Search results for: "The Mind"

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  2. An Exercise in Sensitivity
     … Otherwise, you just go back to the mind’s old ways of wandering around. Although it’s true that you can learn some things by watching the mind wandering around, you can learn a lot more by watching it as you try to get it to settle down and under control. That’s because there are parts of the mind that resist getting under … 
  3. Ask Yourself the Buddha’s Question
     … It’s not just a matter of forcing the mind down, sticking its head under water. You’re going to stay here with a sense of ease and well-being so that the mind is happy to stay here. If it’s not comfortable with the breath, not interested, it’s like a child being forced to stay in the house. You lock the … 
  4. The Noble Eightfold Path to the Deathless
     … And as you’re carrying through, you begin to realize more and more that the important element is the mind. The mind’s got to be trained beyond just simply having right view. You’ve got to work on developing skillful qualities in the mind and abandoning unskillful ones. That’s right effort. And you have to develop powers of concentration. That starts with … 
  5. Consciousness, Name, & Form
     … First, you get the mind really still, and to do that, you have to see things on their own terms: as events in the body, events in the mind—what the Buddha calls name and form on the one hand, and consciousness the other. Consciousness is your awareness. Form is your sense of the body as you feel it from within in terms of … 
  6. Question & Probe
     … So you’ve got to come up with new questions every day—which means that the mind has to be constantly on the offensive. And the fact that you’re on the offensive like this keeps you from being a stationary target for the pain. The same principle applies with the mind. When some emotions are painful, you can ask yourself, “Well, what’s … 
  7. Observe Your Concentration
     … From the sense of joy, the mind becomes serene; and when the mind is serene, it becomes concentrated. So, while you’re listening to the talk on the aggregates, you can look at your mind in concentration and see that the concentration is made up of those same five aggregates. That other passage in the suttas then goes on to explain that when you … 
  8. Complaining Rights
     … But, again, that desire to get the sympathy is going to stand in the way of your seeing, “This is what I’m actually doing that’s causing the suffering.” The doing is very subtle, which is why we have to get the mind really still when we practice concentration, because there are lot of little subtle movements in the mind that we otherwise … 
  9. Samvega & Pasada
    Focusing on the breath, trying to get the mind to stay with the breath, can sometimes be a very chastening experience. On the first level, there’s the simple difficulty of getting the mind to stay with one thing: something as simple and nearby as the breath, and yet you find it slipping off, slipping off, slipping off. You start out with the best … 
  10. Feelings Not of the Flesh
     … Pain not of the flesh, for instance, has to do with your desire to get the mind to be trained in concentration and to gain awakening. As the Buddha says, when you realize that you can’t get the mind to stay equanimous in the face of negative things, you should regard it as an instance of bad fortune. “This doesn’t bode well … 
  11. The Kindness of Body Contemplation
     … It’s not like we’re saying the body is bad and the mind is good. There’s something deeper than even the mind that we’re after. As the Buddha says, this “something” can be touched by the mind and it’s touched and seen at the body. The potential opening to it is always right here in the present moment where the … 
  12. Goodwill for the Whole Committee
     … All actions come out of the mind. That’s why we train the mind to get more and more sensitive to its own actions. What’s radical about all this is what counts as an action. There are lots of things that we think of as things or identities but that the Buddha would prefer that we think of as actions, because it’s … 
  13. Appropriate Attention
     … So, as you go through your meditation and you run across something that wears the mind down, weighs the mind down, ask yourself, “What are you craving? What are you clinging to? And how?” If you can see that you’re craving something that’s placing a weight on the mind, how about letting it go? Each of the four noble truths has a … 
  14. Peace of Mind
     … This is why fulfillment in life has to come from within, developing good qualities in the mind, because these things stick with you even after death. And they don’t have to depend on anyone else. You know when you’ve improved the mind in terms of its virtue, in terms of its kindness, in terms of equanimity when equanimity is needed, discernment when … 
  15. Balancing the Bases for Concentration
     … The more refreshing the breath, the more blissful the breath, then the easier it will be for the mind to settle in, and the concentration can start doing its work. Concentration is a really important part of the path that’s often overlooked. It’s the part of the path that heals the mind. Many times you come to meditation with a sense of … 
  16. Investment Strategies
     … something that helps you stash away good qualities for the future, because conviction comes down to the idea that the training of the mind can make all the difference in the world. As you’re sitting here focusing on the breath, you’re developing qualities that will be very useful, such as mindfulness and alertness. In other words, when you see the mind moving … 
  17. Looking After Yourself
     … There’s a school of thought saying that the practice is not a practice of doing, it’s simply a matter of allowing things to happen, allowing the mind to unfold in its natural direction. But if that were the case, the Buddha wouldn’t have stressed heedfulness so much. He said it’s the basis for all skillfulness, the basis for the skillful … 
  18. To Excel
     … They like to hear that the mind is innately good, innately luminous, and that the luminosity and the goodness are the same thing, so that the practice is simply a matter of getting in touch with your true innately good nature. In fact, the less you do, the better. That’s what we want to hear. But you look at the mind, and it … 
  19. Metta
     … For the meditation to go well, you’ve got to get the mind to settle down. If you’re thinking about how you might harm somebody, or you’re living with the results of having harmed somebody, it’s very difficult to get the mind to be still. You start thinking about unskillful things you’ve done. There may be unskillful things where you … 
  20. Seclusion
    When the mind begins to settle down, it gives rise to a sense of ease. And the ease, the texts say, comes from seclusion. So what kind of seclusion are they talking about? To begin with, there’s physical seclusion. You’re not talking to anybody else right now. You’re not interacting with other people. All the burdens of interacting with other people … 
  21. Meditation Prep
     … He’s simply telling him to replace various levels of aversion in the mind—irritation, resentment, ill will, or the desire to harm—with more positive emotions. If you notice ill will coming up in the mind, try counteracting it with goodwill. Don’t just allow the mind to stay stuck with its ill will. You do what you can to foster an attitude … 
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