Search results for: "The Mind"

  1. Page 108
  2. Safe at Home
     … So it has come from within the mind, from training what resources you have in the mind. The good thing about true happiness is that it doesn’t take anything away from anyone else. It’s not like the happiness and pleasures of the world, where if you gain something, somebody else has to lose it. Your true happiness doesn’t conflict with anybody … 
  3. Change
     … The other change that’s dangerous is the fact that the mind can change so quickly. As he once said, the mind is so quick to change that there’s no adequate analogy for how fast it is. Even the twinkling of an eye is too slow. You can work for years and years on something and suddenly your mind changes and reverses on … 
  4. Knowledge over Fear
     … And when you reach that state where you’ve mastered the skills of meditation and you don’t have to suffer anymore, then you realize there’s no danger in the mind at all. And when there’s no danger in the mind, outside dangers get very small. They’re there, you’re careful, but fear is gone. That’s what the ajaans tell … 
  5. Effective Self-Discipline
     … It’s important to have the desire to get the mind to be peaceful, to get the mind to understand itself. If you didn’t have that desire, you wouldn’t be here. You’d off some place else, down at the beach, looking for happiness. So sometimes it’s useful to remind yourself of why you’re meditating, of what you want out … 
  6. In Your Power
     … You use the teachings from the suttas as tools, but you’ve got to develop the qualities that lead to the knowledge within the mind, so that you can see the mind in action as it’s creating suffering. You catch it in the act. Then you can stop it. It’s like a dog peeing on your rug. If you hit it while … 
  7. Goodwill for Free
     … By giving this free gift, you become free, and the freedom is immediate in the sense of spaciousness that appears in the mind. It lasts for a long time, but it does have to be maintained. You learn how to feed your goodwill by reflecting on the state of the mind that you’ve developed and then comparing that with the state of mind … 
  8. Three Noble Truths Versus Four
     … The directed thought and evaluation that adjust the breath to fit the mind, adjust the mind to fit the breath: That’s fabrication. And then there’s the consciousness that’s aware of these things. You turn those five aggregates into a state of concentration. And in doing so, you’re fighting against those three perceptions of inconstant, stressful, and not-self. You’re … 
  9. Self View & Conceit
     … When the mind gets settled down, is it really as still as it could be? Or is there some disturbance in here? Look around to see what you’re doing that’s causing the disturbance—because the acts of the mind are what’s causing the disturbance. The Buddha devotes a refrain in a sutta to the need to settle in and indulge in … 
  10. The Role of Attachment
     … You develop good qualities in the mind. You like them. When you get something good in the mind, you hold on to it both to see how far it can take you and for the sense of well-being that comes with it. If it’s the best thing you know in the mind, hold on to it. Don’t let go of it … 
  11. The Limits of Control
     … How much can you control the mind to stay with the object of your concentration? Push against the envelope. You find that you can create a sense of greater constancy than you have in any other way, a greater pleasure than you’ve experienced for many other things, greater control over your mind. This is not only to give the mind a pleasant dwelling … 
  12. Mission Possible
     … We’re looking for the details of the mind, how the mind creates a little thought world inside, and how that thought world can suddenly blow up. Like the old pictures they had of the Big Bang: Out of nothing comes a huge sudden expansion. How does that happen? You want to watch it carefully. You want to see what those first steps are … 
  13. Life in the Buddha’s Hospital
     … The events in the mind are the important issues. Those are the things causing your own illness. Do you want to cure your own illness or to aggravate it? Keep this question in mind as you practice. As we live together and practice together, we see each other a lot, but try to make that fact have the least possible impact on the mind … 
  14. Freedom from Beliefs
     … freedom from suffering, freedom from all the limitations we place on ourselves, whether those limitations are dressed up as the bad side of the mind or the good side of the mind. You’ve got to watch out for them, especially the ones that seem good. You’ve got to learn how to question them. What attitudes do you have to put aside immediately … 
  15. Analyzing the Breath
     … If you try to lock the mind into the body, it’s like locking a child into his room: He’s going to try to figure out some way to get out the window, or start doing something in the room he knows his parents don’t like, just to spite them. The mind is like that: If you lock it in with an … 
  16. Change Your Perceptions
     … So we work to overcome sensual desire, ill will, sloth and torpor, restlessness and anxiety, and uncertainty or doubt, to bring the mind into concentration. And we get the mind into concentration by changing our perceptions. When the mind is in concentration, then you can apply the four noble truths. Ask the questions of the four noble truths: “Where is the suffering right now … 
  17. Social Anxiety
     … If the zeros get put after, you’ve got lots of issues, but if the zeros get put first, no matter how many zeros you have, they don’t add anything, don’t burden the mind at all. It’s the same way with the mind: You make it zero and then you put the zeros first. Then when you deal with other people … 
  18. Cooking with Kamma
     … But that, he says, isn’t the suffering that weighs the mind down. The suffering that weighs the mind down comes from craving and clinging. Craving and clinging he defines in different ways. There’s delight and there’s passion, which can take all kinds of forms. So what form are they taking in your mind right now, telling you that a certain unpleasant … 
  19. Planting a Tree
    Training the mind is like growing a tree. You’re responsible for the water and the fertilizer, but the growing is something that the tree does. If you try to speed it up by pulling on the tree, what usually happens is that you pull it out of the ground. Its roots get disconnected. The tree dies. You have to focus on your duty … 
  20. The Wisdom of Incongruity
     … Of course, when we’re getting the mind to settle down, we’re trying to stop that: to get things focused, to get things centered. In the beginning, we actually have to use that ability to think around things from various angles to help get the mind settled in on the breath in a comfortable way. If the mind has a tendency to think … 
  21. Right Resolve & Right Concentration
     … When you’ve got the mind in right concentration, you’re working with the breath, which is usually the part of you that gets hijacked by your greed, aversion, and delusion. These emotions can start getting you to breathe in unskillful ways—you can even have panic attacks—that just squeeze the mind, squeeze your nerves as they say in Thai, to the point … 
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