Search results for: "Discernment"

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  2. For Goodness’ Sake
     … In other words, when your discernment points out the fact that the consequences are going to be good or bad for certain actions, you’ve got to look at your emotions. Are they on the side of what your discernment is telling you, or not? Sometimes they are; sometimes not. When they’re on the side of your discernment, then there’s no real … 
  3. The Middle Way
     … Our discernment has a way of blowing out very easily, too, as the winds of the world keep buffeting it. So every year on the full moon night of July, every time this night comes around, we try remind ourselves we have to maintain that candle of discernment, that light of discernment in spite of the winds of the world. If we don’t … 
  4. Determined to Practice
     … to abandon unskillful behavior, to get the mind into concentration, to develop discernment, to gain release. All these things follow naturally from the initial conditions. The problem is those initial conditions: Those are the things that do require an act of will. They don’t happen on their own. There are two primary ones that the Buddha mentions. One is friendship with admirable people … 
  5. Nobility Through Inner Strength
     … If there’s an impulse to go away, how do you say No to the impulse? How do you learn to keep the mind here with a sense of well-being? That way, you’re developing your own discernment. It’s through trying to be skillful that our discernment develops. Otherwise, we can learn about all kinds of wise things in the books, but … 
  6. Can All Beings Be Happy?
     … It might work for you.” The same with wisdom and discernment: It’s good to be able to share what you’ve got, to encourage other people to develop their wisdom and their discernment as well. But, and this is where it gets difficult, there are limits to how much you can influence the behavior of other people. That’s where equanimity has to … 
  7. The Garden of Enlightenment
     … When there’s joy and pleasures, it’s natural there’s going to be concentration, and so on down the line, from concentration to discernment, from discernment to release. These processes are natural, but they don’t just happen on their own. You’re taking a natural process and you’re training it in a particular direction, starting with the precepts, which are an … 
  8. The Power of the Mind
     … heightened virtue, heightened mind, heightened discernment. Okay, which part of that training is not yet heightened in you? Does your virtue need to be heightened? Does your concentration? Your discernment? What’s lacking? You’ve got three months to settle down, living in a community of other people who are also practicing. What do you want to make out of this time? Choose wisely … 
  9. Your Inner Teacher
     … If you want to a person’s discernment, you have to see how that person deals with questions, knowing if the question needs to be rephrased, if the question needs to be put aside, answered with a counter question, or given just a plain old straight answer. That’s how you can get a sense that person’s powers of discernment. But again, it … 
  10. Right Fear
     … It’s only when you adhere to the precepts that other meditation techniques have a chance of really working, leading you not only to concentration but also to discernment—the discernment that’s honest enough to see your mistakes, that’s not afraid of seeing your mistakes: honest enough to admit them and ingenious enough to find a way to not make the same … 
  11. The Skills of Truth & Calm
     … You’re determined on discernment; you’re determined on truth, relinquishment, and stilling or peace. In other words, you’re trying to use your discernment to understand how to get the mind to settle down. You’re true to yourself in trying to master this skill and in being very honest about when the mind is wandering off, so you that can do something … 
  12. Training Your Inner Teacher
     … All of that comes under discernment that comes from listening. The next steps are the discernment that comes from thinking. You take the Dhamma you’ve heard and you compare it with other lessons you’ve learned, and you think about it, till what you have learned recently makes sense in terms of what you’ve learned before. That’s the discernment that comes … 
  13. Seeing Distinctions
     … This is an important quality of discernment: seeing distinctions. This is the opposite of what we’re sometimes told, which is that discernment sees the oneness of all things. That’s not what the Buddha taught. He taught you have to see distinctions, to see things a separate. This is one of the reasons why he has you focus on arising and passing away … 
  14. Your Goodness is Your Protection
     … your sense of conviction in the principle of kamma, your virtue, your compunction, your sense of shame, your knowledge of the Dhamma, your generosity, your discernment. These things are your protection. So we work on developing these things. Sometimes we’re afraid that the things we’ve tried to build up as we go through life will get torn down. And you have to … 
  15. Defilements Are Real
     … After all, there are parts of the mind that get in the way of practicing virtue, there are parts that get in the way of practicing concentration, get in the way of practicing discernment. Those are defilements. If they’re cleaned away from the mind, the mind’s going to be a lot brighter. How do you clean them away? One, you learn how … 
  16. Willing to Question Yourself
     … That’s how you learn to develop your discernment. Discernment isn’t an automatic process, just saying that everything is inconstant, stressful, and not-self, and getting to the point where you say, “Oh yes, yes, yes. I agree.” That’s not what the Buddha’s asking you to do. He’s asking you to apply those ideas to whatever comes up. See: Is … 
  17. Right Resolve in Real Life
     … So the two factors, right resolve, which is an aspect of discernment, and right concentration, go together. The discernment begins with the realization that, as the four noble truths say, if the mind is suffering, it’s because of something in the mind. An abbot of a monastery in England was talking one time about a number of members of his community who were … 
  18. Days Fly Past
     … To get there involves virtue, concentration, discernment: heightened virtue, heightened mind, heightened discernment. With heightened virtue, you really are meticulous about your precepts, you really are meticulous about your actions. The heightened mind is the development of strong concentration. Heightened discernment is the discernment that sees though our attachments. These are all activities, things we can do. And then there’s release, which is … 
  19. The Buddha’s Vipassana
     … Your discernment develops your concentration. Your concentration develops your discernment. They get clearer; more still, to the point where the two activities are not quite so separate anymore. You see this in the Buddha’s instructions on breath meditation. He divides it into sixteen steps, and the sixteen steps get divided into four tetrads. In the first three tetrads, the basic principle is that … 
  20. The True Dhamma Has Disappeared
     … You’ve got to be really selective, very discerning. Develop the qualities that can make you selective and discerning. And that will allow you to find the true Dhamma that’s still there.
  21. A Full Range of Archery Skills
    There’s the discernment that comes from listening and reading. There’s the discernment that comes from thinking things through. But the real discernment comes from developing qualities in the mind. This is one of the reasons why we’re practicing concentration—both because as the mind gets more still you see things more clearly, and also because as you deal with your defilements … 
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