An Example of the Simultaneous Cultivation of Precepts, Concentration, and Wisdom

1. A couple of days ago I was on holiday, going out and visiting relatives. Every day I tried my best to raise the contemplation of the white bones, visualizing an image of a skeleton hanging in my mind. When dealing with people and affairs, my mind remained calm and detached—just conforming to etiquette was enough. I spoke little, stirred up few emotions, and reduced a great deal of affliction, and afterward I did not dwell on anything. 

2. During the day, if I am not stained by too much affliction, then at night when I sit in meditation and close my eyes, I find my mind is not too scattered and my body and mind are not overly tense, so it is easy to enter the state with breath observation and recollection of the Buddha (buddhānusmṛti). If during the day too many attachments arise in the mind, it is like water freezing into ice; at night in meditation one must melt the ice back into water, which takes a great deal of extra effort. 

3. "Contemplating the body as impure" is the cause—is not "no mark of self, no mark of person, no mark of sentient beings" precisely the fruit? Is this not exactly what the Diamond Sutra teaches about "contemplating the body as impure"? Since there is no mark of self or person, then greed, hatred, and delusion have no root—toward whom would one give rise to greed, hatred, delusion, and arrogance? The mind can then easily remain calm and stable.

4. The Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra says that this contemplation of impurity and contemplation of the white bones is "the dhyāna practiced by fools." Am I not a fool myself? I should raise this kind of right mindfulness more often. 

Assessment: This practice perfectly integrates precepts, samādhi, and wisdom together; the results are excellent, with both meditative concentration and wisdom clearly evident. The manifestation of precepts is that the mind gives rise to no thoughts and no afflictions, conduct with people conforms to etiquette, and the mind is tranquil and peaceful. The manifestation of samādhi is a calm mind, an undisturbed mind, and the ability to quickly enter the state with breath observation and recollection of the Buddha. The manifestation of wisdom is, first, being able to quickly enter the state of contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā), and second, being able to use the principles in the Diamond Sutra and the Śūraṅgama Sūtra for comparison and immersion, subduing oneself and quickly improving one's meditative skill. This achieves using wisdom to guide samādhi and samādhi to give rise to wisdom, with samādhi and wisdom perfectly fused. Such practice has entered the right track. Once precepts, samādhi, and wisdom are further strengthened, the elimination of self-view (ātma-dṛṣṭi) will begin to take shape. 

Many people in practice cannot keep the precepts; when facing objects, thoughts arise repeatedly. Many of the afflictions the mind gives rise to are not inflicted by others, but arise from oneself without cause—perceiving dharmas as truly existent upon emptiness, thereby giving rise to attachments, with endless disputes over self and others, right and wrong, yet without being aware of it. When others remind them, not only are they unconvinced, they even give rise to aversion and resentment. Such people are still far from genuine practice; the nature of self-clinging is too heavy in them. The result of not keeping precepts in this way is that meditative concentration can never be cultivated well no matter what, leading to a lack of wisdom in both worldly affairs and the Buddha's Dharma. Therefore, affliction is the natural enemy of wisdom.