Search results for: "The Mind"

  1. Page 103
  2. The Challenge
     … When you come to meditation with that experience behind you, it’s a lot easier to give up a lot of the things that are really closest to the heart, things inside the mind: your sense of who you are, your narratives of who you are, where you are going, all the attachments of the mind. You’d think that because these things are … 
  3. Control from Within
     … If we don’t train the mind, we’re going to suffer. If we do train the mind, we have the opportunity not to suffer. That’s our big choice in life. The Buddha once said the point that distinguishes a wise person from the fool is that the wise person sees the necessity of training the mind, whereas the fool doesn’t. That … 
  4. Body as Path
     … The really important part is that it’s good for the mind. So this is how you take the body, this aggregate of form, and turn it into part of the path. When you get the mind in a good state of concentration like this, all the aggregates are here. There’s the form of the body, there’s a feeling of pleasure, there … 
  5. Buddhist Engineering
     … But the important thing, as the Buddha described it, is the importance of the mind in this causal sequence. First verse in the Dhammapada: “All phenomena are preceded by the mind, made by the mind.” Then he uses that principle to illustrate karma. If you act with a clear, bright mind, the results will be good. If you act with a clouded, defiled mind … 
  6. Strength to Be Good
     … It puts the mind in a better mood; it’s healthier for the body. And when the mind is in a better mood, it’s a lot more likely to be willing to do what has to be done. Many times we know what we should be doing but we don’t want to do it because we don’t feel like it. Or … 
  7. A Home & a Mobile Home
    One of the standard terms for concentration is *vihara-dhamma, *which can be translated as “a home for the mind.” As you focus on the breath, you want to get the mind so that it feels at home here, in a home that’s solidly built and a good place to stay. Otherwise, the mind goes roaming out looking for scraps outside to give … 
  8. Acceptance
     … And the mind moves from one to another. When you sit down to meditate, part of the mind is with the program and part of the mind is not, which can be the cause for a lot of frustration. But you can learn how to use these many selves to your advantage. Remember, each of your selves is the result of an activity aimed … 
  9. Discernment All Along
     … Watch the mind as it’s engaged with the breath. Watch the mind as it’s engaged with all the various skillful things that are parts of the path: virtue, concentration, discernment—and see what you can learn. It’s easiest to learn when you’re engaged in skillful activities or engaged in the attempt to do something skillful. If you find yourself getting … 
  10. A Slave to Craving
     … But it was when he talked to himself about the rewards of how you can get the mind still, and the usefulness of having a still mind, that he was willing to make the sacrifice. So it’s a good lesson to learn, because you’re going to need that as you meditate. Ideas come into the mind and they see you have an … 
  11. A Greater Happiness
     … And the fourth one is not having seen the true Dhamma, not realizing that there is a deathless element in the mind that’s not touched by aging, illness, or death—the part of the mind that has nothing to fear. So we work on these four issues in the meditation. First, we do it by developing a sense of ease that doesn’t … 
  12. How to Be an Admirable Friend
     … And because our actions come out of the mind, this is where we start. We start with the attitude and we start with the meditation as a way of showing goodwill to ourselves and goodwill to others, of being a friend to ourselves and a friend to others. You get the mind under control. You keep your passion, aversion, and delusion – to some extent … 
  13. Potentials for Refuge
     … We have to remember that those establishings of mindfulness are his instructions on how you get the mind into concentration. So for our internal refuge, we’re trying to get the mind to settle down, to be with the body as a whole. The problem is that as you settle down it’s like sitting in a chair. You find that under the seat … 
  14. Perspectives & Priorities
     … physical solitude, mental solitude, and what the commentaries call solitude from your paraphernalia—in other words, the possessions of the mind, the defilements in the mind, the baggage you carry around inside. The Canon talks about the first two. When you get away from other people, it’s easier to see your issues. When you’re with other people, their issues tend to take … 
  15. The Boundaries of Mindfulness
     … In the same way, as you’re practicing mindfulness, if the mind settles down with any particular theme, remember that. Keep going back to that theme. If you don’t really take note of what the mind likes, what the mind doesn’t like, you’re like the foolish inexperienced cook who doesn’t get a reward from the prince because he’s not … 
  16. When Things Aren’t Going Well
     … The truths are not just truths about something; they’re ways of looking, categories you can apply to anything going on in the mind. You can watch all the crazy thoughts in the mind and, if you do it from the perspective of the four noble truths, knowledge can arise. Learn to find what in the mind you can rely on as a path … 
  17. Inner Wealth
     … They also make it easier for the mind to concentrate: If you don’t have a lot of negative past actions in your background, then there’s less that you have to deny, there’s less that you have to regret—and the mind finds it easier to settle down. Again, you don’t have any wounds that you find yourself suddenly sitting on … 
  18. Observe Yourself in Action
     … How does a becoming form? Even before there’s a sense of I or me doing this in a particular world, there will be events in the mind. When we talk about them, they seem abstract because we’re so used to talking in terms of becoming, but they’re really pretty simple and immediate. There are events in the mind, and you can … 
  19. Inner Wealth Management
     … And it’s good and soothing for the mind. It’s also one of those things that helps the mind get into concentration. If you have ill will for the people around you, that’s going to carry into your meditation and spoil it. So develop goodwill as wealth. Develop concentration as wealth, and regard the problems that come up in concentration as challenges … 
  20. The Wisdom of Restraint
     … But even though the thoughts wouldn’t lead him into trouble, still, thinking even skillful thoughts all the time gets the mind tired. When the mind is tired, it can’t control itself very well. So he realized he would have to exert some more control. Even skillful thoughts, he said, he would have to keep in check as he got the mind to … 
  21. Keep Things Simple
     … They’re very simple questions. “Where’s the stress right now?” And before you get to the stress, ask “Where can the mind settle down?” If the mind hasn’t settled down, if it has no sense of ease, you can’t see anything clearly. So sometimes the only place it can settle down is with an ordinary feeling of okay-ness someplace in … 
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