Search results for: "Perception"
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- Disenchantment… Mental fabrication is feeling and perception. These are the basic elements the Buddha has us focus on as we concentrate. First, of course, we learn how to dress them up in a new way. In other words, bring the directed thought and evaluation to the breath, to create feelings of comfort. You use your perceptions to maintain that sense of comfort. So these elements …
- There’s Work to Be Done… where you can fight against the perception of inconstancy by creating a sense of constant well-being and a constant focus; how you can fight against the perception of dukkha, stress, pain, by creating a sense of well-being, and allowing it to spread throughout the body. And you’re fighting against the perception of not-self. You ask yourself, “Well, what can I …
- A Frame for the Day… As for mental fabrications, those are perceptions and feelings. Start with the perception of which of your belongings are valuable, and which ones not. You’ve got to hold those perceptions in mind. That way, whatever happens, you’re not going to lose your virtue, and if there’s anything you have to sacrifice in order to maintain your virtue—any wealth, or status …
- The Spider on the Web… On that stirring, you slap a perception that this is a thought about x, and then you decide whether to run with it or not, where to take it. In that moment of slapping the perception on: What’s behind that, what’s making that choice? It can be pretty arbitrary. After all, prior to that, it was just a little stirring of energy …
- Hold on to Your Frame of Reference… changing the way you breathe, changing the focus, changing your perception of the breath. This perception that you hold in mind is essential to the mindfulness practice—to perceive the breath not just as air coming in and out through the nose, but as the whole range of energy flow in the body. Some people find it easy to tap into that energy flow …
- All-around Knowing… That helps to change your perception of breath and get it more in line with a perception that will actually help comfortable breath energies to flow throughout the body, to saturate every cell, every nerve end. You need the right perception in order for this to work. Then you move up to the middle of the chest, the base of the throat, the middle …
- Sense Restraint… Those three perceptions don’t cover everything. They apply to everything but they don’t encompass the total nature of things. No perception can. So you have to ask yourself, when you’re applying a perception to something, what is your purpose in applying it? After all, that’s what perceptions are—they’re representations of something that we use for certain purposes. If …
- Everything You Need… The same with holding onto your feelings, holding on to your perceptions, your thoughts, your awareness: You hold on because they’re going to be helpful. But just because they were helpful yesterday doesn’t mean they’re going to be helpful today. And you have the choice of saying, “No,” today. That’s where you bring in the perception of not-self. So …
- Doubting the Buddha… feelings, perceptions, thought constructs. By their nature, these things don’t last very long, yet we try to patch them together, build them into all kinds of things, put lots of mortar in them, hoping that they’ll stick together. But they don’t, because the mortar itself is more perceptions, more thought constructs. But if you learn how to look at the process …
- Frame Your Questions Well… As the Buddha says, we fabricate feelings for the sake of feeling-ness and perceptions for the sake of perception-hood. It’s very strange Pali, turning all these things into abstract nouns, but the important part is the “for the sake of.” There’s an intentional element going on here. We take a potential and turn it into something we think we can …
- Into the Light of Consciousness… Mental is perceptions and feelings, perceptions are the labels you apply to things that give them meaning, identify what they are. Feelings are feeling tones of pleasure, pain, neither pleasure nor pain. We encounter these forms of these fabrications very directly as we meditate. But the three fabrications are also interpreted in another way in some passages in the Canon, where bodily fabrication is …
- Dealing with Pain… Then there’s perception, the labels you place on the pain. They could either be words or they could be pictures. It’s the way the mind communicates with itself through very brief and simple signals. And then there’s fabrication. This is where the emotions are along with your more complex thoughts. Then finally there’s consciousness—awareness of these things. The Buddha …
- Three Parts of Right View… There’s the perception of what kind of hunger we’re suffering from. Is it the kind of hunger that needs something liquid? Does it need something solid? Does it need something salty or sweet? And then there’s the perception of what out there would satisfy the hunger, what qualifies as food, and what doesn’t. Fabrications deal with all the plans we …
- The Second Frame of Reference… Which ways of thinking about the breath and evaluating the breath give more pleasure? Which perceptions of the breath give more pleasure, give you more strength? These are all things you can manipulate, things you can play with. And just knowing that you’re not simply a hapless victim of your pains helps get you on the right side. Sometimes a useful perception is …
- Feeling & Intention… Third, there are perceptions and feelings. “Perception” here means the labels the mind uses, or the images it uses, when you’re thinking about a particular issue. You can practice with this in your concentration. You learn how to perceive the breath, to picture it to yourself, in different ways. This is something that’s very intimate. Just the way you picture the breathing …
- A Heart Set on Goodwill… So you’re thinking about the fabrications of the mind as you’re trying to create a sense of goodwill—how you’re breathing, what you’re saying to yourself, and the perceptions you hold in mind. If you allow yourself to have perceptions of feeling threatened by the people who are difficult to have goodwill for, it makes it even more difficult. This …
- Dualities… But your perceptions have changed. You see that the perceptions are the issue. The same happens as you go through different levels of concentration. You want to notice that when you’re thinking about the breath and adjusting the breath, that’s one level of concentration. Then you get the mind to the point where it doesn’t need to adjust things any more …
- Questioning Your Conviction… You can change your perceptions more directly. Sometimes this takes willpower. You’re used to perceiving things in a certain way, and the Buddha recommends—or Ajaan Lee recommends—other perceptions. The tendency of the mind is to fall back to its old perceptions. But you’re trying to see: How far can I push in another direction? That’s because you want to …
- The Limits of Old Kamma… If you’re feeling trapped in the body, ask yourself, “Why are you trapped?” Well, you have this perception that it’s you or it’s yours. You picked up the perception because there were times when it felt useful to identify with the body. It was a means for gaining pleasure. But now you’re beginning to realize that identifying with the body …
- Learning from the Precepts… For instance, look at your perceptions. Look at your perception of a situation. Look at the narratives you tell yourself about a situation, especially the ones that would say, “I don’t have to observe the precept here,” or, “The precepts don’t apply here.” What in that narrative has its pull? Or in the desire to please? Or in the desire for convenience …
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