Search results for: "The Brahmavihara"

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  2. Discernment Is in the Doing
     … The author didn’t know where to put the brahmaviharas in the context of those truths, so he just tacked them on at the end as a separate section. Actually, the brahmaviharas are an important part of the noble eightfold path. They’re there in right resolve, which is a part of discernment. Once you’ve learned why there’s suffering and how suffering … 
  3. Empathetic Joy
    Empathetic Joy August 20, 2013 We chant the phrases for the brahmaviharas or sublime attitudes every night before we meditate because they’re attitudes that really are conducive to getting the mind to settle down with a sense of well-being. You have no ill-will for anyone, no desire to see anybody suffer. You don’t resent anyone’s happiness; and as for … 
  4. Turtle Mind
     … One way to do that is to develop all four of the brahmaviharas. The first three are the sensitive ones: “May all beings be happy. May those who are suffering be free from their suffering. May those who are happy not be deprived of their happiness.” There’s an attitude of tenderness to all beings in those thoughts. But then there’s the principle … 
  5. Goodwill for Free
     … There’s the divine dwelling of the mind in concentration, which is very spacious; there’s the immeasurable dwelling, which includes all the brahmaviharas; and finally, of course, there’s the noble dwelling of the noble attainments. That’s even more unlimited. The brahmaviharas are still in space and time. They still depend on fabrication. Goodwill is something you have to fabricate, especially if … 
  6. Goodwill All Around
     … This is how the brahmaviharas lead us into the development of mindfulness and alertness. There is a passage where they talk about how the brahmaviharas lead to awakening. It’s the brahmaviharas imbued with the seven factors for awakening. And the first of those is mindfulness, the ability to keep something in mind. In this case keeping your basic attitudes, your basic attitude of … 
  7. Reflecting on Karma
     … When we have the chant about the brahmaviharas, the chant on equanimity says that all beings are the owners of their actions. In the context of the brahmaviharas, that’s what that reflection is for: developing equanimity. You start out with goodwill and you realize that as long as you have ill will for anybody, you can’t be trusted. So you’ve really … 
  8. Feeding on Open Wounds
     … The two main topics he recommends as a bases for sensory restraint are mindfulness of the body and the immeasurable states of mind that go with the brahmaviharas. With mindfulness of the body, you learn to develop a sense of well-being inside. You sit here just breathing, totally immersed in the body, your sense of the body as you feel it from within … 
  9. Goodwill Without Limits
    One of the Pali terms for the* brahmaviharas *is appamaññā. It means immeasurable, unlimited, and there are two ways in which it’s unlimited. One is that you extend these attitudes to everybody, no matter who: people you like, people you don’t like, people who’ve been behaving well, people who haven’t been behaving well. That gets to the second meaning. You … 
  10. Acceptance & Equanimity
     … In the brahmaviharas it comes after goodwill, compassion, and empathetic joy. In the factors for awakening it comes after mindfulness, analysis of qualities, persistence, rapture, calm, and concentration. So obviously it’s something good, but it’s never good on its own. And the Buddha says it’s something you want to develop. We already have equanimity in an ordinary, everyday way. Something happens … 
  11. Remorse
     … The Buddha recommends that, if you want not to suffer from the results of past bad actions or past unskillful actions, you develop the brahmaviharas—and particularly equanimity, along with the ability not to be overcome by pain and not to be overcome by pleasure. Pleasure and pain go together: If you get overcome by pleasure and try to hold onto the pleasure, it … 
  12. How to Be Self-Centered
     … It’s just that you’ve got to develop the brahmaviharas, all four of them, both toward other people and toward yourself. You have goodwill for them. You have compassion and empathetic joy, but you realize that there are times when their behavior is their behavior, and you can’t do much about it. Or even if you could do something about it, you … 
  13. No One Size Fits All
     … recollection of the Buddha, contemplation of the body, the brahmaviharas, contemplation of death. The point being that we all have to find the way that’ll work for us, and in some cases, there’s not just one way that’ll work. In Ajaan Lee’s explanation, you should have one technique that’s your home base, and he recommended the breath because it … 
  14. Equanimity & More
    We chant the brahmaviharas every night before the meditation, expressing a wish for happiness for all beings: “May all those who are suffering be released from the suffering. May all those who are already happy not be taken away from their happiness.” Those are wishes. But as the Buddha said, if things could be made true simply by wishing, there would be nobody who … 
  15. Goodwill Starts with Gratitude
     … One of them is the brahmaviharas: spreading goodwill to all beings, compassion to all beings, empathetic joy to all beings, equanimity to all. That, too, should be based on the reflection of making your mind like earth. Because there are a lot of beings out there who’ve been unkind to you, unkind to people you love, unkind to people you’re concerned about … 
  16. Like Earth and Space
     … As a build-up to doing breath meditation, he also taught Rahula to develop the brahmaviharas, and to contemplate the unattractive nature of the body. He was telling Rahula to engage in some thinking that was proactive in developing skillful qualities of the mind, protective qualities in the mind. When you have that kind of foundation, that kind of protection, then you do breath … 
  17. Approaching Painful Memories as a Meditator
     … This is one of the reasons why the Buddha lists compassion as one of the brahmaviharas. It’s meant to be made universal, so that everybody in a particular story can get a dose of compassion. When you step back and realize that the roles have changed, back and forth many, many times, that expands the range of your compassion, not only to this … 
  18. Goodwill Is Respect
     … When we practice the brahmaviharas—and particularly goodwill for all beings—it means that we respect one another. Even little tiny beings want their pleasure, they want their happiness. You have to realize that if your happiness depends on the suffering of others, it’s not going to last. One, they’re going to try to do what they can to destroy it if … 
  19. Shoulds & Desires
    Shoulds & Desires May 24, 2022 I was leading a retreat on the brahmaviharas one time, and the question came up, “Given that the Buddha assumes that we’re all basically good, how does he explain the evil in the world?” And I had to say, “Wait a minute. The Buddha never said anything about people being basically good. What he assumes about people is … 
  20. Lessons from the Breath
     … In dealing with the breath, you’re learning all the lessons you need for developing the brahmaviharas. You start out by approaching the breath with goodwill. You want it to be comfortable; you want it to be easeful. Anywhere where it’s not, you pay attention to what it needs. Does it need to be shorter, longer, faster, slower, deeper, more shallow? Make those … 
  21. Brahmaviharas at the Breath
     … You learn a lot of lessons about the brahmaviharas in this way. One of the most important ones is that equanimity is not giving up; it’s for when you don’t see a solution to a particular problem, and you realize have to watch it to see if there’s something you haven’t seen. That attitude is useful all around. If we … 
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