More skillfully and quickly, let's take these two words first. Quickly. Many of you have used a computer. Some of you probably type with all 10 fingers. At the beginning of taking typing lessons, was it quick? How on earth did they stuck the letter A underneath the little finger? They did it on purpose if you don't know. It wasn't quick to learn typing. Any music instrument, you first start to play guitar, piano whatever, it's not quick. Yet a person who's played for a long time, a person who types for many years, oh it's very quick, they don't even have to look at their fingers. What makes it quick? Practice, practice, practice, practice. The more you practice the quicker you get.
I had a friend, when I was 14 or so, who played the guitar by ear, taught himself everything. Couldn't read music at all. So I got inspired, oh, I'd like the play the guitar like he does! OK, I didn't practice much. So I figured I'd better get a teacher. It was easy for him to do it by ear, I need a teacher. So I went to a teacher, once a week, for a few weeks, and I didn't practice. I could strum, I could do little things here and there, and that was enough, I quit. And I could play a little bit, but nothing like my friend! My friend could do virtually anything on the guitar but I couldn't. OK it was practice! The whole difference was practice. Practice, practice, practice.
There's one of the Suttas in the "Twenty Suttas," the e-book I made up for anybody free who wants it. One of the Suttas in there is called the "Canki Sutta." And in that Sutta, it has a conversation between the Buddha and a young Brahman, a 16 year old person studying the Brahman religion who was quite bright. And the Brahman was asking him a lot of questions, and in particular, he asked the Buddha about how to obtain Truth. How to actually obtain Truth. And the Buddha explained, through various questions, of how to reach Truth, how to reach Truth.
The young Brahman was quite satisfied, he goes, "Oh good, good, good. I can see that's the way to reach Truth." And the Buddha said, "But that's not the final arrival at Truth." And it's almost like the young guy is... it's not in the scripture this way but you can kind of feel... the young guy is going, "Oh well, what is the final arrival at truth?!" And the Buddha says, "You must do as I just explained over and over and over and over and over." OK? Practice, practice, practice, it gets quicker that way.
Now more skillfully, was the second part of the question. How can one more skillfully and quickly root out these thoughts? Skillful again has a lot to do with practice, but it also has a lot to do with innovative practice. It's like, I'm a very good carpenter, I can build a lot of different odd things, standard things, odd things whatever. When I was first taught carpentry in school and from my father, I just learned simple things. However, one of the more tricky things, that we got taught in school, was to build a kind of lamp base, that had three sides. And the sides have to fit in real nice. Now if it's 4 sides that's real easy you just butt everything together, but 3 sides you have cut at an angle and this and that.
OK, to be skillful, you have to start doing things that are more difficult. You actually have to experiment, be more innovative with what you were doing. One of the words, if you don't know yet, that you want to incorporate into your practice, is the word "Broong Dtang." Broong Dtang is a Thai word, and it's used in cooking. When the nuns Broong Dtang the food, it means that they put a little spice, put a little sugar, put a chili, do this/do that, mix it all together, mix lots of things together. They make it real tasty. They figure if it's not tasty, nobody's going to eat it. So when they Broong Dtang, they put in lots of different extra things to make it spicy or sweet or whatever.
In the meditation, especially with the Reflections, it's helpful to start Broong Dtanging. You have been taught Compassion and Lovingkindness meditation, you have been taught Death Reflection, you have been taught lots of different things, so you can start combining some together. For example, let's take mental Dukkha, let's do the alphabet, let's start with anger. And let's put that into a Compassion and Lovingkindness wish. Everyone who's angry today, "May so and so..." Another mental Dukkha, B boredom. Everyone who's bored today, "May so and so..." OK, we just mixed two together.
Now suppose with Death Reflection, you could use ages. From one to a hundred, what are typical ways people die. Start using different systems, age is one system that we often mention to people. Body parts. What can go wrong with different parts of the body, in which we could die. You know, if you cut off a toe, if the blood doesn't stop bleeding, you're dead. Simple. Go through the body, the body parts. Occupations. Using the alphabet helps there. Airplane pilots, barbers, cooks, doctors, and so on. Broong Dtang in this way, try to look at things from different sides. This helps you get more skillful.
If you have looked at every different physical Dukkha over and over and over, if you have looked at lots of mental Dukkha over and over and over, then when Dukkha comes to you, you're not going to be surprised. You're going to work with it easier. You expected it. If you expect Dukkha, you're not surprised. It's the people who don't expect it, they yell out and scream, "No, no, not me, not me!" with all the self-pity and self-hatred that goes on top of that. So get prepared!