Search results for: "Concentration"
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- Distinctions That Make a Difference… But you really get to know them as you practice concentration. This is one of the reasons why concentration is necessary for discernment, because when you’re concentrated, you’ve got all the aggregates right here. You’re doing them as part of the concentration. Say you’re focused on the breath: The breath is body, or form. It’s part of the wind …
- Choiceful Awareness… Start out with mindfulness, which leads to concentration. It’s not the case that these are two separate practices. Mindfulness gets you focused on body, feelings, mind, and mental qualities, in and of themselves, all of which are the basic components of concentration. “Body,” here, of course, is the breath. Feelings: The feeling of ease that you’re trying to create with the breath …
- Right Now… All I emphasized the other night role was that discernment plays after you’ve developed concentration. But it can also be your preparation for concentration on a certain level—at least enough to clear away a lot of the distractions that would pull you out of concentration. Try to notice: What are the topics you’re thinking about? Which direction does your mind tend …
- Staying Normal… So all these qualities—virtue, concentration, discernment, and release—revolve around this normalcy of mind. They work together. Ajaan Lee has a passage in one of his books where he analyzes virtue, and in the course of his analysis, virtue starts turning into concentration and discernment. He analyzes concentration, and it starts turning into virtue and discernment. He analyses discernment, and it turns into …
- The Goldsmith… One of the things you want to keep in mind is that you’re trying to bring the mind into a balanced state of concentration. You have to figure out first where you’re out of balance and then bring things back into balance. The calming factors—like concentration, calm, equanimity—are for times when the mind is hyperactive and has too much energy …
- Heightened Skillfulness… On the one hand, you practice virtue in a way that’s liberating, conducive to concentration. In other words, even though you are scrupulous in following the precepts, you’re not tied up in your scruples because you realize that virtue is a matter of your intentions. When you’re clear about your intentions, then that kind of virtue really is conducive to concentration …
- The Riddle Tree… This is how discernment fosters concentration. The typical pattern, of course, is that concentration fosters discernment. But as the Buddha said at one point, to get the mind to settle down to good strong concentration you need both tranquility and insight. Sometimes you’ll depend more on one side than on the other. And it will vary from day to day, from session to …
- Tranquility & Insight… If the breath isn’t interesting, try to gain an interest in any of the topics of concentration that seem congenial to you. Learn how to get the mind really skillful at settling down with these topics and staying with them. As the Buddha said, the mastery of concentration requires both insight and tranquility. You have to have some understanding of how you can …
- The Right Time at the Right Place… It doesn’t like to be confined, so the more spacious you can make your concentration, the happier it will be to be here. We’re doing this because right concentration is the heart of the path, and the Buddha defines it in terms of the jhanas. Back when the forest ajaans were beginning to teach in central Thailand, they came up against a …
- Technique & Attitudes… Another attitude you want to bring is an attitude of respect, as the chant said just now, respect for concentration. Why? Well, because concentration takes work. We’re not here simply blissing out, and even though the instructions may be simple, they’re not easy. Especially if you’re the sort of person who likes your thoughts, it’s going to be hard to …
- Feeding on Right Resolve… It’s basically the nourishment that keeps you going, and brings the mind to calm and concentration. Of those seven factors, there’s one sutta where the Buddha points out three in particular that are important: persistence, the concentration, and the equanimity. Persistence is the most active of the factors. Concentration and equanimity are more passive. The Buddha compares meditation to the work of …
- Determination… But when the Buddha talks about renunciation, he’s talking about getting the mind into right concentration, which is the opposite of deprivation. It’s a trade up. Right concentration is your food. It’s your strength. He doesn’t have you follow the path starving all the way and then finally getting food at the very end. He gives you food to carry …
- The Equanimity of a Winner… That’s useful for seeing that even in good things, like the concentration, there’s still more to be done. There are still subtle levels of stress in the state of concentration. Now, you don’t solve that problem by not doing concentration, because that would just take you back to the greater stress of having to deal with what the Buddha calls “household …
- The Open Committee… You can bring out that desire and arm it with concentration, you can arm it with all the techniques you need to help strengthen it. As that desire get stronger, you can begin to set down some rules, some parliamentary procedures. One: that you’re not going to listen to any voices in the mind that really don’t lead to happiness. That’s …
- Obsessive Thinking… what he called training in heightened virtue; training in heightened mind, which means concentration; and training in heightened discernment. When you hear that list, it sounds as if you have to perfect your virtue first before you go to concentration; then you perfect your concentration before you can develop discernment. But in practice, that’s not how it happens. All three have to help …
- Responsible for Your Actions… But then he said he noticed that even if you let the mind think good thoughts all day long, you’ll start getting tired, so he rested in concentration. One of the reasons he rested in concentration is because it’s even better for the mind than the thoughts of compassion, goodwill, or renunciation. Another reason was because it gives you the strength to …
- Whatever It Takes… But the trick in concentration is learning how not to get involved, just letting them pass while you maintain contact with your object, the breath. This is how you can maintain concentration in different situations. You don’t need to have just the ideal situation in order to practice. After all, this is an ability we’ve already developed to some extent in our …
- No Foolproofing… It’s the same with your concentration. You try to make it as still as possible and then be alert to any unstillness so that things get more and more solid. You don’t throw the concentration away so you can move on to vipassana. The clear seeing, which is what genuine vipassana is all about, comes from trying to be very, very skilled …
- To Certify Yourself… At the end of Ajaan Lee’s instructions, he also described how breath meditation fits into the four levels of right concentration—what the Buddha calls jhana, or absorption. There’s always the temptation, when you read that there are different levels of concentration, to wonder: “What level am I on? Where is my practice taking me? How far have I gone? How do …
- Comprehending Pain… This is why we have to develop right concentration. It’s not simply a matter of watching a concentrated mind state coming up and saying, “Oh, there’s concentration,” or watching it go and saying, “Ah, I’ve gained insight into inconstancy or impermanence. These things come and go.” It’s like trying to travel from one city to another. A bus that’s …
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