Taming the Mind November 9, 2009
Posted by Philip Ryan in : Buddhism, Daily Dharma , trackbackAncient Pali texts liken meditation to the process of taming a wild elephant. The procedure in those days was to tie a newly captured animal to a post with a good strong rope. When you do this, the elephant is not happy. He screams and tramples, and pulls against the rope for days. Finally it sinks through his skull that he can’t get away, and he settles down. At this point you can begin to feed him and to handle him with some measure of safety. Eventually you can dispense with the rope and post altogether, and train your elephant for various tasks. Now you’ve got a tamed elephant that can be put to useful work. In this analogy the wild elephant is your wildly active mind, the rope is mindfulness, and the post is our object of meditation, our breathing. The tamed elephant who emerges from this process is a well-trained, concentrated mind that can then be used for the exceedingly tough job of piercing the layers of illusion that obscure reality. Meditation tames the mind.
- Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, from “On Practice: Breathing,” Tricycle, Spring 1995
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This analogy doesn’t work for me. I am so put off by the thought of the abuse of young elephants that I flinch from handling any living thing like that including my mind. The analogy that works for me is the wordless series of pictures of a farmer trying to get his ox to go in the direction he wishes. For five of the seven frames he pulls and hauls and swats to no effect. In the end, he drops the lead rope in disgust and walks away. Of course, the ox immediately trots obediently behind him.
I agree with Lynn. I’m too bothered by the cruelty of trapping the animal and leaving it presumably without food for three days. I love the analogy of the ox though. The more you pull on the rope, he thinks this is part of the game: I stand here, you pull the rope. But when you walk away, he thinks, “oh, we’re going somewhere now,” and follows. How funny.
In agreement with Lynn and Mary. The thought brings sadness for the wild animal loosing her freedom, can’t do it.
Taming does not always equate abuse.
In fact, Early Buddhist teachings often talked about the value of a tamed mind.
Don’t worry about the elephants! They are making merit.
It would be nice if the Ox actually did follow us around and become nice after we leave it alone. But it doesn’t. It is still wild, and still a potential danger.
Just like our minds!
I can’t believe how literally people can be! Its a story! Buddha was born and lived in India where they have elephants! Why not a story about taming an elephant?…a strong, beautiful, potentially destructive animal…like our minds!
I agree with alan and bonnie that being put off by this metaphor is missing the moon for the finger.