The field of boundless emptiness is what exists from the very beginning. You must purify, cure, grind down, or brush away all the tendencies you have fabricated into apparent habits. Then, you can reside in the clear circle of brightness.
The above quote from Chan Master Hongzhi gives us the antidote to the associated consequences of our damning actions. Study it. Practice it. Free the mind.
The world is full of striving temptations. What are yours?
strive (v.)
- 1200, “quarrel, contend,” from Old French estriver“to quarrel, dispute, resist, struggle, put up a fight, compete,” from estrif, estrit“quarrel” (see strife). It became a strong verb (past tense strove) by rhyming association with drive, dive, etc. Meaning “try hard” is from early 14c. Related: Striving. Etymology Online
If we strive, we will experience the consequences of striving. Striving is a common human attribute of mind. It is an action of mind and body that is an ally of strife. That’s right. Striving leads to trouble. Striving is a form of fighting. It may be a rivalry which is also known as competition. It may come in a costume of wishes and dreams of jealousy and envy. Often it becomes protective, suspicious, and protective.
Quarrels, often presented as a challenge of some sort masquerades as trying hard and doing one’s best. Time and time striving brings struggles and conflicts.
But what is the cause of striving? Perhaps the first ground of cause is to recognize that it is our action or actions that are the basis of the cause of striving. To help us understand, let us call striving making trouble for ourselves and others.
Let us be honest and admit that the root of striving is wanting something or someone. And to distinguish it from other desires, we will add that striving is rooted in the ego-self’s hunger for more and better which the striver believes, if attained IT, whatever IT is, will satisfy the underlying desire.
There is a sense of lack which the striver thinks are real. Something is missing, Something is absent. There is a deficiency, a scarcity of a desired something that jettison’s the mind to strive.
Now, let us change the word striving to wishes and dreams.
Wishing and dreaming are the mental formations that arise out of a sense of lack. The sense of lack causes a sense of deficiency and need. There is a hinger for something missing which is the cause of the wishes and dreams which arise in the acts of striving.
The acts of striving may show up in wishes and dreams that are expressed in a belligerent way. Disappointment in life follows belligerence. The mind rallies to arguing, hostility and aggression. The rock bottom cause is hunger. Hunger rolls between deprivation and bits of satiety, but the striver continues to rotate between a sense of deprivation and paltry satiety and belligerent disappointment. The acts that arise from this hunger are quarrelsome, confrontational, and combative often in the guise of working hard.
The person besieged by this cause is driven and emotional. Wants to show off, dominate and run the show.
This karmic condition is quite painful. It keeps a person in a cycle of trying again and again to satisfy this rock bottom sense of being cheated and deprived through wishes and dreams and all out quarrelsome competition. There is a sense of panic and unrest that surrounds the person.
The antidote is to STOP the striving by recognizing that it is an endlessly, painful cycle. It is to STOP the constant review and belief in being cheated and deprived of something. To DROP the blame and guilt.
This requires that the person study the causes to drop them, Generally, the cause that is recognizable is the mental formation in the mind. All those thoughts and images of being cheated, left out, and deprived of something must be discarded. It requires an ability to take responsibility for one’s actions and to stop blaming life. It is to be open to accepting the situations of life without strife.
One needs to study their tendencies to the extent that one recognizes that their tendencies lead to longstanding habits that keep us ignorant of the clear circle of brightness called by many names.
If one tends to dominate, one needs to study that tendency and the habit of being domineering to the point that both tendency and the habit dissolve. Otherwise, the beat of action continues into karmic results and suffering continues.
Fashi Lao Yue