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LEAD ARTICLE | EASTERN HORIZON 7

the forest tradition was to use the term “Buddha” in this Anyone see my horse?” Everyone looks at us like we are
way—the fully aware, awake quality of our own mind. crazy. So we ride over to the next village and ask the
This is the Buddha. same thing: “Anyone seen my horse?”

He would say things like, “The Buddha who passed Ajahn Sumedho offers a similar example. Instead of
into parinibbana 2,500 years ago is not the Buddha looking for a horse, he uses the image of looking for
who is a refuge.” He liked to shock people sometimes, our eyes. The very organ with which we see is doing
when he felt he needed to bring their attention to the seeing, yet we go out searching: “Has anyone seen
the teachings. When he said something like this, they my eyes? I can’t see my eyes anywhere. They must be
would think they had a heretic in front of them. “How around here somewhere but I can’t find them.”
can that Buddha be a refuge? He is gone. Gone, really
We can’t see our eyes, but we can see. This means
gone. That’s no refuge. A refuge is a safe place. So how
that awareness cannot be an object. But there can be
can this great being who lived 2,500 years ago provide
awareness. Ajahn Chah and other forest masters would
safety? Thinking about him can make us feel good, but
use the expression “being the knowing.” It is like being
that feeling is also unstable. It’s an inspiring feeling,
rigpa. In that state, there is the mind knowing its own
but it is easily disturbed.”
nature, Dharma knowing its own nature. That’s all. As
When there is resting in the knowing, then nothing can soon as we try to make an object of that, then a dualistic
touch the heart. It’s this resting in the knowing that structure has been created, a subject here looking at an
makes that Buddha a refuge. That knowing nature is object there. There is resolution only when we let go
invulnerable, inviolable. What happens to the body, of that duality and relinquish that “looking for.” Then
emotions, and perceptions is secondary, because that the heart just abides in the knowing. But the habit is
knowing is beyond the phenomenal world. So that is the to think, “I’m not looking hard enough. I haven’t found
true refuge. Whether we experience pleasure or pain, them yet. My eyes must be here somewhere. After all, I
success or failure, praise or criticism, that knowing can see. I need to try harder to find them.”
nature of the mind is utterly serene. It is undisturbed
Have you ever been in a retreat interview where you
and incorruptible. Just as a mirror is unembellished and
describe your meditation practice and the teacher looks
untainted by the images it reflects, the knowing cannot
at you and says, “More effort is necessary”? You think,
be touched by any sense perception, any thought, any
“But I’m dancing as fast as I can!” We need to put effort
emotion, any mood, any feeling. It’s of a transcendent
in, but we need to do it in a skillful way. The type of
order. The Dzogchen teachings say this too: “There is
effort we need to develop is that which involves being
not one hair’s tip of involvement of the mind-objects
clearer but doing less. This quality of relaxation is seen
in awareness, in the nature of mind itself.” That is why
as crucial, not only within the Dzogchen teachings but
awareness is a refuge; awareness is the very heart of
also in Theravadan monastic practice.
our nature.
Has Anybody Seen My Eyes? It’s an ironic point that this relaxation is necessarily
built on top of a vast array of preparatory practices.
Another parallel between Dzogchen and Ajahn Chah’s Within the Tibetan ngondro training one performs
teachings comes in the form of a warning: do not look 100,000 prostrations, 100,000 visualizations, 100,000
for the unconditioned, or rigpa, with the conditioned mantras, and then years of study, keeping all the sila,
mind. In the verses of the Third Zen Patriarch it says, “To and so on. Similarly, within the Theravada tradition,
seek Mind with the discriminating mind is the greatest we have sila: the practices of virtue for the lay and the
of all mistakes.” Ajahn Chah expressed the futility and monastic communities, as well as the refinements of
absurdity of this tendency by giving the example of the training in Vinaya discipline. We do a lot of chanting
riding a horse and looking for it at the same time. We and devotional practice, plus a huge amount of training
are riding along, asking, “Has anyone seen my horse? in meditation techniques, such as mindfulness of