions to be fully present with the Dharma and the community. Afflictions such as attachment, anger, sorrow, and complexes only reveal themselves when living with others, thus helping us to recognize and to transform them.
Practice in the Sangha is a science of insight according to the Four Noble Truths:
- Diagnosis: clearly recognizing the suffering of attachment, the suffering of anger, the suffering of worry or jealousy
- Etiology: finding the root causes of afflictions
- Therapy: applying methods of practice through sitting meditation, walking meditation, mindfulness in every step, every meal, every task
- Realization, the path: liberation and peace
Negative mental formations need to be called by their true names and looked deeply into in order to transform them, such as
- fear, despair, hatred, anxiety, suffering
When we practice with a method, in just a few days, the atmosphere around us becomes lighter, happiness doubles, faith becomes solid, and interbeing and non-self are experienced in the relationships between elder brothers, elder sisters, and younger siblings in the Sangha.