Question: I find it difficult to separate seeing from thinking about what we see. Seeing and thinking of people and things seem to occur together and thus it seems that we see people and things like a car or a house.

Answer: It is important to have right understanding about seeing. It sees only what appears through the eyes, nothing else. When you pay attention to shape and form and you perceive people and things there is remembrance of concepts, there is thinking, not seeing. But seeing conditions thinking of concepts. If there were no seeing, there would not be thinking of concepts. We should realize when we are living in the world of concepts and when in t he world of realities. There will be less delusion if we learn to distinguish seeing from thinking.

Question: Would it be better not to think, in order to know realities?

Answer: No. We should understand thinking as thinking, seeing as seeing, feeling as feeling; they are different realities. The experience of heat is different from knowing where the heat appears.

Question: Do you believe that you will be a better person when you understand all these things?

Answer: If there is more direct understanding of realities there will be less clinging to the idea of self. We will think less of ourselves as good persons or bad persons. There are wholesome realities and unwholesome realities which arise because of conditions. It is beneficial when there is less attachment to the idea of a self who sees, who hears, who is good or bad.