Every minute listening to the Dharma 

is one less minute of harmful thoughts. 

Those of us who have tried to calm our mind with chanting have very likely experienced the barrage of thoughts streaming through it. To make matters worse, most of those thoughts are neither loving nor compassionate. They do not arise from gratitude or contentment. No, they’re triggered by destructive habits like worry, anger, jealousy, fear, and frustration.

When trying to meditate, we can become aware of such harmful thoughts.

But what about when we’re doing everyday tasks?

In our routine state of mental overload coupled with being occupied physically, we fail to detect what’s happening. Little wonder, we don’t notice all the damaging seeds we keep planting in our store consciousness.

What’s a person to do?

Listen to the Dharma! Every single second that our mind is engrossed in the Dharma, untold numbers of detrimental thoughts are averted and their perilous seeds never sown.

Cultivation is like rowing a boat upriver (Click to view video)

Don’t do what I do,

do what I say. 

I don’t have any statistics to prove my theory, but I think it would be safe to say that parents have been saying this to their children for millennia. If not longer. And if not in so many words, then in their behavior.

“Turn off your TV!” as they turn on the soccer finals from the UK.

“Don’t waste time playing on your phone!” as they text a friend about the latest kerfuffle at work.

“You’re spending too much time on the Internet!” as they resume their computer game.

“Talk nicely to your brother!” as they return to a heated discussion with a neighbor.

Children learn by observing.

And if what parents say isn’t what they do, their children will see the disparity. And want to know why they should follow the rules when their parents aren’t. It’s pretty tough to come up with a good answer to such logic. “Because I’m your mother/father” won’t cut it. Unless parents want a mini-rebellion on their hands, they’d be better off doing what they’re telling their children to do.