THE ART OF SHOPPING FOR FOOD

As you know, shopping for food is commonplace.  First, we buy only what we need.  Careful people usually jot down the necessary items in a list. But we might forget some of the stuffs in need or grab something fresh and yummy though they are not planned.    Thousands of varieties of foods and drinks are there.  Seasonal fruits, vegetables, meats, fishes and flour, sugar, noodles, arrays of sweeties and processed foods, different ranges of wines, teas, coffee and etc. It is similar to a market of life, isn’t it? We merticulously pick the fresh, cheap and delicious food; and we store them in the fridge. Every day, we take them out to cook for the whole family. Then, we go shopping for them again after a while. We also hold them in both compartments, cold and freezing. Gradually, there is no more room in the family big refrigerator. So, we go get the second one and even a freezer.

We might behave the same way in our social life. We might not be cautious enough in selecting friends. We tend to stay close to those who are vivid and cheerful in all events like parties, receptions, birthday celebrations, death anniversaries, Thanksgiving, relatives’ graduation days. We keep participating and enjoying ourselves in those social gatherings. We have wasted our time. We might also bring home anger, distresses and blaming.  We might judge this guy is good due to his wealth, the other poor because of his bad personality, this folk owning a big house, the other having successful children and so on. If we are superior to others, we are happy; if not, we are sad and feel pity for ourselves.

What have been repeated will be automatically stored in our memories.  Time passes, they turn into our karmas. But our remembrance is limited. When young, if we only accumulated the experiences of extravagant enjoyments, at the middle age, we continue pampering ourselves into the  meetings for joy and pleasure, for drinking and singing, where in that storage is  for Buddhism? Some people fall  asleep when listening to the Dharma preaches.  Some are better, while at those teachings, take the full notes. But at home, they neither read them again, nor remember and practice them. So, in vain! That is why when being tied up to the family, practitioners feel tough to make progressive in mind training. When getting aged, closer to the earth but farther away from the heaven, thinking of the long and darkened road ahead, they startle, and want the  commitment  to the mental practice. But with the  worn-out bodies and the blurred mind, what could they expect in life?

  There may be a different type of people. They get awaked earlier. They find out sufferings around or right inside their families. The parent separations, the  lonely  children who could live with either dads  or moms. The siblings are raged and jealous.  The friends are fraudulous and sharply competative. The colleagues at working sites are aggressive, threatening, and discriminative. They earn their living by mixing their tears into daily food. They might be sad, bored, and fearful of daily gossips. They  want to stay far way from life and stop their social interactions. Finally, some flickering light appears at the end of the tunnel. They want to get ordained for life renunciation. Uh-huh! Life is everywhere! Hidden themselves in the mountains or by the seas, though immensely deserted, how could they escape from life while their spirit is full of mundanity? They are akin to the food shoppers who merely find stale fishes, old meat, withered vegetables and sour fruits. They hurriedly grasp them home, load all in their fridges. Then, they sadly blame on them and determine not going to markets anymore. They are not smart enough to see the wide ranges of various qualities in the markets of life.

Both the above types of people are always around us. One indulges themselves in the fun from entertainments, meetings, eating and drinking. They love crowded and hectic places. They do not care of life meanings. The other merely catch the dim, brutal and sorrowful situations. They consequently get depressed and life-bored.

Both of those types are pitiful. They continue saving the negative karmas into their mentality and leave no space for the Buddha to pour the precious Dharma. They are the buyers without the art of shopping.  One gets too many excessive and unnecessary items. Their mind is full of useless recollections except the Buddhist Dharma.

The other pile up so many bad, cruel, tragic and unreasonably lamentable circumstances that the Dharma cannot sneak into their gloomy and tightly-closed remembrance.  Both of them believe human life, enjoyment and wretchedness are truly existent.   

So, what is the best way for food shopping? Life is not different from  a supermarket, isn’t it? Huge ranges of items  in different qualities and at varieties of   prices are there. They all look pretty,  tasty and luxurious. So are human beings. Everyone wants to show their perfection and hide their flaws and drawbacks.

Then, the primary request is some intellect, knowledge and precaution. We should consider what objectives are vital in our life. Which of our advantages need to be developed  to bring more usefulness for us and our families. Which of our shortcomings must be rectified? It is necessary to see two sides of life, good and bad. The two above kinds of people are too extreme. The first only see the good  and just enjoy life. The second see the bad only and get pessimistic.

The Buddha’s teachings release all the impediments of the above two people categories. For those who have been passionately soaking up material pleasures, the Lord explains the impermanence laws. Delights from enjoyment are transient. Youth definitely fades one day. So are health and happiness. That makes them wake up. For those who merely see the worldly miseries, the Lord teaches them the operations of the cause-and-effect laws. Those sufferings risen from different reasons and preconditions. But they all will fade over time because their nature is empty. Life is a dream. Then, people need hurriedly leave that fabrication.

Every wholesome thought, word and action will be recorded in our own memories. We should stop thinking of or attentively looking at the grievious and heartbreaking  incidents around so that no useless and negative imprints could be stamped in our mind that need  be fresh and empty to welcome the Buddhist Dharma. And after absorbing the Buddhist teachings, we must apply them in our life.

Human mind or remembrances are similar to refridgerators. What we store in there  will be taken out. The capacities of both are restricted. Without caution on what to  be loaded, everything inside becomes  chaotic.

Before retaining  something in our mind, it is essential to screen if it is necessary, important and useful. Do  not bring our attention to the sarcastic, useless words so that they can fly away soon.  So are the flattering words. Let them be “Gone with the Wind”! If not, we will be arrogant and smug just because we assume it is true.

Being laypeople living with everyone in the society, we should know how to select good and virtuous friends to start the relations, then, stay close to learn from them and copy their good and kind deeds. We can enrich our experience when knowing their happy families and the way they bring up their children.

If being ordained as monks or nuns and living in the sangha, a community in which we have boldly vowed to follow the path of mind and intellect practice and embraced the same idealism, we easily get harmonized, put up with the others’ mistakes and merely keep watch on ours.

Even when just starting the mind culture, we are neither able to contribute anything for life nor to give any teaching. But with our attentively abiding to our commandaments, our thinking and actions are quite wholesome, then, our spiritual merits and good-deed blessings are immensely uncountable. Why is that?  Everyone looks at us as the brilliant example of honesty, harmony, virtuousness, and self-composedness. Though what we do is modest, it can scatter the seeds of paying homage to the Three Jewels into human hearts.  That is the first merit from mind practice for the ordained Buddhist priests. Later on, they can both assist people in accord to their ability and base on that to improve their morality and wisdom as well. Those blessings are greatly myriad. Candid and simple practitioners are always protected by all the Buddhas; their mind path is widely open and straightforward with the positive conditions.

When there is no more obstacle in our cultivation path, there isn’t either on the road of daily life. Why is that? The paths of mundanity or mentality are just the only one. We merely lead the unique life. When we can transform our mind  accordingly to the operations of daily phenonmena, wherever we are, we stay in our inner peace. Now, seeing people plunging in miseries with the dim mind, we commit to helping them. Then, our compassion, empathy, joice and equanimity naturally generate. The Buddist ordained people only hold virtue, intellect, merits and blessings in their treasures. The wisdom that masters all the truths managing human life is preserved in the treasure and so are the experiences we have gone through. Both cooperate to form an endless spring. Wherever it flows, it washes away all the predestined births, aging, diseases, deaths, sorrows and karmas. This source of awareness can convert everything into the crystal fountain of the tranquility and happiness for those who could immerse themselves in the cool water current of the mind.

With that, be quickly back to our very Mind, the sources of happiness.

Bhikkhuni Thích Nữ Triệt Như

Sunyata Monastery, June11, 2021

English version by Ngọc Huyền

Link to Vietnamese article: https://tanhkhong.org/a2284/triet-nhu-snhp006-nghe-thuat-di-cho