Search results for: "The Mind"

  1. Page 114
  2. Signs Along the Road
     … But if you’re tuned in just right, the subtleties come out, and you can catch the small movements of the mind. It’s in those movements of the mind: That’s where you’re going to see your cravings, that’s where you’re going to see your clingings, that’s where you’re going to see the processes of becoming as they … 
  3. Dethinking Thinking
     … the allure or the drawbacks? Why? That line of inquiry requires both developing qualities of the mind and thinking things through, because sometimes the mind will say, “I’m attracted to this because of x.” Well, are you really attracted to that because of x, or is the mind just lying to itself? You question things, you try to figure them out by questioning … 
  4. Respect for Concentration
     … In other words, they help right concentration along, but the concentration is the heart of the path because when the mind gets really still, it can see things clearly. It can understand what’s going on inside. So you really want to have respect for concentration because it connects to something else you should have respect for, which is the principle of true happiness … 
  5. Stake Out
     … After all, it is a physical property, but of the physical properties, it’s closest to the mind and the most sensitive to what’s going on in the mind. When a thought comes up, you can see that it reverberates both in the body and in the mind. You make up your mind that you’re not going to, as they say in … 
  6. Meditator, Mediator
     … Give reasons for why that particular solution doesn’t work and say, “Can you think of another one?” The part of the mind that hasn’t had a chance to talk will start talking. The part of the mind that has never learned how to negotiate, never learned how to deflect controversy, will start learning to be in dialogue. Remember, you’ve got this … 
  7. Practice in Dying Skillfully
     … There’ll be distraction and pain—the same problems we deal with as we’re meditating, sitting here trying to get the mind with the breath. First you find yourself fighting off distractions and if you don’t get the distractions out of the way in time, then the pain comes, especially if you sit for long periods of time or if you’re … 
  8. Animals in the Mind
     … It lies with the impulses of the mind that just want to go flowing out, running out after these things. That’s how you create a bridge from your sensory input into the mind, where that input can do a lot of damage to the mind. As we’ve seen, the impulses that come from outside, if you take them in, can do a … 
  9. Path & Goal
     … topics that will give more energy to the mind, or topics that will steady the mind. The ones that give energy are the things like recollection of your virtue, recollection of your generosity, recollection of the devas, realizing that the qualities that make a person into a deva are qualities that you have in yourself, so you’re headed in the right direction. That … 
  10. Skills to Make a Difference
     … And often, you’ll misuse some of the skills or some of the powers of the mind—because the mind is very powerful. It shapes your life. The fact that you’re engaged in the world depends on the mind. You’re not simply sitting here on the receiving end of sights, sounds, smells, tastes, tactile sensations, or ideas. The mind actively goes out … 
  11. Acceptance Without Suffering
     … Our main problem is that we’re looking for food for the mind outside, because the mind needs food, too, just like the body. Food for the body is pretty simple. We know what it is. With food for the mind, though, you have to ask yourself: What are you feeding on? You can feed on your intentions. You can feed on acts of … 
  12. Honest & Observant
     … This is one of the other prerequisites for not being overcome by past bad kamma—that you don’t let the mind be overcome by pleasure—and this is how you learn that skill. You give the mind a skillful pleasure like this and you learn how to develop the right attitude toward it. When pleasure comes, we usually try to gobble it down … 
  13. In the Light of Karma
     … But all too often we abdicate that power to somebody else, to greed, aversion, delusion, the voices in the mind that want to just go over old stories: “This person did this to me, that person did this to me, that wasn’t right, that wasn’t right.” We can carry these things for years. Sometimes we’re not even conscious that we’re … 
  14. Shifting Your Paradigm
     … Give the mind something to explore here, especially something that helps to create a greater sense of well-being, a greater sense of strength, a greater sense of openness, stability, a good place to stay right here. The mind will be happy to stay. In this way, the way you play around with the breath, the way you explore the breath, leads you into … 
  15. Learning by Doing
     … Of course, that’s not just a survey—you’re actually creating conditions so that the mind can settle down. If the mind is leaning forward or back, you’ve got to do something about it. Remind yourself that things in the past have gone. There’s no way you can get them back, no way you can go back and change them. As … 
  16. Delight & Beyond Delight
     … It gives you a sense that the Buddha was right when he said, “All things have the mind as their forerunner.” You begin to see the influence that the mind has on basic experiences, even just of the body as you feel it from within. There’s a lot to explore there in terms of your perceptions, in terms of your inner conversation. Learn … 
  17. Asalha Puja
    Try to drop all sensual thoughts, all unskillful qualities in the mind: vivicc’eva kāmehi, vivicca akusalehi dhammehi. Think about and evaluate the breath so that there’s a sense of ease and well-being in the way you breathe. This is how you get the mind into concentration. Concentration is part of the path. When you practice the path, that’s called paying … 
  18. Shame Yes, Guilt No
     … Think of someone on his or her deathbed, whose mind starts thinking about this, thinking about that—all sorts of thoughts are swirling through the mind. If you’re not really clear about what’s going on in the mind, what the mind is saying to itself, then as you leave the body, you can go all kinds of undesirable places. I read a … 
  19. Questioning & Conviction
     … Look at them in a way that highlights the movements of the mind, how the mind makes a choice, and how it enforces that choice, how it justifies that choice to itself. All these processes are going on all the time, but we usually don’t look at them because our attention is focused somewhere else far away. So stay right here at the … 
  20. Happily on the Path
     … But you shouldn’t be content with states of the mind that are less than satisfactory. In fact, the Buddha said that was the secret to his awakening—not being content, even with skillful qualities. When he hadn’t gone all the way, and there was more work to be done, he would do it. He would find ways to delight in it as … 
  21. The Airplane Mechanic
     … If the mind wanders off, you want to be quick to bring it back because the skill we’re working on right here right now—although it does require patiently watching the mind; watching the thoughts that come into the mind—the first order of business is to be able to pull out of those thoughts whenever you have to, because to watch the … 
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