Search results for: "The Mind"

  1. Page 158
  2. The Door of the Cage
     … But the nuts and bolts of what practices to develop, that’s where he goes into a lot of detail, very precise, very accurate, almost diagrams of how things work in the mind. These instructions allow you to bring the mind to a state of concentration where it can see its actions more clearly: where it is that it’s holding on, where it … 
  3. Surveying the World
     … Look into what the mind is doing right here, right now—because that’s going to solve the problems you see when you survey the world. The first time he surveyed the world, he saw it as being like a stream drying up. There were fish in the stream, fighting one another over the water. No matter who won out, they were all going … 
  4. Goodwill Starts with Gratitude
    When the Buddha taught breath meditation to his son Rahula, he started out with some preliminary meditations to get the mind in the right shape to be focusing on the breath. I’ve talked a lot in the past about the meditation on making your mind like earth so that you’re not shaken by events coming up outside or coming up inside your … 
  5. Training Your Inner Critic
     … Breathe in a way that makes you sensitive to rapture, sensitive to pleasure; breathe in a way where you’re aware of the whole body; breathe in a way where you gladden the mind; concentrate the mind; liberate the mind. He gives you perceptions to hold in mind: Think of the pleasure going through the whole body. Perceive it as something that can happen … 
  6. A Point of Balance
     … Only when the mind is balanced in right concentration can it get away from these currents of craving that keep pushing, pushing, pushing. So as you focus the mind right here on the breath, you’re putting yourself in a position where you really can solve the problem of suffering and its cause. If you’re not right here, you’re wide of the … 
  7. You Can Make a Difference
     … When the mind gets solid enough, you can start investigating its perceptions around the pain: what it pays attention to, what it doesn’t pay attention to, how it pays attention, what’s the skillful way to pay attention to pain? In other words, look for the cause. Particularly, look for the cause of pain that’s felt in the mind. So, what we … 
  8. Cross-questioning
     … If you’re working with the breath every day, it’s a lot easier to detect changes in the mind. Or if you’re working with any particular topic consistently, it’s easier to see changes in the mind, because you’ve got the breath as your baseline, or buddho as your baseline, or contemplation of the body as a baseline. That makes it … 
  9. Karma & Gratitude
     … This is why the reflection on gratitude is a useful way of getting the mind to be willing to settle down here in the present moment, realizing that this is the way out. As the Buddha said, the karma of meditation leads to the end of karma and all the entanglements that come with karma. That’s what the noble eightfold path is—everything … 
  10. Encouragement
     … What we do know, though, is that the power of the mind is such that we can train it. Once we’ve accepted that things are uncertain, there is no protector outside, then we have to learn to be our own protectors—and we can do it. That was the Buddha’s message. That’s what his awakening means in our lives: It is … 
  11. Questioning Impermanence
     … You’ve got the body, you’ve got the breath, you’ve got the mind that thinks and is aware. And that’s all you really need. Our problem is that we’re not yet really skillful with these things. We haven’t explored their full possibilities. So sometimes the meditation gets boring. It’s because we haven’t learned how to ask the … 
  12. In the Eyes of the Wise
     … We try to get a sense of what it means to have the mind really balanced—so that it’s not leaning under the power of its likes or its dislikes, or under the power of its delusions or fears. As the Buddha said, there are four ways that the mind gets biased: leaning under the influence of things you like, things you dislike … 
  13. Cleaning up Your Personal Environment
     … All that nice peace and quiet in the mind just got frittered away. He responded, “What you did was to take the gold you had and you traded it for excrement.” Idle chatter just eats away, eats away, eats away at your goodness. It not only takes up your time but also fills up your mind with all kinds of garbage that you have … 
  14. Harmlessness
     … Sometimes when we’re feeling weak in the practice, part of the mind will jump on us and say, “That’s a sign that you should give up.” This doesn’t necessarily mean giving up entirely but just, say, giving up for tonight. You can start telling yourself all kinds of stories about how the meditation’s not going well. You sit down. Your … 
  15. Discerning the Middle Way
     … And “jJust right” for the mind: It’s not too light to detect, it’s not too heavy so that it gets burdensome. So you’ve got to adjust things and then observe and then adjust again and observe. When you find something that’s good, you stick with it for a while. You stop the adjusting then and see how long you can … 
  16. Dispassion Isn’t Oatmeal
    We sit here trying to get the mind quiet, to settle down with one thing, to gain some tranquility. We all have our different reasons for doing this, but the Buddha says that one of the goals of tranquility is dispassion. In fact, he says the highest dhamma, whether fabricated or unfabricated, is dispassion. Ajaan Lee talks about how the moment of dispassion — when … 
  17. A Mind Like Earth
     … In other words, as a prerequisite for getting the mind to settle down, you’ve got to develop a certain quality of patience, resilience, equanimity, that you’re ready for everything. But particularly you’re not going to react immediately to whatever comes up. You want to watch, because this is an important principle in the meditation. Not only does it help you sit … 
  18. The Gift of Speech
     … And the training of the mind is very close to the training of the mouth. Look at the factors in the noble eightfold path: Right after right resolve, which is the type of thinking that leads you to right concentration, comes right speech. And of course, the first level of right concentration starts with directed thought and evaluation, the way you talk to yourself … 
  19. Good & Bad Meditation
     … If you’re not familiar with the territory of the mind, you can’t tell a step forward from a step back. And if you’re tied up in the problems of conceit, it makes things even more difficult. If what looks like a step forward is happening, you can get puffed up, proud, and complacent. If what looks like a step back happens … 
  20. Two Kinds of Defilements
     … Now that kind of defilement is not going to go away just by watching it, watching it come, watching it go, and saying that it’s all okay—pretending that there’s no part of the mind that’s scarred by that, that’s affected by that, that’s damaged by that. That’s the kind of defilement that you have to dig into … 
  21. Visakha Puja – True Homage
     … Be very heedful with the mind, because it might want to wander away from the breath. Be ardent, really paying very close attention to what you’re doing. And be resolute: Once you’ve got the mind firmly planted in the breath, keep it there. This way, we practice the Dhamma in accordance with the Dhamma. It’s an important phrase. Throughout the forest … 
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