Nirvana is the highest goal and principle in the teaching of the Buddha. He awakened to the Noble Truths, the realities present in this world: suffering, the cause that gives rise to it, and the way that frees us from it. All things lie under the law of the three characteristics: impermanence, the state of what does not last; suffering, inherent in all that is impermanent; and non-self, by which nothing can be commanded to go according to our will. Everything arises, lasts a moment, and in the end dissolves.
Having discovered the truth, the Buddha out of great compassion wished all who could understand it to come to know it, so that by practice they might reach the end of suffering in Samsara — which has no discernible beginning or end — and enter Nirvana. His teaching is one of mindfulness, wisdom and reason: it asks no blind belief, nor teaches what lies beyond the reach of thought. Whatever is of no use for the end of suffering, the Buddha did not teach. He taught us to reduce and lay down greed, anger, delusion, conceit and wrong views: the more these impurities thin out in the heart, the more peace arises there.
The truth in all things
Every form and mind in this world is a witness proclaiming the truth: even a falling leaf is itself the truth. The truth is the fixed law of nature, and the Buddha taught it from nature itself. All things — conscious and not, living and not — are part of the world, and we ourselves are nature. At every moment each thing proclaims that all is impermanent and uncertain, that it holds suffering within, that nothing can be commanded but flows and changes according to conditions, and that all is empty. Yet we do not see it, veiled as we are by ignorance: the truth stands before us at every breath, but we lack the wisdom, the eye of Dharma, to understand it. Look, then, upon each thing, and hear its voice, as a Dharma teaching us — within us and outside us: there is nothing that is not the truth.
Train the mind to be pure equanimity, and reach the original, true mind — empty, calm, pure: this is the mind of Nirvana. Born into the world and living in the world, yet not bound to it; using conventions without being attached to them; letting go of suffering and happiness alike. Look upon the world with the inner eye, the eye of Dharma: then whatever arises appears as ordinary, as nature. The worldly conditions — happiness and suffering, blame and praise, gain and loss — have arisen for all, before us and after us, and as they arise so they cease, whirling without end. Whoever sees their truth draws it into the mind and contemplates it as insight, until the wisdom arises that sees clearly into the three characteristics.
Suffering is the truth present in every form and mind; happiness, on the other hand, is not real — it is only a state in which suffering has for a while lessened. If we do not bathe, the body grows unpleasant: that is suffering, arising of itself; and when we wash and feel well, that relief is only suffering diminished, waiting to return, for in time the body grows dirty again. To see suffering is to see the truth. And look upon all things as non-self: without a being, a person, an «I» or a «you» — only form and mind that formations shape for a while. Do not grasp form as «I», nor mind as «mine»; set the mind in equanimity, letting go of every illusion, and raise it above happiness, above suffering, above the world: seeing the world without turning with it, freed from ignorance and the taints, all the way to Nirvana.
The simile of the drifting log
The Supreme Teacher taught by a simile, comparing the practice of the path toward Nirvana to a log drifting on the current of a river. Every river, as a rule, flows down to the great ocean; and a log borne by the current will surely reach it, provided it is not caught along the way. So it is for you who practise, intent on Nirvana: you will reach the goal if you do not get caught as a log may be caught —
- on the near bank: losing yourself in the six inner senses — eye, ear, nose, tongue, body and mind;
- on the far bank: infatuation with their objects — form, sound, smell, taste, touch and mental objects;
- stranded on dry land: clinging to your own «self» as something important;
- hauled off by people: losing yourself in crowds and worldly pleasures;
- seized by non-humans: practising the Dharma only to gain powers, or to be reborn as a deity;
- sucked down by the whirlpool: caught in the five strands of sensuality;
- rotting of itself: living without virtue, with an impure mind and distorted views, until you abandon the practice and lose faith in it.
Whoever practises the Dharma without getting caught on these things, but follows the way the Buddha taught, will surely reach Nirvana.