Search results for: "Form"
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- The Value of Refuge… The happiness of form; the pleasure of form. There was pleasure; there was rapture. So he asked himself, could this be the way? And the answer that came to him was Yes. So he asked himself another question: “Why am I afraid of that pleasure? Why am I afraid of that happiness?” For six years, he had been running away from happiness. But what …
- Don’t Stop with Acceptance… Feeling also occurs in name and form. There it’s associated with the different elements in the body. That’s the “form” part of name and form. In name, there are perceptions again. There are also acts of attention and acts of intention. What is your intention with regard to the pain? Maybe that’s aggravating the pain. Do you want it to go …
- Right Resolve… the ideal happiness to form part of the path. So focus on the breath in a way that feels comfortable. Focusing on the breath is called directed thought. Learning how to make it comfortable is called evaluation. These are the two factors that help build concentration. The third factor is singleness: that you really focus on the breath and try to stay with the …
- A Safe Place… Sometimes your greed, your aversion, your delusion can take very strange forms; forms you wouldn’t like anyone to see. You get to the point where you don’t want to see them yourself. So little messages get sent around in the mind, and you turn a blind eye to them. You’re like a teacher in a classroom where the kids are sending …
- Ups & Downs… Do you want to slide back there? That’s one form of encouragement. Another form of encouragement, of course, is to read stories of people who actually made it to awakening. The Theragatha and Therigatha are really good in this area: the stories of the nuns and the monks who went through an awful lot, and had an awful lot of obstacles in their …
- The Four Noble Truths from Within… When the Buddha defines the suffering that we’re trying to overcome, he talks about form—notice he doesn’t say “body,” he says “form.” When he defines form, it’s basically these elements, these four properties—how you experience the body from within. When he talks about mental properties, he’s not talking about electrons moving around through your nervous system. He’s …
- Issues of Control… In the same way, as we deal with our aggregates—form, feelings, perceptions, thought fabrications, consciousness—there are unskillful ways of trying to control them and there are skillful ways. You can actually turn them into the path. All five aggregates, for instance, are involved in concentration. Form, of course, would be the breath. Think of the breath going through the whole body. Feeling …
- Fence Me In… At the same time, the fence that’s formed by the precepts or the fence that’s formed by concentration is actually fencing us off from ways of acting that are going to bring more restrictions on us. In other words, if you create bad karma for yourself, it’s going to make it your path much more difficult. If you allow the mind …
- Mundane Right View… But that mundane level forms the basis for understanding the transcendent. As with any kind of practice, it’s good to make sure the foundation is solid, that you don’t go skipping over the what seem to be the unattractive details. This is a natural human tendency. Back when I was in Rayong in Ajaan Fuang’s monastery, we built a chedi, a …
- Endurance Through Discernment… Even when we tell ourselves to just sit, that’s a form of fabrication. As the Buddha said, there are three forms of fabrication in all: there’s bodily fabrication, verbal, mental. Bodily is the way you breathe; verbal is the way you talk to yourself; mental is the combination of perceptions you hold in mind, images you hold in mind, or words you …
- The Right Piece in the Right Puzzle… The form is the form of the breath, the form of the body as you’re aware of the whole body. The feeling is the feeling of pleasure. Perception is the mental image that holds you with the breath. Fabrication consists of your directed thought and evaluation as you adjust the breath to fit with the mind, adjust the mind to fit with the …
- See Yourself as Active Verbs… The aggregates are form, feeling, perception, mental fabrications, and consciousness—all of which the Buddha defines with verbs. Form, he says, deforms. In other words, in the form of your body there’s nothing static. Feelings feel: pleasure, pain, neither pleasure nor pain. Perceptions perceive. Thought fabrications fabricate, and consciousness cognizes. These are all verbs, and we cling to them. The act of clinging …
- What’s Real… In a form of Buddhism that’s very sensitive to market forces, teachers tend to shy away from issues that would stir up the militant materialists. But the answer to the first question is a bit more complex. As I said that afternoon, how do you know that what seems to be the natural world really is real? We don’t have any proof …
- The Power of Intention… As the Buddha said, our past karma gives us the potential for different experiences of form, feeling, perception, thought fabrications, and consciousness. Then with our present fabrications—our present intentions—we turn these potentials into something actual for the sake of having an actual experience, and then, of course, for the sake of whatever activities we want to do with those forms and feelings …
- Standards for Thinking… But if you notice that there are also movements through the body, and take those as a form of breath, an energy that goes through the body, you realize they can be felt anywhere. The little muscles in your blood vessels tense up, relax, tense up, relax, and this goes in waves through the body. Can you feel that as you breathe in, as …
- Guardian Meditations… It has to be combined with other qualities to form a complete path. After all, the Buddha did teach a noble eightfold path, not a noble one-fold path. So it’s important as you meditate to look at what ingredients you’re bringing to the meditation, what’s lacking or what’s too strong, and try to bring everything into balance. It’s …
- Using Your Many Minds… Ultimately, you reach the point where you can let go of any form of concentration, because concentration contains the most subtle levels of the aggregates that we chanted about just now: form feeling, perception, mental fabrications, consciousness. They’re all there in the concentration. When you learn how to let go of the most subtle levels, then you’re totally free. But you can …
- Disenchantment… You look for the origination of whatever desire you have—for forms, feelings, perceptions, thought constructs, and consciousness—and you see that it originates in the mind. What is it in the mind that wants these things? What wants to take the raw materials, the potentials in the present moment for these things, and turn them into actual aggregates? And then from the aggregates …
- Understanding Through Developing… Those are preliminary forms of understanding. You want to have a sketch in your mind about how things should work, how the path works, which topics are worth thinking about, which ones are not worth thinking about. Then you think about the things that are worth thinking about. These will be in line with the duties of the four noble truths: You want to …
- Dealing with Limitations… As the Buddha said, when you become a being, you identify with form, feeling, perception, fabrications, or consciousness of particular kinds. And whatever way you identify yourself, that’s how you limit yourself. You gain certain powers by bringing those things under your control, but you also take on certain limitations. Those limitations may not be getting in the way of the particular task …
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