If you pay no heed to all dharmas, they will naturally pass away on their own

There are always people who say, "Do not fear the arising of thoughts; only fear being slow to awaken." But no matter how quickly you awaken, the thought has already appeared, and samādhi is gone—at that moment there was, after all, no enlightenment. Awakening after the fact is like mending the pen after the sheep has been lost: the sheep has already run away, after all. If you are doing well in meditation, clear and lucid, and a thought suddenly arises, do not pay attention to it—just let it pass and that is the end of it, then continue in samādhi. If you pay attention to it, another thought has arisen, and two delusive thoughts have appeared. The delusive thought of "awakening to a thought" often drags things out, and then you regret having had that thought—by then it is very hard to maintain samādhi.

Pay no attention to any dharma, and it will naturally pass away; sooner or later it will pass. No dharma, no phenomenon, can exist for long—they are constantly arising and ceasing; once something arises, the time of its ceasing naturally comes. When it ceases, that dharma is simply nothing at all, and when it arose it was originally nothing either. Pay no attention, and the mind is pure. When the myriad dharmas come, watch them come; when they go, watch them go. Let them arise and cease on their own, playing by themselves—you just sit back and watch the show.