Cinematographic Nature of our Consciousness
Thay shares how we can transform our suffering and heal ourselves so that we can build Sangha in our personal relationships, our family, our workplace and the community. We do this by cultivating mindfulness, understanding, compassion, friendship and harmony.
Thay describes store consciousness, the base of all the other seven consciousnesses. Store consciousness stores all experiences in the form of bījas or seeds. Our transformation happens when, with the help of mind consciousness, we go back to our store consciousness and take care of these seeds. Thay outlines the five characteristics of bījas.
Thay expands upon Henri Bergson’s image of consciousness having a “cinematographic” nature: forever changing, being born and dying in every moment, never the same thing in two consecutive moments. The nature of reality is constructed by our minds; it is like a dream, an illusion; not a “thing” but a “process.”
Practicing meditation and mindfulness helps release our suffering as we bring our awareness to the true nature of reality.
This is the fourth talk in a series of fourteen given during The Feet of the Buddha, twenty-one-day retreat in the year 2004. Thay offered this talk at the Upper Hamlet, Plum Village, France.