The Atma Jyoti Blog

From “A Decent Education” a dharma talk by Ven. Thanissaro Bhikkhu. See the full talk and many others at accesstoinsight.org.

“The narrative of most people’s lives is — what? They were born, they struggled, they went through all sorts of difficulties, and then got sick and died. If they were lucky maybe they got to do some good things for their fellow human beings, but then they still just grew sick and died.

“But if you touch the Deathless, that’s a very different narrative, the narrative of a life that genuinely accomplished something, a life well lived. If you don’t touch the Deathless, the question at the end of your life is, “What was that all about? What was accomplished by all that producing and consuming, all that struggle?”

“Whatever you do in time and space is going to get changed someday, like a picture you draw with a stick in flowing water. But if you touch something outside of time and space, then life hasn’t been wasted. The narrative arc is really satisfying — because once you’ve found the Deathless it’s always there to depend on. You always have something to show for your efforts.

“And that’s the most important thing you’ll ever need to know.”

More reading:

• The Ultimate Man: from Faith to Knowing
• Buddha’s Words: the End of the Journey
• Hard Sayings of the Great Masters