It can be helpful to mention something here called, the eight worldly conditions. We plan to talk about them later in the retreat in more depth, also referred to as the eight worldly dhammas. They are four pairs of opposites which everybody experiences in their life, even the Buddha experienced these same eight worldly conditions; praise and blame, fame and obscurity, pleasure and pain, gain and loss. We experience these eight all the time. Right now you are experiencing a bit of gain. You are gaining some understanding.
When it comes down to power and the opposite we need to ask, "What actually is 'power'?" A sense of power can arise, in the terms of these eight worldly conditions, from fame, from praise, from gain or from pleasure. Power is kind of a quest concerning desires and the fulfilment of them, "I want, I have, I am therefore more powerful than others."
The opposite is when we don't want these things. How often do you not want to be famous? For many, it's like when we were twelve years old, you have to recite a poem in front of the class. Freak out, we don't want this fame, no thanks! That's a typical example, a lot of the kids don't want the fame to be up in front of the class reciting a poem or that sort of thing.
Sometimes we don't want the four nice conditions because we think we should suffer ourselves. Pity comes, "No, I should have loss, I don't deserve it," or, "Oh no, people should blame me, I am a jerk." We actually attach to the other four. So attaching to the pleasant four or the unpleasant four is something that people do throughout their life. It all has to do with a sense with power.
Now, can we let go of wanting the pleasant four or the unpleasant four? Can we let go of rejecting them, as well? This is a large part of the practice. To work with the eight worldly conditions is something that we talk a lot about with our more senior students, especially our assistants back at Wat Kow Tahm. They are continually being reminded about these eight; continually encouraged to work on them in speech.
Suppose we are sitting at a table, with five or six people, and somebody is telling a story. For that moment they are the famous person. Everyone is looking at them. They have the gain, they have the attention. So in a sense, they have the power at the table. Now, say, I am listening to them talking and think, "I want the attention. I am going to tell a story as soon as they are done". And I start getting ready to tell a story. Somebody else is sitting at the table and they are thinking, "That's an interesting story. I have one that could maybe add to that. If they finish I might give it and maybe it will help everyone." Now me and the other person might be thinking of exactly the same story, however, I am doing it because I want power, I want the fame, I want the gain. Whereas the other person is just thinking this could be a good story which could help everyone understand something. So they are not attached, but I am.
That is a clear way of looking at these eight worldly conditions and something to use in your practice from now on, even to the extent of looking at your thoughts, your wandering thoughts. Yesterday I mentioned when people are very restless we ask them, "What do you want in the future?". Often it's gain. What do they want? Do they want fame? Do they want to go home and tell everybody about the retreat and how wise they or their teachers are, etc., etc..
So, when you get caught up in any hindrance thought you can now look deeper. Is this thought concerned with praise or blame, fame or obscurity, pleasure or pain, gain or loss? And you can use them as the mental noting now on a deeper level than just the basic Five Hindrances. And as I said we do plan to talk more about the eight world conditions later in the retreat.