2022-02-11 Satipaṭṭhāna (28) The Four Elements Perspective
IInsight Meditation CenterFeb 11, 2022 at 3:56 pm12min
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00:03Gil Fronsdal
Maybe today can function as another introduction to the topic of what is classically called "the four elements" – the four dhātu(s) in Pali. These are aspects of our felt experience that can be seen to be associated with elements of the physical world around us. I think the four elements practice can have very profound meanings and associations owing to that connection to the world.
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00:49Gil Fronsdal
I prefer to translate the word dhātu as "properties", because, to me, "elements" implies some kind of molecule, or something very essential or elemental. The word "element" does not have to mean that of course, but I prefer "property," because this points to a property "of" something – as in the properties of our body and of the sensations we are experiencing.
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01:27Gil Fronsdal
There are four, and they are always listed in a particular order: earth, water, fire and air. The reason for that order is that, in the ancient Indian cosmology, there is a belief that the earth is on the bottom, and then the water floats on the earth. Above that, there is the heat and the fires that flare up into the air. And then there is the air. There is a progression.
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02:07Gil Fronsdal
Doing this meditation on the four elements or properties means using a very different lens – taking a different perspective on our direct experience than that which many of us normally live in, which is that of concepts and ideas. For example, I have this big bell here. I can just think about it as a bell, and what a great bell it is. And remember who gave it to us, and how wonderful it was to receive this gift. How we have used it for so many years, and the different places and ways we have used it. I can be in that world – in the mind of memory, thoughts, and ideas.
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02:57Gil Fronsdal
Or I can change the lens of my experience to not be in the ideas, the history, the memory, and what this proves about IMC – that it is a really worthy meditation center because it has a good bell. Instead, I can just feel its weight, its smoothness, its temperature. It feels cool to touch right now, with my warm hands. I can feel some smoothness in it, and also there are little indentations on the sides that I can feel. It is fun to let my hands rub across the indentations as they come and go.
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03:32Gil Fronsdal
I can get into the sensations, independent of it being a bell. The bell-ness of it does not need to be relevant. I can close my eyes and just be with the sensations. It does not have to be a bell. It could it be something very different.
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