The Supreme
Contemplation
Andrew Holecek WINTER
2013 tricycle
Practicing with the Four Reminders
One of the best ways to prepare for death is
to acknowledge that we really are going to die. We’re falling in
the dark and have no idea when we’ll hit the ground. Buddhist
scholar Anne Klein says, “Life is a party on death row. Recognizing
mortality means we are willing to see what is true. Seeing what is
true is grounding. It brings us into the present. . . .” We all
know that we’re going to die, but we don’t know it in our guts. If
we did, we would practice as if our hair were on fire. One way to
swallow the bitter truth of mortality and impermanence—and get it
into our guts—is to chew on the four reminders.
The four reminders, or the four thoughts that
turn the mind, are an important preparation for death because they
turn the mind from constantly looking outward to finally looking
within. These reminders, also called the four reversals, were
composed by Padmasambhava, the master who brought Buddhism from
India to Tibet. They can be viewed as representing the trips Prince
Siddhartha took outside his palace that eventually transformed him
into the Buddha. During these trips, Siddhartha encountered old
age, sickness, and death, and developed the renunciation that
turned his mind away from the distractions and deceptions of the
outer world and in toward silence and truth.
As a meditation instructor, I often prescribe
the four reminders as the best remedy to get students who have
stalled on the path back on track. As with mindfulness itself, the
four reminders provide another way to work with distraction. They
bring the key instruction from The Tibetan Book of the Dead—“do not
be distracted”—to a more comprehensive level. The four reminders
show us that it’s not just momentary distraction that’s problematic
but distraction at the level of an entire life. If we’re not
reminded, we can waste our whole life.
The Tibetan Buddhist teacher Chögyam Trungpa
Rinpoche presented them this way:
FIRST Contemplate the preciousness of being so
free and well favored. This is difficult to gain and easy to lose.
Now I must do something meaningful.
SECOND The whole world and its inhabitants are
impermanent. In particular, the life of beings is like a bubble.
Death comes without warning; this body will be a corpse. At that
time the dharma will be my only help. I must practice it with
exertion.
THIRD When death comes, I will be helpless.
Because I create karma, I must abandon evil deeds and always devote
myself to virtuous actions. Thinking this, every day I will examine
myself.
FOURTH The homes, friends, wealth, and
comforts of samsara are the constant torment of the three
sufferings, just like a feast before the executioner leads you to
your death. I must cut desire and attachment, and attain
enlightenment through exertion.
How long should we contemplate these
reminders? Until our mind turns. Until we give up hope for samsara
(the worldly cycle of birth and death), and realize the folly of
finding happiness outside.
Most of us spend our lives looking out at the
world, chasing after thoughts and things. We’re distracted by all
kinds of objects and rarely look into the mind that is the ultimate
source of these objects. If we turn our mind and look in the right
direction, however, we will find our way to a good life—and a good
death. Instead of being carried along with the external constructs
of mind, we finally examine the internal blueprints of mind
itself.
It’s often said that the preliminaries are
more important than the main practice. The significance of these
four reminders, as a preliminary practice, cannot be overstated.
Chökyi Nyima Rinpoche said that if we could truly take them to
heart, 50 percent of the path to enlightenment would be complete.
These contemplations develop revulsion to conditioned appearances,
point out their utter futility, and cause awareness to prefer
itself rather than outwardly appearing objects. They turn the mind
away from substitute gratifications and direct it toward authentic
gratification—which can only be found within.
The four thoughts remind us of the
preciousness of this human life; that we are going to die; that
karma follows us everywhere; and that samsara is a waste of time
that only perpetuates suffering. Memorize them. They will reframe
your life, focus your mind, and advise you in everything you do. As
Dr. Samuel Johnson, the author of the first English dictionary,
said: “When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it
concentrates his mind wonderfully.”
What would you do if you had six months to
live? What would you cut out of your life? What would you do if you
had one month, one week, one day? The Indian master Atisha said,
“If you do not contemplate death in the morning, the morning is
wasted. If you do not contemplate death in the afternoon, the
afternoon is wasted. If you do not contemplate death in the
evening, the evening is wasted.” The four reminders remove the
waste.
We see others dying all around us but somehow
feel entitled to an exemption. In the Hindu epic Mahabharata, the
sage Yudhishthira is asked, “Of all things in life, what is the
most amazing?” He answers, “That a man, seeing others die all
around him, never thinks he will die.” If we acknowledge death and
use it an advisor, however, it will prioritize our life, ignite our
renunciation, and spur our meditation. The Buddha said: “Of all
footprints, that of the elephant is the deepest and most supreme.
Of all contemplations, that of impermanence is the deepest and most
supreme.”
Bring these supreme reminders into your life
and realize that life is like a candle flame in the wind. Visualize
friends and family and think, “Uncle Joe is going to die, my sister
Sarah is going to die, my friend Bill is going to die, I am going
to die.” Put pictures of dead loved ones on your desk or shrine;
put sticky notes with the word “death” or “I am going to die”
inside drawers or cabinets to remind you; read an obituary every
day; go to nursing homes, cemeteries, and funerals. The essence of
spiritual practice is remembrance, whether it’s remembering to come
back to the present moment or recalling the truth of impermanence.
Do whatever it takes to realize that time is running out and you
really could die today. You are literally one breath away from
death. Breathe out, don’t breathe in, and you’re dead.
One of the marks of an advanced student is
that he or she finally realizes that today could be the day.
Realizing impermanence is what makes them advance. For most of us,
however, as Paul Simon sang, “I’ll continue to continue to pretend
/ My life will never end. . . .” We essentially spend our lives
moving deck chairs around on the Titanic. No matter how we position
ourselves—no matter how comfortable we try to get—it’s all going
down.
These teachings exhort us not to spend our
lives, which most of us do—literally and figuratively. Reinvest.
Take the precious opportunity that has been given to you, and do
not waste your life. The four thoughts that turn the mind turn it
from reckless spending to wiseinvesting. We spend so much effort
investing in our future. We invest in IRAs, 401(k)s, pension plans,
and retirement portfolios. Spiritual advisors exhort us to invest
in our much more important bardo (post-death) retirement plan.
That’s our real future.
Don’t worry so much about social security.
Finance your karmic security instead. Invest in your future lives
now. Investing so much in this life is like checking into a hotel
for a few days and redecorating the room: what’s the point? B. Alan
Wallace says, “In light of death, our mundane desires are seen for
what they are. If our desires for wealth, luxury, good food,
praise, reputation, affection, and acceptance by other people, and
so forth are worth nothing in the face of death, then that is
precisely their ultimate value.”
On a personal note, understanding impermanence
has been the greatest gift in my study and practice of the
teachings on death. I’m thickheaded, but I finally get it: I am
going to die—and it could be today. My life has been completely
restructured because I now believe it. The rugged truth of
impermanence has simplified my life, shown me what is important,
and inspired me to really practice. Sogyal Rinpoche says in The
Tibetan Book of Living and Dying:
Ask yourself these two questions: Do I
remember at every moment that I am dying, and that everyone and
everything else is, and so treat all beings at all times with
compassion? Has my understanding of death and impermanence become
so keen and so urgent that I am devoting every second to the
pursuit of enlightenment? If you can answer “yes” to both of these,
then you really understand impermanence.
These reminders may seem like a morbid
preoccupation with death, but that is only because of our extreme
aversion to dying. For most of us, death is the final defeat. As
Jack LaLanne, the fitness and diet guru, once said, “I can’t afford
to die. It would wreck my image.” We live in denial of death, and
suffer in direct proportion to this denial when death occurs. The
four reminders remind us of the uncompromising truth of reality,
and prepare us to face it.
The four reminders, joined with mindfulness
meditation, instill a strength of mind that benefits both self and
other. Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche says,
The strength of shamatha [mindfulness
meditation] is that our mind is slow enough and stable enough to
bring in the reality, to really see it. Then when someone we know
is dying, we aren’t so shaken up. We may be sad, in the sense of
feeling compassion, but we have thoroughly incorporated the notion
of death to the point that it has profoundly affected our life.
That is known as strength of mind.
That stability naturally radiates to stabilize
the mind of the dying person, which helps them when everything is
being blown away.
Dying people are sometimes jealous of those
still alive. “Why do I have to die when everyone else keeps on
living? It’s so unfair. Why me?” At that point they need to
remember that those left behind are not returning to a party that
lasts till infinity. Those left behind are returning to a
challenging life that is filled with endless dissatisfaction and
suffering. As you are dying, remember that it’s just a matter of
time before everyone else joins you, just as you are about to join
the billions of others who have already left this life for another
one. Those left behind are a minority. No one is going to get out
of this alive.
And he who dies with the most toys still
dies.