Lessons In Practical Buddhism - Sirimangalo.Org

as it is. Our knowledge of suffering has to be
all-encompassing. This is what we gain from the practice; we
come to see, not that our experiences are unpleasant or
harmful to us, but that they're useless.
Experiences are meaningless - they are not a source of true
happiness or peace. Even when we attain enlightenment, we
can still live with them and amongst them, experiencing
them as usual, only we will never cling to them; we will stop
trying to find happiness in them. Even intellectual analysis,
views and opinions - all of this we will discard in favour of
simple wisdom that knows reality for what it is.
All of our thoughts and ideas, beliefs and opinions - they
aren't wisdom. Wisdom is seeing that beliefs are just beliefs,
views and thoughts are just views and thoughts. Seeing,
hearing, smelling, tasting, feeling, thinking are what they
are. This is simple wisdom, getting rid of all of the baggage
that we carry and retaining only pure awareness of reality as
it is. That's what enlightenment is about, getting lighter.
Enlightenment is not just turning on a light, it's about giving
up the weight. The Buddha said, "bhārā have
pañcakkhandhā, bhārahāro ca puggalo (SN 22.22)" - the five
aggregates are indeed a heavy burden, and it is us who have
to carry them around. Once we stop clinging to them,
reifying and judging them, only then will we find true wisdom
and enlightenment.
Through the practise, our minds will become light and free.
This is really all that the Buddha had to offer to us. The
Buddha found perfect simplicity; he found perfect rectitude
of mind - straightness. His mind became perfectly straight,
so that he was able to cut through delusion like a knife.
When your mind is crooked you can't cut, you can't point -
you can only cling. When you purify the mind, nothing can
cling to it; all experience will be like water off a lotus flower -
even though the lotus grows surrounded by water and pelted
by rain, it doesn't ever become waterlogged. In the same
way, the mind that sees things as they are is not affected by
experience even when living an ordinary life in an ordinary
world. This is the simple truth.
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