196: Beautiful Mental Factors 'Sobhana Cetasika' (Part 3) Tranquility and Its Companions

In this episode, we explore the third group of beautiful mental factors — twelve qualities that arise in six pairs, bringing harmony and balance to the mind. These include tranquility, lightness, softness, adaptability, healthiness, and straightness of both the mental body and consciousness.

Each pair serves a specific purpose:

• Tranquility calms worry and passion.
• Lightness removes sluggishness and dullness.
• Softness dispels rigidity, wrong views, and conceit.
• Adaptability allows the mind to adjust to challenges.
• Healthiness restores confidence and faith.
• Straightness overcomes deception and crookedness.

Together, these twelve factors refine and purify the mind, supporting deep meditation and wholesome consciousness.

YouTube Video Link

YouTube Channel Link

Website:
www.satipatthana.ca

Donations and Memberships

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:06

Namo tasabhagvato rahato samma sambu dasam namo tasabhagwato rahato sammasambudassa nammo tasabhwato arhato samasambudassa Tirabara Buddhism series Dhammatok number nineteen Beautiful Mental Factors Sobhana Chidasika Part three in the last two parts we have completed seven mental factors which are very important as a society and as well as individuality which connects again back to the society. Today we are going to discuss starting from the eighth beautiful mental factor. Here they always come in pair eight and nine, ten and eleven, twelve and thirteen as such. Eighth and ninth beautiful mental factor of tranquility and calm of mental body and consciousness and pali kayapasati and chitapasati. So before we go into it, I like to discuss about a word kayak because the title is kayapasati and jaitapasati. Kayak. Usually the word kayak means physical body, rupa. Mindfulness of the body. That is kayak. Kayak nupassana. Or rupa nupassana. So that is the usual meaning, common meaning of word the kayak. It pointed to the physicality, materiality. But in here it means mental body. Not physical body, but mental body. Namakaya. Mental body. In other words, mental body is actually mental factors, chetasika. Mental factor, chitasika. But the usage is mental body and consciousness. So kayapasiti means tranquility of mental factors. And jaitapasiti means tranquility of consciousness. So this pair is about tranquility of mental factors or mental body and tranquility of consciousness. So from now on, in these discussions, kaya means mental body. The characteristics of these two beautiful mental factors are quieting down negativity in the mental body and consciousness, quieting down of the negativities in the mental body and consciousness. Or you can say suppressing feverishness of passion. That's how it is written in the book. Suppressing feverishness of the passion. And its function is to demolish, demolish such negativities or fever. Function is to demolish such negativities or fever. It manifests as peacefulness without a trace of worry and anxiety. This feeling of peacefulness is due to the presence of tranquility of the mental body and consciousness. During meditation, a yogi will experience calm and tranquility. When you have a good meditation session, samatha or vipassana doesn't matter. You got into a zone where there is a calm and tranquil. And the proximate cause of this tranquility is mental body and consciousness. In other words, the mind, Jita and Jitasiga. The mind is the cause of this tranquility. That is a pair, eight and nine. And the next pair is ten and eleven beautiful mental factors. In English, lightness of mental body and lightness of consciousness. In Pali, Gaya Lahuta and Chaita Lahuta. This word Lahuta means lightness as opposed to heaviness. Its characteristic is of subsiding heaviness in the mental body and consciousness. Its function is to crush heaviness and heaviness, heaviness, let's give an example so that we understand clearly. When one becomes sleepy, whether in meditation or even in a normal state, what happens? To your physical body as well as the mental body, they become heavier and heavier, drowsier and drowsier, heavier. That's what it means by heaviness. Your body weight doesn't change, but the way you feel becomes heavy and heavy. And that is heaviness. Opposite to that is lightness. And it manifests as non-sluggishness. This lightness manifests as non-sluggishness. Like when one is alert, it brings lightness. If you are alert, you feel your body is light and your mind is light, sharp and quick. That's non-sluggishness. Another word is alertness. When a yogi has this beautiful mental factor, will felt so light. In meditation, of course, we'll felt so light as if one is floating or levitating. Some of you might have already experienced it. You're meditating and you felt like you're floating or levitating. That light. And this lightness or lahutar is opposed to slot and topper. Remember one of the five hindrances? Slot and topper is opposed to slot and topper. Its prospectus is the same as the other. The mental body and consciousness. That is the second pair, ten and eleven, lightness. The first one is tranquility. The first pair. Second pair lightness. Now the third pair. In the book it is translated as the word malleability. Malleability of mental body and malleability of consciousness. In Pali, Gaya Mudutta and Jeta Mudutta. Actually, the meaning of mudutta is softness. It is softness as opposed to stiffness, hardness, rigidity. Opposed to softness is opposed to stiffness, hardness, rigidity. But it is translated as malleability or compliant. It complies. But my teacher prefers the word softness to malleability, softness to compliance. So that's why we can dub the heading as softness and tenderness of mental body and consciousness. Its characteristic is of subsiding stiffness and rigidity. It subsides or it suppress stiffness and rigidity. And it is opposed to wrong view and conceit. How come it is opposed to wrong views and conceit? What it just makes is soft, softness. Because when a person has a wrong views or conceit, it makes that person hard, rigid, stubborn. Dig the trench, hold the ground, not changing, ready to fight. That's what wrong view and conceit does. It makes a person hard, tough, rigid and stubborn. That's why the softness or malleability is opposed to wrong views and conceit. Its function is to soften the rigid mental body and the rigid mind or rigid consciousness. To soften these rigid nature of the mind. That's its function. It manifests as compliance. It makes hard and tough people to comply. Hough and tough minds to comply, to become soft. That's a manifestation, compliance. And approximate causes, these pairs are all the same. Proximate causes, mental body and consciousness. So that is the third pair. This kamanyata, we all know kama is action. Literally it means walkable. Walkable, serviceable. That's what the word means. But in the English translated book, especially the latest one, it translated as wildiness. Kamanyata is translated as wildiness. Which means this mental factor can do what once wants with it. Wielding power. Can make others do or make the object to make it happen as it wish. Its characteristic is suppression or subsiding of unwalkable nest of mental body and consciousness. It's a difficult situation to work, unwalkable. A lot of tough and hard situations, always opposing fighting. But this mental factor, this pair can make that situation walkable, operatable, functionable. So its function is to crush the unserviceableness. Its function is to crush the unserviceableness. It manifests as an adaptable mental body and consciousness in making something. In other words, this mind becomes very adaptable, knows how to do, in modern words, knows how to negotiate, how to do give and take, and make the whole situation work beautifully. I'm using my own words. That's what adaptable means. It can adapt into any kind of difficulty and situation or wrong conditions and make it right. That's why, instead of wieldiness, we'd like to use adaptability of mental body and consciousness. Instead of wildiness of mental body and consciousness, we can use adaptability of mental body and consciousness. Of course, the proximate cause is the same. The mind. Second meaning is proficiency. And the third meaning is good states or good condition. There are three meanings. Straightness is being cancelled because it has its own category, will be coming. Proficiency, we know it is skillful, familiar, on top of it. And the third one is a good state or a good condition. These two. In other words, good state, good condition mean healthy. Healthiness. He prefers the word healthiness of the mental body and the consciousness over the word proficiency. And this mental factor or this pair is opposed to not having faith and confidence. Not having full faith and confidence. Once a person has this pair of mental factors and consciousness, his faith is in full swing. It has full confidence in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. And its function is to crush the unhealthiness of the mind. Unhealthiness of the mind. What makes mind unhealthy? It makes mind unhealthy not having confidence in the process, in the Dharma that can take you to the domain of RIA. That makes it unhealthy. Unhealthy mind, sick mind. A mind with disease. So this is the fifth pair. And the sixth or the eighteenth and nineteen beautiful mental factor. The sixth pair is straightness of mental body and strictness of consciousness. That's why my teacher rejects the translation. The one above, straightness strike out, because it has its own category. Straightness of mental body and straightness of consciousness. In Pali, Kaya Ujuukata and Chaita Ujuukata. So there's the word uchukata. It means straightness or retitude. Translated as straightness or retitude. Which are opposed to crookedness, deception, and craftiness. Opposed to crookedness, deception, and craftiness. That's what it means by straightness, straightforward, not crooked, not decepted. Straightforward, sincere, correct. Its characteristic is the uprightness of the mental body and consciousness. Uprightness of the mental body and consciousness. Its function is to crush. The word written in the book. Crooked, crafty. It manifests as non-crookedness. Manifests as non-crookedness. Meaning that there are no unwholesome states of mind. Unwholesome states of mind are the one that is crooked. This is the pure wholesome states of mind when you have this straightness. Ujukata. So those are six pairs. Altogether, twelve beautiful mental factors. These twelve beautiful mental factors or mental states are put together as six pairs. And it is explained as because these crushes the opposite qualities when they are in pair. And there are many more explanations of course, but I will just present one. So we have finished discussing altogether nineteen. So nineteen. So if you look at them, these six pair, twelve, they have the very specific job. Before in the first ones, they are more like general. Non-greed, non-anger, impartiality. But in here, these works very specific. Tranquility. When you bring tranquility, it crushes worry and anxiety. It crushes passion. If I have to in terms of niwaranat hindrances, it crushes gamachandat ni varanat sense desire. It crushes nivaranat. Ill will hindrance of ill will. Tranquility crushes the first two hindrances. When there is tranquility, there's no trace of worry in your mind. When there is tranquility, there's no anxiety in your mind. When there is tranquility, there's no passion for sense desire in your mind. Very specific antidote for the first two hindrances. And then lightness, lightness of mind, lahuta. That crushes what? Crushes slop and torpor. Sluggishness, laziness, sleepiness. This softness and tenderness of mind. Sorry? Lightness of mind. Lightness of mind. Crushes, sloth and topper. Again what? This is the one of the five hindrances. You can find sloth and topper in the beginner's yogis, intermediate yogis, advanced yogis, even Shrimaglana, the left hand disciple of the Buddha before he became an arahat, endowed with great jhanas. He still have slot and topper. It attacks everyone. This mental state crushes slot and torpa, lightness of the body and lightness of the mind. Lightness of the mental body, lightness of the consciousness. And also the third pair, adaptability. Sorry, third pair is softness of the mind. It crushes wrong view and conceit. Wrong view and conceit. Wrong view deity conceit mana. Dity and mana. Just scale away all the rough edges and make it smooth. And for a Buddhist, that is the final defilements that we overcome. Conceit. One overcomes conceit only when once become a heart. That's what it crushes. Very specific. Softness and tenderness. Or malleability you can call. And adaptability. Adaptability kamanyata. It reshapes every difficult opposition. It can reshape, it can remould every opposite difficult situation. And the healthiness crushes the disease of lack of confidence of faith. And strictness crushes deceitfulness and deviousness. In other words, all the unwholesome jitas, it crushes them all. So these six pairs have a very specific target to attack or erase or suppressed or make them subside. Those are nineteen beautiful mental factors. And all those nineteen beautiful mental factors arise together with every beautiful consciousness or every beautiful wholesome consciousness. And some of the things like tranquility, lightness, soft, tender, lack of rigidity, you can experience obviously in your meditation when you reach a certain level. These are not just simply theory, these are exact experiences one have in meditation. Whether it is vipassana or samatha in some cases. So may all of you be able to develop these nineteen beautiful mental factors. And may you have wholesome consciousness, beautiful consciousness at all times, as soon as possible. Sadhu Sadhu Sadhu. Thank you very much.