Today's the second talk on dosa which is, can be dressed translated as hatred or hostility. And so we're following a sequence here of this week that yesterday I introduced the concept of non hatred as a significant state of well being that involves love and patience, calmness, peace. Not just simply the absence of hatred, but a reference point of, of a significant healthy state of being, that highlights the unsatisfactoriness of hatred that highlights how it's a it's a form of stress and tension, and pain. For for the individual who has it, when we can really see the contrast to being in a state that's, that's not hateful, not full of hatred. And today, I want to talk about just this idea of dosa itself. And then talk about net tomorrow, we'll be practicing with it. Thursday, we'll be composting hatred, the transformation of it. And Friday will be the liberation from hatred and what's possible with F liberation. So the it's important to appreciate that this word hatred, dosa means hostility. It's ancient texts talk about it being a wanting to harm. And it can also involve intense dislike, it kind of intense opposition to others, where that dislike in opposition is a form of harm making, that others feel somehow belittled or boxed in or oppressed or disrespected in some big way. When they dislike them, the the aversion is so strong. And now there can be kind of simple dislike of things. And people leave in indirect, maybe dislike of their activities, what they do. But it doesn't have to translate to any kind of disrespect for others. It doesn't have to even diminish our love for others possible to have a kind of a heartfelt warmth towards others, even if we dislike some of the things that they do. But the intensity of it. Even if we don't think we hate someone or feel hostility, and the intensity of like, we don't feel like we want to harm them, the intensity of the dislike is a form of hatred. And what it's not, or what it overlaps with, and sometimes includes and sometimes doesn't his anger. And this is important, because if we treat the anger and this dosa hostility as the same thing, then all anger is seen as being a problem or be a source of suffering. But if we see it as sometimes anger is a very passioned sense of no sense of This is injustice. This is not right. And the intensity of it might look like something that resembles hostility, but there doesn't have to be any hostility in it. I've been on the receiving end end of what I call the white anger, where I felt there was zero hostility. But and in fact, I felt I don't know if I felt friendship from the person, but I felt no hostility, I felt safe, though the anger was intense. And they won't occur they occur and so I'm thinking about it, the intensity was in the message of No, don't do that again. And, and as soon as the message was delivered, I could feel the person just kind of let it go. And and it was an appropriate message and it was received and I was inspired by the CLI how clean it was. That's intensity of No. So it was kind of an anger, but I was no hostility as part of it. So this is the way in which we have hostility and our this movement of hatred can harm is
a way of we harm ourselves. And that's why the reference point of non hatred is so useful because we see how we're harming ourselves. That it's like a wood fire, where the, the, the wood is both the fire is arising out of the wood, and it's the fire is burning the wood. So in the same way, the heat of hatred of burns, the one who's on fire with it, harms it. Generally when there's hatred, this dose, the attention of the mind is externally directed, is directed to the object of the hostility. And in some people, it takes the form of blame. Sometimes attempt takes the form of being hypercritical and unwillingness to see anything good about the other person and only sees that aspect which is bad and, or problematic. Sometimes there's a recoiling from our own pain, by blaming by finding something outside of us to either blame, or attack, or to be hostile towards sometimes is a deflection from being willing to experience our personal pain and suffering. And, and somehow redirecting that that pain in a sense, outward. And sometimes it's quite clearly to cause other people, other people should feel pain, I'm feeling pain, so other people should feel pain. And so to recognize how hostility has this, and also, there can be hostility towards oneself. Some people hate themselves or some aspect of themselves. And they're also there's a kind, it's not exactly externally focused. But there's a kind of objectification of something that the mind is directed towards. And anytime there's this objectification, then there is an alienation, both an alienation from the other person that we might feel that towards the other thing we feel that for, we're no longer there present, to be able to see and feel experience fully what's there, we're now seeing it through a particular filter, the filter of hate and hostility, aversion. And, and every everything is seen in that light. We everything is wrong, everything is we just pick up all the problems. And, but also, so that's an alienation, we don't really they're fully for the person. It's also an alienation towards oneself. That because we're involved in kind of an intense objectification of something, we're involved in the thought, that idea, a concept of something that they attention is kind of towards that object and towards thinking about it, that we lose touch with ourselves. And so when there is intense hostility, then, you know, it doesn't have to be intense, but there's hostility. It comes with all these different aspects. It comes with a burning, tension and tightening, a stressful state to be in. It comes with an objectification of something that is alienating that the disconnecting. And rose we'll see tomorrow, the task of mindfulness is to reestablish the connection, or overcome the alienation both towards others and towards oneself, by opening up and really being present. A part of because hostility and hatred is so compelling at times. Sometimes it's, it produces its own, you know, produces its own fire, that hurts that that hurt of the or the stress of alienation. It produces more of the same. And it kind of like, it keeps looking outwards for more things to hate, or more things to feel bad about to be critical of. And so there's a loop that of hate sometimes where it's difficult sometimes to get out of, because to do not to not to have the object of the hate or the is to allow us to allow oneself to feel what's happening here. And that's just too difficult. Sometimes intense hatred comes from maybe from good reasons within, you know, it could be that there's an intense protectiveness, maybe there's fear a good reason. There are people who cause harm. And
and so then it's easy to justify the hatred because it's a fun protection from justifiable things we should, you know, just wrote Bible reasons to be protected. And, and but the question is that really the best way to protect ourselves? And I can't I'm not going to answer that question for any individual. But because his circumstances are so complex that I don't want to say that never have hatred, if that's what protects you from the harm that other people are doing. But I believe that it's possible to be trained or be reflective or be have a presence of mind that allows us to protect ourselves in other ways, besides using returning hatred with hatred with returning harm with harm. And, but you know how to find that that's, you know, interesting that this important topic, but the beginning of it, is to have a willingness to study our own hatred, to really our hostility, to really stop and take a look at it. And if, and maybe the words hatred and hostility are, you know, such such intense words, that you maybe feel this doesn't relate to you often, but hostility and, and hatred are also very subtle forms of aversion, subtle forms of dislike in opposition to something such as subtle, subtle, sometimes, there's biting humor we use to kind of get back at people. Sometimes we say cutting things, because, you know, we're upset with someone, we want to kind of step, you know, step up verbal daggers and stab them a little bit. There's all kinds of subtle and subtle ways in which we express hostility, or say things which we don't believe we're wanting to harm anyone, but there is a kind of subtle, kind of, kind of attack that happening. So to become sensitive to this, to become aware of this, and spend some time being willing to look at personal hostility, aversion that sometimes takes the form of prejudice and bias, sometimes takes the form of, of turning away, walking away, shutting down ignoring, where we feel like I'm not hostile, but we are going to shut them out of our hearts. And, and it is a kind of hostile act. And so, but the study had to really get to know it. And it's a worthwhile exercise to do, and even if it's just for these next 24 hours, is to kind of review how this dose the both mild and intense as been part of your life and, and how it's part of your life still and when it manifests, and were the conditions that bring about and then what your relationship to it is. Do you hate it? Do you are you distraught that you have this within you? do you justify it quickly, right? almost automatically, how is it and see if you can practice this clear recognition, is to kind of relax with it. And and find assignment place where you can relax, and just kind of allow it to be there. So you can start seeing it clearly. without the interference of hating or hate, being distraught over hate being critical of her hate. Turning away from it, trying to fix it right away. Spend time getting to know it. It's the really getting to know and understanding how it is for us, that lays the foundation for practicing with it well, and moving on towards freedom. And because in Buddhism, the freedom from greed, hatred, delusion is the definition is one of the primary definitions for what full liberation is. It's a well worth to that to spend some time with each of these but this week with, with hostility, hatred, dislike and really kind of understanding how it works for you, and hopefully you don't get discouraged or depressed. Hopefully you feel in a certain way encouraged that this is the way forward this is a wise and mature thing to do. And then tomorrow we'll talk about practicing with it. So thank you, and and May this all be for the purpose of non hatred. Thank you
