2005-07-27 Updating the precepts
Wed 7/27/2005, Flagstaff, Arizona Dear Dad, Good morning from the NAU Library in Flagstaff, Arizona. Conditions are good here at this time of day to write you a considerably longer letter than could be done by hand or even by phone call. This room on the second floor, one of several computer locations, has about ten terminals in it, but at this early hour in the morning the room has only two other occupants. They are two middle school kids noisily playing computer games side by side. Their non-stop dialog, giggles, guffaws and bold language proves they have completely forgotten they are not alone. I have to to ignore such distractions. They fade in and out of my awareness depending on my concentration. What right have I to complain?  This library generously tolerates guest users including a homeless man such as me. I could move to some other room, but it could be worse, such as the man in the main room who slurps his coffee while talking on his cell phone, or someone else there now having an argument with his girl friend, also on his cell phone. People just forget or else choose to ignore they are sharing space. I just checked my mail status at Las Vegas. I see online that a letter from you has successfully reached my box at Mail Link Plus. This service posts information online about received postal mail to help decide what to do with it. The options are to leave it in the box, or forward it today, or forward it later at any specified date, or delete it. There are little buttons to select these options for each piece of mail. It's pretty neat. The manager of the site, Eric Ruecker, when I asked him how he did it, told me the data is entered by hand, not by optical scanning. This would seem to be labor intensive and costly, but the charge for forwarding each package of mail (which may contain a whole bundle of accumulated letters) is only $2.00 plus actual cost of postage. I am pleased with the service so far. Anyway, today I learned that your letter reached my box. Since I am waiting for some address confirmation letters, I have asked my mail forwarding service to send the current batch out day after tomorrow, on this Friday. So I have several days to wonder what might be in your letter. Thanks for thinking of me. I came into the NAU library this morning to update my Whoa Way home page as a result of thinking over some of the Whoa Way Training Rules. In case you are interested, I'm enclosing a copy of my home page updated today. Sometimes I wish you had kept a computer in your home office, especially when I am out of the country, but then again, there are blocks of time when I do not access Internet either. There is a computer elsewhere in your Galveston house but you do not use it, or even care to use a personal account like mine at some Internet service such as yahoo.com. So postal mail between us is fine. Regarding a satisfactory telephone connection between us, because of the need to raise my voice to meet your hearing requirements when your hearing aid is not turned on and you always tell me that I am "breaking up", the action of raising my voice is most discouraging. Shouting at you or at anyone at all really goes against the grain. You probably understand this. I don't think you like to shout either, can't remember ever hearing you shout. Then too, the background noise of wind at outdoor telephone booths also affects clear communication. So, as I said, postal mail between us is fine. Only we need to be patient regarding the longer turnaround. In case you have been following my interest in these training rules, here are the current standings and some comments. Having typed them up I might forward them to some other contacts too: Training Rule #6: Now is "Do not eat after midday or before dawn." This has been restored to its original form after experimenting for some past weeks with the qualifier "do not eat much". In actual practice it became clear that the word "much" was too vague as a guideline. I could not see "much" difference between a snack of Ramen noodles or a can of corn. And then, why not top it off with a hot dog and mustard from the convenience store?  As a result of the unlimited inflow, my body started to plump out again. Another undesired consequence was the drowsiness that always creeps in on a full stomach. Therefore for health reasons and for keeping a clear head I've gone back to fasting at night. In this connection, however, I have learned that drinking coffee makes hunger much harder to bear. I do love the stimulus of caffeine. I've waged a love-hate campaign against it for years. Caffeine is great for stimulating the nerves before vigorous exercise such as hiking across the Grand Canyon. However when the coffee drinker is tethered to a seat, the nervous stimulation acts as an annoying irritation. If he has any awareness of his bodily state it is not hard to detect. It's like driving a car with one foot on the gas pedal and one foot on the brake. Then to calm the irritation, food must be eaten to quiet the nerves. But eating food brings on inevitable drowsiness. So the end result of drinking coffee is drowsiness, just the opposite of intended. Then to counter the drowsiness more coffee must be drunk. A vicious cycle sets in, wave after wave of action-reaction. So I have reluctantly concluded that the Mormans are right in prohibiting caffeine, I give them credit for that. In fact I feel righteous for having uprooted hundreds of coffee plants in my Costa Rican garden to replace them with trees which will do the world more good. Training Rule #7 was formerly: "Do not dance, sing, play or listen to music, watch shows, wear garlands, adornments, scents or cosmetics." This rule has been condensed to: "Do not chase after pleasurable sensations." Instead of tinkering with a long list of "do not" items which always leaves loopholes and is not, in the long run, very informative, I have tried to get to the essential point. The ancient Theravada style enumerates specifics, but now that I have liberated my training rules from slavish adherence to tradition, it's time to express the essential point more concisely. I know it may not be fashionable to abstain from chasing pleasure. I am not trying to convert anyone else here, just explain my reasons if anyone cares to listen.  The reason for avoiding pleasurable sensations is to break the chains of attachment to the body, dragging one around like a ring in a bull's nose. It is to be a free man. Otherwise, desires never end. There is always something more clamoring for attention -- sight (watching shows), sound (music), smell, taste (food), touch (hot showers) and mental entertainment (watching Columbo catch his man or grandmasters play chess). Whereas I am very conscious that my life time is running out and I have not reached my goal of freedom from suffering based on unsatisfied desires. Another reason for not chasing pleasure is that the desired objects always disappoint in some way or another or else reinforce a habit of dependence. The Thai teacher Buddhadasa used to call indulging in eating delicious food as eating "bait". The Buddha taught that desire is the root cause of suffering, this is the Second Noble Truth. According to the Buddhist psychology, there are three kinds of desires: desire for sensory pleasure, desire for existence (e.g. to be respected as a worthy person), and desire for non-existence (e.g. to go to sleep when tired). By the way, this footnote: I say "do not chase after ..." instead of "do not enjoy ..." because sensory contact, both pleasurable and painful, cannot be avoided. Pleasure and pain are inevitable as long as the senses are working. When the mind is extremely concentrated, sometimes it will not be fazed by external distractions, such as those two kids over there merrily banging away and ramping up their volume ("Sorry, Sir, but that was funny...", or later, "Dear Lord, please forgive me for disturbing this old man..."), but most of the time the sense doors are wide open. So the emphasis is on not chasing after whatever sensations get through. In other words, Whoa! Finally, the eighth rule was recently experimented as: "Do not lie down during the day or lie on soft beds at night." I have heard of yogis who never lie down either day or night, they even sleep sitting up.  With the added restriction against lying down in daytime I had in mind only a more modest goal of reducing daytime sleeping, since lying down always results in drowsiness. However, lying down is necessary for some hatha yoga positions, maybe a trivial objection. More to the point, as indicated above, making a rule for every case is, in my present view, unproductive. Rules may develop historically but they must be understood. (I think President Bush had something like this principle in mind when he remarked that Supreme Court justices should not "legislate from the bench"). The Jewish scribes also taught innumerable rules which the prophet Jesus swept away with one golden rule. So I have gone back to the simple rule which my personal experience has confirmed as being helpful over time: Training Rule #8: "Do not lie down on soft beds". To sum up, if there is any theme common to these three current revisions, it is the idea of staying awake and paying attention to the present moment. Wishing you all the best and looking forward to your mail. J. Willis cc: Jim by snail mail email: Janie, Jeff, Julie, Gerald encl: The Whoa Way home page http://www.geocities.com/williswhoa Home Page (jwleaf.org)