The Path Of Practice - Verse Forty Three

Don't run away from birth and death.
Just look deeply into your mental formations.
When the true nature of interdependence is seen,
the truth of interbeing is realized.

By constantly looking at the interdependent nature of reality we can one day perceive the ultimate nature, the unconditioned world. In order to do this we need to look closely at the world of birth and death.

In this verse Vasubandhu tells us how to practice in a manner that can help us realize interbeing (emptiness). With the help of teachers like Thich Nhat Hanh and Vasubandhu, things become so clear to practitioners like us.

Our meditation practice is to observe the mental formations arising in our consciousness and to identify the four conditions. The four conditions for manifestation of phenomena are primary cause, object as a cause, supporting causes and immediacy of continuity. We then know that the manifestation of the mental formation is dependent on these conditions.

Let us say that someone is very rude with us and we become angry. So we immediately identify the four conditions that are causing the anger to manifest. We, then, need to analyze if we and the anger really are separate from each other and the four conditions causing this anger.

Just like how the mental formation, anger, arises due to the presence of the four conditions, we too arise in the same manner. We are like the music from a violin. Without violin, there is no music. Without the violinist there is no music. The nature of the violin and the violinist are also the same as us, as the music and as all other phenomenon. This is interdependence.

When we go a step further and see how the tune in the mind of the violinist combines with the violin to manifest as music, we see that the music was already in the violinist and the violin. We see interbeing. Can you also see the violinist and the violin in the music?

One aspect is to see that music manifests when the conditions are present. The other aspect is to realize that the music was always there. The realization that music was always there and inseparable from the violinist, the violin and everything else is to touch suchness - the realm of unconditioned phenomena, nirvana.

(Based on the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh.)

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