"Let’s pause for a moment and ask ourselves why are we studying the Buddha’s teaching? Why do we need to study it? Why do we fail to achieve our purpose? So we have to remember that we are here to learn from Buddha. I don’t believe that anyone will disagree with this; everyone will think of it this way too. However, let’s take a closer look for a reality check. Have we come here to truly learn from Buddha? This is questionable. Speaking from my experience, we claim that we are here to learn from Buddha but, in reality, we are learning from “me”. " - Master Jih-Chang
What are the attitudes and behaviours of “learning from me”? How can we correct these attitudes and behaviours?
I am pretty certain I am “learning from me”.
I see myself trying to interpret the Dharma according to my own perspective. I also tend to follow the teachings only when it is convenient and when it suits my current habits.
I think the first step towards correcting this flawed attitude and behaviour is to be aware of it.
Then we can do more repenting to accumulate the merits required to truly learn from our Teachers.
Our attitude is usually we want things to be done in our way, it is always about me. And for our behaviour, we are less bothered about what others think, as we only think about what we want to do. One solution is to take a step back, look at the bigger picture and think about it in the grand scheme of things: What will happen if I do things my way? What if I cooperate with everyone? So you have to see the end results. If you know that you are learning with everyone together in coming up with a common ground to work together, the task can be completed efficiently. But if we want to do things in our way, then we might use a lot of time arguing and debating.
Usually when we think that our experience is correct, especially if we can do something very well, we will insist on doing it our way, and then we may do it very enthusiastically, so this is the kind of attitudes and behaviors that we will have, when we are “learning from me”. We will think that this should be the way and then we will cling onto it and we will even put in a lot of effort to just do it our way.
However if we have this kind of attitude and behavior to learn the Buddha’s teachings, we will have a major issue because it means that we will shut ourselves out from some of the teachings that the Buddha is trying to teach us. So this is really a major issue especially if what we think to be right is actually wrong.
So we’ve got to be very grateful to our excellent teachers for pointing this out to us, and especially for teaching us the stages of the path, because the stages of the path gives us the whole overview of the path and our Excellent Teacher will remind us not to cling only to a specific practice.