The Dangers of Crash Courses on Attaining Fruition and Awakening to the True Mind

The path of the bodhisattva's practice is long; why be concerned with the momentary speed or slowness before your eyes? The goal is to be achieved over three incalculable eons. As long as one completes the Buddha-way most swiftly within those three incalculable eons, one is the winner. It is like a ten-thousand-meter long-distance race: what wise person cares about being ahead or behind within the first hundred meters? Setting up a long-term plan and arrangement according to one's physical capacity, and ensuring that one arrives at the finish line first—that is what is fundamental; everything else is unimportant.

As the saying goes, if a person lacks far-sightedness, worries will surely be near at hand. The more distant the goal, the vaster the wisdom, the broader the breadth of mind, the grander the magnanimity, the loftier the aspiration, the stronger the legs, and the fuller the confidence. Do not be concerned with momentary speed or slowness, or with winning and losing.

Now, in the Dharma-ending age, there are not so many people of bodhisattva disposition, not so many suitable vessels for the Path, so absolutely no crash courses for swift attainment of realization and awakening to the true mind should be conducted. These past two years I have observed certain phenomena and have become somewhat alerted: crash courses do people great harm; what they produce are all shoddy, counterfeit products, endangering the normal and orderly development of Buddhism.

Many people cannot find the entry point for genuine practice and realization—this is a normal phenomenon, showing that their karmic conditions for realization are not yet mature. As they bump about here and there, they gradually mature themselves, gradually grow their roots of goodness and merit, as well as meditative concentration and wisdom, perfecting the conditions of a bodhisattva, cultivating the bodhisattva's disposition and virtue. At the very least, one must have the moral cultivation of being a proper human being, having the character of a person; otherwise, how could one serve as a bodhisattva leading sentient beings? If sentient beings are all led into the mire without even being aware of it—as one who stays near vermilion becomes red, and one who stays near ink becomes black—sentient beings unknowingly become tainted with bad habits, yet believe it to be bodhisattva conduct. Such consequences are also very frightening.

I have observed some seekers of enlightenment whose character is extremely vile, who simply do not know how to be a proper person and do not even wish to be good people. If all such people were to find the entry point for practice and realization, all know the final result, and all become so-called bodhisattvas in name but not in reality, what would Buddhism develop into in the future? Just thinking about it is truly terrifying.

The more eager a person is to swiftly awaken to the true mind, attain enlightenment, and realize the fruits, the less such a person should awaken, for one with such an urgent mind has impure motives; the bodhisattva disposition is still insufficient, and the mind that seeks nothing has not yet been cultivated. Once such a person awakens, they will seek even more, and the mind craving fame and gain will become uncontrollable. Therefore, in matters of practice, I advocate letting things take their natural course—when water flows, a channel forms. For those whose karmic conditions are mature, it cannot be controlled even if one tries; they will certainly awaken naturally, and naturally they are bodhisattvas.

With swift attainment of realization and awakening to the true mind, the accumulation of merit is insufficient, karmic obstructions have not yet been eliminated, and afflictions have not yet been subdued. Once one approaches realization and awakening, karmic obstructions will emerge to obstruct, and afflictions will arise to hinder; with obstacles upon obstacles, it is extremely easy to regress in bodhi and lose the aspiration for the Path, leaving no strength for subsequent practice. Therefore, for some whose karmic conditions are not mature, one absolutely must not begin to guide them, absolutely must not pluck unripe melons, lest one harm others, harm oneself, and harm Buddhism.

If Buddhism were to run crash courses, one could only run crash courses in disposition, in the aspiration for the Path, in human character, and in meditative concentration—absolutely not crash courses in attaining realization or in awakening to the true mind. If disposition cannot be achieved quickly, if human character cannot be achieved quickly, if the aspiration for the Path cannot be achieved quickly, and if meditative concentration cannot be achieved quickly, how could realization and awakening to the true mind be achieved quickly?

So many people have come to me pouring out their troubles, saying that they have no entry point in their practice, do not know how to investigate Chan or awaken to the true mind, and do not know how to engage in contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā) to realize the fruits. Thinking about it now, that is exactly right: not knowing is normal, and having no entry point is normal. After a period of arduous tempering, when the karmic conditions mature, they will come to know and understand everything.