Spiritual Practice Must Be Down-to-Earth

In our practice, we must cultivate earnestly starting from right where we stand, rather than adopting the mode of shouting slogans and keeping them on our lips all day long. Those slogans all pertain to the cultivation and realization of bodhisattvas on the ten bhūmis. If one has not cultivated to the level of a tenth-bhūmi bodhisattva, no matter how loudly one shouts the slogans, one still cannot move even half a step from where one stands. For example, the contemplation that all is like a dream is realized by bodhisattvas at the stage of the ten dedications (daśa-pariṇāmana). No matter how loudly we now proclaim that all dharmas are like a dream, or how we understand that all dharmas are like a dream, by the time one truly realizes the contemplation that all dharmas are like a dream, one is already a bodhisattva at the stage of the ten dedications, close to entering the first bhūmi. As for understanding the contemplation that all is like a dream, if one has not cultivated to the stage of the ten dedications, no matter to what degree one understands it, it remains merely understanding, not realization. This kind of understanding is also called wisdom. If everyone pursued and contented themselves with this kind of wisdom, then becoming a Buddha would be far too easy—one would only need to take out all the contemplative theories prior to buddhahood, study and understand them one by one, and generate the wisdom of various understandings. Would that then mean we possess the wisdom of the ten bhūmis, of the stage of near-perfection, and of the Buddha?

Talking about food does not fill the stomach. I detest and am averse to this mode of practice that amounts to shouting empty slogans. The words sound lofty and grand, yet one's actual inner mind is petty and lowly. Why not, in accordance with the actual condition of one's own mind, adopt the corresponding methods of practice to cultivate, and refrain from shouting slogans that cannot be achieved in the short term or even in the long term? The Buddha-dharma is for actual contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā) and for counteracting and subduing one's own mind; it is not for playing with one's tongue. One must not indulge in momentary verbal display while neglecting real and genuine practice.

For example, take the non-abiding of the tathāgatagarbha: to ask our seventh consciousness to likewise abide nowhere with regard to all dharmas, as the tathāgatagarbha does—this is simply far too lofty. Only an eighth-bhūmi bodhisattva can accord with it in part, not fully; bodhisattvas above the first bhūmi can accord with it somewhat, but still cannot fully accord with it. Pre-bhūmi bodhisattvas (pūrvabhūmika bodhisattvas) and pre-enlightenment practitioners can only understand it; making the mind not abide in dharmas is extremely, extremely difficult. Talking is talking, and doing is doing; if one has not actually cultivated to that level, speech and action cannot be unified or consistent. Because one has not realized it, one cannot do it. After understanding, one can speak; only after realization can one act, and only then can speech and action be consistent. Therefore, if we encounter people who say one thing and do another, we should know that they have not actually realized it and are not those who have awakened to this dharma.

Take another example: after seeing the mind, the shallowest contemplation is that all is like an illusion. Without very deep meditative concentration (samādhi), one cannot have even the slightest sense of illusory transformation; apart from meditative concentration, this perception cannot possibly arise—even shallow concentration will not do, let alone no concentration at all. Many people keep the words "all dharmas are like a dream, like an illusion" on their lips all day long, but in fact they cannot truly be like an illusion at all. An understood "like an illusion" ultimately cannot genuinely take effect; when events come, the inner feelings are not the least bit like an illusion, let alone like a dream. I urge all of you to cultivate earnestly and solidly, and not to play at mere verbal Zen. Those verbal formulas are certainly fine as a motto for one's own practice, and certainly fine as a goal to strive toward, but one must still begin cultivating step by step, diligently cultivate merit and meditative concentration, and earnestly complete the thirty-seven factors of the path. Do not expect to skip the thirty-seven factors of the path without cultivating them and yet complete the various contemplative practices of the Great Vehicle—that is sheer fantasy.