Concepts lie at the essence of mental fabrication. The mind thinks of matters either past or future and then starts elaborating on them as good or bad, liking or disliking them.

If we see them as good, we get pleased and taken with them: This is delusion. If we see them as bad, we get displeased, which clouds and defiles the mind, making it irritated, restless and annoyed: This is ill will. The things that give rise to unrest and disturbance in the mind are all classed as hindrances (nīvaraṇa) – fabrications that fashion the mind, destroying whatever is good in our practice of concentration. So we have to do away with them all.

Mental fabrications, if we think in terms of the world, are world-fabrications. If we think in terms of dhamma, they’re dhamma-fabrications. Both sorts come from avijjā, unawareness. If this unawareness disbands, awareness will arise in its stead. So we have to try to increase the strength of our concentration to the point where fabrications disband – and at that point, unawareness will disband as well, leaving only awareness.

This awareness is identical with discernment, but it’s a discernment that arises from within. It doesn’t come from anything our teachers have taught us. It comes from the stillness of mind focused on events in the present. It’s an awareness that’s very profound, but it’s still mundane–not transcendent–discernment because it comes from labels and concepts. It’s still tied up with affairs of being and birth.

Perhaps we may become aware of matters of the past, knowing and seeing the states of being and birth we’ve been through. This is called knowledge of past lives. Perhaps we may become aware of the future, knowing the affairs of other people, how they die and are reborn. This is called knowledge of death and rebirth. Both these forms of knowledge still have attachment infiltrating them, causing the mind to waver in line with its likes and dislikes. This is what corrupts our insight.

Some people, when they learn of the good states of being and birth in their past, get engrossed, pleased, and elated with the various things they see. If they meet up with things that aren’t so good, they feel disgruntled or upset. This is simply because the mind still has attachment to its states of being and birth. To like the things that strike us as good or satisfying is indulgence in pleasure. To dislike the things that strike us as bad or dissatisfying is self-affliction. Both of these attitudes are classed as wrong paths that deviate from the right path, or right view.

Matters of the past or future, even if they deal with the Dhamma, are still fabrications and so are wide of the mark. Thus the next step is to use the power of our concentration to make the mind even stronger, to the point where it can snuff out these mundane forms of discernment. The mind will then progress to transcendent discernment–a higher form of discernment, an awareness that can be used to free the mind from attachment–right mindfulness, the right path.

Even though we may learn good or bad things about ourself or others, we don’t become pleased or upset. We feel nothing but disenchantment, disinclination, and dismay over the way living beings in the world are born and die. We see it as something meaningless, without any substance. We’re through with feelings of liking and disliking. We’ve run out of attachment for ourself and everything else. The mind has moderation. It’s neutral. Even. This is called six-factored equanimity (chalaṅg’ūpekkhā).

We let go of the things that happen, that we know or see, letting them follow their own regular course without our feeling caught up in them. The mind will then move up to liberating insight.

This reflection by Ajaan Lee Dhammadharo is from the talk “Mental Power, Step by Step, July 26, 1956,” translated from the Thai by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu, in the book Inner Strength & Parting Gifts: Talks by Ajaan Lee Dhammadharo (pp. 36-38).