The 14th Dharma Session of Middle Way Buddhist Association: Suffering and Impermanence

As part of our monthly routine, we drove to Pinellas Park last Saturday to attend the 14th Dharma Session of Middle Way Buddhist Association (MWBA), in a continuing series of Dharma discussion of Buddhist wisdom, this time on suffering and impermanence. The discussion was to be led, as usual, by Bhante Dhammawansha, the resident monk of Dhamma Wheel Meditation Society (DWMS). However, we were informed by Brother Tom at the outset that Bhante has been taken ill in the past week, having succumbed to the recent spells of cold weather that have engulfed the Tampa/St. Pete areas.

And Brother Tom had acted swiftly to request the company of the Samadhi Buddhist Meditation Center (SBMC) in the vicinity of the same locale, which has planned a half-day retreat at the same time. So it was an opportune moment for the two Buddhist groups to merge the two events in the spirit of Buddhist brotherhood. The SBMC group was led by Bhante Upananda, whom we have met previously, and Venerable Bhikkhuni Sudarshana, the Senior Dharma Teacher and Abbess of SBMC, respectively.

Wify and Shenghua arriving early at the lunch room, backed by the book shelf of Buddhist books for free reading.

Attendees taking their respective place before the start of the Dharma session.

At the start, we all prayed for a speedy recovery by Bhante Dhammawansha. After meditating as usual (meaning experiencing the usual struggle to stay mindful, at times I could sense my body wanting to go out of plumb; also, usual in the sense that just when I felt I had gained the upper hand, the end signal always came too soon), the attendees briefly introduced themselves. When Bhante's turn arrived, he told us that his ordained name (in Pali) is a combination of “close to” and “happiness”. How befitting.

[That reminds me of wify's ordained name (in Chinese), bestowed when she took the Three Refuges under the aegis of Venerable Hsing Yun last July in the Buddha Light Temple of Orlando. It translates as having the nature of cloud, roaming free in the wide expanse of the sky, whimsical and forever changing, signifying impermanence. Wify also chipped in with two other notable traits of cloud: it's everywhere and its original nature stays the same despite its many forms since it is water vapor.]

On the first of the twin subject of suffering and impermanence, Bhante first gave the Pali word for which the above English term was later rendered, Dukkha. The simplicity of the word belies the multiplicity of facets, levels, and aspects that the word connotes. It's at once ambiguous and deceptive, laden with many strata of human emotions that its English counterpart has found wanting.

Taken apart, the first part, Du, means no, in the negative, without essence. The suffix implies finding it distasteful or disgusting. Together then, Dukkha conveys the sense of being in despair because of the absence of essence/core, rendering it meaningless such that it's not good at all. In that regard, it's a feeling, a sensation.

[Here I recall that a similar word is used in a similar context, but perhaps lacking the associated profundity, in the Malay language. It's simply spelled as Duka, which is often used to preface a disappointment or rejection.]

Dukkha arises from many different sources, making our life hectic and yet never far from lethargy. The struggle to seek peace of mind and yet survive the rat race is an everyday dilemma that seems insurmountable. Split between two worlds where we alternately submerge and emerge, all we could aspire is to minimize the gap, compromising and treading the middle ground.

There are three levels of Dukkha. The first, Dukkha Dukkha, is the general everyday fare of discomforts like headaches, which most of the time can be alleviated through medical treatment.

Then there is Sankhara Dukkha, that which is created, arising from the conditioned world, the world of conditionality. It being unavoidable, we cannot stop the source, but can hope to block it.

[The notion of conditionality is best embodied in the twelve links that the Buddha taught:

“Confusion conditions activity, which conditions consciousness, which conditions embodied personality, which conditions sensory experience, which conditions impact, which conditions mood, which conditions craving, which conditions clinging, which conditions becoming, which conditions birth, which conditions aging and dying.”]

In Buddhist cosmology, the world is comprised of whatever that is subjected to arising, breaking, falling, and changing. Since we are all part of this world, inter-dependency and inter-connectedness are the key words.

In the realms of matter, composed of all physical and material things that are reducible to nothingness, and mind, the mental state, we are brought up to think in terms of a fixed time frame, chained to the notion of time and space as it were, where we focus on what is made, couched in the present perfect tense. But conventional wisdom does not serve us well, pulling wool over our eyes and blinding us to the truth of suffering. Instead, our mind needs to identify with the state of being made, and thinks in the present continuous tense as everything is changing by the seconds.

The third level is Viparinana Dukkha, formed from the prefix Vi, meaning starting to go down, not able to be kept in its original state, and parinana, meaning evolution or formation of what has taken place within a time frame. It is noted that Buddhism only accepts evolution as part of a higher and deeper process.

Viparinana Dukkha is perpetual, constantly being created and destroyed, incessantly arising and falling. In a word, it is change. It is suffering because we cannot see the change. It's much more subtle than the second level, inhabiting our innermost space, and hence requires more education, and a much broader sense to understand. Seeing its nature itself is not enough; we need to see the nature of the cause. Through meditation, we can see the constant change.

On impermanence, Bhante brought us along a similar epistemological exploration, starting with the Pali word for it, Anicca. The prefix, Ni, denotes no or neither. The second part, nicca, connotes permanence. As one sees Anicca, one escapes Dukkha.

Bhante then enumerated the four divine abidings (also equilibrium states of mind) that in totality amount to Unconditional Love as:

loving kindness
compassion
sympathetic/altruistic joy, and
equanimity (equality in the social context).

Buddhism teaches us not to be judgmental, and to recognize that there is no quick fix nor band-aid solution.

An attendee raised an interesting question on whether enlightenment too is subjected to the immutability of impermanence. Bhante explained that there are two levels of meditations: absolute awakening (absolute is preferred to permanent here to avoid any inconsistency), and awakening into a moment (catching a glimpse as it were). Absolute awakening can be attained as a sudden realization, or as a gradual revelation. Bhante then cited two examples of the former: a nun noticing the bubbles forming and bursting on the ground while she was washing her feet; and of one seeing the mirage, which we know to be a optical illusion but an illustration of bogus reality nonetheless since what is seen as water is not water.

At this point, the attendees adjourned for a nice serving of vegetarian lunch, after which the Dharma discussion continued apace.

A moment of doubt, followed by a moment of clarity, facilitated by Bhante.

Everything is suffering in the sense that it remains as a source of suffering. Take the pen (though mighty it is said), a typical mindless inanimate object, as an illustration. We all know that a pen is not capable of suffering, but it is a source of suffering as when we lost it, or broke it. This is what is meant by the characterization in the morning that suffering is a feeling. Living beings are both the victim and the source of the suffering, even though animals suffer at a reduced level.

How to reduce suffering (implying that it's the best we can do)? Cut the cord, the fabric, a euphemism for clinging. To do that, we need a new perspective (Dassana in Pali), a sort of paradigm shift. But first we need to weaken the clinging by reducing the desire and dealing with preconceived notions some of which have been wired into our consciousness through conditioning, lest we concretize and solidify it. Dissolve the ego. Create an inner domain, an inner sanctum. And give a parallel impression that is equally mighty.

At this point, a glance at the clock made us realize that it was well past 2pm, and we bid a somewhat reluctant retreat from the patient Bhante, who continued to field inquiries from those remaining behind.

A Sand Mandala: A Buddhist Symbol for Impermanence

We read about another Vesak Day celebration in the Bay area, scheduled for June 10, 2007, on the June 7, 2007 issue of St. Petersburg Times (Tampa & State, pg.4B).

This time, the venue is Chua Phat Phap Buddhist Temple in St. Petersburg, a Vietnamese Buddhist temple that we have visited earlier as blogged here.

However, this one has an addition: the display of a sand mandala. According to Wikipedia, while mandala is Sanskrit ("circle", "completion") and has a Hindu origin, "in the Tibetan branch of Vajrayana Buddhism, mandalas have been developed into sandpainting. In practice, mandala has become a generic term for any plan, chart or geometric pattern that represents the cosmos metaphysically or symbolically, a microcosm of the universe from the human perspective."

The Wikipedia article further adds:

"To symbolize impermanence (a central teaching of Buddhism), after days or weeks of creating the intricate pattern, the sand is brushed together and is usually placed in a body of running water to spread the blessings of the Mandala."

"The visualization and concretization of the mandala concept is one of the most significant contributions of Buddhism to religious psychology. Mandalas are seen as sacred places which, by their very presence in the world, remind a viewer of the immanence of sanctity in the universe and its potential in his or her self. In the context of the Buddhist path the purpose of a mandala is to put an end to human suffering, to attain enlightenment and to attain a correct view of Reality. It is a means to discover divinity by the realization that it resides within one's own self."

As shown in the following scanned copy of the St. Pete news, Venerable Tashi, a Tibetan monk based in Bradenton and who was also present in the last two Vesak Celebrations featured in my blog, is a picture of rapt concentration, deftly guiding the tiny flow of colored sand grains issuing from a small tube by rubbing a metal object against the tube's notched surface to form an intricate design of a mandala, which was gradually taking shape as shown in the bottom picture. What a painstaking undertaking indeed.


Today, we made a beeline to Chua Phat Phap Buddhist Temple. The completed mandala was placed in front of the stage in the sanctuary, which was slowly being filled by a constant stream of Buddhist practitioners and other attendees, patiently waiting for the service to begin. We were informed by the usher that indeed the sand mandala will be destroyed after the service and the sand, filled in small bags to be given to the attendees.

Mom and son at the front compound of Chua Phat Phap Buddhist Temple.

I was able to take a picture of the sand mandala before the service, which looked much more vivid than its black and white half-completed counterpart in the paper. However, I take heed of the significance of the symbolic act of creating and destroying the sand mandala, it being the impermanence of things.

The Sutra of the Eight Bodhisattva Realizations

Yesterday, we attended a Dharma talk delivered by Brother Shieh at the comfy home of Brother Brian and his wife, Sister Connie, with the usual accompaniment of delicious food. The topic of the day was The Sutra of the Eight Bodhisattva Realizations, which is based on Brother Shieh’s English translation of the title of the Sutra in Chinese. This Sutra summarizes the eight essential ways toward attaining enlightenment as enunciated by the Buddha himself. A slight variation of the English translated title, Sutra of the Eight Realizations of Great Beings, together with the translated full text, is accessible at the website of the Buddha Gate Monastery. In Buddhist parlance, Great Beings is an alternative term for Bodhisattvas.

While perhaps small in number and laconic in verses, each of the eight realizations covers expansive grounds and entails profound ramifications that are inter-related. A practical way to embracing the eight realizations, as outlined by Brother Shieh (seen here doing the preamble outlining his approach to the talk), is to follow the sequential steps comprising:

1) Memorization and recitation of the Sutra. This will ensure that the Sutra will reside in our subconscious and can be invoked at will, much like our own name when asked.

2) Reading interpretative texts and listening to Dharma talks on the Sutra. This will facilitate our understanding of the correct meanings and implications intended by the Buddha.

3) Ruminations on the teachings embodied in the Sutra. We need to contemplate, chew, and mull on the teachings, bringing to bear our unique life experiences conditioned by individual circumstances, and be awe-struck when the realizations hit.

4) Mental Transformation. The realizations should then propel a mental transformation toward actualization and manifestation of the Buddha teachings in our daily life.

From a personal perspective, the first two steps seem passive and relatively easier to achieve. But precisely because the first two tasks do not demand great effort other than prioritizing time for them, most followers also tend to stagnate at this stage, and fail to think long, hard, and deep so as to be able to follow through and eventually benefit from the Buddha teachings.

Brother Shieh spent about three and a half hours leading us through the first three realizations, including a Q & A session at the end. The session was sprinkled with personal anecdotes that helped bring home the messages, interspersed with examples of dealing with specific circumstances such as employing the right tone and nuances for communication.

The first realization encapsulates the notions of impermanence and no-self. This is perhaps easier to grasp if we were to view all things, including life-form, as assemblages or fabrications, or compounds comprising constituents which in turn are assembled from yet minuscule constituents. For example, our body is composed of the four elements: earth (bones and skeleton), water (blood), fire (heat/temperature), and wind (gaseous substance). Our body undergoes regeneration constantly, and we age by the seconds, and experience the great equalizer of all, death. It is the same with any inanimate object, say a wooden table. The wooden pieces are from trees, and in the process of turning a felled tree into wood, various ingredients such as preservatives, are added. Despite that, the finished product continues to undergo physical expansion/shrinkage brought about by changes in heat and moisture content in the air, and other more subtle chemical reactions that manifest in color change. As they say, change is the only constant in life, literally. So if we could internalize that nothing is permanent, then we are more inclined to accept that whatever our attachments to worldly stuff, including our body, our look, and our possessions, are merely transitory. Then letting go becomes relatively painless, much less a struggle.

On the other hand, the notion of no-self does not imply that we disregard our self and do not take care of our body. It’s removing our own selves from the equation, it’s putting ourselves in others’ shoes. It’s about helping others and giving. And to do that, we need a healthy body and a wholesome mind. Here Brother Shieh was driving home the point (as evident from his clenched fist) that we need to take care of our physical body in order to serve a greater purpose: a life of wisdom.

The second realization advocates minimal desires, realizing that craving leads to vicious competition and places excessive demands on our limited resources. When acquiring a new possession, always ask ourselves: do I need it? And not do I want it. In this age of one-upmanship and keeping up with the Joneses, to not to compare may be hard to resist. But the least we can do is to compare with those less endowed than us to satisfy our warped sense of superiority.

The third realization denounces and hence, renounces an insatiable appetite. And we do that by cultivating contentment. Feel blessed with what we already have. Lead a simple life. In the end, a status symbol is just that, a symbol, and an imaginary one at that. It confers no tangible substance, let alone permanence.

Until conditions permit the continuation of the Dharma talk on the Sutra by Brother Shieh, let’s contemplate on the first three realizations. You are more than welcome to share the fruits of your ruminations and experiences of your actualizations in mutual support of our forward march toward enlightenment.