How to Apply Effort in Chan Investigation

When the mind consciousness has thoroughly grasped the theoretical views and the power of meditative concentration is more or less sufficient, one begins to investigate Chan and engage in contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā). Whether sitting quietly or walking, standing, lying down, one should always carry a questioning doubt in the mind, so that one can engage in contemplative practice, reflection, and investigation at all times. During the investigation, the mind consciousness first thinks through the framework of the dharma principles clearly, gets the general direction straightened out, makes the content of the reflection clear, and masters the basic information needed; then it condenses the dharma principles into a single point and hands it over to the manas, so that there are no more words and language in the mind—it feels as if the mind were empty. In fact, at this point the manas is not empty at all; the manas will hang the dharma principles in the mind, and He will deliberate and examine them moment by moment, with questioning doubt unceasing in the mind, extremely diligent. This requires quite good meditative concentration. If the concentration is not good, the mind consciousness's deliberation will appear, and the manas will be unable to go deep into the dharma principles, unable to deliberate deeply, let alone practice diligently in an unbroken continuum.

Before investigating Chan, one should first settle the mind and cultivate enough meditative concentration to be usable. If the mind cannot be stilled for a whole day, then one should not investigate Chan or engage in contemplative practice; if it cannot be stilled for a whole month, one certainly cannot investigate Chan and the Dharma. When you investigate with sufficient meditative concentration, the more you investigate, the deeper the concentration becomes; the deeper the concentration, the clearer the thread of investigation. When the concentration is very deep and the manas has little left of the dharma principles to investigate, one will enter profound meditative absorption; after emerging from samādhi, one continues the investigation, and the practice is also very effective. Occasionally entering samādhi is quite good as well: first enter samādhi and then emerge from it; when walking, standing, sitting, and lying down all carry meditative concentration, one can very diligently investigate and engage in contemplative practice. The steps of investigating Chan must be taken one by one, pondered bit by bit; in this way sufficient experience will accumulate, so that in future lives one can quickly put it to use, and others can also draw on and absorb this experience.

All methods and means of cultivating meditative concentration and gathering the mind are nothing other than enabling the manas to realize the Buddha's teachings. Of course, the mind consciousness must first have a certain wisdom and fully comprehend the Buddha's teachings, and then let the manas realize them. If there is no meditative concentration, and one takes the mind consciousness's comprehension as realized wisdom, that is a great misunderstanding. Wisdom not moistened by the waters of samādhi is called dry wisdom; dry wisdom means the mind consciousness understands, but the manas does not realize or understand it, and it produces no actual effect. If problems arise in the course of practice and one encounters a bottleneck, one must turn back to search the theory, re-examine and correct one's understanding of the principles, and then go practice again once the direction is found.

Learning the Dharma must be grounded in actual realization. Only through actual realization will the body, mind, and spirit of a living being be transformed, and one's views and ways of thinking be transformed. When the manas understands the principles, one's views and ways of thinking will certainly be transformed, the world will transform accordingly, and all one's conduct and attitudes in dealing with the world will also transform accordingly—this is precisely the purpose of cultivation. One must not think that one has already understood the principles and need not cultivate anything further. If one does not actually practice on the basis of the mind consciousness's understanding of the principles, then in actual affairs one remains as before, still turning along with the afflictions of greed, anger, and delusion, and the result is still entering the cycle of birth and death, without liberation.