The mind sends its energy around its central intention and that needs to be ending suffering in order for the mind to be willing to let go of its effluents If I ever need to do something in the real world I’ll use truth If I need to do something in my own mind I’ll use the path But my own mind has an internal representation of the external world So you can treat external things in an internal way Like for example you can see how someone is more similar to you than different and inspire love and compassion Ultimately the mental construct that represents “you” and the mental construct that represents “them” are both part of the same mind, that is representing a mental world for you two to act in (usually centered around “you” although that can be altered)So by understanding that your relationship with a person is a reflection of yourself, you can see how to smooth that relationship out and make it more harmonious because you can change yourself it’s true in the sense that it works to help keep the mind calm and unified You use it intentionally, understanding that it’s an empty construct that exists to help end suffering And doesn’t automatically pertain to the “real world” at all.
By seeing the way in which unskillful and skillful actions are the same
for example, they’re still both made of combinations of form, feeling, perception, intention, and consciousness
so you can break them down into their costituent parts using skillful perceptions, and then turn those raw materials into something skillful
For example by breaking them down into the 5 aggregates you can see them as having nothing to do with you, as non self, and as impermanent and dependently originated, not worth clinging to
This drains the craving/delight that allows suffering to proliferate
You identify a stress, ie, a hindrance, noble truth one, you identify the origination of that hindrance, clinging and ignorance, noble truth two
You discern that the stress will cease when the originator of the stress ceases, when craving is extinguished and ignorance is replaced by wisdom, noble truth 3, and the set of practices to help replace ignorance with wisdom, the noble eightfold path, the fourth noble truth.
