{"id":7994,"date":"2017-07-27T15:35:06","date_gmt":"2017-07-27T08:35:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/?p=7994"},"modified":"2017-07-27T15:35:06","modified_gmt":"2017-07-27T08:35:06","slug":"the-way-out-is-in","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/?p=7994","title":{"rendered":"The Way Out is in"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Dharma speech by Prah Chit Chittasawaroh from Wat Pah Dharmma Uttayan Temple, Khonkaen province, Thailand,\u00a028th<\/sup> March 2017, at Roong Aroon School\u2019s celebration of Werukham Building (a.k.a. Bamboo Pottery Workshop)
\n\u2026
\n<\/em>\u201cToday I\u2019m here to deliver a sermon under the subject \u2018The Way Out is in\u2019. The phrase itself is a paradox; especially when our common understanding is that the way out should be out. But this phrase I brought to you today is not my own, it is my teacher\u2019s teaching, which I will pass on to you. That is, \u2018the way out is to go back in\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy am I here to deliver a sermon? How do I owe my life to these arts and crafts? Actually I graduated and worked in a totally different field. These handicrafts didn\u2019t play a part in my career. They didn\u2019t bring me fame. But they\u2019re important because they are my friends–precious friends. I\u2019m not sure whether parents or children sitting here today has got any chance to experience any artwork, or has any experience in weaving, pottery, painting, stitching, or any other handicrafts or not. But as for me these are my precious companions indeed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy do I call them my precious friends? They are not just imaginary friends who help me kill my time, but they help me discover what\u2019s going on in my mind. Because \u00a0for me, a good friend is a friend who willingly listens to us, a friend who truly knows us, a friend who doesn\u2019t judge us<\/strong><\/span>, a friend who can put up with us when we\u2019re not at our best, a friend who keeps us from doing bad deeds; like saying to us \u2018hey, hold your horses\u2019. They also support us when we want to do something useful, like saying \u2018well, let\u2019s give it a try\u2019. What I was looking for back then wasn\u2019t \u2018art\u2019 but that friend; the friend, who always lends us an ear, really knows us, doesn\u2019t jump to conclusions about us, doesn\u2019t flatter us, and stops us from doing bad things. When I feel bad, this friend of mine is also the one who tells me not to be angry, and that grieve will not lead us to anything. We all know this, right? We all know that no matter how much money we\u2019ve got, we can\u2019t find a friend like this on a shelf in some random department stores; we have to create this friend ourselves.<\/strong><\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor those who have some experience in pottery, we\u2019ll know that pottery isn\u2019t an art that will work as we please; pottery remains what it is and it\u2019s our job to get to know it. Therefore, while we work with it, we\u2019ll find ourselves getting bored and irritated that things don\u2019t go our way. Back then, I was working with pottery as my second piece of work after I had finished weaving. I was thinking, \u2018should I go back to weaving?\u2019 Weaving isn\u2019t my speciality though. When I first started weaving my piece of work, I was downhearted as well. But it was then that I discovered that there are many mixed feelings in my mind; be it the competitiveness, the satisfaction in easy success, and many others. Back then, if I did as I pleased, I would have done my work sloppily. Then I\u2019d be careless and be done with it. Especially for those who are experts in certain fields, when they start anew in other fields, they can\u2019t handle the feeling of their incapability. That\u2019s what I like about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMy teacher is the one who introduced me to these arts and crafts that I call friends. And these arts and crafts are the ones who taught me that no human is good in everything. If we jump to conclusions about ourselves every time we start our piece of work, we\u2019ll be saddened. But if we accept this new part of ourselves, and focus on ourselves, it doesn\u2019t matter how discouraged or tired we are when we knead the clay. The teachers usually have us keep on kneading the clay without telling us when we would kneading. The reason is because the teachers wanted us to face these negative feelings.\u00a0 You can be downhearted, but you must keep on kneading. Therefore, \u2018overthinking\u2019 which keeps us from living happily can be found here. And each artwork requires us to stick with it and face it. As for me, what people like or dislike about our artwork matters less than our acknowledgement in our state of mind while we work with it.<\/strong><\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore we can shape it into a cup or a plate, or before we can weave a piece of cloth, I\u2019ve felt discouraged countless number of times. But then again, we\u2019re here to learn about it. In our lives we\u2019ve faced downheartedness and denial. There are times when we want to turn away from it and do something else when we don\u2019t want to tolerate \u00a0it, when we don\u2019t know how to live with it. And we often cut it loose from our lives. When we grew tired, we withdrew from it and find something new. People change jobs, spouses, or other things often. These people don\u2019t know how to live with what they have. We don\u2019t know either; we don\u2019t know how to treat this feeling.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have this discouragement in our minds. But we have pride, boredom, cheerfulness, expectation, fulfilment, disappointment, and everything in our artwork. My pieces of work here, cups for instance, I never thought of taking them back home;and the same goes for the plates too. Because what I have gained and stays with me is a friend who helps me know myself better, a friend who taught me how to live with myself. From womb to tomb, from today until our last day, there are countless unpleasant things we need to face. We usually push it aside by changing the outside world; like changing the class, asking the teacher if we can change it to a different colour, changing the type of clay, or changing the size of work. Similarly, if a teacher told us to make a cup, we\u2019ll negotiate that we want to make a plate, or if the teacher told us to make a cup with a holder, we\u2019ll ask if the holder is necessary or not. The negotiation is endless.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we try not to negotiate and give it a try, put some effort into it, and don\u2019t back down when we\u2019re in low spirits. When we know where our discouragement lies and try to overcome it. Whether we feel discouraged, uneasy, bored, or tired or not, we keep on making our work. Once we\u2019re able to do that, it means that our state of mind can no longer lead us astray from our determination. This is what I feel that I owe my artwork so much. Because these artworks help us overcome our old habits that we don\u2019t want to die with it. I, for instance, don\u2019t want to die with discouragement in my mind.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe often wonder why the teachers don\u2019t let us start off with something easy, why the teacher taught us nothing, or why the teacher just handed us 5 lumps of clay and tells us to shape it into a sphere without teaching us much. The teacher would tell us to keep on shaping these clays and try to understand ourselves. The first one would be full of pride. We\u2019ll have pride in ourselves that we are not children anymore, so shaping it into a sphere would be a piece of cake. Then, we start shaping it. But as we do, the more we wanted it to become round, it wouldn\u2019t. It wouldn\u2019t be as round as we want it to. We want it to be perfectly round. We feel that we need to impress our teacher. We can make this clay round. This desire, this excessive self-confidence, is what we need to learn and observe.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we want to take our sweet time with the second lump, the fifth would start to dry out because we left it outside the bag. The elements like earth, water, wind, and fire don\u2019t obey us; they have their own nature. This doesn\u2019t apply only to the elements, but to humans as well. People don\u2019t do as we want them to; though they might be extra cinciderrate to spare our difnity from time to time. When we are able to live with inanimate objects or nature, we\u2019ll find that they possess no minds or feelings at all. They can\u2019t scold us, they can\u2019t argue with us, they never belittle us, and they never praise us. Every problem that happens comes down to us.<\/strong><\/span> We\u2019re arguing with the cottons. We\u2019re arguing with the threads. We\u2019re driving ourselves crazy. We can feel it. We can feel how much the clay and the cottons made ourselves uneasy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe thing is, the more we try, the more burdensome it\u2019ll be.<\/span><\/strong> The more we try to win, the more we lose. What\u2019s going on? We\u2019re fulfilling our duties. Why do I feel indebt to these artworks? Because spending time with inanimate objects made me realise that all the irritation, all the normal and abnormal things, all the uneasiness we feel, are created by us. We then started to blame other people less than before. We don\u2019t blame the teachers, the threads, or the clay. We started to look back at our own desire; we want to win, we want to be better at this, we want to work faster, and we want things to be as we wish.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, what can we do to prevent negative feelings? There are two choices; feel the desire and be saddened by it, or let go of it and keep trying. I chose to let go and move on.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cArtworks are great teachers when it comes to testing our emotions. Sometimes our piece of work doesn\u2019t turn out as we expect. We might need to train or have some speciality at some fields before we can start the work. We might have some experience in kneading doughs, which is why we can knead the clays as well. Now we see that everything requires training. Do we experience difficulties in meditating? Do we still feel uneasy while we walk back and forth in our meditation? Or do things not go as we want them to? Similarly, we need to keep on practicing. If we overcome the discouragement, for me, pottery is only difficult with the first several lumps of clay. The same goes with weaving which seems difficult at first. But after that, when we\u2019ve overcome the discouragement and belittling ourselves; speaking of which, have you ever belittled yourself? Telling yourself that you\u2019re not good, you\u2019re not good enough. If we have this in mind, we\u2019ll start to judge other people as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you know what\u2019s great about this? It\u2019s great when someone break your handicraft. Whenever we hold on to something, although it\u2019s not beautiful \u00a0(but it\u2019s our first piece of work), it\u2019s a good thing that it\u2019s broken, because we don\u2019t have to worry about it anymore. The teacher once presented me with a piece of pottery, telling me that he\u2019ll make me a new one if it ever gets broken. The thing is, it\u2019s not broken. Why? Because we\u2019re no longer afraid that it will. We\u2019re here, knowing that one day it\u2019ll break. And no matter when or how it\u2019ll break, we\u2019ll not be worried when it does.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHow are we living our lives today? Do we know that at some point of our lives, this cup will break? Are we doing useful things in life? Do we understand our own cup? Do we understand the problems that are going on with our cup? These cups namely \u2018fear\u2019, \u2018anger\u2019, \u2018desire\u2019, \u2018muddle\u2019, \u2018hesitation\u2019, \u2018confusion\u2019, and \u2018want\u2019. Do we know our own cups? What drives these cups? Do you know that these cups will break someday?\u201d<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI chose to become a monk merely because I can learn the nature of the mind. I can get to know how the mind works, so that I can learn how to live with this cup of mine; and at the same time, learn to not be too possessive of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can regard everything in life as an art of getting to know ourselves and an art of overcoming our minds. Art is always with us\u2026therefore, open up your heart and learn. This building is a building for art. Here, we shall learn the art of living with our messy minds, the art to be free from greed, anger, and obsession<\/strong><\/span>.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dharma speech by Prah Chit Chittasawaroh from Wat Pah Dharmma Uttayan Temple, Khonkaen province, Thailand,\u00a028th March 2017, at Roong Aroon School\u2019s celebration of Werukham Building (a.k.a. Bamboo Pottery Workshop) \u2026 \u201cToday I\u2019m here to deliver a sermon under the subject \u2018The Way Out is in\u2019. The phrase itself is a paradox; especially when our common understanding is that the way out should be out. But this phrase I brought to you today is not my own, it is my teacher\u2019s teaching, which I will pass on to you. That is, \u2018the way out is to go back in\u2019.\u201d \u201cWhy am I here to deliver a sermon? How do I owe my life to these arts and crafts? Actually I graduated and worked in a totally different field. These handicrafts didn\u2019t play a part in my career. They didn\u2019t bring me fame. But they\u2019re important because they are my friends–precious friends. I\u2019m not sure whether parents or children sitting here today has got any chance to experience any artwork, or has any experience in weaving, pottery, painting, stitching, or any other handicrafts or not. But as for me these are my precious companions indeed.\u201d \u201cWhy do I call them my precious friends? They are not just imaginary friends who help me kill my time, but they help me discover what\u2019s going on in my mind. Because \u00a0for me, a good friend is a friend who willingly listens to us, a friend who truly knows us, a friend who doesn\u2019t judge us, a friend who can put up with us when we\u2019re not at our best, a friend who keeps us from doing bad deeds; like saying to us \u2018hey, hold your horses\u2019. They also support us when we want to do something useful, like saying \u2018well, let\u2019s give it a try\u2019. What I was looking for back then wasn\u2019t \u2018art\u2019 but that friend; the friend, who always lends us an ear, really knows us, doesn\u2019t jump to conclusions about us, doesn\u2019t flatter us, and stops us from doing bad things. When I feel bad, this friend of mine is also the one who tells me not to be angry, and that grieve will not lead us to anything. We all know this, right? We all know that no matter how much money we\u2019ve got, we can\u2019t find a friend like this on a shelf in some random department stores; we have to create this friend ourselves.\u201d \u201cFor those who have some experience in pottery, we\u2019ll know that pottery isn\u2019t an art that will work as we please; pottery remains what it is and it\u2019s our job to get to know it. Therefore, while we work with it, we\u2019ll find ourselves getting bored and irritated that things don\u2019t go our way. Back then, I was working with pottery as my second piece of work after I had finished weaving. I was thinking, \u2018should I go back to weaving?\u2019 Weaving isn\u2019t my speciality though. When I first started weaving my piece of work, I was downhearted as well. But it was then that I discovered that there are many mixed feelings in my mind; be it the competitiveness, the satisfaction in easy success, and many others. Back then, if I did as I pleased, I would have done my work sloppily. Then I\u2019d be careless and be done with it. Especially for those who are experts in certain fields, when they start anew in other fields, they can\u2019t handle the feeling of their incapability. That\u2019s what I like about it.\u201d \u201cMy teacher is the one who introduced me to these arts and crafts that I call friends. And these arts and crafts are the ones who taught me that no human is good in everything. If we jump to conclusions about ourselves every time we start our piece of work, we\u2019ll be saddened. But if we accept this new part of ourselves, and focus on ourselves, it doesn\u2019t matter how discouraged or tired we are when we knead the clay. The teachers usually have us keep on kneading the clay without telling us when we would kneading. The reason is because the teachers wanted us to face these negative feelings.\u00a0 You can be downhearted, but you must keep on kneading. Therefore, \u2018overthinking\u2019 which keeps us from living happily can be found here. And each artwork requires us to stick with it and face it. As for me, what people like or dislike about our artwork matters less than our acknowledgement in our state of mind while we work with it.\u201d \u201cBefore we can shape it into a cup or a plate, or before we can weave a piece of cloth, I\u2019ve felt discouraged countless number of times. But then again, we\u2019re here to learn about it. In our lives we\u2019ve faced downheartedness and denial. There are times when we want to turn away from it and do something else when we don\u2019t want to tolerate \u00a0it, when we don\u2019t know how to live with it. And we often cut it loose from our lives. When we grew tired, we withdrew from it and find something new. People change jobs, spouses, or other things often. These people don\u2019t know how to live with what they have. We don\u2019t know either; we don\u2019t know how to treat this feeling.\u201d \u201cWe have this discouragement in our minds. But we have pride, boredom, cheerfulness, expectation, fulfilment, disappointment, and everything in our artwork. My pieces of work here, cups for instance, I never thought of taking them back home;and the same goes for the plates too. Because what I have gained and stays with me is a friend who helps me know myself better, a friend who taught me how to live with myself. From womb to tomb, from today until our last day, there are countless unpleasant things we need to face. We usually push it aside by changing the outside world; like changing the class, asking the teacher if we can change it to a different colour, changing the type of clay, or changing the size of work. Similarly, if a teacher told us to make a cup, we\u2019ll negotiate that we want to make a plate, or if the teacher told us to make a cup with a holder, we\u2019ll ask if the holder is necessary or not. The negotiation is endless.\u201d \u201cWhen we try not to negotiate and give it a try, put some effort into it, and don\u2019t back down when we\u2019re in low spirits. When we know where our discouragement lies and try to overcome it. Whether we feel discouraged, uneasy, bored, or tired or not, we keep on making our work. Once we\u2019re able to do that, it means that our state of mind can no longer lead us astray from our determination. This is what I feel that I owe my artwork so much. Because these artworks help us overcome our old habits that we don\u2019t want to die with it. I, for instance, don\u2019t want to die with discouragement in my mind.\u201d \u201cWe often wonder why the teachers don\u2019t let us start off with something easy, why the teacher taught us nothing, or why the teacher just handed us 5 lumps of clay and tells us to shape it into a sphere without teaching us much. The teacher would tell us to keep on shaping these clays and try to understand ourselves. The first one would be full of pride. We\u2019ll have pride in ourselves that we are not children anymore, so shaping it into a sphere would be a piece of cake. Then, we start shaping it. But as we do, the more we wanted it to become round, it wouldn\u2019t. It wouldn\u2019t be as round as we want it to. We want it to be perfectly round. We feel that we need to impress our teacher. We can make this clay round. This desire, this excessive self-confidence, is what we need to learn and observe.\u201d \u201cWhen we want to take our sweet time with the second lump, the fifth would start to dry out because we left it outside the bag. The elements like earth, water, wind, and fire don\u2019t obey us; they have their own nature. This doesn\u2019t apply only to the elements, but to humans as well. People don\u2019t do as we want them to; though they might be extra cinciderrate to spare our difnity from time to time. When we are able to live with inanimate objects or nature, we\u2019ll find that they possess no minds or feelings at all. They can\u2019t scold us, they can\u2019t argue with us, they never belittle us, and they never praise us. Every problem that happens comes down to us. We\u2019re arguing with the cottons. We\u2019re arguing with the threads. We\u2019re driving ourselves crazy. We can feel it. We can feel how much the clay and the cottons made ourselves uneasy.\u201d \u201cThe thing is, the more we try, the more burdensome it\u2019ll be. The more we try to win, the more we lose. What\u2019s going on? We\u2019re fulfilling our duties. Why do I feel indebt to these artworks? Because spending time with inanimate objects made me realise that all the irritation, all the normal and abnormal things, all the uneasiness we feel, are created by us. We then started to blame other people less than before. We don\u2019t blame the teachers, the threads, or the clay. We started to look back at our own desire; we want to win, we want to be better at this, we want to work faster, and we want things to be as we wish.\u201d \u201cNow, what can we do to prevent negative feelings? There are two choices; feel the desire and be saddened by it, or let go of it and keep trying. I chose to let go and move on.\u201d \u201cArtworks are great teachers when it comes to testing our emotions. Sometimes our piece of work doesn\u2019t turn out as we expect. We might need to train or have some speciality at some fields before we can start the work. We might have some experience in kneading doughs, which is why we can knead the clays as well. Now we see that everything requires training. Do we experience difficulties in meditating? Do we still feel uneasy while we walk back and forth in our meditation? Or do things not go as we want them to? Similarly, we need to keep on practicing. If we overcome the discouragement, for me, pottery is only difficult with the first several lumps of clay. The same goes with weaving which seems difficult at first. But after that, when we\u2019ve overcome the discouragement and belittling ourselves; speaking of which, have you ever belittled yourself? Telling yourself that you\u2019re not good, you\u2019re not good enough. If we have this in mind, we\u2019ll start to judge other people as well.\u201d \u201cDo you know what\u2019s great about this? It\u2019s great when someone break your handicraft. Whenever we hold on to something, although it\u2019s not beautiful \u00a0(but it\u2019s our first piece of work), it\u2019s a good thing that it\u2019s broken, because we don\u2019t have to worry about it anymore. The teacher once presented me with a piece of pottery, telling me that he\u2019ll make me a new one if it ever gets broken. The thing is, it\u2019s not broken. Why? Because we\u2019re no longer afraid that it will. We\u2019re here, knowing that one day it\u2019ll break. And no matter when or how it\u2019ll break, we\u2019ll not be worried when it does.\u201d \u201cHow are we living our lives today? Do we know that at some point of our lives, this cup will break? Are we doing useful things in life? Do we understand our own cup? Do we understand the problems that are going on with our cup? These cups namely \u2018fear\u2019, \u2018anger\u2019, \u2018desire\u2019, \u2018muddle\u2019, \u2018hesitation\u2019, \u2018confusion\u2019, and \u2018want\u2019. Do we know our own cups? What drives these cups? Do you know that these cups will break someday?\u201d \u201cI chose to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":7655,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[107,8,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article","category-s11-2010-01-11-08-20-37","category-s10-2010-01-11-05-57-12"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7994"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7994\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7995,"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7994\/revisions\/7995"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7655"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.roong-aroon.ac.th\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}