It’s the time of year when many people spend time weeding their vegetable and/or flower gardens. As I was weeding the other day, I reflected that this is similar to what we do in our Dharma practice. Cultivate what is wholesome, and let go of what is unwholesome. Calm, generosity, equanimity… keep it. Anger, worry, greed… don’t feed them, let them go.
There’s a bit more nuance with the Dharma practice than with the garden. With the garden, it’s clear cut. Weed, out. Broccoli, in. When we are being mindful of our heart and mind states and we notice something unwholesome, however, we don’t necessarily throw that mind state out (although we could). We don’t want to add aversion to the unwholesome. We pay attention to understand, not to judge. We spend time (investigate) with it so we can see that on a relative level, those mind states leads to suffering. Instead, when we choose to be with difficult mind states in an intimate way, we begin to see their nature. We see that they are impermanent, not satisfactory and not self.
Whether it’s the vegetable garden, or the mind, the important part is to respond out of clear seeing, not out of reactivity. This is where the analogy of the garden is helpful. We don’t hate the weeds. We don’t get angry with them or think they are inherently bad. We just know that if we let them keep growing, they will choke out the vegetables we are wanting to cultivate. That’s all. It’s nothing more than that.
Yet, when it comes to our minds, we tend to me more identified with the material we notice and therefore, more reactive. We notice greed, for example, and judge ourselves for the fact that it’s there. The greed becomes wrong and we become wrong. Neither is true. It’s simply that if we water and nourish the greed, it will take over the mind and make it more difficult for non-greed to arise in the mind, and lead to suffering. The difference between letting go of greed based on the clear seeing that it doesn’t support our happiness and letting it go because it’s bad and we’re bad for having it, is night and day in the feeling of the experience, as well as the ultimate outcome. The former feels like a kindness towards ourselves and serves to free us from the attachment of thinking mind states belong to us. The latter feels terrible as we judge ourselves harshly and strengthens the delusion that believes the mind states are ours, and therefore, we should have complete control over them.
So, approach your mind like you would your vegetable garden. Caring for the wholesome qualities that are present by seeing them clearly and forming the intention to act on them when appropriate. Letting go of the unwholesome qualities that you notice, also by clearly knowing them in their presence, and in their unwholesome nature. Then forming the intention to not act on them, including not watering or fertilizing them with any more attention than is needed to see them for what they are.