In English
Attitude necessary for developing detachment
A little reflection will give the attitude necessary for developing detachment. You have a house in this city; you have lived in it some years; you call it yours; your are proud of it; you protest angrily when a poster is pasted on its walls; you have taken great care to see that it is comfortable, charming, impressive. Then one day you sell it. It is no longer the object of your attachment. Even when lightning strikes it, you are not disturbed. Now, the fields you have purchased with the sale proceeds become yours and they attract all your attachment. When flood waters invade those fields, you are very concerned and you run hither and thither trying to save them from harm. Next, you sell them too. You call the money yours; you put it in a bank and you become attached to the pass book issued by the Bank. You keep it in an iron safe and scan its pages lovingly. The money you gave the Bank may be loaned by them to some one you do not like, but you do not care. You have the pass book with you. Now what exactly is yours? To which were you attached so deeply? The house, the fields, the money, the pass book? To none of these things. You were attached to prestige, comfort, show, greed: things that arose in your mind as desire, as urges; to your own ego, basically. That was the thing which induced you to claim these things, one after the other, as yours!