Search results for: "The Mind"

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  2. Look Around as You Follow the Trail
     … Then you build on that as you see the qualities of the mind that get developed as you stay here. Let your mindfulness, your alertness, your ardency engage in directed thought and evaluation around the breath, so that the mind can get centered and concentrated on the breath. As you do that, you start seeing things in the mind, different activities of the mind … 
  3. Do You Want to Stop Suffering?
     … There’s an oxygen exchange going on at the pores of the skin, and if the mind is really, really still, that’ll be plenty for you. When you get good at this, you can begin to observe the mind as it goes in and out of the concentration, and you begin to see subtle ways in which the mind is shaping things—when … 
  4. Restraint Leads to Freedom
     … In the same way, when there are unskillful thoughts in the mind, you’ve got to restrain them. But then once they are under restraint, then the mind can expand itself freely. That’s the paradox of the practice: with restraint comes freedom. By imposing some limits on the mind, you can take the mind to a place where it’s unlimited in the … 
  5. Dualities
     … So you want to get the mind really, really still—as still as you can. And then, when it’s no longer quite so still, compare it. What happened? What’s the difference? The Buddha talks about this in his sutta on emptiness. He says you compare the mind when it’s at home and with the mind when it’s out in the … 
  6. Tranquility & Insight in Tandem
     … Hopefully, you get quicker and quicker at this, to the point where you can actually sense when the mind is about to go. That’s when you’re on the safe side. You realize that the mind is beginning to get a little loose in its connection with the breath, so you do what you can to tighten things up again. Make the mind … 
  7. Mindfulness the Gatekeeper
    The Buddha’s instructions for getting the mind into concentration are in his descriptions of right mindfulness. For example, the body: You keep focused on the body in and of itself—ardent, alert, and mindful—putting aside greed and distress with reference to the world. The “body in itself” here means the body simply as its sitting here right now. You don’t think … 
  8. How to Read Yourself
     … In this case, the Buddha says, there are times when you to get the mind to stay with the breath but you run into a fever in the breath or a fever in your feelings, or a fever in the mind. In other words, the mind’s not willing to stay. It feels antsy, irritable. That’s when you have to stop and think … 
  9. In the Land of Wrong View
     … Then you can turn that same exploring attitude on the mind. You want to see the mind doing unusual things. The mind is like a face. It has its micro-expressions, its micro-thoughts. The more sensitive you are to the body in the present moment, the more you’re going to see the little micro-thoughts, the micro-voices that come flitting through … 
  10. Inquisitive
     … How does the mind relate to the body, how does the body relate to the mind? And how can you understand that relationship in a way that you can make the most use of it? You see that the mind and the body meet at the breath. So as you get to know the relationship between the mind and the breath, that spreads out … 
  11. Fixing the Present
     … You ask yourself, “What way of breathing would feel good, would give rise to a sense of refreshment inside? What kind of breathing would give rise to a sense of ease and pleasure? What kind of breathing would help gladden the mind when it’s down, steady the mind when it’s erratic, release the mind from unskillful states?” You don’t learn these … 
  12. An Equanimity You Can Feed On
     … When the mind is hungry, it’ll stay with equanimity only through willpower. Then it’ll go slipping off. When the mind goes slipping off like that, it just goes back to its old likes and dislikes because it needs some food, it needs some nourishment of some kind. So you have to learn how to feed the mind well. A sense of comfort … 
  13. Dealing with the Hindrances
     … Meanwhile, you develop bad habits in the mind. As the Buddha said, the things you tend to think about a lot bend the mind. So every time it thinks, its thinking gets bent in that direction, like ruts in a road. The deeper the ruts, the harder it is to get out. Heedfulness works together with appropriate attention to keep the mind from getting … 
  14. The Pursuit of Pleasure
     … So we need a certain amount of pleasure for the mind be strong enough to deal with the issues that come up in life. But it has to be a pleasure that’s not complacent, that’s not intoxicated. It has to be a pleasure that keeps the mind sharp. That’s the kind of pleasure that actually forms the path to the end … 
  15. Do, Maintain, Use
     … There’s that five-step program that the Buddha gives for dealing with anything unskillful coming up in the mind. First is seeing its origination: Where does it come from within the mind? That’s an important insight right there—that it’s coming from within the mind. It’s not just floating past. You want to see that—and you see that best … 
  16. Respect for Concentration
     … Respect for your own concentration means that you really give value to the little quiet moments in the mind. They’re the spaces we tend not to look at. We’re more interested in the thoughts in the mind—what we can think about this, what we can think about that—and the few moments when the mind seems to rest between its thoughts … 
  17. Establishing Priorities
     … It provides you with a still center from which you can watch the movements of the mind and see where they go. This way you can detect: This is what a defilement is like; it blocks the mind, obscures the mind. You check into it: Is it greed, anger, delusion, lust, fear, jealousy? What are the things that spark these emotions? You see the … 
  18. A Positive-Sum Game
     … Each time you’ve overcome the impulse to go someplace else, there’s a small victory in the mind. The mind will come up with all kinds of reasons as to why you should move someplace else. As you learn to see through those reasons, that’s another victory. You’ve gained some insight into how the mind pushes itself around, how it lets … 
  19. Expert’s Mind
     … Of the different aspects of the body, the breath is closest to the mind. It’s most sensitive to the movements of the mind and it in turn exerts a positive or a negative influence on the mind. So it’s a good part of the body to know. Try to be aware of the whole body as you breathe in, so that you … 
  20. Why Mindfulness
     … We’re here to train the mind, to understand how the mind creates suffering for itself, and how it can learn not to create suffering. Yet all of a sudden, we find ourselves running restaurant reviews through the mind, planning for tomorrow. Memories of childhood come through and you say, “Boy, I haven’t thought of that in a long time. Let’s look … 
  21. What Are You Doing in the Present?
     … Try to find just the right amount of pressure so that the breath can have its freedom, but the mind can stay with it. Then notice how it will change as things begin to settle down. This way, when the mind and body are in harmony like this, both sides benefit. The mind has a good place to stay. The body has someone looking … 
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