Skilful Action

1. Skilful action causes happiness. In Wings to Awakening, Thanissaro Bhikkhu argues that skilful action is “the primary factor” that “contribut[es] to happiness”.

2. Thanissaro Bhikkhu defines an action as skilful if and only if the “intention motivating it” is skilful. In turn, he defines an intention as skilful if and only if it is “free of greed, aversion and delusion”.

3. Skilful intention is caused by both appropriate attention and admirable friendship. In the Itivuttaka, the Buddha argues that a monk who either “attends appropriately” or “is a friend with admirable people abandons what is unskilful and develops what is skilful”.

1. Thanissaro Bhikkhu defines appropriate attention as the “objective” view of one’s thoughts “in terms of their actual consequences” out of “conviction in the principle of karma”. He identifies appropriate attention as “the main internal factor” that “enable[s] one to tell what is skilful and unskilful”.

2. Thanissaro Bhikkhu defines admirable friendship as the friendship with people “who live by the principle of karma”. He identifies admirable friendship as “[t]he main external factor” that “enable[s] one to tell what is skilful and unskilful”.