Renunciation & Relinquishment.
It is a matter of getting out of the turbulent water of mind states - and relinquishing our tendencies and habits that keep us in the boat of samsara.
One of our biggest and most rooted tendency is our tendency to think, believe and execute the personal idea of I think I can. This idea was taught to countless children in the early 1900’s in a book titled, “The Little Engine that Could.”
The idea is very much like the image of the sinking boat above. We tend to try to beat the odds against samsara by changing the external world we find ourselves drowning in.
We believe we can overcome samsara (suffering) by putting our shoulder to the wheel of birth and death with the desires of wealth, health, security, success, fame, gain, pleasure, status, praise, and countless other external fulfillments. Yet, when we pay attention, we begin to see we are in a sinking boat and are blown about by the worldly winds.
Much like the figures in the boat we know we are in a sinking ship, but we ignore it. Even though we bail water the boat sinks. This is when we ask for help - from spiritual teachings. We get out of the boat and onto a dry dock.
The dry dock of spiritual practice is not about repairing the boat and sending you on your way - that is merely a quick fix on an external, material level. Indeed, we start right where we are - so, if we are over our head in external, worldly desires we stop thinking “I think I can, I think I can.” This changes desire to renunciation.
When the mantra, “I think I can” runs out we are at a fork on the path of suffering. We either continue down the path of suffering or seek higher ground. We learn to relinquish the delusion of bailing and sinking.
We renounce the one more time to do something, get something, have something, claim something of value from the external world. We relinquish our attachments to the somethings.
Eventually, we reach the first signposts of spirituality. Namely, the four Noble Truths. Birth brings aging, sickness and death of the body and the identities we have taken up.
Spiritual adepts practice daily the signpost of our eventual death of the body - not as a morbid thought, but as a Truth to awaken us to our situation. Then, aging and sickness are known as real.
These Truths lift the veil of ignorance just enough to show us where we are.
www.asinglethread.net - www.zatma.org