Search results for: "Concentration"

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  2. Preparing for Death
     … As you’re leaving the body and the human realm, the practice of concentration is good for fears around leaving the sensual pleasures of the human realm. We’ve learned through concentration that there is a pleasure that doesn’t require sensuality at all. In fact, you can experience that pleasure only when you put sensuality off to the side. Think of the definition … 
  3. Discernment in Concentration
     … by turning them into concentration, a state of body and mind where things come together. So it’s important that you realize that as you’re doing concentration you’re also developing your discernment. Discernment is not just a matter of being clever in memorizing what’s in the books. It’s a matter of learning to see a problem, get sensitive to the … 
  4. Remembering Ajaan Lee
     … There are stories of his being able to stop the engine of a bus, of getting other people to levitate through the power of his concentration. His concentration was amazing. So the fact that you’re thinking as part of the concentration doesn’t mean that concentration is light. It means that you’re bringing all of your mental powers to bear on it … 
  5. The Bridge to Concentration
     … You’re here not only to look after your own concentration and to have respect for your concentration. Have respect for other people’s concentration as well. Other people here are trying to keep their minds quiet. They’re trying to keep as little greed, anger, and delusion as possible from infiltrating their minds. So avoid expressing things that would stir them up, especially … 
  6. Four Noble Questions
     … So in this case, doing the concentration is, again, applying the four noble truths. What should you be doing right now? The answer is: concentration. You realize that concentration is something good to do. It should be done; it’s something to be developed. Right there you’re getting into those four noble questions. The mind settles down. What do you do with it … 
  7. Skillful Thinking
     … If concentration comes, they say, just notice it passing and then you learn something about inconstancy. Well, yeah, but you haven’t got much use out of the concentration. Concentration is something to develop. Make sure you’ve got your duties straight. When you do, then your thinking can be helpful. You know when to turn it on, when to turn it off, which … 
  8. Grasping the Snake
     … One is that the four main factors of the path, which appear again and again in the lists, are effort, mindfulness, concentration, and discernment. These are the qualities we have to develop within ourselves. The different lists differ in the order with which they place these qualities. Sometimes you start with discernment, and you use that to develop concentration. Sometimes the concentration comes first … 
  9. Ingenuity
     … Well, you just sit down and meditate, pose the question in your mind, then drop it and put the mind into concentration. Don’t deal with the question while you’re in concentration. Then see what pops up in the mind as you come out. There’s no 100% guarantee that what pops up in your mind will be the right solution, but it … 
  10. Faith in the Practice
     … We hear that the practice starts out with virtue and then goes to concentration and then to discernment. But actually, you have to develop all three at once: virtue in your day-to-day actions, while trying to develop your concentration and your discernment at the same time. This way, they strengthen one another. Now, for most laypeople the five precepts are plenty, but … 
  11. In Context
     … We’re here practicing concentration, trying to get the mind to settle down, stay with one object, the breath. That requires thinking, it requires an intention, it requires a sense that you’re going to benefit from this—and also, a sense that you’re competent to do this. After all, concentration is something you do. The whole path is something you do. But … 
  12. Intent
     … This is a formula for how you get into concentration. And underlying it is a very important quality for succeeding in concentration, which is intent. You want to be totally intent on what you’re doing right now. Let the past and the future fall away. They don’t have to get involved right now. This means you can unburden yourself of a lot … 
  13. The Right Attitude to the Body
     … You take those as themes for your meditation so that you can develop a sense of ease, a sense of rapture, a really good solid base for your mindfulness and concentration. Then as you maintain this full-body concentration, getting more and more sensitive to how the energies in the body can be used to create even stronger states of concentration, you can ultimately … 
  14. Refreshment
     … This is one of skills we need to develop as we develop concentration. Some people complain about the word “concentration” as a translation for samadhi, but samadhi is very much a matter of the mind being centered, with all its activities being centered on one thing. There’s something concentric about it. The skill lies in not putting a lot of force and tension … 
  15. The Same but Different, but the Same
     … It’s not that you do concentration and only when your concentration gets really good do you gain insight into the mind. You’ve got to have some insight into how the mind works from the very beginning. Otherwise, you can’t get the mind to settle down. Some people find it easy, but it’s not always easy even for them. There’ll … 
  16. Dualities
     … Where is your food and water going to come from? What kinds of animals are there out there? So you bring the mind into concentration. Drop the perception of wilderness and just be with the object of your concentration. And then take a while, after the mind has settled down, to notice that it’s freer than it used to be—less burdened. There … 
  17. More Buddhist Engineering
     … You can train your intentions so that they’re virtuous and generous, and then you can train them further so that they develop a good, strong state of concentration. Again, concentration is something you make. Ajaan Lee’s analysis is really helpful here. Of the five factors of the first jhana, three of them, he said, are causes and two of them are results … 
  18. The Prison Break
     … Those are the feelings that come from getting the mind in concentration. And that requires that you be intent on doing this. Again, there are people who warn that if you try to get the mind into concentration, there’s going to be a sense of self doing the concentration, or the sense of self that’s going to benefit from the concentration—as … 
  19. The Path to Stream Entry
     … Right mindfulness is basically the Buddha’s instructions on how to get the mind into right concentration. So all the factors do come together. As the Buddha once said of his teachings, “There’s nothing lacking, and there’s nothing in excess.” So try to be virtuous and discerning in your concentration. Try to be discerning and concentrated as you practice virtue. And then … 
  20. The Fires of Sensuality
     … It helps the mind be more inclined to get into concentration, and then the concentration helps provide you with an alternative form of pleasure. After all, if you’re going to drop one form of pleasure, you have to find another one to take its place. This is why the pleasure of fully inhabiting the form of your body, which is a higher level … 
  21. Right Livelihood
     … We in the West tend to overlook our need for the groundwork provided by concentration. The Buddha himself compared the happiness, pleasure, and equanimity that come from concentration to kinds of food. His image was of a fortress at the edge of a frontier, and different qualities in the path correspond to different aspects of the fortress. There’s discernment, which is like a … 
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