Date: 12/21/2024 12/22/2024
Location: Star River Meditation Center
Teacher: Yunquan Huang
Dharma Knowledge
What Is Spiritual Practice
Spiritual practice, in Buddhism, is not an escape from life nor a set of external rituals. It is not limited to meditation cushions, chanting, or monastic settings. At its core, practice is the ongoing transformation of how we understand and relate to our experience. It is the process of moving from confusion to clarity, from compulsive reaction to mindful response, from being driven by habit to living with awareness and freedom.
Practice is necessary because human beings tend to live unconsciously. We assume there is a solid, unchanging self that must be protected and satisfied. We believe happiness lies in controlling circumstances, securing pleasure, or avoiding discomfort. From these assumptions arise craving, resistance, fear, and endless dissatisfaction. Practice begins when we start to question these assumptions—not intellectually, but experientially—and see how suffering is constructed in our own lives.
At the heart of practice is attention to the mind. Buddhism does not deny the reality of the world, but it emphasizes that our experience of the world is shaped by perception, interpretation, and habit. Two people can face the same situation and experience it completely differently. Practice, therefore, is not primarily about changing the world, but about learning to observe how the mind reacts to it. Each moment of desire, anger, or anxiety becomes an opportunity to wake up.
Practice is not about suppressing emotions or achieving a polished spiritual identity. It is about developing a clear and kind relationship with whatever arises. Through mindfulness, we learn to notice thoughts and emotions without being controlled by them. Anger is seen as anger, fear as fear, joy as joy. We do not deny or indulge them; we understand them. This honest seeing is what gradually weakens their grip.
Traditionally, practice unfolds through three integrated trainings: ethical conduct, mental stability, and wisdom. Ethical conduct aligns our actions and speech with non-harm and integrity, creating a foundation of trust and calm. Mental stability, cultivated through meditation, steadies the mind so it can remain present. Wisdom arises from this steadiness, revealing impermanence, non-self, and the conditioned nature of experience. These three are not separate stages but mutually reinforcing aspects of a single path.
True practice is tested in daily life. It shows itself in how we listen, how we speak, how we handle disappointment, and how we respond under pressure. Can we pause before reacting? Can we feel discomfort without fleeing it? Can we act responsibly without being rigid or self-centered? Practice becomes real when awareness enters ordinary moments—work, relationships, conflict, and choice.
The fruits of practice are not necessarily dramatic experiences, but subtle and profound shifts. Reactivity softens. Compassion deepens. The need to defend a fixed identity loosens. One may not appear extraordinary, but there is a quiet reliability and openness that others can sense. These changes are not forced; they unfold naturally through consistent and sincere practice.
Ultimately, practice is not about becoming someone else, but about seeing through what we mistakenly took ourselves to be. It is not about adding spiritual layers, but about removing confusion. As attachment loosens and understanding grows, life becomes lighter. We begin to live more fully in the present, less driven by fear or grasping, more guided by clarity and care.
In this way, practice is not a project with an endpoint, but a way of living. It does not promise control over life, but it offers freedom within life. Through practice, we do not escape the world—we meet it with open eyes and a grounded heart. And in that meeting, genuine transformation occurs.
