Q&ASasanarakkha Buddhist Sanctuary Retreat8 Jan 2024
Q&A group B — Investigating Drowsiness and Practicing with Right Attitude
Sayadaw U Tejaniya · 2 hr 15 min
Original audio: Burmese · English interpretation
0:00−2:15:05
AI-written summary
In this group interview, the teacher addresses working with sleepiness, guilt, and illness using right attitude. He explains that practice means being aware of mind and body in the present moment without trying to eliminate unpleasant experiences. Wisdom unfolds naturally as the mind maintains equanimity.
Topics
Talks in this retreat
Sasanarakkha Buddhist Sanctuary Retreat · 6 talks
- 11 hr 28 minIntroduction talk — Cultivating Wholesome Qualities and Right Attitude5 Jan 2024
- 21 hr 44 minQ&A group A — Investigation and Right Attitude Toward Unpleasant States6 Jan 2024
- Viewing32 hr 15 minQ&A group B — Investigating Drowsiness and Practicing with Right Attitude8 Jan 2024
- 42 hr 21 minQ&A group A — Cultivating Awareness with Right Attitude10 Jan 2024
- 52 hr 26 minQ&A group B — Appreciating Awareness and Staying on the Side of Awareness12 Jan 2024
- 648 minConcluding talk — Continuing Practice and Awareness at Home14 Jan 2024
Transcript
English
ఓకే, రికార్డింగ్లో— Wait, are you going to press record? Okay. So let's begin. Thank you, Sayadaw and Matet, for today's Q&A session.
English
Yes, yes. Sayadaw has a show— చాలా, చాలా, చాలా ఎందుకు? మాట్లాడండి, చాలు. కంగం చాలా. Okay. For today's recording: today is 8 January 2024, Q&A with Sayadaw U Tejaniya, and translation by Matet at Sasanaraka Buddhist Sanctuary via Zoom. We have Group B today.
English
Hello. Good day, Sayadaw and Matet. Um, a little bit nervous. Don't know why this time is nervous, but I will just try to watch it. Okay, um, it's been the third day at retreat right now, and
English
I was discussing with some yogis, and they were— because I have this issue with drowsiness and sleeping. So this yogi was saying, "Why don't you be interested and, um, and investigate what is sleepiness?" So when I heard that, that information, it has, um, it was introduced, and then I was like, yeah, why?
English
You know, usually I— I dislike it, and then I try to push it away. Why don't I make it, like, a mission? Make it fun and try to investigate: what is this drowsiness, what is sleeping like? So this morning, when the alarm went off, I tried to get up, but I felt that, like, my legs and hands, like, they're really heavy, then it's difficult to wake up.
English
Then I was like, what— what's happening here? Because the first two days I woke up, I didn't lay around, I just woke up and went to the meditation hall. But this morning I didn't— the body doesn't want to wake up. It's as if the body doesn't want to wake up. But then when I checked, I saw that there was an intention to continue to sleep.
English
I saw that intention. But after I saw that intention, the next— I think it's the next moment— it happened so fast that it's like, oh, it's okay, I still have time, let me go back to sleep. And I went back to sleep, and I was late to the meditation hall. However, I continued to, to investigate, to be aware of this awareness.
English
So now it comes on and off. It comes on and off. When I— when I check the mind, you see, I always have this view that it's because I don't have enough sleep. That's why I'm tired. I must have a certain amount of sleep, certain hours. So, but when I checked the mind, I saw that be— I wanted to be curious and see when does the, the awareness actually— sorry, when does the drowsiness actually arrive?
English
When does it come? And how does it come? So I noticed that when the mind finds— when it's boring, when I'm listening to a talk, when it starts to get boring, when the mind doesn't understand, or when the mind says, "Oh, this is boring," then it starts. And then it will start to think, and when it thinks, it— it's familiar, and then it will start to get drowsy.
English
I will start to be drowsy. So that's one. And then later on, after the meditation, I— I did my own sitting, and I noticed more, um, because there's this intention to know, to investigate what is sleepiness. And I also noticed that when there are certain thoughts that come in, the mind feels unpleasant, and when it feels unpleasant, it doesn't want to deal with it, and— and then it starts again, the drowsiness starts again.
English
So that— that's the second thing I noticed. Oh, so when it doesn't want to face something, or something is unpleasant, it starts. And then I also noticed that— what else did I notice? I wrote it down as I was, like, noticing these, um, these things. Um, yeah. It starts to look for— okay, when it doesn't want to meditate, I— I was— I asked, "So what do you want to do?
English
If you don't want to sit here and meditate, what do you want to do?" So then I look around, there's nothing to do here, it's a meditation, it's a retreat, there's nothing to do here. But then the eyes would wander off to look at scenes, scenic, because there's nice scenes here. So I noticed, huh. So then it— it's seeking pleasure through the five sense doors, like, I want to look at nice things.
English
If I can listen to something, it wants to listen to something. It also wants to talk. It wants to talk because it just wants sensual pleasure. So it is wanting something. And when I saw, "I want this, I want that," then I was like, what— what is this? What is, "I want this, I want that"?
English
What— what is that? So then the mind says, "Yeah, that's great, isn't it?" But that's not too prominent until the— the bell rang. I went to the dining hall for lunch. So I— I got my food, as usual, and then I put it on the table. There were fruits served today. I went to get the fruits, and there was soup. I went to get the soup.
English
And after I gathered everything, I put everything on the table, and I suddenly saw, like, oh my god, there's so much food on the table. I don't normally take so much food. Why is it so much today? It's— it's very obvious it's more. Then I realized, my god, that's the greed that from the meditation hall, it came here, and then it piled up the food there.
English
So, so it saw that, the process of how it works. So now my question is this: actually, I also want to observe, um, guilt. Um, somebody in my family member, somebody passed on recently, and of course now I cannot investigate guilt when guilt doesn't arise.
English
So my— my— I know that after the retreat, when I go home, when I— when I see pictures, when I see objects, it will— the guilt will come. So then my question is, the way I'm investigating drowsiness, is that also how I should apply when I get home, to investigate guilt the same way?
English
Like, how it comes, how— how— how is the mind reacting, when it, you know, when it goes, and— and what triggers it? So I— I— I seek Sayadaw's to offer me some— some understanding so that I can work on the cause correctly. Thank you.
[Burmese segment]
English
We won't, I will walk. Yes, of course, he said. That's all there is to it.
English
Somehow the mind is not— , experience . Yeah, basically so long as the mind accepts the emotion or like the experience, like the drowsiness or the guilt, accepts that it's present, and then investigates to see everything that's related to it, that's all you need to be doing.
English
So but Sayadaw, it's easier said than done here, it's investigating drowsiness. It's— it's somehow easier. I don't know, somehow easier. But when I get home, it's because, you know, I have a view that this— this family member, I've been taking care of her. I— first of all, I'm responsible, okay? I have this view that I'm responsible for this family member. And now that she is gone,
English
I cannot talk about guilt without tearing up a little bit, but I feel
English
guilty that for some reason, um, I'm guilty. So every time I go home, I see her bed, I see her picture, that guilt is so overwhelming that I don't think that I can see correctly right now. So, um, that's why I want to understand why this is happening, um, why this guilt appear, and, um— Alo, personally
[Burmese segment]
English
Okay, my bad. So Sayadaw says, uh, the main thing is, um, you kind of have to see all that is happening, the— the guilt, the— the— the— the— the characters in the story that your mind is upset about, you have to see it all as nature, right? You have to— you— so you don't— you're not identified with me who is guilty, you're not identified with the person who's related to you.
English
It's not identifying them as conceptually, but remembering that these are all, um, uh, forces of nature. So you, um, not you. So, um, you know, there is guilt. Uh, the person passing away, they're, you know, they're, they're, um,
English
some, you know, death has happened. And how— and you need to, Sayadaw says, accept that these are all, like, experiences in life, right? In order to investigate.
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Sayadaw U Tejaniya began his Buddhist training as a young teenager in Burma under the late Shwe Oo Min Sayadaw (1913–2002). After a career in business and life as a householder, he has become a permanent monk since 1996.…