164: Retreat Dhamma Talk 59: Five Types of Liberation

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Number fifty nine. Lately we have been discussing about Jaitta Nupassana, mindfulness of the mind. And along with that we discuss six pairs of consciousness or jaitha as described in the Satipatthana Sutra. Discourses on full foundation of mindfulness. Those are the six pairs or twelve types of consciousness that one can observe in our mindfulness meditation. The first four are concerned with most of us, especially the beginners. And the last two pairs. And another one for that's called it no advance or some at the highest stage. And the last pair is called We Mukti Jeta, Liberated Mind, and Ah We Mukti Jeta. Non-liberated Mind. So liberated mind means a mind that is free from all form of kilisa. Mental defilements. The mind that is pure. The mind that is free from manipulation or influence of mental defilements. Today we are going to deal with this We Mukti Jaitta. Liberated mind. When you are liberated, that means you have a freedom from kilesa. Liberated from kilesa. Mental defilement. In fact, one need to know there are five different types of liberation. Liberation or freedom called we mukti. Or consciousness is called we muti chitta. And here is liberation is simply we mukti. There are five types. The first one is called the Tingat Vimukti. The Tingak Vimukti. It's a momentary liberation or momentary freedom from mental defilements. That is one type, the first type. So when one is observing, okay, precisely, observing mindful, when one is observing precisely and powerful on the physical or mental objects, nama or rupa. At the moment of arising. And if you can observe with precision, with power, with force, with effort, on the object that is arising at that present moment, whatever that may be, physical or mental. At that time you can say you have a sati or noting mind. You have established sati or noting mind. It must be all in order with precision. And that noting mind or that sati, in other words, the mind with sati. Actually is free from all mental defilements, kilesa. At that particular moment. At that particular moment. That kind of momentary freedom from kilesa is called Tatinga Vimukti. Momentary liberation from freedom. So let's uh expand it a little bit on that. Let's take that you have a one big glass jar, but with a very little narrow, tiny hole. Big jar with a tiny little hole. So we can say the jar is empty, but in fact it is not empty, it is totally full and filled with air. That jar is. Again, too, in here sati, it is a one noting at a time, one sati at a time. Just like a drop at a time, you can replace with sati, but one sati at a time. In one moment you can apply one sati. In one moment there's one object arising. So you can only put one sati or one mindfulness at a time. And when you apply that sati, okay, when you apply the sati, you must have great attention. You must have great attention. To have great attention, you must have put all effort to have that. With that great effort and attention, you aim precisely at the object that is arising. With precision and then steadily. You aim, you totally engage with it, and you stay till it's finished, the object passed away. But one thing was you have to do one after the other, every moment, every object continuously, you have to apply. Only if you apply that way continuously, you will see the significant difference in the mind how much kilesa has been replaced. But one or twice. An hour here, an hour there, a little retreat here, a little retreat there. You must do it continuously, and if you do that way, you will have a significant change in the mind. The content of kilisa. So that's what the Dinka Bimoti is. One moment at a time, one drop at a time, one sati at a time. If you have a correct and precise sati, it replaces the kilisa. And at that moment you are free from the influence of mental defilements. That's the first type of kilesa or liberation, the dinka bimukti. And second one is waitkampana mimukti. Freedom from kilesa by distancing or liberation from kilesa by distancing. Wikampana mi. So let's call it kilesa distancing. Distancing oneself away from kilesa or kilesa distancing. That's a second type of liberation. So we already know one mindfulness at a time. And this one mindfulness at a time, we must be doing it again and again and again, continuously, repeatedly, unbroken. Unbroken means one after the other, nothing comes in between. Unbroken means you are extending your time to five minutes, fifteen minutes, one hour. One hour continuously. If you have one hour continuously, what happens is your mind is free from the influence of kilesa. Your mind is liberated from kilesa for one hour. In other words, you have distanced yourself from kilesa for one hour. So one keep on practicing, and if you can achieve a series of those long stretch of period or duration, continuous mindfulness, then you will have a series of liberated period from killesa. And if you can do that, if you can achieve that, what happened was a person is observing satip. Okay, satip. At that moment you are free from kilesa. But sometimes you are not perfect, sometimes you miss. In other words, there are moments in between moments that you lose mindfulness. You are unmindful. But now as you have that stretches or series of continuousity, even though you are unmindful, the gross form of kilesa cannot arise. The gross form, that's for sure. Gross form of kilisa cannot arise, even if you are unmindful. But medium and refined me. But if you have a very powerful momentum of these continuous mindfulness, Sati, even medium and refined kilisa will not arise. That's the gradual progression. But if you don't observe, if you don't observe, or if you don't practice full foundation of mindfulness, your mind will be occupied with 100% kilisa. So whenever you face with pleasant object, craving and grasping, automatic. They come. Whenever you are facing with unpleasant object, instantly, dosa will arise. Anger, ill will, instantly, like a fraction of a second is faster or slower than that arising of the dosa when you face with the unpleasant object. And also object that you see, you will see with the tainted eyes, tainted glasses. You will see it obscurely, in other words, you don't see as it is, you see wrongly. That seeing is called moha. So if you don't have full foundation of mindfulness, instantly loba or dosa or moha will be arising for sure. And we need to take care of these things, and how do we take care of? Let's say a person, a person trained, himself or herself to become an Olympian, to get a gold medal in Olympics. Then second is that person, what do that person need to do? Or let's say Olympian. First of all, they need a very good, competent coach. And then that coach, as it is good and competent, has to teach that person proper technique and method and movements to perfection, to maximum efficiency, they have to teach it. Coach and apply the right method, and after that, that person has to exercise brightest, brightness again and again and again. At least for four years, at least eight hours a day is for four years you have to practice, and then with that kind of a program and effort, one will get a gold medal in the Olympics. That is just for Olympic medal. So just like that too, in this strengthening of the mind. Our mind is always occupied with kiresa. When it's occupied with kilesa, we call it a weak mind. We want to transform and it's a very strong mind. The strength of the kirita. To what level to gain liberation, to gain freedom from kirisa, we want to strengthen it. To do that, we first of all need a very competent teacher that you believe in, that you have confidence in. And that teacher will teach you the correct methods and techniques. Along with these techniques, theory, why we do, what we do, how we do. And then the last thing it falls upon you. You practice and practice and practice. But this practice is not for four years, not for 40 years. You practice so that that practice becomes a lifestyle. It becomes a habit. That way one needs to practice. How do we practice? We know. First of all, physical or mental object is always arising. When it comes into your attention, you know. At that moment, the moment it arises, you aim it directly. Aim it. And after you aim, you shoot it, that means you come in contact with the object. And then you stay with that object. You stick with the object till the object disappears. And when you do that, what happens is sati mindfulness arise. And when that correct sati arises, samadhi mental concentration automatically arises together. So you can picture that, eh? Let's see at that moment, let that moment. Ask yourself a question and then figure it out, look into it, see it, feel it, experience it. At that moment there is no such thing as sense, desire for sense pleasure. When you're observing an object with precision, developing mindfulness and concentration at that moment, there is no sense pleasure associated with it. And also you have no dislike to it. You don't have aversion towards it. What is sense pleasure? Let's go back. Sense pleasure is called karma chandatni varana. Kama chandatni varana. Hindrance of sense pleasure. There's no sense pleasure, anger, aversion. What is that? Byabada niwarana. Hindrance of ill will. They are not there at all. And also the condition is that you have already established at that moment sati, mindfulness, and samadhi. So to be able to establish sati, you cannot just simply pick up, grab it, or fall into your lap. You have to put great effort. Great effort. When you are putting effort because you have sati. When there is effort, there is no sleepiness, laziness. There no slot and topper. In other words, there is no tina meita niwarana. You don't have tina meita niwarana either at that moment, slot and topper. Free from slot and topper. And at that moment we are taking one precise moment what we are doing under practice. The mind is squarely and firmly on the object. If the mind is not squarely and firmly on the object, you won't have this mindfulness. When the mind is squarely and firmly on the object, the mind has no restlessness. The mind has no guilt. The mind has no remorse. Because the mind is squarely and firmly on the object. It is free from restlessness and remorse. It is free from odditya, kukitya, niwarana. You don't have that either. Now you are practicing with the correct instruction from your competent teacher. You have the right technique, the right method, the right procedure. And also to have that you understand the procedure. You already have the understanding. So as you are executing, you are directly experiencing whatever that object is at that moment. So you understand that object very clearly, both in theory and in practice. That means you have no doubt. In other words, there is no wichike niwarana. The hindrances of doubt, skeptical doubt is not there. So we have what all five of them. There is no sense of dire, there's no ill will, there's no slot and torpor, there is no restlessness and remorse, and there is no doubt. That one little moment when you apply that precise mindfulness, you are free from the five hindrances, pinja, niwarana. That is what exactly is happening. So if you look at it, why are we practicing? Why are we applying that strong, powerful, precise mindfulness sati? It is to overcome the five hindrances. Mindfulness is the cause. Overcoming the five hindrances the effect. So now you know we actually dissect it. You know it. So you must repeat this process again and again and again and again so the mind becomes really strong. Bala jigta. Bala means strong. Powerful. You repeat this process again and again so that the mind becomes strong and powerful. Become bala jitta. Strong enough to do what? Strong enough to overcome kilesha, mental defilements. These five hindrances are what? The five hindrances are the key significant part of kilesha, put it out in a specific way for our practice. But in general, they fall under mental defilement, khilisa. So to overcome that we practiced it again and again for the mind to become powerful. So in this process of replacing kilisa with wisdom, we are not simply developing concentration. We don't stop at concentration. We go up to wisdom. We are doing wisdom. What is wisdom? And the hindrances. When there is no doubt, when there is no doubt, you understand it with precision. Understanding is wisdom. We don't stop at concentration. We go right to the end of the road till wisdom. So in other words, we are not simply replacing killesa with concentration samadhi. We are replacing khilesa with wisdom, binya. And to have this wisdom of binya, one must observe each and every object one after the other without messing with precision. I'll be repeating these words again and again because these are the most important part of our practice. That's why you will see the teacher always stressed what the importance of this process. Observed. First of all, precisely and correctly, seamlessly, from object to object. Don't take a break, don't take a gap. You will hear that words again and again. Observe correctly, precisely, seamlessly, take no break, have no gap. That's a key part. And if you have that, you are the Lord of the Kilisa. You overwhelm the Kilisa. But regardless how much the teacher may say these things, they are yogis because we all have a different types, different personality. Some yogis are very they have great imagination. Some people like to live in fantasy land. Majority of their life. Some people like to live their, make their life in planning, planning, planning, planning. Imagination, fantasy land, planning land. And those type of people, these are not just simply one sort of doing, they become the main traits of these people or yogis who are practicing. Those people they drift away from one story to another, another story to another, one plan to another, one fantasy land to another, and they drift away. One hour up, maybe you have 15 minutes in that land. Maybe 10 minutes you have no thing. That kind of situation definitely will arise. And also there's another type of yogi. Another type of yogi is they are they love reading, they love intellectual understanding of Dharma. And they try and shoot that understanding of Dharma everywhere. And especially in the practice, you're practicing and you have one little moment, two little moments. As soon as that little moment is finished, you start dissecting that moment. Oh, I'm doing this, I'm doing this, I'm right, I'm experiencing this, I'm here, I have this insight, I have that insight. That is another type. Those people are intellectual type. They love to live in their brain, dissecting. So in here they are dissecting the Dhamma experience or their little observation. Maybe about a minute of observation and then analysis. Of three four minutes. That's even more dangerous because as they are involved with Dharma in practice and more in theory, they think all the time they are practicing. They think they are practicing all the time they are with Dharma, they are with meditation. And that way they don't even know that they have lost their mindfulness. The first one, fantasy people, they know when they get over. That is dangerous too, even more dangerous. So keep those little things in mind. And when these kind of situations come in, those yogis, they must note or they must observe and note. They must note forcefully, energetically, and sharply, not just rising, falling, rising, running, lifting, rising, falling, rising, falling, rising, falling. In other words, little power, force, energy, sharpness put it in. Like as if you are scolding yourself. That kind of thing. By doing so, it may remedy the situation. And also there's another one. We are talking about lifting, pushing, dropping. Another one is thinking. You go into thought as soon as you become aware of you say thinking, thinking, thinking, thinking, thinking, wondering, wondering, that's it. But for those kinds of people, that's not enough. Some people just thinking, thinking, the thoughts go away and they keep away. That's okay. But those types of people, thinking, thinking, wondering, wondering is not enough. Like scriptural language, it's called loba jeta, you are saying. In other words, consciousness associated with lobba, consciousness associated with dosa, anger, consciousness associated with moha. You remember the first three pairs of the consciousness in the jetana nukasana. One must observe that way. Or that's a structural term in the real practical term. Know that there's anger, there's lust, there's hate, there's wanting, there's desire. More specific, more detailed, go into it. By going more specific into the nature of the consciousness, not the content, not the story, the nature. By doing so, you may take yourself out of that drifting land. Fantasy land. Yeah, the Buddha said somehow it runs like this dried up the moisture of kilisa. Dried up the moisture of kilesa with the heat of effort by using satipattana vipassana. In Buddhism we always kilesa is presented as something wet, sticky, moist. Kilesa always presented as that. And then effort is presented in a sort of a heat, heating. You both have to put a great effort, even to rub too stick, to generate heat, to generate fire, heat to come up. So effort is always presented as heat and moisture or being wet as presented at kilisa. That's why I said dry. You must totally dry up all the moisture with the moisture of kilisa, with the heat of effort. But with what? Rubbing two sticks? No. You must use the full foundation of mindfulness. By using these four groups, you exert great energy and dried up all the kilisa. That's Buddha's words. So to do that, Sitipathana Vipassana, you can, we always use that one word, mindfulness inside meditation. But what it is, a little more detail is you are exercising three trainings. What are the three trainings if you remember? Morality, sila, concentration, samadhi, and wisdom, biny, silak, samadhi, binya. You must practice these three trainings. Or if you want to go even a little deeper, you must exercise the eight constituents of the noble path. Eightfold Noble Path. So we won't go into detail. You know what eightfold noble path is. Morality group, concentration group, and wisdom group. You must practice these things. And if one is very confident in this practice and know the what kind of benefits can arise out of it. Of course, theoretically, what benefits can come out of it by practicing this mindfulness inside meditation? That person will practice seriously and respectfully. Seriously and respectfully. You can interpret in any way, whichever way people like to. Let's narrow it down. What does it mean by seriously and respectfully? By totally purely emphasizing, focusing on one noting at a time. If you are serious, you will be giving full attention on one noting, one sati, one mindfulness at a time, and the next time, and the next time, and the next time. And if you focus that much attention on each noting without having a gap in between, that means the yogi is serious about this practice and very respectful of this practice. That's the definition of serious and respect. We say that because many teachers come across many yogis. We call them chronic chronic yogi. Chronic yogis, chronic, chronic yogis. These yogis they have been practicing 10 years, 15 years, 20 years, 30 years. They go wherever there's a retreat is. Oh this retreat, that retreat, rain retreat, oh this great teacher is giving in that country, you follow, you go, you practice, you go, you practice. But they do that diligently, without missing. But uh the sad thing is they never really experience the Dharma. They never truly experience the flavor, taste the flavor of the true Dharma. And those kind of people we call it chronic yogi. Our teachers give that name. So for those kind of yogis, even the great teachers have to surrender. They can't do anything, they just let it be okay, at least they come here and they practice. They are not going around and doing what you call transgressive killesa and obsessive killesa. That's about it. But they would not progress in times of Dharma. And here, once a person observes fairly consistently, okay, if if you can observe very consistently, not once or twice, consistently, that they are thoughts, my thoughts are related with raga or greed, desire, might have thoughts that are related with dosa, anger, aversion, dissatisfaction. If they become aware of it, if they can observe consistently and if they can observe consistently and become aware of these things, the nature of their thoughts, or in other words, the type of consciousness that are arising in you. What happened was you begin to understand yourself, your idiotic nature, all the fallacy that you have in your mind, all the idiosyncrasy you have in your mind, you become to understand that, but you must be able to observe and know it. And as soon as you know it, and if you are practicing this mindfulness inside, it is auto-correction. They correct it, they arise, you aware, they disappear. That disappearance is the correction, they automatically correct it very quickly. Just to give an example, we are all familiar with alcoholics. The first step to cure yourself out of that alcoholics or alcoholism is. Oh, I have this kind of thoughts arising, I have this nature of thoughts arising, not contact, the nature. And that is basically the you are admitting you to yourself. Like the alcoholic admits to himself, I am an alcoholic. Here, oh, I'm full of irritation, I'm full of frustration, I'm full of sense desire, and so on and so forth. That's the first admitted initial understanding is the more like an admittance that you are addicted to Kirisa. Only when you're addicted then automatically the cure will come. What is the cure? The same thing, you have a powerful and more pronounced awareness of your consciousness or of your thoughts arising. Simple word is thoughts, but precise word is chitta awareness. If you have a powerful awareness of all the consciousness, chitta arising at the moment will become known. And when you know that that addiction to killesa is over, every consciousness you know their nature and your addiction, addiction to kilesa is gone. Because uh the mind, the mind is like a child. Okay, if you let the mind run wild, okay, it will only collect bad habits, bad habits, just like a child would. They only collect bad habits, they don't collect good habits. The same thing, the mind. You let it go well, they will collect all the bad habits, unwholesome habits. And the mind is very hard to tame. It requires discipline and training and harnessing for the mind to become proper, polite, and gentle. And if you train like that, then by through that training you can develop good habits. Good habit doesn't come automatically, bad habit is automatic. So keep that the nature in your mind, the nature of the mind. So in here, training, we call it training. Training is what? We all know mindfulness and sight, Satipathana Vipassana, because that's what we are practicing. So this mindfulness insight is a revolutionary way to improve, upgrade, and strengthen your mind. Many cultures, system, religion have many different ways of how to train their mind. But this Buddhist way mindfulness is a revolutionary way from all other systems, all other techniques. How to improve, upgrade, and strengthen one's mind. And if you have a precise and correct noting or observation, you have one improvement. You do one noting, you have one improvement. And this system, this technique is the simplest, easiest, surest, and the quickest way to get results. And it is good for any level of yogi. Any level means whether you were a beginner or intermediate or advanced, whatever you are in, level you are in, this is suitable. A person from the road who have never practiced any meditation can come and practice right away, and if you follow precisely with great effort, one will see the result in the shortest amount of time. So each and every noting, each and every observation, a step towards the establishing a mental culture. We'll put it a new word, strengthening the mind, that's one thing. Here's mental culture. It's a specific word in Pali, it's called danta. Danta, mental culture. And if you have established this mental culture, mental culture in one way is the non-arising of kilesa. If kilisa is not arising, the mind is totally cultured. Danta means in a way, non-arising of kilisa. And if you have that, you will have a kind of happiness that you will never become bored of. Okay, we always know happiness. What happens? Okay, there's a great dish you like. Okay, chicken pot pie, grandma recipe, put it in. Oh great, I love it. I can eat it. One meal, you can eat it, two meal you can see. If somebody keeps on cooking that for about ten days in a row, you will get sick of it. You won't get that pleasure anymore. In other words, some happiness, if you keep getting it, you become bored of it, and you even have a repulsive nature towards it. But this happiness you get out of the mental culture, you will never get bored of it. Okay, and that happiness has a specific name. Santi sukkha. Supreme bliss. Okay, it's a happiness that is pure, that you don't get bored of, that you don't need any sense pleasure. Without any sense pleasure, this kind of happiness arises. Okay. So let's say you don't culture your mind. So you don't culture your mind means your mind is in the unmindful state. Your mind is an unmindful state. Sad to say most of our minds are unmindful state. Most of us and most of the time are unmindful state. So if the mind is in an unmindfulness, unmindful state, it has that infinite possibility and infinite potential. That will grows into three unwholesome actions. What are these? Unwholesome thoughts. If your mind is unmindful, unwholesome thoughts will come in. Sometimes you will do unwholesome speech and sometimes you will do unwholesome deed. And they have an infinite potential and possibility it will become one or the other. That's what unmindful state is. But by being mindful, if you're mindful, automatically that potentiality or these possibilities are all cut off and terminated. Eliminated, gone. So if these unwholesome things are eliminated, what happened? You become safe, you become secure, safe and secure from your own unwholesome action, speech, deed, or thought. You are safe from these unwholesome actions, the result of these unwholesome actions, you are safe and secure. When you are safe and secure, you are in peace. And not only that, you are. You can never stand alone. Of course you can, but all your actions vibrate around you into the society. Don't forget that. Keep that in mind. So you practice mindfulness, and if this mindfulness becomes a habit, if it becomes a habit, in other words, it's with you. Once you become a head, in those periods, even if you are not mindful, kilisa will not arise. Surprisingly, you will find it. Before you have to be mindful for kilesa to not to arise, but if you make this sati a habit, and you will find even the moments that you are not mindful, kilisa doesn't arise. That's what it is. And that's what we call kilisa distinct. Liberation from Kilisa, freedom from kilisa, we muti. So I stress quite a bit on this Vipankana Vimukti because that is where most of our yogis are. Momentary one, if you have one precise noting, you got it. But you can't feel it, you can't see it, you can't taste it. But at this second stage, we bankana vi mukti, you can feel it, you can seal it, you can taste it. And even if you temporarily lost mindfulness, killesa will not arise. You have come to the second phase of liberation. And the third one, the third one is called samuk cheda vimukti. Samukseda vimukti is it's a freedom from kilesa that have a power to reproduce or to give rebirth in the full woeful state. Now it's very specific. States of constant suffering or 80 or 90% of your life to give numbers is suffering. Very little pleasure. That's all full woeful state. So in here, what you do, once you've got a wimpankana vimoti, okay? Killesa distancing, you keep practice, you keep practice. When you keep practice, what happened was you begin to understand the nature, the true nature of the mind, the due nature of the matter. There are two different phenomena and they work hand in hand through the law of cause and affair. And these are always arising and passing away. And the system, these mind and matters are always oppressed by this nature of impermanence, and there's no such thing as a core, no such thing as something as self or a soul or individual or personality. These things you come to know, stage by stage, stage by stage. And slowly and slowly, the higher you go, you still know the same thing, but in a more pronounced way, more distinct way, more clear way. That's the difference. Clarity. Changes. The higher you go, the more clear you come to experience these things. Basically, you can call it gradual progress in insight. Or jnana. And upon maturity of all the insight, one will experience the first part consciousness. Mega jigda or part wisdom. Magad vinya. And along with that, Magat Jida or Magad Vina, Pat Wisdom, you have the samochhed vimutti. At that moment you are 100% totally free from the killesa that can or that have the power to give rebirth in the full woeful state. Another word for it is called sotapana. The first string winner, the first noble person. That's one. And the next one is called Bati Pasati Vimutti. This is simple. You have this, you become a noble person. Okay, part. Pat consciousness, mega jita. And once you have that part consciousness, it comes with its path and fruition. The result of that part, the result of the wisdom is you have some, let's call it peace. Pala, fruition, result, peace. Some kind of peace far superior than the one that we know before. And you can experience or you can stay in that fruition. You can stay in it. And that one is the freedom from the killesa of the part consciousness and experiencing. You experience or you feel peace brought about by the uprooting of kilesa by part consciousness. The result of the part basically, simply put. And then of course you know there are four different levels: first novel person, second novel person, third fourth. So accordingly you will experience. And the final one or the fifth one of liberation is called Nisarana Vibukti. It is totally, total escape from the constant arising and passing away of Nama and Rupa. You escape. In other words, cessation of mind and matter. Your mind and matter cease to exist. Don't think you die. You are still alive, but you can experience the cessation of mind and matter. That is the fifth type of freedom or liberation. There are five kinds of liberation. One is the momentary liberation. Second one is liberation through distancing. And the third one is freedom from the full woeful state. The fourth one is result, or let's say peace, peace of extinction of kilesa from each part consciousness. And the final is total and complete extinction of kilesa. So the first two are for most people, the first two liberations. The second two liberations of the final three liberations are for the noble person Ariya. So may all of you be able to practice mindfulness and sight meditation and may you be able to experience all five types of freedom and liberation from kirisa as soon as possible.