Search results for: "Focus"

  1. Page 110
  2. Motivation
     … So focus on giving it top priority. Or you can think of the meditation as a gift, not only to yourself but to the people around you. When you come out of meditation, you’re in a much better mood. As Ajaan Lee says, when the meditation is going well, they can curse your mother and you won’t get angry. Even though you … 
  3. Good Fences All Around You
     … concentration here. We establish ourselves in one of the frames of reference—the body in and of itself, or feelings, mind states in and of themselves—although primarily though the body. Focus on the breath. Any thought that doesn’t relate to the breath, just drop it. Realize that it’s a thought that’s run up against the fence, and you don’t … 
  4. Looking Inward
     … We give our inner gaze the proper focus. Because until this particular issue is taken care of, it’s just going to linger in there and keep coming back at you again and again and again. No matter how much you try to deny it, no matter how much you try to run away from it, it’s always going to be there. And … 
  5. Training in Right Resolve
     … top of the head down to the toes. Then take a couple of good, long, deep in-and-out breaths. Notice where you feel the breathing most clearly in the body. Focus your attention there, then ask yourself if the breath is comfortable. If you’re not sure, you can experiment with different kinds of breathing. See what the body needs right now, see … 
  6. Opening Your World
     … This may be why the Buddha focused on the problem of suffering as the main focus of his teaching. It’s when you know that there’s suffering or stress inside: That’s when you’re willing to look outside and gain lessons from others. This is what makes us teachable. After all, the Buddha didn’t say he came to save all beings … 
  7. Take Good Aim
     … This is one of the reasons why we’re working on concentration—to develop that steady, constant, unwavering quality of focus that enables our discernment to do its work. And what is the work of discernment? To understand our cravings. As we chanted just now, the mind is usually a slave to craving. We’re slaves to cravings because we don’t understand them … 
  8. Training Your Intentions
     … We choose the ones we want to focus on and pay attention to, and we turn them into the actual experience of an aggregate. So we’re playing a very intentional and purposeful role in our engagement with these things—in fact, with our engagement of all our senses. It’s not the case that we’re just sitting here passively being bombarded by … 
  9. Learning How to Learn
     … But, to do it well, you have to focus on the causes. Then, based on that desire, you develop your persistence: You actually do your best. Anything that comes up in the meditation that’s not skillful, you try to get rid of it. Anything that’s skillful, you try to give rise to it, then nurture it, nourish it, maintain it, help it … 
  10. Right Speech
     … You’re reminding yourself, “Now stay here,” commenting on how the breath is, and trying to think up ways that the breath could be better, where to focus, what you find interesting, what you find useful. This inner conversation is actually an important part of the meditation. It’s called verbal fabrication: the way the mind chatters to itself. What you’re trying to … 
  11. Cause & Effect
     … This is why, when we meditate, we focus on developing a sense of ease, a sense of rapture. It’s not simply a matter of being able to do it once and say, “Okay I’m no longer attached to that, I’m no longer excited by that. I can move on to other things.” These are your basic nourishment as a meditator. You … 
  12. Gratitude & Trust
     … We’re indebted to the people who’ve made this possible, and so the best way to repay that debt is to focus on the practice. The Thai way of expressing this is that other people have started weaving something and so you continue the weaving. You don’t let the edges get all frayed. This is what gratitude is all about: It’s … 
  13. Breath Meditation, Step by Step
     … If you breathe in a certain way, how does it affect the mind? When you breathe in another way, how does it affect the mind? How does it affect the body? When you focus on the breath in a certain way, what does that do to the breath? How does the mind affect the body? How does the body affect the mind? Or to … 
  14. Faith in the Buddha’s Awakening
    Focus on your breath. Know when it’s coming in, know when it’s going out. And allow it to be comfortable going in and going out. Experiment to see what rhythm feels best right now. As you stay with the breath, you’re staying in the same place where the Buddha was staying when he gained awakening on the full moon night in … 
  15. Doubts
     … If any thoughts do come up as you’re trying to focus on the breath, if they’re not related to the breath, you try to put them aside. If you find yourself wandering off, the Buddha has five major methods for not thinking about those things. One is simply to notice that you’ve wandered off. You’ve moved to another topic that … 
  16. Basic Wisdom
     … That’s when your discernment has to focus on working on your motivation and on figuring out what’s going to work in your case—because this is something that varies from person to person: the reasons that will induce you to want to do the skillful thing. This is where discernment comes together with right effort. Sometimes, to get you motivated, the Buddha … 
  17. Learning Through Healing
     … We focus on some things and ignore other things. We direct our thoughts and evaluate things in a particular way. And when we do this out of ignorance, there’s going to be suffering. We hold certain images in mind. When you deal with some people, you’re not really dealing with that person, you’re dealing with an image you’ve carried over … 
  18. Sober Up
     … If it can focus on one object, it’s like a flock of birds that finally settle down on one spot, all gathered together. In Thai, though, they have another idiom: They talk about lifting the mind up above its ordinary preoccupations. So you can think of the mind either going up or down, whichever seems to describe how it feels to you as … 
  19. Attached to the Body
     … This is why we’ve got to focus a lot of energy on this issue. Otherwise, the mind will never be free. It’ll always be a slave to its passions. And it’ll blame the body; it’ll blame just anything it can think of. But the real danger lies within. Sensuality is one of the asavas, one of these effluents that comes … 
  20. Switzerland Inside
    The Buddha’s basic teachings on mindfulness focus on two activities. The first is keeping focused on the body, or feelings, or mind, or mental qualities, in and of themselves; the second is putting aside greed and distress with reference to the world. You need both activities to get the mind into concentration. The first is the actual concentration. For instance, at the moment … 
  21. The Power of Perception
     … You can focus on a point someplace around the middle of the chest and find a quality of feeling there that feels nice. You try to maintain that niceness, that pleasant feeling, so that nothing in the in- breath and nothing in the out-breath touches it or disturbs it. This is where the Buddha’s image of holding a baby chick in your … 
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