Search results for: "Becoming"

  1. Page 106
  2. The Buddha’s Safe Space
     … of course that raises the question, why did the first monk hit the second monk, or who hit who first? When you trace it back and back and back, that question becomes meaningless. And the funny thing is, is that making it meaningless takes a lot of sting out of it. The part of the mind that says, “I’ve got to right this … 
  3. Passion for Dispassion
     … Are we willing to change our expectations, to take him seriously when he says there is a cessation of suffering, and it’s the ultimate rest, the ultimate refuge, harbor, safety, total freedom? Now, to get there requires that we become dispassionate for the things that we have been looking for happiness in. This is where it goes against the grain, because we look … 
  4. Success on the Path
     … In other words, he teaches you how to become your own doctor. So try to develop this sense of what’s needed to be your own doctor, to be your own teacher, so that at the very least, the dialogue in your mind can be more helpful, more intelligent, more wise, and actually head in that direction that we want to go—to the … 
  5. Your True Responsibility
     … Your inner landscape becomes a lot more malleable than you thought it could be. When you ask the right questions, everything gets turned around for the better. We’re working on these two qualities needed to learn: intention and attention. The intention right now is to be mindful. Get the mind to settle down. Attention is watching: is the intention really working or not … 
  6. The Power of Intention
     … This gives you a more solid foundation where you can become more interested in trying to understand the process of pain itself to see to what extent you’re actually making the pain worse by the way you think about it, the way you perceive it. When you can see how your intentions in the present moment have a big impact on your experience … 
  7. Relate Everything to the Breath
     … This is how you become skilled in breath meditation: going on the assumption that whatever comes up, you want to relate it to the way you breathe, the way you experience the breath energy in the body, the way you conceive the breath energy in the body. Then use that knowledge to develop skillful qualities in the mind.
  8. Equanimity in Heart & Mind
     … You begin to see how that person seemed to become part of you. You were actually feeding on that person in terms of your emotions. A large part of your identity is built around that relationship. But look what happens: Every relationship is going to end. And when it does, are you going to go looking for another one? Or would it be better … 
  9. Safe Haven
     … As you develop a sense of ease sitting right here, wherever you may feel it, be confident that this is going to become your safe place. It may not be very large right now. To use another image, it’s like starting a fire on a windy day. As soon as you light the kindling, you’ve got to protect it. Once the fire … 
  10. Figuring Out Concentration
     … The more the mind gets still, the more delicate the work becomes—but it’s still work. There’s still plenty to figure out. So whatever verb you use, or however you describe the verb of thinking, make sure that your thinking is on target, doing what it should be doing. Whether it counts as directed thought or as reflection or whatever, it’s … 
  11. What’s Not on the Map
     … Your external habits of speaking become part of your internal dialogue. So the practice is a combination of learning what you’ve picked up from other people, taking it to heart, and then also realizing that you’ve got to test it. Things may not come out the way you anticipated them. This is part of discernment. It starts with learning from what you … 
  12. Wisdom as a Tool
     … We’re here because it’s one of the best places to watch things as they unfold, before we slap labels on them, such as “This is me” or “This is mine or somebody else’s” or “This is a great insight.” Before you start conjuring up all the processes of becoming around them, learn to see things as events, as they come, as … 
  13. Letting Go
     … After all, if you hang on, you become a ghost and then haunt the people you’re concerned about. That, of course, freaks them out. You’re not doing anybody any good. You’ve got to realize that a lot of these thoughts, even though they may be responsible and they may be compelling, have their time and place. When it’s no longer … 
  14. Training Your Moods
     … It’s in this way that the training becomes a complete training. Not just for a couple hours during the day—it’s the whole day. As Ajaan Fuang used to say, our practice tends to get fragmented into times. We have a time to eat, a time to talk, a time to work, and then there’s a little bit of time for … 
  15. Visakha Puja
     … Develop this path—this middle way of virtue, concentration, and discernment—take your desire for happiness seriously, so that it’s not just a selfish thing, it becomes a quality that gives rise to wisdom, compassion, purity. Then you take these qualities and bring them to the present moment, look what’s going on in the mind right now, so that you can develop … 
  16. Reflections
     … There will be part of the mind that says, “Hey, I’ve got a whole hour here, I can just take five minutes to think about what I want… ten minutes, fifteen minutes, whatever.” You find of course, that what’s originally planned as a short excursion becomes a long-term trip. It eats up the whole time. You can tell yourself: “I’ve … 
  17. Doing, Maintaining, Using
     … It’s the same with the meditation When you use it, it becomes a more complete training. We’re here not just to master a technique, but also to learn how we’re creating suffering in unnecessary ways, both for ourselves and for other people around us, and how we can learn to undo those habits. We see that the suffering that really matters … 
  18. Close to What You Know
     … If you take that as your context, then the issue of self becomes a question of: What kind of activity is self? And what are the results of selfing in different situations? When you look at your sense of self in that way, you begin to realize that it’s something you do, something you put together given certain circumstances. You perceive a certain … 
  19. Tranquility & Insight Together
     … It becomes what’s called a path. It leads you ultimately to something that’s not shaped at all, not fabricated at all. It’s just there. So when you’re working with the breath, trying to get the mind into concentration, you’re bringing some awareness to the way you fabricate the state of your mind and your experience of your body. When … 
  20. The Self-correcting Mind
     … This way, the mind becomes self-correcting and learns to explore possibilities that it might not have thought of before. As the Buddha said, there’s the discernment that comes from listening and there’s the discernment that comes from thinking things through. But the discernment that really works in making a difference for the mind, allowing it to gain release from its suffering … 
  21. Choosing Not to Suffer
     … It’s bad to die when you’re worried, because that becomes the dominant mindset that you go with.” She was able to put him at ease. And it so happened that he didn’t die. He recovered. At one point, when he was just barely strong enough to walk, he went to see the Buddha. He told him about what his wife had … 
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