Search results for: "The Breath"

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  2. Discernment Is in the Details
    When you focus on the breath, there are quite a few activities going on in the mind. But the two most important in getting you to be with the breath and stay with the breath are directed thought and evaluation. Directed thought is when you keep reminding yourself to keep coming back to the breath: “Breath, breath”—this is what you’re going to … 
  3. Basic Intro
     … As long as you’re with the breath, you know you’re in the present moment. So notice where you feel the breathing. What sensations in the body tell you, “Now the breath is coming in; now the breath is going out”? Notice how the sensations feel. Are they comfortable? If they’re not, change the way you breathe. Maybe the breath is too … 
  4. WYSIWYG
     … the people who say, “When you die, the breath’s going to go, so you’ll be abandoned by your meditation object.” Well, if you were only learning about the breath, that might be a valid criticism. But the fact is, as you’re learning about the breath, you’re learning about the mind. In particular, you’re learning about how the mind shapes … 
  5. Refreshing
     … When you focus them on one object, like the breath, and you can maintain those three together—directing your thoughts to the breath, evaluating the breath, paying attention solely to the breath and mind together—then the other factors of right concentration will come in, which are a sense of ease and pleasure, along with a sense of what in Pali is called piti … 
  6. Ask Yourself the Buddha’s Question
     … That’s another area where you can question yourself: “This label I have of the breath here, my mental image of the breath: Is it helpful?” You read Ajaan Lee and he talks about the breath energy going down through the nerves. What does that mean? Well, watch the sensations of your body. Open your mind to the possibility the breath could be moving … 
  7. Protect Your Inner Center
    You focus on the breath, the feeling of the process of breathing. It’s not just a matter of the air coming in and out of the lungs. It’s an energy flow in the body—and it has a huge impact on how your mind feels, how you feel in the present moment. Take some time to look at it. When you breathe … 
  8. Marshalling the Emotions
     … As long as you’re controlling the breath anyway, try to do it consciously, skillfully. And what is it that controls the breath? There’s an intention and there’s a perception. Can you be clear about your intentions and perceptions? Can you change your intention to be more sensitive to what the breath really needs? Can you change your perception of the breath … 
  9. It’s Good to Talk to Yourself
     … What are you saying to yourself about the breath right now? You can ask yourself if the breath feels good. Where do you feel the breath? What concept of breath are you using? There’s the breath of the air coming in and out through the nose. There’s also the breath of the energy movements in the body. Some of those movements are … 
  10. Here Be Tigers
     … Let the breath be in the foreground. Why the breath? Because the breath is the closest thing to the mind that you can focus on. We’re here to understand our minds, but first we need something close to the mind to focus on, to gather all the thoughts and all the feelings and perceptions in the mind into one place. The breath is … 
  11. Delusion Concentration
     … As soon as the breath gets comfortable, think of it spreading down the back, spreading down the legs, wherever the pains may tend to congregate. You open up the breath channels leading to those spots and leading away from them. Keep your main attention with the comfortable parts of the breath, the areas where the breath feels good. This, of course, leads to the … 
  12. The Thread of Mindfulness
     … So in this case, as we’re settling down, you want to keep the perception of the breath going. You can test different perceptions of the breath to see which ones are most conducive to settling down right now: the breath as flowing through the whole body; the breath as little lines going through the body, coming in and out of the pores—whatever … 
  13. Cutting Roads
     … problems with our posture, preconceived notions about which parts the body have to do with the breathing, and which parts get a free ride. If we make up our mind to stay with the breath but don’t question those perceptions, we can make things worse. This is why Ajaan Lee recommends so many different ways of conceiving the breath energies. You can try … 
  14. The Limits of Old Kamma
    Focus your attention on the breath and see how it feels. Where do you notice it in the body first? Where does it seem most prominent? You might notice the passage of the air through the nostrils, the rise and fall of the chest, the expansion of the rib cage: There are lots of different places in the body where you can sense the … 
  15. Perceiving the Breath
     … Part of that is because of the breath. As we’re meditating on the breath, we want to get sensitive to that because holding this different perception in mind helps get the mind into the breath, snug with the breath, surrounded by a sense of breath, and it feels really comfortable. When you have that sense of comfort, it’s a lot easier to … 
  16. Judging Mindfulness & Concentration
     … The first is keeping focused on one topic, like the breath, in and of itself. You’re not worried about the breath in relationship to the world outside, just the breath that you’re experiencing directly, right here, right now. Where do you experience it? Where do you feel it when it comes in, when it goes out? Stay right there with it. Sometimes … 
  17. The Path Requires Effort
     … First, while you’re practicing with the breath, focus your attention on where the breath seems most obvious, so that you know: Now the breath is going in; now the breath is going out. And stick with it. It’s the sticking-with-it that makes all the difference. Sometimes you hear people say, “I’ve done a little concentration. I know what it … 
  18. Levels of the Breath
    Levels of the Breath August 20, 2006 We all bring our stories to the meditation. Sometimes they’re helpful stories, sometimes they’re not. Even the Buddha brought his stories to the meditation. That first knowledge on the night of his awakening was basically his story stretching back over many lifetimes. The big issues in each lifetime were his name, his appearance, his food … 
  19. Directly & Indirectly to the Breath
    Sometimes when you sit down and close your eyes, you’re right here with the breath. There are not too many other things impinging on the mind. You find it easy to let them go. And there it is: the breath coming in, going out. You can watch it for a while to gain a sense of its many ins and outs—in other … 
  20. Take Care of Your Tools
     … You just keep reminding yourself in states like that, “Okay, how is the breath?” If the breath feels okay, then these other sensations will pass pretty quickly. Just don’t leave the breath to go into the rapture, or leave the breath to go into whatever sense of ease comes up. The ease is there. You don’t deny it. In fact, you actually … 
  21. Why the Breath
    Why the Breath January 9, 2004 We watch the breath so we can watch the mind. The breath is like a mirror for the mind. When you look at the way you breathe, you can get a good sense of what’s going on in the mind. If you get really familiar with the breath, you can begin to detect things that are happening … 
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