Search results for: "Attention"

  1. Page 25
  2. Varieties of Mindfulness
     … So that’s where we focus our attention. That’s what we should keep in mind. This is called dhammanussati, keeping the Dhamma in mind. This is why the Buddha has us listen to the Dhamma, read the Dhamma, because the Dhamma contains all sorts of useful and encouraging ideas. For instance, there’s the passage where the Buddha is talking to his son … 
  3. Factors for Awakening
     … One is that the Buddha says that as you go through the factors for awakening, you develop them based on appropriate attention. What is appropriate attention? It’s applying right view to what you’re doing, asking yourself, “What am I doing that’s skillful and what’s not? What am I doing that’s causing unnecessary stress and what can I do to … 
  4. Respect for Concentration
     … These things will all be present to your awareness, but you won’t send your attention out after them. Try to keep your center here inside. As you develop this continuity, it becomes your habitual center of awareness, your habitual point of reference. The movement of other things in relation to that center becomes very clear. In other words, the impulse to go out … 
  5. Decisions
     … This doesn’t mean there’s no distinction between the path and the goal, simply that you focus your full attention on the path and that’s what gets you to the goal. You don’t have two separate things you’ve got to focus on here. You focus on being skillful right now, and that in and of itself makes the goal clearer … 
  6. Committed to the Breath
    We’ve all read enough on physiology to know where the breath comes in, where it goes out, but as you’re sitting here right now, where do you feel the breathing? What parts of the body are engaged in the breathing process? Focus your attention on those sensations—your direct experience of the breath energy—and commit yourself to it for the hour … 
  7. The Tricks of Denial
     … Then all of a sudden, the father loon went running out to the middle of the lake and made huge displays, flapping its wings and calling, calling, calling, trying to pull our attention in its direction, away from the baby loon. Well, the mind does that too. Sometimes there’s a lot of chatter going on in the mind and it’s an attempt … 
  8. Proving the Teachings
     … When you pay really close attention to the breath, you find that you can breathe in all kinds of ways that really are beneficial for the body and beneficial for the mind. You can breathe in ways that feel full and refreshing. When you’re tired, you can breathe in a way that gives you energy. When you’re tense, you can breathe in … 
  9. Centered on Concentration
     … There are so many other things that are more demanding, that require our attention right now, that seem more interesting, more important, and these bits and pieces of stillness get pushed back into the background. They don’t have a chance to grow. They don’t have a chance to reach fullness. Then, of course, when we need them, they’re not there. We … 
  10. Judicious vs. Judgmental
     … You have to pay attention to what you’re doing even when things are not going well. Pay attention to how the mind slips off, pay attention to how you bring it back, and you’ll learn an awful lot right there. Underlying all this has to be an attitude of good-natured goodwill. If there’s a sense of frustration, remember that you … 
  11. On Idle Chatter
     … It’s a good exercise for developing appropriate attention. You ask yourself, “When I’m going to do this, when I’m going to say this, is it really worthwhile, is it really going to be helpful or harmful?” Make sure that in what you say, you’re acting as an admirable friend to other people. Those two qualities—appropriate attention and admirable friendship … 
  12. Friends with the Breath
     … This requires paying careful attention. As with any friendship, it takes time. But that length of time can be shortened if you’re really attentive, if you really watch. Try different ways of focusing on the breath, different places in the body where you can focus, different ways of adjusting the breath. Sometimes all you need to do is think and the breath will … 
  13. The Middle Way
     … When you work on a skill, you want to be able to look objectively at your handiwork and say, “This looks really good.” That’s because you’ve put a lot of effort into it, you’ve put a lot of time and attention, and the effort and the results come out well. Even if they don’t come out yet, at least you … 
  14. Truths Noble in the Heart
     … And the internal one is appropriate attention, seeing things in terms of the four noble truths. What’s noble about these truths? You look at them, and they’re pretty ordinary. There is suffering in life. Well, yeah, everybody knows that. And some people might notice that, yes, it does come from craving and ignorance. What’s noble about the truths is the fact … 
  15. Give of Yourself
     … But where those potentials are and how you develop them through appropriate attention, again, he doesn’t say. You have to explore. Then there’s the question of how to interpret his teachings. There’s a place where he says that some of his teachings are meant to have their inferences drawn out—in other words, you think about them and you think about … 
  16. A Good Place to Stay
     … If that doesn’t work, then just don’t pay any attention to that part of the body. Pay attention to the parts that you *can *make comfortable through the breath. If you have trouble staying with the breath, ask yourself, are there any leftover thoughts from the day that are impinging on your mind and keep getting in the way? If there are … 
  17. Four Bases of Success
     … that you really do pay attention to what you’re doing and you find it interesting to work with the breath energy in the body. They talk of the breath energy going down the spine: What does that feel like? Coming up the spine: What does that feel like? Which do you need right now? Sometimes, if you have a backache, it’s good … 
  18. Square One
     … They may keep coming in, but just don’t pay attention to them. And you try to be ardent, alert, and mindful. Mindful means keeping something in mind, i.e., the breath, and whatever lessons you’ve learned from past meditation sessions. Alert: Watching what you’re actually doing right now, along with the results you’re getting. And then ardent: you’re trying … 
  19. Learning & Respect
     … You want to pay careful attention to what you’re doing. After all, what is the Buddha’s message? We’re suffering because of our actions—which means we’re doing something wrong. So we have to learn: What is it that we’re doing wrong? We come into this world, we have certain desires that shape our sense of who we are, the … 
  20. Capable
     … You really give your full attention to what you’re doing, full attention to what the results are. You’re not just going through the motions. You put your whole heart into this. Give the breath one hundred percent of your attention. After all, it’s all around you: Wherever your focus is located in the body, there’s breath in front of it … 
  21. The Buddha’s Wisdom
     … telling you what to watch out for, what’s important—basically, telling you where to pay attention, and how to pay attention. You’re sending messages that you then pick up. Sometimes there are other messages that come in that don’t seem to be coming from the present moment. They’re coming from someplace else. The Buddha identifies these as voices coming from … 
  22. Load next page...