Thoughts Come and Go, Yet Original Nature Remains As It Is
As we study, sometimes one sentence stays in the heart for a long time. The center of today's teaching is that original nature remains as it is. We can receive this as meaning that even though there is coming and going, arising and disappearing, the original ground does not move.
Countless thoughts arise and disappear in our minds. Joyful events come, difficult events come, the body may be ill, and happiness and unhappiness may rise and fall. Living in the world of appearances, it is hard for us to avoid that movement.
Yet that movement is not the whole of who I am. Just as the shadow of a cloud passes over the Dharma hall floor without making the floor itself disappear, thoughts, feelings, and events pass by while the place of original nature remains.
Practice is not forcing that place into existence. It is continuing to notice and examine what arises and disappears, and returning deeply to the original ground. Seeing, knowing, and the awakened mind open that path.
Today, when the mind is shaken, try noticing, 'This thought too comes and goes.' If you do not forget that original nature remains as it is, even while joy and unhappiness rise and fall, you can walk through the day's movements with a little more steadiness.
Thoughts, feelings, and events keep arising and disappearing. We rise and fall with happiness and unhappiness within that movement, but the place of original nature is originally as it is. Notice what arises, examine what disappears, and return deeply to the original ground.
