The Sky of Mind and the Weather of Karma
Over countless lifetimes, driven by craving, the urge to cling to what is pleasant, the urge to push away what is unpleasant, this craving has accumulated into a force, a stream without origin, set in motion by intention, that we call karma.
Karma is like the weather system. Clouds, winds, and storms form in the wide expanse of our awareness. Awareness by nature is like a vast open sky, unobstructed, naturally clear, boundless, and still.
But because of ignorance, the clouds of desire and aversion have long since covered the sky. Most beings see only the weather, shifting moods, passing storms, fleeting glimpses of sunlight, and they mistake this for the whole of reality.
Karmic formations are like clouds. They take shape from bodily actions, mental actions, and verbal actions. Each one is a condensation of karmic energy. Just as clouds are born from unseen vapor, so too these formations arise from unseen intentions, unseen ingrained habits, and unseen tendencies. Once formed, they look heavy and undeniable. Yet in truth, they are only passing shapes, only patterns in the air, and only temporary formations.
When craving swells, the pressure builds. Bodily, mental, and verbal formations solidify and intensify. The sky darkens. Then thunder comes, flashes of attention searching for an object, a target, a landing place. This is the mind reaching outward, stirred by desire, stirred by aversion.
After thunder comes rain, the release of karmic energy into experience. Each raindrop is contact: a feeling, a perception, coming together into a thought.
Each drop nourishes the soil of becoming, sprouting identity, feeding the cycle of birth and death. Rain feeds karmic seeds, clouds gather, storms erupt, and the cycle continues.
Our practice is to see through this weather. To stand beneath the storm without getting lost. To feel the rain without clinging. To watch the thunder without trembling. To know the whole process as conditioned.
And when awareness is steady, we begin to notice: even in the heaviest storm, there are breaks in the sky; even the darkest clouds cannot erase the openness; even the loudest thunder cannot disturb the vast silence beneath.
As insight deepens, we see that formations are not solid as we once believed. The body is changing, the body is unstable. Feelings come, and feelings go. Perceptions shift, and perceptions dissolve. Thoughts arise, and thoughts vanish. And behind them, we see their fuel: craving.
As we learn to subdue desire and aversion, they subside, the storm loses its strength. The bodily, mental, and verbal formations start to dissipate. The clouds scatter. Awareness clears. The sky opens. There is unobstructed awareness.
As we progress on the path, the rain may fall, but it does not soak in. Obstructions may arise, but we do not take them as self, nor do we regard them as solid or lasting. Seeing their true nature, we recognize they are not worth holding on to. Instead, we know them only as passing processes.
With the development of Right Concentration, the mind is able to abide in a higher ground, as though resting above the clouds. In the stillness of jhāna, the movements of the weather are seen with clarity. From that calm and open view, the storms no longer hold sway. The sky clears, and the sky simply remains.
Yet even in that clarity, a subtle longing may remain, the quiet wish for peace to last, the delight in stillness, the hope that storms will not return. But this, too, is a seed of becoming. For even the clear sky belongs to the weather system.
So the final task is not to cling even to the blue sky. Not to make clarity into a final refuge. The true goal is to understand the whole process, to know clouds, to know rain, to know thunder, to know sky and to see them all as empty of essence.
Only when we release even the craving for clarity, even the delight in unobstruction, does the cycle of weathering come to an end. What remains is not a perfected sky, not a sky forever free of clouds, but the ending of sky-making itself.
Where water, earth, fire, and air find no footing: there the stars do not shine, the sun is not visible, the moon does not appear, darkness is not found. And when a sage, a brahmin, through wisdom has realized this for themselves, then they are freed from form and formlessness, from pleasure and pain.
UD8