The Initial Level: Refraining from Destructive Behavior
We have seen that karma and discipline are involved with each of the three graded levels of motivation and aim, as presented in the lam-rim graded stages. We’ve also seen the way that karma works and the way it functions to perpetuate various sufferings.
- Destructive behavior brings about the experience of being unhappy. We experience nasty things happening to us that are similar to what we did to others, and we experience feeling like repeating our destructive behavior.
- From compulsive constructive behavior, we experience this ordinary happiness that never lasts and never satisfies, and we experience nice things occurring to us that are similar to nice things we’ve done before, but again, they don’t last. We also feel like repeating our constructive behavior.
- From both of these behaviors, whether constructive or destructive, we experience uncontrollably recurring rebirth. We’re reborn over and again because when we die, we compulsively grasp for another body. We grasp for a solid “me” to continue existing.
To fulfill our initial aim in accord with the lam-rim stages, which is to stop experiencing the suffering of unhappiness, we practice the ethical self-discipline to refrain from destructive behavior. When we feel like acting destructively, we realize all the unhappy things that would follow, and just stop ourselves from acting out our feelings. That requires great discipline, based on correct discriminating awareness of what is harmful and what is beneficial, specifically harmful or beneficial to ourselves. In order to have this ethical self-discipline, we need to stay mindful of the unhappiness and suffering that would follow if we acted out that destructive feeling and did what we felt like doing.
Mindfulness is like a mental glue that keeps us from forgetting that if we act out every negative feeling we have, it will just bring us an enormous amount of unhappiness and suffering. To stay mindful, we need concentration for our attention to stay put in this understanding. For this, we need a caring attitude. We care about the effect of our behavior on ourselves and on others, so we take our lives seriously. We care about how we act, so we’re careful.
We also need to pay attention to what we feel like doing. We have to watch out for when we’re feeling like acting or speaking or thinking in destructive ways. Then we need alertness to keep watch and, with distinguishing and discernment, detect when we feel like doing something and discriminate that what we feel like doing is destructive. We’re not naive: we understand that if we act it out, it’s going to bring problems. These are the pieces that are involved with applying the ethical self-discipline to refrain from acting destructively.
The main thing that we need with this type of self-discipline, as well as in concentration meditation, is mindfulness, the mental glue. We need to hold on to the discriminating awareness and understanding that if we act destructively, it’s going to cause us unhappiness. Everything else follows from our mental glue being well set and preventing us from forgetting. If our mental glue is properly set, we’re automatically alert to notice when the glue loosens. If we care about what we would experience as the result of our behavior, we’ll immediately reset our mindfulness if it’s lost. The more that we practice like this, the more easily we’ll remember and exercise the ethical self-discipline of self-control. Ethical self-discipline, then, is a mental factor – the state of mind that causes us to refrain from acting destructively.