WHO IS ANNOYING WHO?

Ma Thor, age 40, live above our flat, together with her invalid husband and a son. She owned a boutique in the Bogyoke Market (formerly Scott Market), a landmark of Yangon, Myanmar, retailing imported apparels. One day, as she came downstairs to go to work, I met her on the pavement in front of the building and we exchanged greetings. In the course of the conversation, I asked how is business these days?

Ma Thor :- "Its really slow.. Worse of all, to see all these people going about in the market, it was very annoying and sickening.

Ba Thet Gyi :- It must have been one of those bad days, but the people you saw were only doing what have to do. They weren’t there to annoy you, were they?

Ma Thor :- I didn’t know what they were doing, but going and coming about the whole day.

Ba The Gyi :- That is correct. There must be all types of people there. It was true that they were going about. It was true that they were shouting, talking, making all those noises. Were they making all the commotion on purposely to disturb you or to annoy you?

Ma Thor :- No, I don’t think so.

Ba Thet Gyi :- If they weren’t annoying you, then why were you annoyed. Before you come to a conclusion, you should find the culprit and stop the troublesome maker. When you go to the shop the next time, try and be on the lookout.

A few days later, I saw Ma Thor playfully teasing my two grand daughters. I approached her and asked her whether she has found the person who was annoying her in the market.

Ma Thor :- I couldn’t find any one who was annoying me.

Ba Thet Gyi :- In that case, it must be you who was annoying yourself.

Ma Thor :- How come?

Ba Thet Gyi :- It was true that these people were walking about. The truth was happening right in front of you. Instead of accepting the truth as they were, you looked at them with the discrimination of like and dislike. You will like them if your desire is fulfilled and angry if it is otherwise. When things did not happen according to your wish, you generated the hatred and from it the annoyance appears. It is normal that you always blame the misgiving to any one but yourself.

Ma Thor :- I never happen to look at it this way. Yes, I was annoyed and it was my own creation.

Ba Thet Gyi :- Knowing the truth and live accordingly is the essence of Buddhism. You will save a lot of troubles and be able to live in harmony with the world around you.

Ma Thor :- You sound as though you are insinuating that I start meditating. That is one thing I have never tried and further more, I have a shop and a household to look after. I can hardly find time to browse through the ladies journal, leave alone the meditating.

Ba Thet Gyi :- You needn’t go to the center to meditate. You just try and be aware of the truth and the result, which will be your experience will show what you had missed. Now, when you go to the shop tomorrow, When you are not attending to your customers, in your free time, try and be aware of the thoughts. Such as anger, anxiety worry etc. Just be aware that you have been thinking.

Ma Thor :- I can give it a try, but I haven’t a slightest idea how to go about it.

BaThet Gyi :- When you see the people walking by and being annoyed by the sight of the people, be aware that you are annoyed. Look into your thought of annoyance. When you are watching the people, be aware that you are seeing the truth. Try and be aware of your thoughts as many times as possible.

Ma Thor :- That much, I will give it a try out.

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Ma Thor :- Since I last met you, I must admit, I did not look into it like you said. Eventually, I had a look at the people again, and I couldn’t find anyone who was annoying me. Then I realized that they were going about and doing what they had to do without bothering me. It was me who had all sort of thoughts that made me blame upon those I saw. Today, something else happened to me. It was about noon, and no sale was registered. I was feeling down hearted and depressed. It was also raining heavily and I happened to mumble to my self “Who would come out in a raining day like this.” I realized immediately that I had been carried away by my thoughts. Blaming the slow business to the rain, the people, the noises are all my creations from my imaginary thinking. Actually they were the natural occurrences, and I was adding a lot to my conceptual thoughts for no reason at all.

Ba Thet Gyi :- This is the way I wanted you to look at the rain and all thoughts..

Ma Thjor :- What am I suppose to do so that I will be able to look at things naturally?

Ba Thet Gyi :- Let me tell you something before we talk about the technique. What we called your loka (the world) consisting of animate and inanimate world of natural phenomenon, in which you are in the center, you have the six sense organs i.e., the eyes, ears, mouth or tongue, nose, the skin and the mind. These sense organs are functioning naturally. They are just doing their jobs as long as there aren’t any physically impaired. When it rains, seeing it raining is natural. When the atmosphere is hot, the skin will feel it. When you put something on the tongue you will taste it and so on. There were not any like or dislike in these pristine perceptions. Only your thought had created the like and dislike over the perceptions. When you add ‘the like ‘to the perception, then you have the sensation of joy or happiness. When you add ‘the dislike’ to your perception, then the anger or annoyance will generate. What you have to do is try and look at all natural phenomenon without any discrimination, similar to the way you looked at the rain in the market. Please remember that the thought with ‘like’ is dhamma. The thought with ‘dislike’ is dhamma. The thought without ‘like or dislike’ is
also a dhamma.

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I met her a few days later and I asked her how she was getting on. She replied “ One of my friends called and informed me that the shipment I made a few days ago was lost. To confirm the message, I called my courier and asked him about the consignment. He said the truck had broken down in the middle of the night and the cargoes were loaded onto smaller cars. There was a chaotic mix-up that night and my two packages were lost. As the shipment wasn’t insured, he has taken the whole responsibility. At the beginning, I was very upset and mad when I heard the confirmation of the lost. I was angry and frustrated, but I was aware of my thoughts over the lost, immediately the anger stopped. I realized that it was true and my mad behavior will not get my lost property back. Having realized the awareness, I felt calm and went on with my normal work. I did not lose any sleep over it. As a matter of fact, the courier had promised to make up the amount I had lost

Ba Thet Gyi :- The anger and frustration started from tanha (desire) and upadan (attachment or clinging) with a snow balling effect. They always started small and getting bigger if the sequence of thoughts is not broken. The moment you are aware of the angry or frustrated thought, the sequence is broken instantly. The severance has given you sufficient time for another thought to enable you to change your mind.

Ma Thor :- Do I have to go to the meditation center to practice so that the awareness will appear more often?

Ba Thet Gyi :- I am afraid I have to go through some explanations before you have to decide what you want to do. You see, our minds can concentrate one thought after another only, but never two things at a single moment. When you are meditating upon the respiration, no other objects will have an opportunity to appear unless and other wise the concentration on breathing had stopped. When constant stoppages occurred, we said your samadhi is weak. When your samedhi is good, the concentration never wavers. When your samadhi is good, the defilement, kilesa such as lobha, dosa and moha, will have no chance of manifesting. When you leave the meditation center, you have to drop the samadhi and your mind will wander from one thing to another and in this situation the defilement will have all the opportunities to appear in your thoughts. When the defilement has taken place in your thoughts, how are you going to eradicate them. If you can’t, then the problem begins. When you lost the shipment, that was when you were having the wandering mind and you were angry. What you did was to be aware of the angry thought and it will spontaneously disappeared. When meditating, you had on purposely occupied the mind with the samadhi that no defilement could appear. When you are aware of the angry thought, annihilation of the anger gives way to another thought to start anew. That means without discrimination such as like and dislike. the awareness will certainly help you to live in harmony with your loka.

Let us dig into it and see how does the dukkha,( suffering ) appears? At first you lost the consignment and you came to know it . For that there must be a friend, you must have a phone, your hearing must be good, etc and when you put these together, you r desire (tanha ) was not to loose the cargo. But it happened against your desire, which was the cause and the effect of that was your anger, which is suffering (dukkha).

Let us go into the rain episode. It was raining heavily, and there were people going about but none of your customers, it was half a day gone, having that in mind you compared with those busy days of the past and you were disappointed. That was the cause of feeling depressed.

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In these two experiences, you will find that all the misgivings were due to the causes which is known as samudaya sicca, (the Noble Truth of the causation of suffering.). Because of those causes, you had generated worry, anger, frustration, disappointment etc., are known as dukkha sicca, (the Noble Truth of Suffering.). When you were aware of your anger, anxiety, frustration, disappointment etc., that awareness is the magga sicca,( The Noble Truth of the Way Leading to Cessation of Suffering) When you see the Truth as truth is, the sufferings were annihilated momentary during that duration of awareness.

The important part is to be able to be aware of all the objects as the nature phenomenon. We are facing a lot of the dukkha daily. The lady of the house, during her cooking where she had to prepare and produce the meals. If she looks at them in discrimination all these could become problems and if she accepts them as her daily chaos, then there will be no more problems.

Let us say we have a fish dish in front of me. If I like the fish dish, then I will say it is good. If I do not like it, then I will say that dish is awful. Discrimination of the fish dish with like and dislike will generate problem. The truth of the matter is the fish dish, which is in front of us. There weren’t any like or dislike nor the goodness or the badness comes with it. The answer to the problem is to realize there wasn’t any discrimination that comes with it. If it does , it will be our creation of our thought. When you know and accept the truth, then you can eat anything and in that case where is your problem?

Ma Thor, Please try and understand that seeing and looking aren’t the same. In looking there is concentrating or choosing goes with it. Where else in seeing, it does not involve any doing or creation. What is to be seen are all the natural function of the eyes. The seeing, hearing, the taste, smelling, hot or cold sensation, and mental images are the natural phenomenon and require no doing or creation. They were simply doing their works.

In the awareness, there is no like or dislike, no discrimination, no lobha, moha or dosa, no illusion or delusion., no joy or sadness, no anxiety or frustration, it does not side with anybody and it does not sway, no one can claim the ownership, no alteration or decoration, accept no addition or subtraction, and you can be aware of the awareness as it is, for it is the ultimate truth.

It was some months later that I met her again and she said, “ The other day I was late getting up. I woke up at 5:30 a.m. I had to drive my son to the school at 6:00 a.m. I had to prepare his take away lunch, and drive him to school. I also had an appointment with one of the buyers at 7:00 a.m. The time was running out fast and I had to rush the preparation and was getting worried. I couldn’t figure out when I got up a bit late and couldn’t think about it this manner. I lost my mindfulness that made me to do things hastily. The more I worried I became more frustrated. While I was going through this awful commotion there was a cry from the street below, ‘Boiled chicken peas’. My household helper heard the voice and she said, ‘ What a noisy cry so early in the morning!’ Soon as I heard her, I was aware of it immediately and told her, ‘ She was shouting to attract some customers, and what has it got to do with you to be annoyed.’ `Having said that my awareness returned and I was calmed instantly. The anxious thought had disappeared. My senses returned to the work I was doing. I called the buyer and rescheduled the appointment to 8:30 a.m. and everything started to get back into order again. The awareness that annihilate the anxiety that rarely happens in the past comes more frequently now.”

I said, “ To be aware of the thought when you want it is the most important, and you need to practice to be aware of the thought. There are a lot of ways to practice, but it is hard to find a technique, which is most suitable to you. Referring to your experiences, there are two ways of awareness. First was the voice you heard shouted by the boiled chicken pea hawker. As soon as you had heard the shout, your thought relevant to your household work was disrupted and your mindfulness was directed towards the cry. The cry from below had momentarily broke the chain of anxious thoughts, which was interrupted by an outsider.”

The second type was when you had lost the shipment or dissatisfied with the rain. In these two cases, there weren’t any assistance by an outsider to divert your attention. It was when you are aware of it over your own thoughts. It was your awareness of what you were thinking that broke the sequence of thoughts. Having broken the chain of thoughts had prohibited the snow balling affect of the anxious thoughts.

For example:- When some one is sitting on a chair, it cannot be occupied by two simultaneously. Therefore when one gets up, only then the second person can sit down. Awareness is like a person dislodging the sitting person off the seat and giving the third a chance to sit down.

Thor , you said your sati, mindfulness, is not there most of the time. You want to practice the mindfulness. You must remember that the mindfulness is different to the samadhi, concentration. What you have to practice is the awareness. Only the awareness is free of conception and it is the truth. Like looking at the fish, or the rain, or the cry of the hawker. Merely being aware of it without any discrimination or conception. Sometimes when you are aware of your own thoughts, look into it directly. If it is tainted with like or dislike, then be aware of it as discriminatory thought, or thought with desire or with hatred. There will be times when you are angry. In such case, be aware of the angry thought. In case your are happy, try and be aware of the happiness, you will find the happy thought will abruptly annihilated. All the thoughts will never be able to stand the awareness. They will be immediately annihilated as soon as you are aware of it. Try the awareness and your answer is in your practice. Strange, but its true.