Dhammapada Verse 305: Alone

0:03So today we're looking at Dhammapada verse 305, which reads as follows, ekasanam ekasayam eko caramatandito eko damayamatanam vanantiramitosiham, which means, with a solitary seat, with a solitary bed, solitary, practicing tirelessly, solitary, taming oneself, one would find happiness in the extreme forests, or in the depths of the forest. So the story behind this verse is not much of a story, it's more of a circumstance. But such as it is, the story is that there was a monk who got the name Ekavihari, an elder monk, Ekavihari Thera.

1:31Ekavihari means one who dwells alone. And he got this name because he walked alone, he sat alone, he slept alone, he lived alone, he ate alone. Everything he did, it was alone, alone, alone. And the monks observed this and a group of monks who observed this went to the Buddha to let the Buddha know that there was this monk who was behaving, I guess, different from the other monks. He stood out. This monk said to the Buddha that this monk is walking alone, sitting alone, eating alone, sleeping alone, everything he does is alone.

2:25And the Buddha's response was, sadhu, sadhu. This monk is practicing properly and he thought this verse, he said, such a one who sits alone and sleeps alone, who has a solitary dwelling, will be able to practice tirelessly. And if they do that and practice tirelessly and tame themselves, Such a one could truly find peace where others have difficulty finding peace in the depths of the forest. So again, a very brief sort of story. But the circumstances give us a good example of preconceived biases that we have that color our perception of the Buddha's teaching.

3:30Loneliness is one such bias. We're biased against loneliness. Or more aptly, we're biased against situations that trigger our loneliness, trigger feelings of loneliness. So rather than addressing the loneliness as a quality of our mind, we tend to blame the circumstance. And so we're biased to believe that staying alone is unhealthy, is unhappy. Some would even say it's unhelpful in the practice of the Buddha's teaching and they would point to the teachings where the Buddha said that one should find good friendship and that dwelling in good friendship and having good friends is the whole of the holy life.

4:29So if that's the case, why should we not socialize? Why should we not do things as a group? And so these sorts of teachings are important to explicitly state the misconception of those sorts of ideas that the Buddha never praised socializing. He often warned against over-socializing and he quite often praised those who stayed in solitude. And he praised solitude, he praised seclusion, seclusion of body and seclusion of mind as the practices that allow us to cultivate the Buddha's teaching in depth and in earnest.

5:21So the lesson there is be careful about your biases. Like another one that I was thinking of was sleep. We often come to the Buddha's teaching with a sort of apprehension about the instruction not to sleep. So when we tell meditators to sleep only six hours, meditators can get down to four hours. And some meditators will go without sleep, practicing day and night. And this seems shocking, horrifying sometimes, There's an antagonism towards this idea of sleep deprivation.

6:12But the truth is that through the practice of the Buddha's teaching, the practice of mindfulness, the clarity of mind and the strength and purity of mind provides you with the energy and the the efficiency such that your mind no longer needs eight, ten, twelve hours of sleep. And meditators will find that they don't feel comfortable sleeping more than four hours and that they're easily able to pick up a practice from time to time where they don't sleep at all, where they practice day and night because the meditation refreshes them, it uplifts them.

6:59It's actually more refreshing than sleep if the mind is in the proper state. So these kinds of preconceived ideas we should appreciate that The benefit that we find in the Buddha's teaching isn't going to be gained in the way that ordinary benefits are gained. The benefits that we gain from communication, from interaction with other people, the benefits that we gain from sleep, are the benefits that we gain from indulgence in sensuality. The benefits of the teaching of the Buddha have to come from strength of mind.

7:38which come from training, which come from things that are difficult, things that are challenging, situations and practices that are challenging. So the truth about loneliness is again you should be facing the loneliness rather than facing the situation or trying to change the situation that makes you lonely. And the best way to do that of course is to put yourself in a situation where loneliness is likely to arise. Because the same situation that brings peace and tranquility and allows you to dedicate yourself to the Buddha's teaching is the same sort of situation that is going to lead to loneliness in an ordinary person.

8:22People are horrified with the idea of having to be alone. don't understand the benefits. So we'll talk a little bit about the benefits. If we move to the verse, we can get an idea of how the Buddha saw the benefits of staying alone. So the first part is eka sanang eka sayang, a solitary seat and a solitary bed. So the idea here is that the seat being would you use during the day, whether you're walking, in walking meditation or sitting meditation, everything you do, doing it alone is the practice that the Buddha praised.

8:56Which is interesting because we often find that people prefer practicing in groups. We hear a lot about group meditation, and in our tradition this has never been a thing, it's never been the main sort of framework that has been encouraged in meditators. We're taught to meditate in our rooms. We're told we're given a room with our own bathroom and our own space, and we're taught to practice alone. And so there's a debate whether which is better, and some people will say that group meditation has benefits, and some centers will even insist that meditators practice in a group.

9:38Well, here we see explicit instruction by the Buddha, not instruction, but praise by the Buddha. who never seems to have praised practicing in a group, is now saying practicing alone, dwelling alone, sitting alone, has benefit. I'll explain why I think this is an explicit, is explicitly superior to practicing in a group. We'll talk about why this idea of being alone has such value. But first we'll go through what the Buddha says about it. As far as sleeping alone it means as far as your off time when you're not engaging in practice.

10:21This is another potential problem that meditators encounter is the craving or the desire for communication outside of practice, or socialization outside of practice. So a meditator might be dutifully engaged in solitary meditation during their practice, doing walking and sitting focused on themselves, but outside of the practice find themselves dragged back into engaging in chit-chat chatter and enjoyment or engaging in sensuality, sensual enjoyment of conversation and socializing and companionship and so on.

11:06So meditators often fall into this as well where they outside of their meditation practice, they'll fall into chatting with other meditators, talking with the resident monks, or that sort of thing. And this is, of course, to be discouraged. The Buddha made clear, and we see a clear example here with this monk, The ideal practice is to stay alone, both in the practice, to practice alone, and to live alone outside of the practice, to stay alone. Because of course, mindfulness is not something that you do only in your formal practice.

11:37Outside of practice, staying alone is the greatest benefit. Of course outside of a meditation center it's almost impossible to stay completely alone, but we have to understand the concept behind staying alone. It's in many ways just an attitude, because it relates not so much to being in proximity to other people, but it relates to your perspective and your perception of the world around you. Anyway, so these two ideas of being alone, being alone during the practice, outside of the practice, just living alone, this is the way of someone who is dedicated to the practice of the Buddhist teacher.

12:21And so why the Buddha said these are beneficial, the first one is, he said, eko caramatandito, one can practice tirelessly, meaning without getting lazy, because again, engaging in socialization is a great way to indulge your laziness. When meditation practice is challenging and can evoke a certain amount of stress, when it's not easy, when you're not skilled at it, it can be uncomfortable. Often the mind craves for something more comfortable, something that allows the mind to relax.

13:02And one great way to relax is to go back to this perspective, this way of looking at things that involves communication, telling jokes, telling stories, asking questions, learning about other people, being fascinated by other people's ideas or speech even engaging in intellectual conversations about the Dhamma all of these things can be relaxing they're a way of taking a break that's not really helpful not really beneficial because it encourages laziness it encourages indulgence absolutely companionship is a great way to from a Buddhist perspective become lazy in regards to the practice The second, the Buddha said, Eko Dhammayamatahanam, that one through the practice of solitude, one is well positioned to purify the mind.

13:58So again, engaging in socialization not only has the potential to make one lazy and to cultivate this, attachment and addiction to relaxing and enjoying and engaging in comfortable and familiar and enjoyable states, it also has the potential to sully the mind. So obviously you can get into arguments if you're talking to other people, you can dislike what other people are saying, but just as easily you can enjoy and like what others are saying. Even meditators will give rise to attraction to other meditators if they engage in conversation.

14:48But at the very least there's a confusion and a delusion that comes up through conversation if the mind isn't careful. If one isn't careful during speech it's very easy to give rise to greed, anger and delusion. Very difficult to undertake the determined and wholehearted practice of cleansing the mind, purifying the mind of these things. So practically speaking, these two ideas of having a difficult time putting out effort or dedicating yourself to the practice because of the distractions and because of the indulgences and the pollution of the mind, that the mind becomes polluted when you engage in socializing with others.

15:43These are the reasons the Buddha said that it makes it difficult for you to live in a way that allows you to practice the Buddha's teaching. But he points out that one who is able to live alone is well positioned to to engage in dedicated practice of the Buddhist teaching and live anywhere, including the depths of the forest. Why he mentions the depths of the forest is not because everyone should live deep in the forest, but he points out that this is pointed out as the most difficult place for a person to live, living deep in the forest where there's no attractive or enjoyable sensual pleasures like dancing and singing and good food and bright colors and so on.

16:33There's only very simple and natural and quiet experiences to be had. It's very difficult, the Buddha said, to live in the forest. But someone who lives alone has the power to live anywhere. They can live in society, they can live in the forest, they can live anywhere because of the clarity and the purity of their minds. So the lesson, the verse gives us these ideas of where the Buddha wants to direct us as Buddhist meditators, that we have to put out effort.

17:09Our practice requires effort if we're going to be mindful, if our mindfulness is going to lead us to seeing clearly and freeing us from suffering. We need the dedication. And we can't get that if we're constantly distracted by socializing and engaging in the distractions that come from interacting with other people. And we have to work on purifying the mind. And there's of course our engagement, engaging in conversation and socializing and the many activities that are involved in society are constantly challenging us with experiences, phenomena, things that are liable to give rise to greed, give rise to anger and delusion, constantly, constantly, right?

18:12We're confronted by stimuli that trigger us to like or cling or crave or to be upset and angry and frustrated and so on. But the deeper meaning, the real lesson that we take away, I think, from this is in regards to why, truly why staying alone has great power. Because the nature of human interaction or interaction with beings, interaction with concepts of any sort, but most obviously with other human beings, is conceptual that our conversations, our interactions our engagement with in relationships with other beings with other humans is completely conceptual.

19:10It distracts us from, or makes us unable to clearly observe reality as it is. So the Buddha's teaching relates to seeing the nature of reality as a sort of a mechanistic process. So every moment there are phenomena arising. But these phenomena are quite simple, they're quite basic. So every moment there is seeing, or there is hearing, or there is smelling, or tasting, or feeling, or thinking. There's physical phenomena, mental phenomena, all working together, sort of, there's a mechanics to it.

19:52And this process is called ultimate reality. Ultimate, not because it's some mysterious thing, but because it's ultimately what is happening. And it's different from the reality that is conceptual of people, like a person talking, or a person walking, or a person eating, or two people talking together. It's separate from ideas about society or about people or about things, about possessions and belongings, about money and economy, about beauty or ugliness or war and peace and all these concepts that we have.

20:31about reality and those things therefore distract us from this mechanistic process that is really and truly happening because they're imaginary. We give rise to them in our minds. We see someone and we imagine this is this person I'm seeing and this is their name and they are like this and all these things. And no matter how based they may be in fact, they're ultimately not the facts themselves, they're not the reality themselves. And so, by focusing on them, we can never really see the truth of what is suffering and what is causing suffering.

21:08and how we're we're acting in such a way that is hurting ourselves and hurting others it doesn't allow it prevents us from seeing how anger arises how greed arises how delusion arises or how these things then lead us to trouble lead to problems lead to stress and suffering and so The real reason why staying alone is so important is because reality is alone. Reality is us, is ours, alone. We can't have reality with someone else. Engaging with someone else is outside of the ordinary experience.

21:45During the time that we're talking with someone else there's still only seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, feeling, thinking happening for us. That's all we're truly experiencing. We're not really experiencing the other person at all. And by engaging with others we lose that, we lose sight of that. And so by staying alone we allow ourselves this opportunity to face and to focus on and to learn about and understand true ultimate reality. Reality is alone, reality is ours alone.

22:19And so by staying alone we're able to see that, we're able to open the door to ultimate reality and to see the nature of reality, which allows us to see ultimately that nothing is worth clinging to, to see the impermanent, unsatisfying, uncontrollable nature of everything that arises. and allows us to let go you can't let go if you're living in a conventional reality because you're not even seeing the things that you're clinging to on an ultimate level you're not seeing the building blocks of reality which are the very things that truly we cling to moment after moment after moment and so there's no question that staying alone in all ways is of greatest benefit.

23:04And a good example is about the idea of practicing meditation in groups. As I said, I talk about this. Practicing in groups is something that is easier and more comfortable. But one of the reasons why it is, is because we're distracted. It's easier to be distracted by others, it's easier to want to be performative in our meditation practice, to practice sitting properly and practicing because other people are watching us. And to watch others and to see how they're practicing and to compare our practice, all of these things even subtly are a means of distraction to prevent us from looking at our ordinary reality which Though it is the most beneficial thing, it is also quite difficult, quite challenging, quite uncomfortable to have to face our own solitary reality.

23:54So practicing in groups is often preferred by meditators, but I don't think it's preferable. or should be preferable from a perspective of the mental development that the Buddha taught. We certainly don't have the Buddha again encouraging this. Instead we have the Buddha encouraging us to be alone. And I think this is the deepest reason. You can say practically, you can just say that it's a distraction, and of course that's the truth. But on a deeper level, why it's a distraction, because it's not just a distraction in terms of looking at yourself versus looking at someone else.

24:27It's deeper than that. It's about looking at reality. It's very difficult to look at reality when you're engaged in a conversation with another person who isn't a part of that ultimate reality, isn't part of the seeing and the hearing and the smelling, isn't real in that context. But the context of Reality of experience is only our own experiences of seeing and hearing and smelling and tasting and feeling and thinking. Staying alone is the best way to observe that and to cultivate wisdom and clarity and purity of mind based on that.

25:05a brief teaching but a really important verse especially when you have people telling you that you have to be you have to engage in socializing of course in modern times staying alone isn't as powerful by itself as it would have been in the Buddhist time because now we have means of engaging in socializing and entertainment when we're alone we have televisions we have computers we have internet we have means of communicating so Being alone is not the only factor.

25:37You have to be alone and you have to truly be with ultimate reality. You have to turn off all your devices. Meditators are told to give up the internet and to give up communication. Obviously they give up watching shows or playing games or things like that. But being alone is the sentiment here that we... we set up a situation where we're able to face ultimate reality moment by moment. We're able to face experience moment by moment. And this means shutting ourselves off from all of the concepts that distract us.

26:17Other people are a part of it. Our phones are a part of it. television is a part of it and things like that. All of these things are, of course, doors back to the realm of concepts, of people, places, things, of entities that only exist in our conception of them, our recognition of them mentally. They don't exist in the moment by moment. experiential realm that we are truly faced with in the ultimate reality so an important reminder stay alone as best you can outside of a meditation center again it's very difficult but the perspective is the same when you have the opportunity to face your reality make that shift even just take five minutes out of your busy day with the engaging with other people, to focus on yourself, to focus on your experiences and to see them clearly and to try to understand what is it that's truly causing me stress and suffering, to see all the nitty-gritty, subtle ways in which we hurt ourselves and hurt other people, which we manipulate and lie and cheat and steal and engage in unwholesomeness moment by moment in our experiences.

27:39So, simple teaching. That's the Dhamma for today. Thank you for listening.