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In Roman times the Latin term "Mens Sana In Corpore Sano', which means a sound mind in a sound body, was well known and understood.

This implies the notion that a healthy mind is a function of a healthy body.

To a very large extent this notion is still predominant in western cultures, given the extraordinary emphasis given to sporting activities, physical fitness and body culture.

The reason for this is that in the process of identification with their body, people derive the notion of who they are.

In Buddha Dhamma the emphasis is shifted in favour of the mind, since the body is considered to be a tool of the mind.

The Buddha taught that if progress in 'mind cultivation' was to be achieved it is important to maintain a healthy body, without becoming fanatical about it.

In psychosomatic medicine there is a notion that the body reflects the state of your mind, which to a certain extent equals the Buddha's Teaching.

The Buddha taught that the mind is chief.

In Dr. W.F. Jayasuriya's Introduction to the Abhidhamma (The Psychology and Philosophy of Buddhism, 1976): mind is conceived of as being different from matter. At the same time it is superior to matter because you can control or determine features of the material body. (1)

He emphasised that modern psychosomatic medicine is based on this very concept of mental states, such as anxiety, causing physical disorders like gastric ulcers.

In Bhikku Khantipalo book's 'A Bag of Bones - A Miscellany On The Body', he introduces the anthology 'relating to the body in various ways' as:

'The body which is thought to be most obviously 'me', what I regard as the most tangible part of myself. Around it, therefore, are constructed many views, all of them distorted to some extent, which prevent insight arising into the body as it really is.' (2)

The image people hold of themselves as a person is essentially that of a body.

In today's western society the body has been increasingly venerated as a 'temple', the idea of which comes from the culturally ingrained notion that the body is a temple of the creator god.

Inherent in this notion is the idea that the body is a perfect machine.

However, when you strip from this notion its religious underpinnings you can see that a more accurate analysis reveals that the body cannot live up to the cultural expectation.

In reality the natural state of the body is to be unhealthy.

The level of sickness determines how much you can perform.

Let us compare then the performance of the human body with the most efficient engine in the world which happens to be the transformer having a 97% efficiency.

In contrast the human body is only .1% efficient (and this only when the body is in a high state of health). This comparison underlines the precarious nature of our existence.

In truth the state of health of the human body varies from instant to instant.

A popularly held belief maintains the view that the preservation of a youthful body will help achieve some sense of spiritual balance or well-being. This reinforces the false notion that blinds us to the reality that the body deteriorates and eventually dies - in Pali this is anicca or impermanence.

This is the cult of youth.

Some of the underlying elements of this popular western culture are its increasing affluence, longer life span and increasing number of older persons, who some how think they can stop the clock by seeking in retirement to recapture the vitality of their youth.

This attempt to recapture the lost vitality of their youth, is in many cases the only area where they can get a sense of engagement in a culture that has idealised this cult of youth, since it does not appear that there is an outlet for society to utilise their accumulated experience and knowledge.

Most of the established cultures of the world have placed high value on the older generations, the practice of which is still evident in eastern cultures.

However, in the last forty or fifty years there has been a shift away from holding our older generation in such a high regard, and while this trend has been particularly evident in English speaking countries, it is gradually creeping into non-English speaking nations.

In contrast to this, the Buddhist practice regarding older persons is one of venerating those who have kept up the cultivation of their mind throughout their lives according to the Buddha's teachings.

From the Buddhist viewpoint life can be broken into 3 parts:

--The first 30 years you live burning vast amounts of merit and making little.
--In the second 30 years you live starting to generate enough merit to match that being used, and
--If you are fortunate to live a third 30 years and have created the right causes you have the opportunity to create more merit than you have burnt.

The reason why older age is highly valued is because you can make more merit than you can consume.

Buddhist practitioners actively seek the advice and guidance of wise and Noble older persons, tapping into this wealth of knowledge and experience accumulated over the years.

The Buddha taught that there are 4 sure things in life:

1. You are born
2. You get sick
3. You get old
4. You die

In the Tibetan Buddhist Medicine and Psychiatry - The Diamond Healing author Terry Clifford notes "the Buddha himself described his role and his teachings in terms of a fundamental medical analogy that runs throughout all forms of Buddhism." (3)

In his own lifetime, the Buddha was known as "the great physician" since the purpose of his teaching is to cure suffering.

In the Mahaparinirvana Sutra, there are four basic motivations stated as necessary for the practice of Dharma. These are:

--To consider the teacher as a doctor
--To consider oneself as sick
--To consider the teaching as medicine
--To consider the practice of the teaching as treatment

These four motivations are the key attitudes you need to adopt if you are to cure the symptoms of this ill health, which is characterised by a runaway imagination.

Buddha Dhamma allows you to build a life which is not full of empty promises but is firmly built on reality.

The Buddha Path enables you to see clearly what is reality and what is a projection of your own mind - a fantasy.

At the level where this is functionally relevant to you it cannot be communicated by concepts, it can only be experienced and for that you need a Teacher.

In the Sutta 'The Lotus of the Good Law' the Buddha is regarded as a great physician; and all beings must be regarded as blinded by error, like the man born blind. (4)

The Buddha is the 'great physician' and teacher - the shower of the way.

His advice is to develop awareness in the present. It is with awareness that you can watch the mind and see what it is doing to create its own happiness or unhappiness. Which has an effect on the health of the body.

When pain in the body arises it is a response to a defilement in the mind. The reaction is the arising and grasping of an unwholesome cettasika.

When the body is tired it is important to rest.

Tiredness is a conditioned response from the mind to the body. The mind reacts through habit which are sankaras. Sankharas are one of the five groups of constituents making up a human being, and are the mental formations karmically determined and motivate behaviour.

He pointed out to his disciples 'Look and see for yourselves, can you find anything permanent? - investigate! Look into things. Be the one who observes, who is aware. Don't be the blind one, the one who just follows his or her habits', which Ajahn Sumedho described as winding up like a mechanical toy and then running down. (5)

The reality for so many people is that when they are young, they have the notion that their whole life is ahead of them and do not see or understand the need to cultivate their mind.

When they reach middle age or older, suddenly they look back at youth with nostalgia, a time when life was exciting and full of promises.

The reality is that life will not live up to those promises. This is the reason why youth is looked upon with nostalgia and regret by most people.

The problem with the culture of youth minutes is that it wrongly believes that life is anything but suffering or in Pali dukkha. When suffering arises the inexperienced believe that it can be subdued by looking to the next after next excitement.

Buddha Dhamma does not allow you to take refuge in such an escape mechanism because it gets you to face unequivocally the reality that life is suffering, and it shows a rational way out of it.

This rational way out of suffering is what is taught and practiced at the Buddhist Discussion Centre (Upwey) Ltd. At our Centre we learn how to cultivate a healthy mind while looking after the body.

One of our Centre's key priorities is the preservation of our body of knowledge, accumulated over many years, and we have identified the process of documentation as a key element in the preservation of our Buddhist Cultural heritage.

Our core values approach is more complex than popular culture because we have inserted columns and rows of determinants left blank in the popular versions of postindustrial culture.

These determinants include such actions as keeping refuge in Buddha, Dhamma, Sangha; holding sila or morality by keeping precepts; paying respect to the Sangha and Dhamma teachers; being of service to others and following the Noble Eightfold Path.

The logical outcome of the processes just outlined may be to have a good human birth in your next life.

We have identified the use of higher orders of thought as key factors required to enable us to skillfully operate in the complex and multi-layered facets of reality. These skills are increasingly needed in a Dhamma-ending age.

We have now moved on from first order thinking through 2nd, 3rd and 4th to 5th and progressively higher levels as our modus operandi. The Members who seek to maintain a first order level of thinking are finding the going hard because that is a mind that is confused and relies on habits, refusing to acknowledge or even know other modes of living or thinking.

In our operating model, 2nd, 3rd and 4th order thinking deals with a series of precepts and factors in a 500 year time line. To operate internationally, we must operate on 3rd order or better. Many of the World Fellowship of Buddhist Secretariats and delegates operate on 6th or 7th order thinking.

Since we are a Regional Center of the World Fellowship of Buddhists we have an added motivation for our Members to develop to an equivalent level of thinking in order to be able to lend a helping hand.

The first order thinking mind is inflexible and lacks a heart or consideration of others. It seeks only to deal with the current task and does this ineffectively. It is not conducive to developing perfection of energy.

The mind which knows Perfection of Energy, or in Pali Viriya Parami, knows how to look after the body.

Someone operating on higher orders of knowledge, particularly at 5th or above, can see how important it is to their own well-being to create the causes for long life and health by selflessly helping others.

They have learned to guard themselves against the attacks coming from lower order thinking minds.

In general, people who do not practise Buddha Dhamma hold the false belief that the body is the self, and this belief causes the body to become sick because of the inability to see that unwholesome states of mind arise only as a result of past kamma.

The theory of kamma espouses the notion that happiness and unhappiness in the present arise out of wholesome or unwholesome actions of body, speech and mind done in the past. Therefore they unskillfully link such states with the concomitant circumstances they happen to experience in the present.

Psychosomatic diseases which affect the body arise out of unwholesome mental states.

In 1967 Herbert Hyman, using a wide range of data from opinion polls and sociological surveys, argued that the value system of the lower classes created a "self imposed barrier to an improved position".

However, a sizeable minority of the working class did not share these limitations and identified more with the middle class, and as a result tended to have higher aspirations.

Speech patterns are an important medium of communication and learning. The English sociologist Basil Bernstein distinguished two forms of speech pattern which he termed elaborated code and the restricted code.

Members of the working class are limited to the use of restricted codes, whereas members of the middle class use both codes.

Those conversing in restricted codes do not make meaning explicit in speech due to the common conversant culture.

The meanings conveyed by the code are limited to a particular social group, they are bound to particular social context and are not readily available to outsiders.

At the Buddhist Discussion Centre (Upwey) Ltd we use the Oxford English Dictionary as the standard to convey meanings of concepts which are related in one form or another to the cultivation of the mind, or bhavana in Pali.

Self imposed cultural barriers or limitations of our Members which have tended to keep them functioning at 1st order thinking are being removed each for himself or herself in a systematic way.

We have earlier discussed the limitations of first order thinking and the inability to be taught the universality of suffering and what it takes to escape from it.

In Je Gampopa's classic handbook of Buddhism, 'Gems of Dhamma, Jewels of Freedom' (5) one section deals with the suffering of the higher states of existence which includes the human world. In this Je Gampopa notes that humans have eight principle sufferings, described in the Garbhavakranti Sutra they are:

"Likewise birth is suffering, ageing is suffering, sickness is suffering, death is suffering, to be separated from what one likes is suffering, to encounter what one dislikes is suffering, striving after and obtaining what one wants is suffering and also the difficulty involved in maintaining what one has is suffering".

Without the capacity for analytical reasoning, inherent in the processes of practicing Buddha Dhamma, people accept and follow uncritically the belief system which they have learnt from their parents or from the general culture they happen to live in.

At our Centre, our Members are encouraged to change their culture: that is implied in the lemma "Lifetimes of Learning". It is through scholarship practised in one lifetime that individuals can learn and do what is needed to overcome the limitations of earlier cultural conditioning.

For those without that have not been exposed to this type of practice, one outcome is they have maintained the nonacceptance that they are going to die, even though they might not deny it at an intellectual level. Inherent in this belief resides the view of the culture of youth and focus on the body, which can only produce suffering.

The Buddha says that no enemy can harm one so much as one's owns thoughts of craving thoughts of hate, thoughts of jealousy and so on....these all lead to suffering.

In Je Gampopa's explanation on the sufferings of ageing, he notes they are immeasurable and are summarised as tenfold. He explains as follows:

Sufferings are caused by one's marked change in physique, hair, skin, complexion, abilities and faculties, prestige, quality of life, good health, mental capacity and sufferings caused by reaching life's end when one's time is up.

He expands on each of the ten sufferings, for example, there are the sufferings caused by marked physical change - that the body which was previously strong and robust, holding itself erect, changes and becomes bent, twisted and having to support itself with a stick.

The hair formally jet black changes to become white or one becomes bald, the skin once fine and smooth becomes coarse, lined and wrinkled.

The complexion once filled with brightness and luster like a freshly opened lotus, fades, becoming bluish or grayish like an old withered flower.

And with ageing comes the marked change of health, once stricken by the greatest of illnesses - old age itself - one suffers, for it brings on all the other diseases.

The idea of long life from a Buddhist perspective is not for long life itself but so that a person may practice during this human birth which is so rare.

In K. Sri Dhammananda's work titled "How to Overcome Your Difficulties "(1980) (7) he noted that the mind can influence the body profoundly. He describes this effect noting that if the mind is allowed to function in an unbridled manner and if it is allowed to play with unwholesome thoughts, it can cause disaster, it can even kill a being.

The reverse is also true - it can cure a sick body.

He said when the mind is concentrated on right thoughts with right effort and understanding, the effect it produced can be remarkable: it can liberate the human mind from countless lifetimes of suffering.

When a being has enough merit to be born as human, by necessity that being has to take the form of a human body, with which he or she is able to accumulate meritorious activities which are the fuel for the progress along the Buddha Path.

From the Discourse on Old Age the Buddha said:

Short indeed is this life-
within a hundred years one dies,
and if anyone lives longer
then he dies of decay

And yet even though human life is so short it provides a rare window of opportunities to practice for the benefit of self and others, seen and unseen, with the potential to end the cycle of suffering which has no beginning, but can have a conclusion.

In a discussion titled Insight Knowledge, Khantipalo explains that 'this my body consists of four great elements, is procreated by mother and father, is built up out of boiled rice and bread, is of the nature of impermanence, of being worn and rubbed away, of disillusioned and disintegration, and this my consciousness has that for it's support and is bound up with it.'

As we grow older, the earth element begins to dominate and the body starts to deteriorate leading towards death.

Meditating on the body is a good method in determining which element is dominating so balance can be restored.

Wise people create the correct causes for keeping their bodies healthy.

When the heat element is dominant, it is caused by one or more of the unwholesome minds (akusala cetasikas). These are:

1. Ignorance ( Moha)
2. Lack of moral shame (Ahirika)
3. Lack of fear of unwholesomeness (Anottappa)
4. Restlessness (Uddhacca)
5. Attachment (Lobha)
6. Wrong view (Ditthi)
7. Conceit (Mana)
8. Aversion (Dosa)
9. Envy (Issa)
10. Stinginess (Macchariya)
11. Regret (Kukkucca)
12. Sloth (Thina)
13. Torpor (Middha)
14. Doubt (Viccikiccha)

In contrast to the 14 unwholesome minds, here are 19 of the Wholesome Minds. These wholesome minds or (in Pali: kusala cetasikas) are thus described as they are common to all wholesome or kusala moments of consciousness.

1. Confidence (Saddha)
2. Mindfulness (Sati)
3. Moral shame (Hiri)
4. Fear of unwholesomeness (Ottappa)
5. Disinterestedness (Alobha)
6. Amity (Adosa)
7. Equanimity (Tatramajjhattata)
8. Composure of mental states (Kayapassadhi )
9 Composure of mind (Cittapassadhi)
10. Lightness of mental states (Kaya-Lahuta)
11. Lightness of mind (Citta-Lahuta)
12. Pliancy of mental states (Kaya- Muduta)
13. Pliancy of mind (Citta-Muduta)
14. Adaptability of mental states (Kaya- Kammannata)
15. Adaptability of mind states (Citta- Kammannata
16. Proficiency of mental states (Kaya-Pagunnata)
17. Proficiency of mind states (Citta-Pagunnata)
18. Rectitude of mental states (Kaya-Ujukata)
19. Rectitude of mind states (Citta-Ujukata)

Development along the Path is characterised by a progressive display of wholesome cetasikkas or mental states, as per the list just outlined, and systematically moves the person through the four foundations of mindfulness which are:

1. the effort to strengthen the wholesome states already arisen
2. the effort to bring forth the wholesome states which are yet to arise
3. the effort to stop the unwholesome states of mind already risen
4. the effort to prevent from arising the unwholesome states of mind yet to arise

This development enables a person to understand more clearly the nature of existence and impermanence or in Pali Anicca is one of the main tenets of Buddha Dhamma.

Anicca points to the essentially evanescent nature of human existence. This is in contrast to the feeling that we will live forever that is commonplace especially in the young. A young person takes for granted the energy that the youthful physical body normally has.

Whilst you are living, it is important to create the causes to be born as human next life with the conditions favorable to practice.

When you come close to dying, some of the most unwholesome cetasikkas which habitually rooted deep in the mind become concentrated at the point of death. This can results in the a person having a glimpse of their future birth in a lower state of existence, becoming terrorised and become a self fulfilling prophesy.

We practice in order to be able to produce wholesome minds at the moment of death.

Since this is difficult we need to practice wholeheartedly in this life.

The range of events constructed by a person's consciousness during one lifetime produce a constructed 'own-being'. If to this 'own-being' we impute an inherent fixed existence, then a constricting suffering-inducing effect is produced.

In other words the Buddha is saying that suffering is centered around this wrong notion that we exist inherently as a self.

While some will identify themselves with a body, as it is our materialistic belief system which has become the dominant driver of values in our main stream culture, others would identify this notion of self with the notion of an eternal being or creator god.

These views are regarded by Buddha as extreme and identified as two wrong views of nihilism and eternalism.

Vasubandhu was a great Abhidharmika.

Abhidhamma is the ancient Buddhist phenomenology of moment-events, and the reduction of psychological processes to such moments. (1) The five aggregates or 'five groups' are really all the changing states which 'make up' an 'individual', and there is no central entity underlying these aggregates.

Effective translation of the Pali or Sanskrit words expressing the five groups should include a consideration of the commonly accepted 'Western' notion of a healthy person as an 'active individualist' whose achievements are constantly growing.

Effective translation should cover traditional 'Eastern' notions, which emphasize such terminal values, as, for example, Moral Self-restraint, which are not seen as order associated with progress and domination, but rather conservation of stability and inner control.

The intra personal confusion of 'Eastern' and 'Western' values may result in a conflict of values because there is no superior stance available for sorting out the value conflicts.

There are no shortcuts to mental health because cultivation of wisdom is a slow process.

The aim of the one of our past Bhavana Courses held at our Centre was to provide a superior stance to enable persons to sort out intra personal value conflicts of the type described earlier. In some sense, the Teachings might be classified as Abhidhamma based.

It is Dhamma Teachers who keep the memory of Lord Buddha alive and can make the Dhamma relevant to the students' lives.

The Students' own set of trusts and beliefs are the root causes of their suffering.

It is only in an environment of Metta or loving kindness and compassion that the Students are able to look at their root causes, enabling them to confront themselves without feeling under attack.

This is the skillful means of the Teachers.

This process was described effectively in a Dhamma talk given by Venerable Arcok Rinpoche at Melbourne University in 1989.

He taught that the Teachers or Bodhisattvas have great compassion, and through their Teaching, Practitioners can understand and develop compassion.

All people have some compassion and this is increased step-by-step until it extends to all beings in all realms.

When Practitioners have a base of great compassion, the six Paramitas (Perfections) of morality, generosity, patience, perseverance, concentration and wisdom can be practiced.

All six points should correspond with great compassion. Your practice will then be more helpful to beings who are suffering.

You will realise self-discipline.

When compassion increases, attachment and desire reduce little by little. His Holiness The Dalai Lama teaches with great compassion, not with attachment, and so the effect is greater.

The relationship of the Teacher and student is important. Rules of conduct have developed to maximise benefit of the Teachings.

It is normally difficult to calm the mind, but through concentration comes wisdom. Great patience and concentration which lead to wisdom are needed for your deeds to be more effective. With wisdom you will understand how to deal most effectively with situations in everyday life.

Teachers have great patience. Teachings are explained many times and repeated over and over. Teachers have great wisdom and use the text method for students to understand.

Students are taught how to develop compassion.

In the beginning students are taught to develop compassion for themselves, and then to develop compassion for others. They discover that when they have compassion for others, others will show compassion to them, and this creates goodwill towards neighbours.

Normally people don't compare which actions are more beneficial to others. Feelings don't usually follow reason, even if reasons are good, so when you can see what is more beneficial to others, love and compassion can be developed.

Feelings you don't like can arise, but these can be changed because of values and good qualities seen in other people.

How can we change feelings towards enemies?

If a patient did not want an operation which would cut the body, the doctor would explain the benefits, and after a time, the patient would accept the idea of the body being cut.

Feelings are not permanent and can be changed.

When a Practitioner has short periods of compassion, these can be extended for longer periods depending on practice and knowing the disadvantages of not practicing.

Compassion is defined as 'to care' or 'to protect others from harm'.

Action follows the feeling.

Compassion and wisdom are most important. When these are complete you will have all six points. Generosity comes first, but all six go together, and with this basis, the Bodhisattva Path can be practiced.

In another five day Bhavana Course held at our Centre in 1989, our resident Teacher and then President John D. Hughes focused students learning toward the development and cultivation of the seven factors of enlightenment (satta bojjhanga) in association with the Bojjhangaparitta (the Enlightenment-Factor's Protection).

The first part of the Teachings was to encourage Course Members to write their present organised beliefs, trusts and values which support their present goals. These frames of mind, when discovered, could be seen to help or hinder practice of the Buddha Dharma.

The cultivation of various enlightenment factors, strongly practiced, either prompted or unprompted, brings about the super-knowledges (abhinnya).

From this position, prescience arises which has the power to change former unwholesome (unwise) beliefs, trusts and values matrices. Prescience, a form of bodhi, could be described as a type of internal synergy: being free from any partiality or dualism; it "overcomes the extremes of emphasizing subject or object".

This mental quality is powerful enough to 'break' former misconceptions and incorrect beliefs, trusts and values, providing clear reasons for the wisdom of such an action.

Normally, this profound change of beliefs, trusts or values occurs within a second or two. It occurs with an experience of relief and gratitude that the former 'error of view' has been discovered and corrected.

New useful 'insights' are formed at this time. These can endure for many lifetimes on the matrix. By way of example, it might be mentioned the irony that many persons who had been practicing meditation for over a five to ten year period discovered (to their chagrin) their beliefs, trusts and value system matrix did not include meditation.

Upon the appearance of the prescience mental factor, meditation entered their matrix system of beliefs, trusts and values. Certain types of questions simply disappear at that point and cease to be problems.

The Tranquillity factors include the wholesome factors of consciousness, described in Pali as kayapassaddhi and cittapassaddhi (which may be glossed as body and mind tranquillity).

By investigation, it becomes evident how these two factors (in the Buddha's Discourse, of the Seven Enlightenment Factors) could result in the curing of fever of Phra Moggallana and Phra Kassapa as described in the Bojjhangaparitta.

Under these rare-to-find circumstances; with the evocation of White Tara (by the internal method of visualization), Members participated in a long life puja for the great benefit of their Teacher John D. Hughes and many beings.

The doctrine of animism or anima mundi (Stahl 1720) is the notion that inanimate objects and natural phenomena have a 'soul' or 'spirit' apart from matter as the incorrect basis to seek "protection" from objects, such as, for example, "protection arrows".

A proper analysis at all levels would be lengthy; but the correct basis should be summarised by noting the effect on Mara. ASURAKAYA (Demons) should be distinguished from Mara. Mara, the Evil One, is referred to many times in Buddhist Scriptures.

According to Buddhist tradition he sought to deflect the Buddha from the attaining of Enlightenment. Mara is shown as entirely powerless to influence Buddha in any way.

Mara appears again and again in the course of Buddhist history, sometimes assuming human or animal forms in disguise. Mara is experienced directly by any Buddhist when engaged in advanced meditation.

Mara literally means 'the killer' or the death-agent.

Mara can be overcome by following the Buddhist Way.

Since "Maric attacks" are to be expected at some stage of a Buddhist Meditators Path, the question to be asked is what wholesome Buddhist Protection Methods are valid in view of the Buddha's Teaching on morality.

Our Teacher, John D. Hughes, has had the benefit of hearing many methods used by Noble Persons in many Countries and has been fortunate in accumulating many Blessings during this process.

Simply, it is a matter of employing skillful means to defeat Mara and to realise that powerful Protectors of the present Buddha-Sasana can help you.

According to T.O. Ling, the Pali word Sasana carries sense of both 'doctrine or teaching and also rule of life' .

The Dhammapada advises that entering the Eightfold Path 'will be the bewilderment of Mara' and that the meditative ones, who enter upon the Path 'are released from the bonds of Mara'. (2) Therefore, the first need is to develop Confidence (Saddha).

Confidence is one of the beautiful cetasikas (sobhanasadharana).

Regard Mara as your examiner.

If your Saddha is incorrect, it must fall to Mara.

Try again and again till you know, without doubt, that your saddha or confidence in Buddha is correct. It should not be based on some condition that is time dependent, which falls to pieces as a function of time. Saddha should not depend on other persons or particular locations.

Dhammo Sanantano is endowed with universal values and contains no self-contradiction.

Saddha views all worldly possessions, things, ideas and views, even if they seem useful in the world, as essentially fleeting and unreal (Asara) when judged from the standpoint of Ultimate Reality.

The Real (Sara) is the Noble Eightfold Path of Morality (Sila) Mental Concentration (Samadhi) and Wisdom (Panna) leading to Nibbana. The knowledge of Deliverance and the Realisation of the knowledge of Deliverance - these are real from the standpoint of Ultimate Truth. Saddha is concerned with the Real.

The Buddhist approach to the body is to firstly begin to understand it's nature. Through understanding it's nature the correct view of how to look after it follows.

The process which enables a clear understanding of body (rupa) to arise involves various Buddhist meditations (kayanupassana).

Of the forty different types of Buddhist Meditation eighteen involve meditation on our body. This is because we do not begin Buddhist practice with a clear view of our body. It takes a lot of practice to actually to see how it really is.

The view of our body which we have grown up with often involves an egotistical view of our athleticism, bodily beauty or lack of it.

So many sufferings arise in our life because of our incorrect view of our body.

The Buddha said "when an uninstructed ordinary person experiences painful bodily feeling, he or she grieves, is afflicted, laments, beats his or her breast, cries out load, and becomes distraught. So it is said the uninstructed ordinary person has not emerged from the bottomless abyss, has not obtained a firm foothold."

"But, Bhikkhus, when an instructed Noble Disciple experiences painful bodily feeling he (or she) does not grieve, is not afflicted, does not lament, nor beat his (or her) breast, nor cry out load, nor become distraught. So it is said, Bhikkhu, the instructed Noble Disciple has emerged from the bottomless abyss and has obtained a firm foothold."

The Buddhist Path teaches that the problems and fears and sufferings associated with our body "are not overcome by pretending they do not exist"'

From CliffordÅfs discussion on the medical analogy in Buddhism and the three jhanas, he notes the understanding of the Four Noble Truths. Buddha suggested a sequence of the disease and a prescription for its cure.

The cause of the disease is rooted in basic ignorance which produces hate and craving.

There are 84,000 defilements summarised by Buddha into the three poisons of hate, greed and ignorance.

The cure for this disease is the Eightfold Path which can be briefly expressed as the threefold training of morality, which cures greed, desire and lust and uses as a means of treatment, the meditation on revulsion, the ugliness and disgust towards the object of attraction.

Concentration reduces anger, hate and revulsion by the means of meditation on compassion.

Wisdom eliminates ignorance by meditation on dependent origination.

The most important of them is the development of wisdom because it cures the root poison of ignorance from which all other poisons arise.

Clifford concludes therefore that wisdom or prajna is considered to be the ultimate medicine that cures all disease and all suffering.

Over three years and three moons, from February 1999, our teacher is teaching the Prajna Paramitta each Tuesday evening. This teaching is one way of expressing the Bodhisattva Path which aims to develop wisdom by recognising the emptiness of self and others and to generate active love and compassion as an expression of that wisdom.

The Mahayana path as detailed in the Tibetan Buddhist Medicine and Psychiatry - The Diamond Healing, is grounded in awakening the "thought of enlightenment", the Bodhicitta, the aspirations to perfection for the sake of all beings, since Buddhahood, that is, the full enlightenment, is said to exist inherently in all sentient beings but to be obscured by their defilements.

The process of Buddhist practice also involves developing mindfulness of the body in each of the four basic postures; standing, sitting, walking, lying down.

You cannot exercise mindfulness without an object.

But mindfulness can also be mindfulness of the various activities of the mind.

It is mindfulness, ultimately, that is the key to a healthy mind and a healthy body.

MAY ALL BEINGS BE WELL AND HAPPY

This script was written and edited by Vince Cavuoto, Julian Bamford, Maria Pannozzo, Philip Svensson, Frank Carter, Evelin Halls, Lisa Nelson, Anita Svensson and Leanne Eames.

References:

1. Jayasuriya Dr. W.F. " The Psychology and Philosophy of Buddhism - An Introduction to The Abhidhamma". Buddhist Missionary Society Publication, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 1976.

2. "Bag of Bones - a miscellany on the body" Compiled by Bhikkhu Khantipalo. Author's Introduction, The Wheel Publication No. 271/272. Buddhist Publication Society, Kandy, Sri Lanka 1980.

3. "Tibetan Buddhist Medicine and Psychiatry - The Diamond Healing" by Terry Clifford - published by Samuel Weiser incorporated - York Beach - 1984

4. Sutta "The Lotus of the Good Law"

5. Teachings of a Buddhist Monk - Ajahn Sumedho - 1999.

6. Reference from book: The Wisdoms Series No: 21 "How to Overcome Your Difficulties" By author K. Sri Dhammananda (1980)

7. "Gems of Dharma, Jewels of Freedom", by Je Gampopa, pulbished by Altea Publishing, Forres, Scotland, 1995.

?. Anguttara-nikaya. 1. 43, trans, Ven Nyanamoli.




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