In Buddhist practice, the training laid out for an individual begins with how
one practices with others. This is sila, or virtue - not harming others, being
honest in the way one deals with others, being trustworthy in one's actions
and speech. The practice of keeping the precepts is already social action. The
precepts remind us of the ways our actions affect others. Oftentimes, people
may think, "Let s get to the real stuff about Buddhism - the liberation,
the enlightenment; keeping the precepts is just a social convention, just the
basics." But this "basic" stuff has an effect. It is important.
The Buddha recognized that our actions have effects for ourselves and for others.
While virtue concerns itself with actions and speech, the second aspect of the
Buddhist training is meditation, or samadhi - a training of the mind and the
heart, a clarifying of mindfulness, awareness, and composure. These are essential
to cultivate. If we are going to take any social responsibility, it has to be
done with an open heart and a clear mind. We must develop a standard for reflection.
We can then start to ask, what are the effects of our words and actions? Sometimes
people get enthused about social action and forget about the ordinary activities
in life. How do I deal with my family? How do I deal with the people closest
to me? Or even . . .how do I answer the phone?
What do I put into the universe when I am irritated or upset? These are very
ordinary, everyday things, preparing the ground for how we relate to the world
around us. Paying attention to these things is social action. Dealing with the
circle of people around us is social action. It is not different.
From a Buddhist perspective, the next step is recognizing the quality of wisdom,
or pañña. There are many different levels of wisdom, but seeing
things as they truly are is its essence. With a reflective ability of the mind,
we can begin to see things as they truly are and start to turn towards that.
This is not simply gathering new bits of knowledge or being zapped with some
sort of enlightened energy. It is a turning inward to be able to open to all
the ways things truly are and allowing our lives to be guided by that wisdom.
How does this affect myself? How does this affect others? What is the way to
freedom and liberation? What is the way out of suffering and dissatisfaction
for myself and for others? Wisdom is seeing the different ways we entangle ourselves
in things and the different ways we can be free.
Virtue, meditation, and wisdom are the tools we use in training ourselves in
how to relate to the world around us. This training will help us to see the
qualities that bring true benefit to our society the qualities of loving-kindness,
compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity. These are the Brahma viharas, or
divine abodes. In a way, these can be considered a goal of social action: creating
a way in which human beings should live. Loving-kindness is the wish for another's
happiness. Compassion is the wish to alleviate another's suffering. Sympathetic
joy is the happiness we feel in the success of another.And equanimity,the ability
to stay centered in the midst of life's ups and downs.
The quality of sympathetic joy is an interesting one in terms of social action.
Its opposite is jealousy or envy. In many ways, envy is the foundation for competition
and conflict. If a society is based upon competitive accumulation like some
societies we know, it can create conflict and a lack of appreciation and willingness
to enjoy each other. Having come to the United States after living in Thailand
for twenty-three years, the sense of competition here is very striking. In Thailand,
there is a wide stratification in terms of socioeconomic level and opportunity
within society, but there is not a lot of envy or competition. People are often
motivated to improve their economic lot, but they don't resent those who already
have wealth or privilege. Similarly, there is usually not a looking down on
or shunning of those in economic difficulty or from a poor background. There
is an acceptance that people have accumulated different tendencies and have
different abilities.
This acceptance has imbued people's consciousness. It is a sense of karma playing
a role in people s lives over many lifetimes, a feeling of "who knows?"
This lifetime can change; in other lifetimes it might be different. Rebirth
is an accepted part of how they perceive the world - it's a long view on life.
This takes away the edge of selfishness and competitiveness and brings a sense
of appreciation for each other as human beings, a joy in each other's happiness.
By turning toward this quality of joy, we can draw on our wish to help others,
to be of service. Acceptance also brings the quality of equanimity, a non-reactive
clarity that allows one to stay centered. Equanimity is not indifference. It
is the ability to return to a place of stillness, to be non-reactive, and to
weigh things carefully. This is an important quality especially when considering
social action or social responsibility. Without equanimity we can get drawn
into our own reactiveness - our views and opinions. We can think that we re
always right, that other people are just a bunch of idiots. It's easy to get
turned around and out of balance. Not being drawn into the web of our views
and opinions but being able to settle and reflect- to ask, what is the way of
balance? - equanimity is essential in undertaking social action.
In the social action projects I have been involved in, the Buddhist perspective
has taught me some important things. Take a particular project, like protecting
the forests. The monastery in Thailand at which I was abbot was quite wellknown,
with a large community of monks, novices, lay men and lay women practicing and
training there. I thought it would provide a good balance to set up a more remote
branch monastery. Our new location was right along the Mekong River. It was
in one of the last forests in the province, and around that time, the area was
made into a national park. But this was just a designation on the map, and it
caused a lot of problems. The area was full of stumps. It was being logged,
and many villagers had made their fields there.
The Buddhist perspective was very helpful. We couldn't simply say, "These
are awful, nasty people. The planet would be a fine sort of place if they weren't
doing this." The reality was that they are doing this and that they are
people just like us. They are trying to look after their families and to get
ahead in the world. In order to do anything to protect the forest, we had to
find ways to include them. How do you involve the people who are cutting down
the forest? How do you include the merchants who are paying them? How do you
include the civil servants who are taking the bribes to allow the cutting?
The teachings told us that problems come from people not understanding how they
are creating suffering for themselves and for others. Problems and suffering
come from desires and attachments. You can't simply wish that away. You ve got
to work on the basic problems of bringing knowledge and education into their
lives. Why were they cutting down the forest? Of course, they wanted to live
comfortably, to look after their families. So, we had to find ways to provide
for them. Otherwise, it would be like trying to build a wall to stop the tide
from coming in. Good luck! It s going to find a way. Instead, you have to think
clearly and find ways to address peoples needs, to include them and bring them
in. This takes time.
This understanding reflects our own personal spiritual practice. We'd all like
to sit down, cross our legs, close our eyes, and become enlightened just like
that. Instead, we have to take the time to lay a foundation, to become patient
and clear enough to develop the path in a comprehensive way. Just as the Buddha
taught us the Four Noble Truths as the basis for our own practice - suffering,
the causes of suffering, the cessation of suffering, and the path leading to
the cessation of suffering - the same applies to social action. We've got suffering,
we've got a problem. What are all the different causes of that problem? What
kind of end can there be to that problem? If we haven't understood the problem,
we won't be able to see the causes. And if we aren't really clear about the
goal we are working towards, we won't really know what kinds of path to develop.
It works in society the same way it works in our own practice. The more we reflect
on and practice with those truths for ourselves, the more we are able to apply
them in our life, in very ordinary situations, with our friends, with our family,
at work, with different problems happening in the community. That is social
action.
How can we work together to do this? With our project along the Mekong, we began
by drawing in people affiliated with the monastery who were interested in helping.
In a Buddhist society, the monastery is a foundation we could build on, a field
for social action. Because the monastery is dependent on lay people to support
it, there is a day-to-day connection with the neighboring society. It is a web
of support and interaction, so that when there is a problem in the community,
we can easily recognize who is interested in helping. At first there were a
few volunteers. When there was too much work for volunteers to do, we hired
some people. Again, the money for their salaries came from offerings to the
monastery from people in the community.
The forest project continued to grow. We even drew in people like the police.They
had power, especially when it came to controlling who was taking logs out. Rather
than getting into a confrontation with them, we asked how we could work with
them. That was very easy at the time because one of the supporters of the monastery
was the Deputy Superintendent of Police. He was a great resource for drawing
in other honest police officers, who then had a few words with even more police
officers and got them on our side. This takes time, it takes patience, it takes
clarity. If you work in a confrontational way, it's difficult to achieve this.
By having a strong focus on one's personal practice and integrity, by becoming
more clear, centered, and pure-hearted in one's intention for doing good, the
more one starts to connect with other people. In terms of social action, this
seems to be a magnet, drawing other good people. It gets its own momentum going.
So far, the forest project is working. And besides being successful in its own
right, it has been adopted as a model for trial projects in other national parks
in Thailand.
During one of the recent elections in Thailand, I saw a handwritten sign on
the side of a building. It said something like, "The forces of corruption
are given more power when good people retreat." The "system"
gains more momentum when we decide we don't want to deal with it, that things
are hopeless. With social action work, we have to be patient, discerning, equanimous.
We have to be willing to try and to fail. We have to recognize that sometimes
things will work and sometimes they won't. And that they always work out in
ways we may never have conceived. This is the same as returning to the foundation
of one's own practice: keeping the precepts; developing clarity, tranquillity,
and peace of mind; establishing wisdom through reflective investigation; cultivating
the qualities of kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity. These
form the foundation that allows us to move out into the realm of social action.
Ajahn Pasanno is co-abbot of Abhayagiri Monastery. Originally from Canada, he
spent 23 years as a monk in Thailand and served as abbot of Wat Pah Nanachat
for 15 years. Last year he visited Bodhinyanarama Monastery to direct Venerable
Hasapanno's Upasampada (acceptance into the Sangha of monks) as the preceptor.
This talk has been first published in the Abhayagiri Newsletter in Spring 1999.