Lessons In Practical Buddhism - Sirimangalo.Org

constant, unchangeable entity will fall away and one will be
able to take people as they truly are at any given moment.
Instead of holding grudges or having expectations of others’
behaviour, one will take people moment by moment.
However other people may be at any given moment, one will
respond appropriately to that moment based on the
understanding of reality as it is, rather than as one expects it
to be. One will be able to confront all aspects of life in a wise
and impartial manner, free from the baggage that ordinary
people carry around with them: feelings of vengeance,
jealousy, fear, worry, and so on. All problems we have with
others will disappear. Eventually, all problems we have with
everything will disappear. When you experience something
that before would make you afraid or stressed or worried,
you’ll find that you don’t judge it to be so anymore. You will
take everything simply for what it is.
The reason we stress and worry about the experiences in our
lives is because we conceive them to be more than they are.
Once we start to see things just as they are, we give up any
attachment to them. We see that they’re impermanent,
unsatisfying and uncontrollable, and therefore see no reason
to cling to them or expect them to bring us true and lasting
happiness. Because we don’t cling to them, wishing, “oh,
may this make me happy!” or worrying, “how can I fix this to
make it better?”, we will see everything as a series of
experiences – seeing, hearing, and so on.
A good example of how this works is in regards to the fear of
flying in an airplane. In truth, far fewer deaths are caused by
airplanes than by more ordinary forms of transportation like
automobiles or motorcycles, and yet very many people are
still deathly afraid of the experience of flying in an airplane.
Once they are able to become comfortable with
moment-to-moment experience, the fear will vanish entirely
as though it never existed.
I once had an opportunity to teach meditation to a woman
sitting beside me on a flight in Canada. She was very much
afraid of flying, and when the airplane took off she clung
desperately to her seat as a result of the deeply ingrained
fear. During the flight she relaxed somewhat, and I
explained to her the method of observing the fear for what it
102