Buddhist Assembly and Dharma Talk

If You Don’t Know This, Even Bill Gates Would Be Troubled

- Most Ven. Jinwoo’s Seon Meditation Academy for Leaders, Part 3 -

1. Questions About the Senses and Perception

Are the objects we perceive through our five senses - eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and body - and those we engage with through our thoughts, truly real? Are there any limits to our perception? If we understand even just two things, we can gain at least some control over our suffering. These two things we need to understand are: our emotional states, such as joy and suffering, and the phenomena, the objects of our experience or perception. Liberation means having complete control over our suffering. It is the state of enlightenment known as Buddhahood. Being liberated does not mean that we can use suffering to gain joy. Rather, it is a state in which suffering ceases to exist. Therefore, liberation is both the goal we must attain and the means by which we can resolve all suffering.

I will briefly discuss the twelve links of dependent origination and alaya-vijnana (the eighth consciousness), both of which are related to the concept of karma and the cause-and-effect relationship between pain and pleasure. The first three links, namely ignorance, volitional formations, and consciousness, pertain to past lives. Events experienced before we were born are imprinted in what is called ‘habitual consciousness’ or ‘karmic consciousness,’ causing us to unknowingly repeat these actions in the present. Children’s resemblance to their parents is not a matter of chance either. Just as birds of a feather flock together, the karmic force draws people with similar karma towards one another, causing them to form attachments that can bring the utmost happiness and pleasure. If only that were all there was to it! But inevitably, there is always a price to pay. More often than not, the stronger the attachment, the greater the pain and hardship we eventually experience. 

2. The Nature of Pain and Pleasure and the Meaning of Liberation

We must understand that pleasure inevitably gives rise to pain, albeit at different times. All phenomena, no matter how insignificant they may seem, arise according to this natural law without fail, just as the sun rises and sets, and as the tides ebb and flow. All phenomena have an element of relative truth to them, and therefore inevitably undergo the cycle of birth, ageing, sickness, and death. In other words, they all go through the processes of formation, existence, decay, and cessation. In Buddhism, this law is known as dependent origination, whereby phenomena arise through interdependent causes and conditions. Only by understanding this concept clearly and thoroughly can we avoid being deceived by phenomena. If we can accept whatever happens as the natural course of events and an inevitable outcome, we will see things as they truly are, literally see “mountains as mountains and water as water.” However, we are unable to do so. Our perceptions and experiences in every situation are shaped by what we have seen and heard, perpetuating a vicious cycle in which we derive pain and pleasure from these stimuli. This generates the cycle of samsara, in which phenomena repeat themselves in an endless loop of pain and pleasure, suffering and happiness arising from our own minds as we perceive and experience them.

Let me ask a question. Over the last tens of thousands of years, humanity has evolved radically, and science has advanced civilization to the point of creating AI. If this trend continues, it seems that we will all end up living in floating cities in the sky. Roads will vanish, as will cars and ships, and the digital world will transcend the physical body. The ancient legend of Master Jajang, whose soul supposedly left his body through astral projection, could become a reality. Our eyes and ears evolved because we wanted to see and hear. Similarly, will our bodies degenerate and eventually disappear once they are no longer needed? If we can leave our physical body at will, then it becomes redundant. We would not need them to move around, because we would be able to move freely with just our consciousness.

If this future is an imminent possibility, then surely the goal humanity has pursued for millions of years would have been achieved by now. Despite all our efforts and progress, however, have our worries, anxieties, and pain disappeared? Is humanity finally free from suffering? Suffering remains just as it always has. Ultimately, the development of civilization may be a product of human greed, with all advances having nothing to do with the true alleviation of suffering. New civilizations continue to emerge and develop, and this progress may be driven by human greed. While the civilization may result from our efforts to become happier and eliminate suffering, has suffering truly disappeared?

Although Buddhism addresses and appeals to human emotion, it also places great value on its philosophical and logical elements. It is impossible to say with certainty whether knowing more will reduce suffering, or whether knowing less will cause more. With difficult-to-grasp events unfolding throughout our society, who can really know? When we encounter things that are hard to understand, we tend to think that they happened by chance, or that there must be hidden circumstances of which we are unaware. However, these are all inevitable outcomes of causes and conditions. Whether or not we accept this is entirely up to us. No one is free from suffering, not even those with great wealth, power, or prestige - let alone religious practitioners. As quantum mechanics explains, all events are simply outcomes that arise when the necessary causes and conditions come together. Neither prestige nor power can bring happiness on their own. Suffering follows us, building up layer upon layer of cause and effect, otherwise known as karma.

3. The Philosophy of Emptiness

In order to eliminate suffering, we must understand its cause and true nature. So where does suffering come from, and what is the problem? In Buddhism, ‘six-sense objects’ are perceived through ‘six-sense organs’ – the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind – creating ‘six-sense perceptions.’ Together, these are collectively referred to as the ‘18 realms.’ When perceptions arise, we tend to attribute these phenomena solely to our own experiences and beliefs. This can lead to thoughts such as, “I like this person,” “I dislike this person,” “This action is right,” or “This action is wrong.” Everything we see and hear falls within these 18 realms, and ultimately, everything boils down to our own perceptions and experiences. Even if the world were to collapse right now, it would not matter if we felt no sense of concern and remained at ease. Conversely, even if the world were a paradise, it would be of no use to us if we were sad and suffering.

Ultimately, everything comes back to each of us. Since our experience is ultimately defined by the karmic imprints of pain and pleasure that we carry with us, it can be concluded that all phenomena are illusory. The Buddha succinctly referred to this as “emptiness” in the Diamond Sutra. We perceive these formless phenomena, which are “like a dream, an illusion, a bubble, a shadow, like dew, and like lightning,” and project joy, anger, sorrow, and pleasure onto them. Only by deeply realizing that phenomena have no inherent existence can we let go of attachment and reduce our suffering.

The Yogacara school of Buddhism uses the analogy of ‘One Water, Four Views’ to illustrate how phenomena are perceived. Even the same body of water can appear in four different ways depending on one’s perspective. Celestial beings see it as a jewel; hungry ghosts, as pus and blood; and humans, as water. But how do fish perceive it? Underwater creatures likely perceive water as their whole world. If animals perceive the world differently, what about beings who do not perceive the universe through the six-sense organs (eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind) as we do? How would they see this universe? They would perceive it entirely differently. Since phenomena change depending on perception, the concept of an indefinable soul emerges. While there is debate about whether consciousness and karmic imprints can exist without a physical body, the Buddhist concept of “true nature” suggests that existence and non-existence cannot be determined. We tend to define that which exists and undergoes reincarnation within our own realm of perception as a soul. In this context, pleasure and pain can themselves be viewed as the soul itself.

4. The Phenomena, the Endless Cycle of Cause and Effect

From hundreds of millions of kilometers away, Earth appears as nothing more than a speck. Once we leave our solar system, it disappears entirely from view. The stars that we see are said to be hundreds of millions of light-years away, and some of them may no longer exist. How fleeting is that? In Buddhism, this concept is described as "one speck of dust containing the universe in ten directions." Even the entire universe is nothing more than a speck when viewed from far beyond. This illustrates that phenomena are ultimately born out of comparison. When we look at something, we believe that we are seeing what truly is. Yet, when we point upward, "down" emerges, and when we say "big," "small" arises. So-called reality is an amalgamation of purely subjective and relative phenomena. Therefore, we should not be rash in our judgments. No matter how advanced science becomes, there will always be things we do not understand. Likewise, phenomena inevitably appear different depending on our experiences.

The same is true of the phenomenon of time. This very moment becomes the imminent future, and then, in the blink of an eye, turns into the past. We are simply under an illusion. As the saying goes, “The time for a single thought is an immeasurable kalpa,”; even a fleeting moment contains immeasurable eons of time, while an incredibly long period is like a single moment. Can we even imagine this? Tens of thousands of conditions give rise to individual results, and our perception of them as right or wrong is itself a phenomenon of dependent origination. We must view them through the lens of interdependent causality, the chain of cause and effect. This is why Buddhism teaches that all things in the universe exist within an infinite web of relationships, endless and boundless. Ultimately, what remains is suffering. We wish it would simply come to pass, but that is not easy. In Buddhism, the past, present, and future are described as the “double causality of three times”, whereby the present leads into the future, continuously overlapping and building upon itself. Furthermore, the causes and effects across these three times also continue to overlap, repeating endlessly within the past, present, and future, thereby creating suffering.

The objects of perception—form, sound, smell, taste, touch, and mental phenomena—are called the ‘six-sense objects.’ They are perceived by the six sense organs—the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind—and the mind then reflects on them. So, what is the nature of this reflection? It is the manifestation of past experiences that have accumulated over time. Once the six-sense objects have been perceived by the six-sense organs, they are recognized and accepted by the ‘six consciousnesses.’ Together, the six-sense organs, the six-sense objects, and the six consciousnesses are collectively known as the ‘18 realms.” All phenomena in the world are contained within these 18 realms. This is referred to as “All phenomena come from the mind.” When we view everything as a phenomenon, we ultimately realize that it is empty of fixed existence. Numbers 2, 3, and 4 only arise because of number 1, so they can never converge to zero. No matter how finely we divide them, they will always be a number, albeit a smaller one. Phenomena are the same. They can only become smaller—into atoms, molecules, subatomic particles, and microparticles—but they never cease to exist. It is precisely this cycle that zero, or ‘emptiness,’ breaks free from. ‘Zero’ or ‘emptiness’ has transcended the inevitably tangled pair of pain and pleasure, suffering and happiness, and joy and sorrow. Nothing can be attached to zero. In the Seon Buddhist tradition, this concept is described as “present yet empty.” This is exactly what we mean by enlightenment.

5. Seon Meditation and the Purification of the Three Karmas

Once we understand this, no matter what happens, we will not feel any distress. Even if we were struck by lightning, for example, we would simply observe the phenomenon of being struck just as it is, without feeling any distress. However, it is not easy to eliminate the karma of pain and pleasure. It seems impossible to break free from it, and there appears to be no way out. “Seon” is precisely what shatters the karma completely. Through Seon meditation and proper contemplation, we can attain liberation, nirvana, and Buddhahood - the realization of one’s true nature. We can become completely free from obstacles related to our actions, speech, and thoughts, and all hindrances will vanish. This is referred to as the purity of the three karmas, in body, speech, and mind. To avoid giving rise to the feelings of pain and pleasure, we must start practicing the Seon meditation right now.

Calm your mind and remove any sources of distraction. Practice Seon meditation however you like: lying down, sitting, or walking. The experience of phenomena arises from the karmic imprints stored in the alaya consciousness - the mass of pain and pleasure karma residing in our subconscious. Once these experiences have arisen, they simultaneously act as causes and conditions for other phenomena. Since we perceive everything through our six sense consciousnesses, our experiences of pain and pleasure are determined by our karma. This is an example of “the peck from without and the crack from within occurring simultaneously”; it does not arise by chance.

We must practice alleviating and eliminating our suffering, even if only slightly, so that we can ultimately eradicate the karmic imprints of suffering entirely. Western philosophers were also well aware of this. Plato’s Theory of Ideas describes the highest stage of cognition achieved beyond the world of experience. Ultimately, it is about the perception of phenomena. Therefore, from a purely philosophical perspective, Plato can be considered a Buddhist. This is because the “highest stage of cognition beyond the world of experience” is liberation or nirvana—that is, the Ideas. Nietzsche also said that all events repeat themselves infinitely, which precisely coincides with the concept of reincarnation. The idea that "the only thing anyone can do is try their best" is another way of expressing the Buddhist concept of letting go.