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Dear friends,

I'd be really interested to hear about your current understanding of "anatta"(not-self).

Are you able to apply it to your everyday life ? If so, please share some examples.



with kind wishes,

Aloka

Hi Aloka

In respose to your original post, my current understanding of Anatta is that the teaching points to an understanding that there is no fixed core traits that create a permanatly fixed entity called self, from observation it becomes obvious that the self we can take as a permanent entity is in fact a process that is created as a result of interactions with the world.

The importance of this knowledge for me on a day to day basis is that an awful amount of what I think of me and mine, is in fact my mental volitions ( I prefer to call them Concoctions - Skandhas), it is not permanent conditions, things can change because of Anatta, therein lies the freedom to become, what you become depends on intention as the process can be influenced by intention

So to summarize, if there is an aspect of my life that is causing me dis-ease, I have confidence that coming to an understanding and forming an intention I can affect that dis-ease