(E17)-01-Dana

Brothers and sisters in the Dharma, today our topic is lay Dharma practice or lay Buddhist practice. Lay Buddhist practice normally in the Buddha's teachings starts off with dhāna. Dhāna is charity. Charity or making offerings. It means that you can either offer material things or, as they say in Hokkien, you can offer work, you can offer sympathy, kind words, you can offer time to be with your friends, etc. For example, if any one of our friends has got cancer or dying, then we should go and offer our sympathy, be near that person. Don't be like some people who don't understand the Dharma, they like to pantang. They say, better don't go after I get sick. Especially like funeral, dare not go. That's not good. If we say we practice metta, loving kindness, and that is very important in the Buddha's teachings, then whenever any one of our friends is in trouble or needs us, we should always be there. Christians are well known for this. That's why a lot of people like Christianity. So those things that are good, Christianity or whatever religion, as long as it's good, we should follow. What is not good, we should throw away, even if it's Buddhist. Dhāna, charity, just now I said the different types of dhāna, and it is mentioned as the first item for lay persons to practice. Not that there are no other practices easier to do, for example, chanting, bowing, repentance, pangse, liberation of animals from captivity. All these can also be done, but they are not really important. For example, chanting. Chanting, although it is useful, it gives us support, but it is not important enough for the Buddha to mention it actually in the discourses. by bowing repentance is also not something that the Buddha taught, something that we created ourselves, Buddhists created. Even this pangse, the Buddha also did not specifically tell us to do it because some of these things, for example, like eating vegetarian food, that is no good. It's also quite good because it gives you this sense of compassion. But it's not important enough for the Buddha to mention it. In other words, even if you don't do it, it's all right. It's not so important. But dhāna is important, charity. And this, for example, this vegetarian practice, a lot of people, we say, Buddhists chak chaya, sik chaya. Sikchaya and Sikso is different. Buddhists, we practice Sikchaya. It's not a Buddhist practice to Sikso, you know. Sikso is vegetarian. Sikchaya, the meaning is not vegetarian. Sikchaya, the meaning is after a certain time you don't eat. That means between one o'clock in the afternoon until the next morning about seven o'clock, you don't eat normal food. That's why Puasa is called what? Kaichai or something. Fasting. So actually Sekchai, the meaning is fasting. After a certain time, you don't eat. Not that you eat vegetarian food. So a lot of people don't understand the way Buddhist Sekchai, but they think it's eating vegetarian food. This dhāna is the easiest thing, easiest important thing for lay persons to practice. Why is it easiest? Because the Buddha said that any dhāna you do, any charity you do, should not harm yourself, should not harm others. In other words, you don't give until you suffer. You have extra, then you give. Of course, during the Buddha's time, there were some people who had so much faith in the Buddha and his disciples that they gave too much. These people are normally stream-enterers, those people who have already understood the Dhamma, they have already entered the stream, the ariya. So sometimes they are poor, yet they give beyond their means. And it is in the monk's precepts that a monk, if he knows that there is such a family where they give beyond their means, it is in the monk's precepts that a monk should not go to that house. to go and beg for food. So the monks, if they know there's such a person, they will spread the word around. This house is giving too much, making themselves suffer, making their children suffer. So the monks try to avoid that house. Not that we don't want them to give charity, but we don't want them to overdo it. Some people, they overdo things. So we must know our limit. Even charity also, we must know our limit. So in this way, it contradicts some... Nowadays, our Dharma, our Buddhist teachings is a bit rojak. So there are certain things like jataka stories. We think it is actually real stories, but it's not real. It's created by later monks and all that. So these jataka stories are supposed to be stories of the Buddha's past lives and how he perfected the paramis, certain perfections of character. For example, in the Dana parami story, it is said that our Buddha in his past life, he saw a hungry tiger. a female tiger, so hungry, had no milk to give the cubs. So the cubs were going to die. So out of pity, he jumped from the top of the hill, committed suicide, so that his body could feed the tiger, so that the tiger could feed the cubs. This type of teaching actually contradicts the Buddha's teaching. Because the Buddha's teachings is that a good person's charity should not harm himself and should not harm others. So in the same way, you cannot go to the market and choose a fat chicken. and ask somebody to slaughter it. So that is one of the characteristics of a good dāna, must not harm yourself, must not harm others. Then there are others, like timely. Your dāna or charity should be timely. For example, when the tsunami hit a lot of places, then people need help. That's the time to be generous. So that's a timely dāna. Then another good thing is dāna must be made joyfully. Before you're going to do a dāna offering, even the thought of doing the dāna, you should be very happy, you should rejoice. And then when you are doing the dāna, again you should be very happy. And after you have done the dāna, and when you think about it again, again you should be very happy. Because the Buddha said that if you have this joyful heart in giving, then the merit is more. There is a story about a man in Savatthi, long time ago. He was a very stingy man. Then his wife like to do dana, like to give alms to beggar monks, mendicant monks. But the husband was not happy. But one day when, as they say, kin katit as he, he was in a good mood, he asked the wife to go and do charity for any monk that comes. So the wife was so happy to hear that, that the wife cooked special food, specially good food on that day. So it so happened on that day, a Pachekka Buddha came, a real Buddha who doesn't teach. So the Pachekka Buddha came to the house and the wife happily gave good food to this monk. And then when the monk was leaving the house, the husband came back to get something. Then he saw the monk leaving the house. He stopped the monk and then he opened the monk's bowl. Curious what the wife gave, opened the monk's bowl. He saw such good food, closed pack. He was very unhappy. He thought, what man, my wife cooked such good food for this monk. He'll go and eat and then he'll go and find some tree and sleep under the tree in the forest. He thought to himself, if this food was given to my workers, they can do much more productive work for me. So because of having that thought of regret, remorse, not feeling happy, many lifetimes later, he became the richest man in the same town, Savatthi. Why? Because he asked the wife to do dāna to a pācika buddha. So when that karma ripened, he became the richest man in that town. But he was a kedukud kiamsiap, very stingy, selfish person. A stingy or selfish person, he doesn't know how to enjoy his money. He doesn't know how to make himself happy or make his relatives, his family happy with that money. for that very reason, because he did not have a happy mind when that dāna was performed. So that's why the Buddha says it's important that we have this joy in giving. So next time when the karma ripens, we will be happy and we will enjoy the wealth and also make our relatives happy. Also, when we do charity, we should try to give good things, not things that we want to throw away. Some people, they have something old because the husband bought something new for them. Don't want to throw away, sayang. But use also they don't want to use. Sometimes they go and bring it to the monastery. So sometimes we did a lot of second-hand things. But it's not very good. Next time when your karma ripens also, you also won't get so good things. And then the other thing is when you do dāna, you must give respectfully. Last time when I was young, we had a lot of beggars around. So sometimes we find this poor beggar coming, begging for money and sometimes people just throw the money at them. No respect. It's no good. If you want to give, give nicely. So these are the characteristics of a good dana.

(E17)-02-Five-destinations-of-rebirth

Dana is the least meritorious of all the other, compared to other ways of getting married, this one is the least. Why is it the least? Because it is the easiest to do. Anything easy to do is not so valuable. So, but it is very important to do, because the Buddha said every time we are reborn, there are five places of rebirth that await us. The best is the heavenly plane, and then below that is the human realm. And then below that are three woeful planes of existence. Khoi Toh, the ghost realm, the animal realm, and the hell realm. These last three are called Dugati, woeful places of rebirth. The first two, heaven and human realm, are called Sugati, happy places of rebirth. So because human realm is a happy place of rebirth, every day that we live and enjoy life, we are using up our blessings. So it is important that we replenish our blessings. Actually a lot of people don't realise our human plane is very near the ghost realm. Very near. You can see this from the simile. The Buddha gave a lot of, a few similes. to let us know these five destinations of rebirth, how they compare. So the Buddha said, if you go into hell, it's like a person who has fallen into a deep pit full of burning charcoal, burning embers. So you are burned and you are trying to jump out of that pit, but that pit is higher than your height. and you cannot jump out of the pit, so you are burning inside there and you are falling down and the charcoal is burning you. That's a simile for hell. Then the animal realm, the simile the Buddha said is like a person who has fallen into a shit hole, full of shit, and also deeper than a man's height, so you cannot jump Out of that pit, you are wallowing in that pit, struggling to come out, and you are swallowing shit, and shit is all over your body. as a simile for the animal realm. And then the ghost realm, the simile is like a man who has walked a long distance, he is tired and thirsty and hungry and then he finds a tree and he likes to take a rest from the hot sun under the tree. But the tree There are not so many leaves on the tree, so when he rests under the tree, he still feels the heat of the sun, so he is not very comfortable under the tree. Now the human realm is another man, same like that, who has walked a long distance, hungry and tired and thirsty, and he comes under a tree, but that tree is full of leaves. So he takes a rest under the tree and he feels quite comfortable and she eats him from the hot sun. And then the last one is the heaven realm. The heaven realm is like a person who is tired and hungry and thirsty and then he comes into a big mansion which is luxurious. He goes inside, there's a nice dunlop pillow. air-con, everything, so he's very comfortable and nice in that big house and that is the Heaven Realm. So you compare the Human Realm and the Ghost Realm, you see both of them are under the tree. So not very much, not so great difference. That is why you find a lot of people, after we die, we fall into the Ghost Realm. That's why you notice Chinese, we believe, seven days after our relative passes away, they say he'll come back. And sure enough, very often he comes back. But not necessarily seven days, sometimes one day, sometimes two days, sometimes three days. So that's why the Buddha said it's very easy for us to go into the woeful plane of rebirth. We are not careful. And to give an example, you see, there are drug addicts. If you come across a drug addict, you will know that after they try to rehabilitate, as they are trying to give up their drug, they act like a hungry ghost. Always very hungry, always want to eat. And then there are cases, I know, where they have this, they suffer from bulimia. When they eat, they eat like a hungry ghost. They eat two or three times what a normal person can eat. Then a few minutes later, he'll vomit everything out. So, two hours later, he's hungry again. Again, he'll eat, gorge himself full. After a few minutes later, again, he'll throw out everything. So, this is a characteristic that shows that person is having that character of a ghost already. And these people, you'll notice, at night they cannot sleep. Cannot sleep at night. Try to sleep also cannot sleep at night. Daytime they will fall asleep. That is the characteristic of a ghost and animal also. Even you see, we read in the papers, half-time princess Diana, before she passed away. She also had suffering from bulimia. Why? Enjoy too much. Too much enjoyment uses up our blessings. A few years ago, the richest man in the world was Howard Hughes, multi-millionaire. He used to date all the beautiful Hollywood film stars. And then when he was old, before he passed away, he also was like that. He locked himself in the flat, in the condominium, don't want to see people, don't want to bathe, kept his hair long, don't want to cut his hair, don't want to cut his nails. So from this, you can see, if we use up our blessings, that's where we are headed for. That's why the Buddha said it's very important for us to do charity to replenish the blessings we use up. Just like your bank account. Every now and then, you go to an ATM machine, pick up $1,000, $1,000. You don't put in money. Mana ada $1,000 for you to take out? So in the same way, we have to replenish our merit, our blessings, bank.

(E17)-03-Sila

The second thing for lay persons to practice is sila, precepts, moral conduct. Moral conduct, the Buddha said that the least that we should practice is panca sila, the five precepts. The first precept is not to kill intentionally. The second is not to take what is not given. The third is not to commit adultery if you already have a husband or a wife, not to find some other man or woman. And then the fourth is not to lie. And the fifth is not to take intoxicants, liquor or drugs to the extent where you lose control of yourself. So these five precepts are very basic. It is so basic that if you break some of these precepts, you'll also get into trouble with the law. For example, if you go and kill somebody, you might get gantong, death sentence. Or you steal somebody's property, you'll end up in jail. You commit adultery, also you'll be caught for, in some religions, kalwat. Even if you are not a Muslim, also you get in trouble with the law, committing adultery. And then if you lie and cheat people, also you'll end up behind the bars. And if you take liquor or drugs and you lose control of yourself, also you get into big trouble. Sometimes people, if they want to cheat, want to con another person, he will make that person drink until that fellow is a bit tipsy already and make him sign something, an agreement. So sometimes we get cheated that way. Now actually, initially the Buddha did not talk about five precepts, he talked about seven precepts. The first is the same, not to kill. The second is not to take what is not given. The third is not to commit adultery. These three are the same. And then the fourth also is the same, not to lie. And then the fifth, sixth and seventh has got to do with verbal karma. The fifth one is not to tell fairy tales to cause people to quarrel and fight. For example, you hear A talking bad about B, You don't go and carry tales to B, that they tell B what A said, all this rubbish about you and all this thing, and then he calls A and B quarrel and fight, patu api. So that's the fifth precept. The sixth precept is not to speak coarse words, rough words, vulgar words. And the seventh precept is not to engage in idle gossip. Wasting time, gossip, talking about other people and all that. Wasting time. So, the Buddha talked about these seven precepts initially. These seven precepts, you notice, the first three is body karma. Killing, stealing, committing adultery is body karma. The last four is verbal karma. lying, carrying tales to cause people to quarrel, using coarse or vulgar language, and the last one, idle gossip. So you find here, the verbal karma is four, because it's very easy to commit verbal karma, so we have to be careful of our tongue. That's it, every person is born with an axe in the mouth. We wag our tongue too much, we cut ourselves and we cut others. Now, the Buddha also said that lay persons, because you don't have time to siu heng, to cultivate the spiritual path every day, at least once a week you should take the trouble to cultivate the spiritual path. At least once a week, you should keep the eight precepts, what Chinese call Pa Kwan Chai. So the eight precepts are not to kill, not to take what is not given, not to engage in sexual conduct, not to lie, not to take intoxicants, And then you add another three. The number six is not to eat afternoon, from one o'clock in the afternoon until the next morning about seven o'clock. You don't eat normal food. But in our monastery, you can still take Milo and milk powder and all that so you won't be hungry. And then the seven precepts, actually there are two precepts inside the seven precepts. That is, one is not to see shows, or listen to music, or sing songs. And another part of it is not to 化妆, not to use cosmetics, and dress yourself up, or use perfumes and all that. So this is the 7 precepts. The 8 precepts is not to sleep on high and luxurious beds. So these are the 8 precepts. So once a week you should try to keep these 8 precepts. You can either keep it in this Buddhist society or in a monastery or if you can't then you can keep it at home. Last time, during the Buddha's time, encouraged people to keep the 8 precepts on 4 days of the month. The lunar calendar or Chinese calendar, the 8th day, the 15th day, the 23rd and the 30th day. If no 30th, then 29th day. These are the Uposatha days. And then later Mahayana Buddhism changed the 30th day to the 1st day. But originally it was 30th. Why these 4 days? Anybody know? I think I mentioned before. Ah, the devas come. Devas come down to see who are, whether the human realm people are keeping eight precepts or not. So if you are keeping the eight precepts, they are very happy. Ah, Patricia is going to become a devi. So the devas and devis are going to welcome you. They know who is going to come up to heaven. That's why they come and see. Now this keeping seal is more meritorious than doing dhāna because it's more difficult to do. A lot of people, they do not come to the Buddhist society to listen to Dharma talk. They say, after this Bhante tells me all about these precepts, if I don't keep the precepts, it will be a big sin. But if I don't listen, then I can plead ignorance. But you cannot plead ignorance. Now this sila, if we keep the sila, it prevents us from taking rebirth in the animal realm and the hell realm. You know the character of animals. First one is very fierce, right? Animals tend to fight and kill. Another one, very lustful. Lust is very strong. Anger is very strong. So if you don't keep the precepts, you will also kill. and then you will, you break the third precept, you also commit adultery, and then if you take liquor too much, what you are not supposed to do, you do, what you are not supposed to say, you say. So that is why you notice from here, that if you don't keep the precepts, very easy to fall into the animal and the hell realm. And when you fall into hell realm, don't think that you don't know why you are there. In the sutra, the Buddha said when a person is suffering in hell, then you know exactly why you are suffering in hell. Now according to the Buddha, these two things, dāna and sila, if you do very little dāna and sila, These two, to a very low degree, the chances are that after you pass away, you still get a human body, but you will be a person with very little blessings. Born into a poor family, maybe you are cacat, paraplegic, and then cari makan also very susah. Not enough blessings. But these two, Dana and Sila, if you keep to a medium degree, then the chances are that you'll be reborn as a human being with a lot of blessings. You look at a person like, now the richest man in the world is who? Bill Gates. It seems, I'm told, he's reported in the newspaper, he's so rich, he says he's going to give 95% of his money away. Not give his son, you know, he's going to give away in charity. Only keep 5% for himself. I think about a month ago I was listening to the BBC radio. They reported that he gave away US$750 million to help children. to help children, to inoculate them against diseases. Because he estimates, one thousand US dollars can save one life. So he gave 750 million. Calculate there how many lives he saved. So you see this person, how come he is born as the richest, he can become the richest man in the world? Because must be in a previous life, he is also so generous like that. So generous. There are a lot of rich men, really rich like Henry Ford. So rich, you see he set up the Ford Foundation. Ford Foundation is quite famous, do a lot of charity. Very good, this orang putih, these people, when they are very rich, they do charity to help a lot of people. Not like our Chinese. Chinese, you have money, they only think of the children. And sometimes only think of the sons, not even the daughters. That is selfish.

(E17)-04-Supramundane-Merit

Okay, so this dana and sila, these two things that you do is meritorious, but it only gives you what in Hokkien we call hok tik, hok ki, worldly merit. And then it doesn't give you kong tik. Kong tik is supramundane merit. that will help you get out of saṃsāra, the round of rebirths. To get out of saṃsāra, to get out of this round of rebirths, we must cultivate kaunteka, which is supramundane merit. And the easiest way is to listen to Dharma. Listen to the suttas if you can. The discourses of the Buddha is the best. If you can't read, then you can listen to my tapes, my CDs. I'm sure you all have here. Because if you listen to the Buddha's teachings, you will get something that is very, very important and very, very valuable. What is that? Right view. Once you get right view, you are an Arya. You are a person who has stepped out on the way to Nibbana already. And right view is the first factor of the Noble Eightfold Path. The Buddha said to get out of samsara, we have to practice the Noble Eightfold Path, which has eight factors. And this Noble Eightfold Path begins with Right View. You don't simply start the Noble Eightfold Path anywhere. It must start with Right View. And right view, the Buddha said, will bring you to right thoughts, and right thoughts will bring you to right speech, and right speech will bring you to right action, which will bring you to right livelihood, which will bring you to right effort, which will bring you to right recollection, which will bring you to right concentration. So the Noble Eightfold Path must be cultivated in that order, one by one in that order. So some people, they don't understand, they start meditating. They start meditating, they meditate, meditate, meditate. After many years, they can't get what they want, they give up. They give up the Buddha's teaching, give up Buddhism. You don't start with meditation. Meditation is the last factor of the Noble Eightfold Path. You must start with all the others, especially right view. And this right view is something that everybody should try to get. In the sutras, the Buddha said when a deva is about to pass away, a heavenly being is about to pass away, he will know and the other devas will know. Why? Because normally their body, they have very fine clothes and they have flowers and all that and very nice smell and very bright. When they are about to pass away, their clothes will start to get dirty. They will start to sweat. They will start to have body odour when they sweat. And then they start to feel very restless, agitated. Normally they are very happy and peaceful, but now they are about to pass away. After using up all their blessings, they get very excited, very agitated. Then their friends know, you know. Then their friends will come and give them three advice, three very important advice. What are these three advice? First one, ask them to be reborn in the human realm. Because they have already used up their karma as a deva, they have to go down. Go down, the first one is the human realm, after that the three woeful planes. But the three woeful planes is suffering. So the best is the human realm. If they still have enough good karma, they can be reborn in the human realm. So their friends will tell them, go and take rebirth in the human realm, at least try to. Then the second thing, the friends will tell them, to acquire faith in the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, that means to follow the Buddhist religion. The third one, their parents will tell them to listen to the Buddha's teachings and get right view. Because if they get right view, they become a stream enterer, become an Arya. So these three things are very important. Now we have the human body, now we have the chance to listen to the Dharma, now we are following the Buddhist religion. The important thing now for you all to do is to listen to Dharma enough or study the Buddha's teachings enough so that you get right view. Once you get right view, you have acquired the most precious thing you can get in this world. And to meet the true Dharma is very difficult, you know. A lot of people don't realize how difficult it is to meet the true Dharma. A lot of people, because they don't understand, they think, oh, now what's the use of practicing now? Next time I make a vow, I go and meet Maitreya Buddha. Next time, firstly, to meet Maitreya Buddha is so difficult. Secondly, if you meet Maitreya Buddha, what are you going to get? The same teaching. The same Dhamma that you are getting now is not going to be something different. Teaching of the Dhamma is always the Four Noble Truths, Dependent Origination, Five Aggregates, always the same thing. So don't be so silly as to wait for another time. Now is the time.

(E17)-05-Conclusion

Because the Buddha said he looked into the past, the Buddha must have sat up the whole night from 6 p.m. until 6 a.m. looking into the past. He looked into his past lives. He said he looked so long, 91 world cycles. One world cycle, the Buddha said, is very hard to imagine how long it is. Very very hard to imagine how long it is. And yet the Buddha looked into 91 world cycles and he said he saw only 6 Sammasambuddhas. 6 Buddhas who are willing to teach the Dhamma. But there are a lot of Pacheka Buddhas. So from here you can know 99.99% of Buddhas are Pacheka Buddhas. So don't think that it's so great to become a Buddha. Buddha means he can enlighten all beings and all that. By the time you become a Buddha, you don't want to teach. Because it's very difficult to teach people. Sometimes they don't want to listen, sometimes they talk bad about you. You know, Sakyamuni Buddha, he is an enlightened Arahant Samasambuddha. Yet, he has certain disciples, like one monk. And he was with the Buddha. He was observing the Buddha. My teacher never practiced all these ascetic practices. But he looked at the external sect people practicing all kinds of ascetic practices. He was praising all these external sect monks and looking down at our Buddha. And then he asked the Buddha to show him psychic power, miracles. The Buddha refused to show him. Finally he disrobed. He disrobed and then talked a lot of bad things about the Buddha. Then when the other disciples of the Buddha heard about it, they came and reported to the Buddha. And the Buddha said, this stupid man. Then the Buddha, because he said the Buddha never practiced ascetic practices, the Buddha informed his disciples. Six years, all kinds of ascetic practices the Buddha practiced. Anything you mention, the Buddha practiced. Until he used to follow the cows, the cow shit, he would eat the cow shit. Bad shit also he eat, dry shit also he eat. Sampai, his own shit also he ate. Because he was so eager to become enlightened, he tried everything, anything that some teacher taught, he will follow. And he followed all these ecstatic practices until he nearly died. Because he was so thin, he said he was eating one grain of rice a day. We eat one bowl of rice also, sometimes not enough. He ate one grain of rice a day until he said his cheeks sunk in, his bones protruded out, his eyes sunk in like a deep well like that, and then when he touched his stomach he could touch his backbone and he had no backside. And because he was suffering from malnutrition so badly, he said when he rubbed his skin, the hair would drop off. So the Buddha was somebody who did not like to boast of his practices. That's why he didn't want to talk about all these things until his disciples talked bad about him. Then only he brought up all these things. And then miracles also, he performed miracles, but this stupid disciple, he didn't realize. So you see, it's very difficult, even for some Buddha to teach. A lot of people talk bad about him, that's why most Buddhas don't want to teach. Now all the Buddha's disciples, the Buddha called them Savakas. Savakas means hearers or listeners. All the Buddha's disciples, whether lay disciples or monk or nun disciples, it's very important for them to listen to the Buddha's words. That's why they are called Savakas hearers. Buddha didn't call them meditators, didn't call them yogis, called them Savakas. So, because they listen to the Buddha's words, then they become an Aryan disciple. If they didn't listen to the Buddha's words, they can practice meditation until they get psychic power, but they are not going to get out of the round of rebirth. Just like some Indian yogis, they have very powerful psychic powers, but because they did not have the good fortune, the good luck to hear the Buddha's words, they cannot get out of samsara. That's why it's very important to listen to the Buddha's words. Now the last thing that you can practice even as a lay person is meditation. And meditation in the Buddha's teachings is always Samatha. Samatha means tranquility meditation because In the Majjhima Nikaya, somebody asked Ananda, the Venerable Ananda, what type of meditation is praised by the Buddha? What type of meditation is not praised by the Buddha? Then he said, the type of meditation praised by the Buddha is the first jhana, second jhana, third jhana, fourth jhana. These are states of deep absorption. In the fourth jhana, the Buddha said, the breath also stops. person stops breathing in the fourth jhāna. But the person is very blissful. So the type of meditation which is not praised by the Buddha is the type of meditation, if you practice it, you cannot cut off the five hindrances. All of us is blocked by five. Ill will or anger. Third one is sloth and topper. Fourth is restlessness and worry. And the fifth is doubt. So these five hindrances envelope us so that we don't see very clearly. But if we attain deep concentration, these five hindrances fall down, fall down to such a low level that it does not obstruct us anymore. So actually the aim of meditation is to eliminate the five hindrances and attain the jhanas. Because the Buddha said once you attain the jhanas, then wisdom comes, you can see very clearly. After we attain jhana, then if we listen to the suttas, to the teachings of the Buddha, the Dhamma, the effect is different. If a person has not attained concentration, or perfect concentration, If a person listens to the Buddha's teachings, he can become a stream-enterer, a stream-winner, sotapanna. Actually, it is the first path, the first magga, and this magga will change to pala before that person dies. So the first path person, stream-enterer, will become a sotapanna before he dies. But if a person has attained jhana, deep concentration, when he listens to the same sutta, he either becomes an anagamin or an arahant, third fruition or fourth fruition. The effect is different, whether we have jhana or we don't have jhana. So for final liberation, attaining the jhanas is a must. But even if you cannot attain jhana as a lay person, since it's very difficult, just meditating every day, you will make your mind more tranquil and this has a lot of benefits. If you meditate in the morning before you work, when you go to office, the whole day you can stand pressure better. Even if people scold you and all that, you don't get angry so easily. That's the effect of meditation. Meditation makes us very tranquil. We don't get agitated. We can withstand pressure. Nowadays, people who are dying of cancer, they are taught to meditate. I have a friend who is a specialist doctor in Australia. He takes care of people who are dying from cancer. He said nowadays, they give you a painkiller because your pain is so intense, you're dying of cancer. After some time, the painkiller doesn't work because you're thinking of pain all the time in your mind. It becomes imprinted in your mind. It's always pain, pain, pain. So now they teach them three things. One is meditation or yoga or tai chi. So at least they have something to do to get them to forget about the pain. So meditation is also nowadays, meditation is known as the best anti-stress medicine. Nowadays in modern life, a lot of people are highly stressed. And stress, the one effect of stress is we get cancer. That's why you notice that in this country, Chinese get the most, most Chinese get cancer, yes or not? In Malaysia, One in four persons get cancer. But most of these people who get cancer are Chinese. So you can say probably one in three Chinese get cancer. That's very high, you know. Why is it Chinese get more cancer? Because we tend to stress ourselves, too hard working, think too much, isn't it? Not just cari makan, cari bite makan. So I think I'll stop here. But just to summarize, the first practice you can do, first important practice is dana, to replenish your blessings so that you don't fall into the ghost realm. And then more important than that, the second one is to keep sila. If you keep your sila, then you won't fall into the animal and the hell realm, which is worse. But these two, dana and sila, is just worldly merit. It cannot get you out of samsara. It will give you a good rebirth. And then if you are thinking of getting out of samsara, then you must, the third thing, you must listen to the dhamma. At least every day, you must listen to some dhamma. It's better still if you can get the CD or the MP3. We have my talks in English. I have two MP3s and Hokkien, two MP3s. If you can get this, then every day you listen to a few teachings, at least half an hour or something. Then eventually, hopefully, you can get right view. And you get right view, that's the best thing that you have done as a human being. Then besides listening to the Dharma, we should learn to practice some meditation every day. Try to fix a time. The best is in the morning. And the best time is just Just when you wake up. If you normally wake up at six o'clock, then you try to get up half an hour earlier so that you can meditate for half an hour. It's the best time to meditate. So these are the four things that you can practice.