We should also compare our practice with the Buddha’s instructions for the second and third noble truths. Does it bring about abandonment of craving for sensuality, for being and for non-being? Does it lead to witnessing the cessation of dukkha: the “remainderless fading & cessation, renunciation, relinquishment, release, & letting go of that very craving.” 154 This is the purpose for which we practice. And so we ask: Has this been the result of our jhāna (meditation) practice?
This way of evaluating tallies with this passage from Satthusāsana Sutta (AN7.83):
“… those things which you might know thus: ‘These things lead exclusively to disenchantment, to dispassion, to cessation, to peace, to direct knowledge, to enlightenment, to nibbāna,’ you should definitely recognize: ‘This is the Dhamma; this is the discipline; this is the teaching of the Teacher.’” (NDB, p1100)
As it speaks of Nibbāna, the ultimate liberation, it can seem like a criterion too demanding to go by, but it’s not really so. We just need to understand what Nibbāna is. “The evaporation of passion, the evaporation of aversion,the evaporation of delusion—this, friend, is called Nibbāna.” (Nibbānapañhā Sutta, SN38.1)
And so we should check: With my present way of practice, have I become freer from mental defilements: passion, aversion and delusion? This, for me, is the litmus test of spiritual progress. Through our practice, has desire lessened in us? In meeting undesirable situations similar as before, are we less angry, less afraid, less hurt? Have we become less jealous, less conceited, less stubborn, less vain, less muddled, less attached (e.g. to views)? To evaluate the trueness of our way of practice, we need to answer these questions honestly.
In addition, bear in mind that all our problems—worldly and spiritual—consist of mental defilements. Our practice should bring about their evaporation at all levels and in all aspects of our lives, not only when we’re on the meditation cushion or in a retreat.
Considering that the strength of noticeable defilements fluctuates, one teacher suggests comparing between the recent period and five years ago. If that’s too long for you, how about three years? If, after more than that, nothing has changed for the better, then something is wrong somewhere, and it’s good to step back and re-evaluate our way of practice, and make the necessary changes. If defilements have grown instead, then surely we should do something immediately!
There’s another list of criteria in Saṅkhitta Sutta (AN8.53). You may find the following advice from the Buddha to his step-mother more concrete and immediately experiential:
“As for the qualities of which you may know, ‘These qualities lead
• to dispassion, not to passion;
• to being unfettered, not to being fettered;
• to shedding, not to accumulating;
• to modesty, not to self-aggrandizement;
• to contentment, not to discontent;
• to seclusion, not to entanglement;
• to aroused persistence, not to laziness;
• to being unburdensome, not to being burdensome’:
You may categorically hold, ‘This is the Dhamma, this is the Vinaya, this is the Teacher’s instruction.’” 155
So, we can also compare our practice with these eight points, and see if it is the Dhamma, the Vinaya, the Teacher’s instruction.
Back to the cessation of dukkha due to the relinquishment of craving, we needn’t limit our thinking to en bloc cessation. As the Buddha said in Uposatha Sutta (Ud5.5 & AN8.20),
Just as, bhikkhus, the great ocean is gradually sloped, gradually slanted, gradually inclined, with no abrupt drop-off; even so, bhikkhus, in this Dhamma-Discipline, there is gradual training, gradual practice, gradual progress, with no abrupt gnosis-penetration.
