This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Journey to our Friend Within; Insight (20) Recognizing Unsatisfactoriness. It likely contains inaccuracies.
The following talk was given by Gil Fronsdal at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California. Please visit website www.audiodharma.org to find the authoritative record of this talk.
Hello and welcome. Welcome to this meditation on freedom, on the American Freedom Day here in the United States. May it be that we understand the full depth of inner freedom that can be the great foundation for an outer freedom for a whole country. We are here to learn about samadhi1 and insight as a foundation for a phenomenal capacity for inner well-being and inner freedom. The simplest way of understanding it is freedom from suffering. A little bit more developed understanding of it is that it’s the freedom that will allow the most beautiful and wholesome parts of our heart to take the lead for how we live in this world.
Imagine there’s a very dear, wonderful old friend that you haven’t seen for a very long time, maybe decades even, because of whatever circumstance. But it turns out that they’re going to be in town, and there’s a one-hour period that they’re available to have lunch with you. You’re looking forward to that; it’s important for you. Maybe you have things you have to do that morning, so you’re involved with your responsibilities, and you’ve set enough time aside to get to the place for lunch and to meet with your friend. And then you’re heading there. You’re walking or driving there, and then you start getting notifications about emails. You get notifications about wonderful opportunities. You see billboards. You go past stores with interesting displays of things for sale in the window. You go by an important demonstration that’s happening for some social justice issue that’s dear to you. All kinds of things happen on the way.
You understand very well that you only have an hour with your wonderful old friend, and so you just hold the course. You stay on track. You have an important thing to do. You don’t get distracted; you don’t get pulled into these things. In a certain way, some of them are clearly distractions. Some of them are clearly unsatisfactory in general to be involved in—window shopping for things you can’t even buy and getting upset about why you can’t buy them. Some of them are valuable to do, but given how wonderful it would be to see your friend, it’s unsatisfactory or less satisfactory. What’s really important now is to see this wonderful friend. And so you hold the course. You’re so steady, and you’re not averse towards anything. It’s just that this is the task at hand.
When we meditate, we are here to see, in a sense, a long-lost friend. We become our own best friend. It becomes invaluable just to connect to ourselves, to see parts of ourselves that easily get lost in the busyness of daily life, in the preoccupations of the mind, in the obsessions of the mind. The advertisements, the notifications the mind provides us, the images that become window shopping in the mind—there are so many ways the mind can go. But we have this very important task, and in relationship to this important task of really connecting deeply here to the best friend within, all these other things are less satisfying, less important, not important enough to get sidetracked with.
Part of the function of samadhi, part of the function of insight, is to hold the course, to stay here in a nice, supportive, peaceful way, not straining, not pushing, but steady. And the function of insight, one of them, is to understand that anything else that pulls us away takes us away from this really important task at hand. That these other things, as important as they might be to think about, to be involved in, to react to, they’re less satisfying. They’re less meaningful within this wonderful hour we have, these wonderful few minutes we have to deeply connect to something profound here within us.
For today, I’d like to say that the capacity to discover the best friend that you will ever have can be discovered deep inside of your own self. So, assume a meditation posture.
I suspect that for many of you, if you sit down at lunch with this old, good, dear friend, you don’t automatically slump into the chair. Probably there’s a certain kind of alertness in the posture, a delight in the posture, like, “Oh, here we are.” And there’s a certain kind of wonderful energy arising from deep inside that animates your posture about the goodness of this moment. Offer this to yourself.
To meet yourself, sit down with yourself with a posture that you’re going to meet a dear, respectful friend.
And to gently close your eyes.
Maybe you can bring a smile to your face, a half-smile, at the delight of meeting this old friend that’s been with you your whole life, but maybe, just maybe, hasn’t really been seen or contacted that often. But how fortunate it is to sit down here and now.
And then to begin the process of settling and stabilizing, so that there’s a kind of a direct, undistracted journey to be with a friend.
Taking a few long, slow, full breaths. Settling in on the exhale.
Taking a deep breath. Relaxing the body.
Inhaling and feeling a broad sense of the body. Exhaling, a broad release of the body. Letting go.
Let the breath return to normal and continue a process of settling.
In every relaxing of the body, let it be a relaxing into the grounding spot of breathing, the place where breathing begins or ends in the depth of your torso. Settle into there.
Feeling on the inhale, feeling the muscles of your face. Exhaling, relaxing the face. And relaxing, settling into the breathing.
Feeling the shoulders. And on the exhale, softening the shoulders while at the same time settling into the grounding place.
Feeling the belly and settling into the belly.
Quietly breathing, but connecting to the grounding place, the deepest place where you can feel and sense breathing in your body.
And to let go of all things—all thoughts, distractions, concerns—because breathing, being absorbed in breathing, is the direct journey to see your best friend within, to meet the best friend.
And nothing at this moment has any more importance than visiting your friend. Everything else is not as satisfying, not as important, takes you away from something invaluable.
And for these minutes here, with the support of your breathing, stay on track. Stay with this gentle journey that will take you closer and closer to meeting a best friend within.
Having the wisdom to see that you’re involved in distractions, anything that distracts you from being on this very valuable journey to sit down here with something invaluable: the deepest friend within.
Stay on the journey. Stay present with what’s valuable here and now, deep inside. Either because you feel it, know it, or you feel and know the journey there.
And then, as we come to the end of this sitting, to take a moment, some moments, to feel and recognize whatever is really good about being present here in the meditation, in yourself.
Is there some way of being present here and now that’s satisfying for you, or at least more satisfying than how you usually go about your day and go about your thinking and preoccupations?
Is there some way of being alive right now that you’ll miss once you get up from meditation and get involved in the activities of your day?
And if there is some way of being right now that’s valuable for you or you appreciate, why give it up? Why sacrifice it for a way of being that’s less satisfying?
Maybe what you’re discovering here in meditation can be a way in which you can meet anyone as if they’re a good friend. A simplicity of being, a simplicity of presence, a clear attention to others in an undistracted way can be the vehicle for kindness, for friendliness, for respect, for care.
May it be that this meditation that we do is here for the benefit and well-being of this world. May what we learn here in meditation help us to enter the world with a gift of well-wishing.
May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free.
Thank you.
So hello and welcome to this next talk in the series on insight, the deeper insights into what’s usually called the three characteristics. But in the early teachings of the Buddha, these are called the three perceptions or the three recognitions that, as practice deepens, we begin recognizing something that’s invaluable in helping us on the path to freedom, to liberation, helping us on the path to connect to the deepest parts of well-being that we can have.
The first of these recognitions is a deeper and deeper recognition, perception, a wisdom around inconstancy, impermanence, change, things becoming different. The second one, which is our topic right now, is a deep recognition, a deep wisdom and understanding about dukkha2. The word dukkha is usually translated as “suffering” when it’s translated into English. And as such, it is maybe a never-ending process of becoming wiser and wiser about how we suffer, how we have stress, distress, how we make things worse for ourselves. And in doing so, to understand something more and more about the opposite of suffering—maybe in shorthand we call it happiness, and sometimes maybe peace. Because the primary way the Buddha talked about positive emotions that come into play with the deepening practice, with freedom, is happiness and peace. Or maybe the opposite is some deep feeling of contentment or satisfaction or being at home in ourselves, in this world, in this body.
And so, to begin appreciating that we can have wisdom, that deep understandings can arise from suffering itself. Rather than seeing suffering as only a problem, only something unwelcome, only something overwhelming, only something that we should get rid of and fix and take care of, only something that tells us that we’ve done something wrong or something like that. The approach here in the dharma is to be able to be willing to see suffering as a vehicle to freedom, as something not to shy away from but something to see directly and honestly so we can come to a deep understanding, a deep recognition of what’s happening here and the nature of suffering itself.
In this regard, different people will have different translations, and each different translation of dukkha is a valuable perspective, a window to see it in a different way. One of the translations that people like to prefer is “unsatisfactoriness.” The simple way of saying it is that everything is always changing, and there’s something very deeply unsatisfactory about trying to stop the change, trying to hold on to things as they are. And it’s unsatisfactory because it doesn’t work. If you’re trying to stop yourself from aging, people spend a lot of money to somehow stop the signs of aging—facelifts and makeup and exercising and all kinds of ways we’re trying to stay young. Some of them are valuable to do, and I’m not saying we shouldn’t do some of it, but if we’re attached to it, holding on, expecting to be successful for our whole lifetime, that’s going to cause a lot of suffering. We will age, and our bodies will change, our capacities will change, and if we’re holding on to how things were, that’s an unsatisfactory effort. It’s much more satisfying to find our freedom with change, to find our capacity to open up and be expansive and to be delighted and happy and peaceful with all the inevitable changes that will happen in this life.
This is a tall order in all the complexities of life. But we can become wiser and wiser in recognizing that the activities of our mind, what we’re preoccupied with, what we do with our mind—the craving, the holding on, the tightening of the mind—that is unsatisfactory. Maybe in some ways, we can recognize it’s very unsatisfactory to lose our capacities as we get older, to have all kinds of things change as we get older. It’s not very satisfying, of course. But what the dharma is looking at is how it’s unsatisfactory to cling to it or resist it. What we’re adding on top of it, we can feel is not the best for us. It’s making things worse.
And so as we practice more and more, the sensitivity, the insight that can come, the recognition, the understanding, the perception that becomes clearer and clearer is which activities in our minds that we do, what sources of motivation, impulses to how to live, how to speak, how to act in the world, how to think, the attitudes we have—where does it start feeling unsatisfactory?
The beauty of this dharma practice is that it is not a matter of analysis. It’s not a matter of calculating how unsatisfactory it is or having some policy that it’s unsatisfactory. But rather, we’re settling ourselves. We’re quieting ourselves. We’re touching into something that’s here inside of us that’s deeply satisfying. It’s satisfying to feel peace. It’s satisfying to feel at ease with oneself. It’s satisfying to be calm. It’s satisfying to have some deep wellspring of happiness and well-being. There is a satisfying way of being. Just enough—it doesn’t have to be dramatic—just enough to see that the activities of what we do with our mind, where we lose the satisfactory feeling, that those feelings are unsatisfactory.
This is what many people are blind to. There’s a compulsivity, there’s an authority to our preoccupations, our concerns, our attachments. The ways we get stressed, the ways we get tight, the ways we feel like things have to be different, the ways that we resist, the ways that we hold on to me, myself, and mine. The ways that we think that we have to save the world. There are so many different ways that we’re convinced to give up our deeply satisfying inner peace for agitation, for stress, for suffering. And we’re so convinced in it, or sometimes obsessed about it, so attached to it that we don’t even know we’re distracted. We don’t even know the sacrifice we’re making. We’re so distracted by distractions, we don’t even know we’re distracted. We’re so involved in our stress that we don’t think it can be any other way. We give so much authority to our self-talk, our ruminations, our self-criticism, self-preoccupations, those thoughts that we believe it can’t be any other way. This is the truth. And the way it undermines us, the way that we think depresses us or alarms us or distresses us or makes us feel guilty or inadequate—it just feels like it’s part and parcel of the truth. We’re so involved in it, we don’t think there’s any other option. This is how things are.
And so this way in which we lose ourselves in unsatisfactory states of mind that seem so real and so convincing and so absolute, we need powerful medicine to break through that and learn another way. And samadhi, settling meditation, insight, deeper understanding can be a powerful support. One of the ways is to begin appreciating that whatever way we are now, there’s some connection, some deeper, fuller, happier way of being, just enough that we recognize that the different way is unsatisfactory.
Maybe we’re already stressed, but then something else happens and now we’re even more stressed. The understanding is, you know, the previous stress was better. Now I’m involved in some higher stress. So, it may just be, to use a silly example, maybe you’re late for an appointment, and so it’s stressful, and you’re kind of involved in trying to get to the place on time, and you’re worried about the consequences of being late. And then you see a window display in a store, and it isn’t just simply you’re attracted to it, but now you’re stressed because you want to have it and you want to get it at a good price and should you go to some other stores to check it out? And now you can feel your stress level go even higher than it was before. Wisdom tells us, “Oh, to add this level of stress is unsatisfying. This is unsatisfactory.” And we have a clear insight, a clear recognition, an understanding of something that’s now unsatisfactory. I don’t have to do this.
As the stress levels go down more and more, we get a better reference point for how this works. If we’re already really stressed out, one more aspect of stress, we don’t see the difference. It’s all just a pile of stress. As we get calmer and calmer, settled in better, that insight into unsatisfactoriness becomes more and more clear. And then if we get below the stress level and start feeling a sense of well-being, that gives another different kind of vantage point for how we sacrifice well-being for an activity of the mind which is unsatisfactory.
Over time, we get more and more wisdom not only about what is unsatisfying but what the mind can do. But even more important, we see we have the opportunity, we see we can not take that road, not get involved. We can let go of that, not do it. We have something much more valuable to do. And that is to come back here in a deep way, because it’s in here, in ourselves, we discover our best friend. We discover the deepest levels of care, love, peace, happiness, well-being. Here is where we discover an inner beauty where we can really value ourselves in a deeper, deeper way as our best friend.
And that, in turn, this deeper insight into unsatisfactoriness also allows us to see other people in better ways because we begin recognizing the unsatisfactory ways in which we add projections, judgments, interpretations on them. That diminishes our own happiness but also does very unfortunate things for the people that we’re with. And to see the unsatisfactoriness of bringing stress to other people, the unsatisfactoriness to see them in a bad light. And the deep satisfaction of seeing people in their goodness, and their kindness, and their potential, in what’s possible in them, and to bring love and care and respect to everyone.
May insight into suffering, insight into unsatisfactoriness, support you in a wonderful process of choosing the satisfactory way of living your life, moment by moment.
So, thank you on this Independence Day in the United States, where we’re learning how to find independence and freedom in our own hearts. And may the freedom and independence of our own hearts be the foundation for what we offer the world. So, thank you.
And one announcement that may interest a few of you. I was just reminded, and kind of delightfully, that on Tuesday evenings on the East Coast at 7:00 p.m., the Insight Meditation Society has online offerings. A long time ago, they invited me to come to their book club to talk about my translation of the Dhammapada3, a very important ancient canonical text of poetry. And so I’ll be doing that on Tuesday, and it’s free as part of the book club. And partly I’m kind of delighted and inspired somehow that almost 700 people have signed up for it, so it’s not like a small, intimate book club, which maybe I thought it was going to be. But with that number of people, I thought, “Wow, this is a different kind of experience,” so I thought maybe I would offer you a chance to come as well.
So thank you very much, and I look forward to coming back here on Monday.