Search results for: "Discernment"

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  2. 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 … 
  3. 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 … 
  4. 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 … 
  5. 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 … 
  6. 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 … 
  7. 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 … 
  8. 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 … 
  9. 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.
  10. Strength of Conviction
     … Strength of discernment is the one that makes them all solid, but we have to remember: Discernment doesn’t come simply from things you’ve read—it doesn’t come from perceptions, or sañña. It comes from conviction: saddha, conviction that there’s got to be a way out. There’s got to be a way to survive hardships and come out not only … 
  11. 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 … 
  12. No Preferences
     … There’s a sutta where the Buddha defines wisdom and discernment in terms of how you handle four courses of action. The first two are the things you like to do that give good results, and the things you don’t like to do that give bad results. Those two are not hard. They’re no-brainers. You avoid the things that you don … 
  13. Refuge for All Beings
     … He says, if you have an unlimited mind, if you train yourself in virtue, train yourself in discernment, train yourself not to be overcome by pleasure or pain—which are issues of concentration and discernment—then when results come from past bad karma, they’re going to be a lot less. He gives the example of the lump of salt. If you put the … 
  14. When Aging Closes In
     … mindfulness, concentration, and discernment. Mindfulness means keeping something in mind. You practice it together with alertness. The first thing you need to keep in mind, of course, is the fact that the training of the mind is the most important thing there is. When you look back on your life, you want to be able to see that you developed some of the perfections … 
  15. Strong Through Admirable Friendship
     … And four, they’re discerning. You want to look for people like that and associate with them. You try to emulate them. You ask them how they develop their conviction. What inspires them to be generous and virtuous? What kind of discernment have they developed? And how? Then you try to follow those qualities and develop them in yourself. Having a living example like … 
  16. A Sense of Yourself
     … So ask yourself, where are the cases where it’s hard? And where can you use your discernment to convince yourself that, yes, it is worthwhile to extend forgiveness. Discernment is the fourth quality. How discerning are you on the ways in which the mind creates suffering for itself, stress for itself? You can look at it as you meditate right here, right now … 
  17. Seclusion Through Mindfulness
     … So seclusion involves both concentration and discernment. And this is what mindfulness does. In the lists of qualities that lead to concentration—say, in the noble eightfold path—discernment does come first, and mindfulness comes before concentration, but you need some concentration to get the mind willing to do the practices that mindfulness requires. So, they help one another along. So learn to delight … 
  18. Worries & Regrets
     … Of course, there are ways in which he describes the progress along the path in which discernment comes last. But a certain amount of discernment, a certain amount of understanding, has to be there at the beginning. You start with right view. It’s not right knowledge—it’s not going to be knowledge until the end of the path—but you can tell … 
  19. Strength Training
     … The Buddha talks of the path as a path of strength, and the strengths of the mind are conviction, persistence, mindfulness, concentration, and discernment. The Buddha has one way of formulating the path in these five terms. He himself often compares the path of practice to various skills, and some of them have to do with strength. The skillful meditator is one who can … 
  20. Past & Future in the Present
     … your willing, which is your intention that moves into the future; your intention to stay here in the present; and your intention to be discerning. One of the Thai ajaans, Ajaan Chah, talks about how discernment has to come from desire. If you don’t really want to find true happiness, you can sit here and watch your breath for eons, and you’re … 
  21. Take Time to Evaluate Your Life
     … This is where the concentration also involves a certain amount of discernment. You evaluate the object of your meditation, in this case the breath, so that the mind can be really snug with it, so that it’s not likely to want to wander off. One of the meanings of evaluation is that you evaluate the breath as it’s coming in, going out … 
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