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TEACHINGS | EASTERN HORIZON 13

fuel for future existence and further the final letting go of body and close on the branch. The more it
suffering, only these four are to be mind (the Five Khandhas). It is relaxes, the more the claws tighten.
avoided. wrong to suggest that any of these That’s why you never see a bird
stages of letting go are the same as fall off a perch even when they are
Thus taking up the practice of attachment. asleep. It may look like attachment
compassion, taking up the practice but, in fact, it is letting go. Letting
of the Five Precepts or the greater The path is like a ladder. One grasps go often leads to stillness, not
precepts of a monk or nun, and the rung above and lets go of the moving from where you are, which
taking up the practice of meditation rung below to pull oneself up. Soon, is why it is sometimes mistaken as
- these are not un-Buddhist and it is the rung just grasped is the rung attachment.
mischievous to discourage them by one is now standing on. Now is the
calling them ‘attachments’. Keeping time to let go of that rung as one So don’t be put off by well-
the Five Precepts is, in fact, a letting grasps an even higher rung to raise meaning but misinformed L-plate
go of coarse desires like lust, greed oneself further. If one never grasped Buddhists who have completely
and violence. Practising compassion anything, one would remain misunderstood upādāna and
is a letting go of self-centredness spiritually stupid. attachment. Attach without fear
and practising meditation is letting to your precepts, your meditation
go of past, future, thinking and To those without wisdom, letting go object and to the path for it will
much else. The achievement of may often appear as attachment. For lead to Nibbāna. And don’t forget to
jhāna is no more than the letting example a bird on the branch of a purchase the attachments for your
go of the world of the five senses to tree at night appears to be attaching vacuum cleaner too!” EH
gain access to the mind. Nibbāna firmly to the branch, but it has
is the letting go once and for all actually let go and is fully asleep. Source: BSWA Newsletter, Perth,
of greed, hatred and delusion, the When a bird lets go and the muscles Australia, December 1999
seeds of rebirth. Parinibbāna is around its claws begin to relax they