Seven Points of Mind Training

Point 2 : Training in Bodhichitta

6: In postmeditation be a child of illusion.

Point Two, Ultimate Bodhichitta Slogans : In postmeditation be a child of illusion.

Commentary :

Being a child of illusion means that in the postmeditation experience there is a sense that everything is based on creating one's basic perceptions out of one's preconceptions. If you can cut through that and inject some basic understanding or awareness, you begin to see that the games going on are not even big games but simply illusory ones. To realize that requires a lot of mindfulness and awareness working together. Here we are talking about meditation in action actually, or postmeditation discipline.

Illusion does not mean haziness, confusion, or mirage. Being a child of illusion means that you continue what you have experienced in your sitting practice (resting in the nature of alaya) into postmeditation experience. Continuing with the analogy of the projector, during postmeditation you take the bulb out. You might not have the screen or the film at this point, but you transfer the bulb into your flashlight and carry it with you all the time.

You realize that after you finish sitting practice, you do not have to solidify phenomena. Instead, you can continue your practice and develop some kind of ongoing awareness. If things become heavy and solid, you flash mindfulness and awareness into them. In that way you begin to see that everything is pliable and workable. Your attitude is that the phenomenal world is not evil, that "They" are not going to attack you or destroy you or kill you. Everything is workable and soothing.

It is like swimming: you swim along in your phenomenal world. You can't just float, you have to swim; you have to use your limbs. That process of using your limbs is the basic stroke of mindfulness and awareness. It is the "flash" quality of it - you flash on to things. So you are swimming constantly in postmeditation. And during meditation, you just sit and rest in the nature of your alaya, very simply. That is how we could develop ultimate bodhichitta. It is very basic and ordinary. You can actually do it. That's the whole idea.

It is not abstract, you simply look at phenomena and see their padded-wall quality, if you like. That's the illusion: padded walls everywhere. You think you are just about to strike against something very sharp, while having a cup of tea, or whatever, and you find that things bounce back on you. There is not so much sharp contrast - everything is part of your mindfulness and awareness. Everything bounces back, like the ball in one of those little television Ping-Pong games. When it returns, you might throw it out again by not being a child of illusion, but it comes back again with a beep, so you become a child of illusion. It is "first thought, best thought." When you look at things, you find that they are soft and that they bounce back on you all the time. It's not particularly intellectual.

This slogan is about learning how to nurture ultimate bodhichitta in terms of mindfulness and awareness. We have to learn how we can actually experience that things in the postmeditation situation are still workable, that there is room, lots of space. The basic idea of being a child of illusion is that we don't feel claustrophobic. After your sitting practice, you might think, "Oh boy, now I have to do the postmeditation practices." But you don't have to feel that you are closed in. Instead you can feel that you are a child of illusion, that you are dancing around and clicking with those little beeps, all the time. It is fresh and simple and very effective. The point is to treat yourself better. If you want to take a vacation from your practice, you can do so and still remain a child of illusion. Things just keep on beeping at you all the time. It's very lucid. It's almost whimsical.

Being a child of illusion is very simple. It is being willing to realize the simplicity of phenomenal play and to use that simplicity as a part of awareness and mindfulness practice. It's a very strong phrase, "child of illusion." Think about it. Try to be one. You have plenty of opportunities.