Search results for: "Focusing"

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  2. Focus on Your Skill
     … Make sure you’re asking the right questions, focusing on what you’re doing, the craft of what you’re doing right now. Seeing it as a craft is one way of making more interesting what you’re doing. We’re not just plopping down and accepting whatever comes up. There’s a skill in staying properly focused. As you work on that skill … 
  3. Everything Gathers Around the Breath
     … You look in the 16 steps of breath meditation, and you get training in focusing on the body by focusing on the breath. You get training in learning how to comprehend feelings by focusing on the breath. You get training in how to bring some order into your mind by focusing on the breath, and you learn about the dhammas that can lead to … 
  4. Big Things in Little Things
     … So we’re focusing on the little things of the mind, the same way that a carpenter would focus on his tools. If you’re a carpenter, you have to spend a lot of time sharpening your saws, making sure your tools are properly balanced. It seems like you’re wasting a lot of time that could be spent in building things. But no … 
  5. Body as Path
     … So as you’re working on this skill, you find yourself sometimes focusing on the focus and other times focusing on the pleasure and other times focusing on the spreading. And it’s normal that you’ll be focusing on one or the other, but over time you want to be able to do all three at once. That’s when the pleasure and … 
  6. Cultivate a Limitless Heart
     … As we’re focused on our own issues, things can get very narrow. On the one hand, it’s good that the sufferings that weigh down the mind are things that come from within, because otherwise we’d have to depend on help from somebody else outside to put an end to them. It’s good that we can put an end to them … 
  7. Switzerland Inside
     … And where do you find that wealth? By staying focused on the breath in and of itself. Staying focused on the feelings around the breath in and of themselves. Staying focused on the mind as it relates to the breath in and of itself. In other words, everything, in and of itself right here: That’s where the wealth will be found. So let … 
  8. Watch the Mind at the Breath
     … But try to keep it strong enough so that you can stay focused on it. If your focus is very precise, the breath doesn’t have to be all that strong. But when you’re starting out, it’s good to have a breath that you can stay with. It’s not too refined. Otherwise, you get lost. We’re training the mind, we … 
  9. Taming the Elephant
     … where you’re focused, how you’re focused, what channels of energy have to be opened up. This afternoon, we talked about a tightness in the chest, a tightness in the stomach that comes when you focus in on the breath. There are different ways you can deal with that. One is that you can change the focus. Focus someplace else. Or try to … 
  10. Practice in Dying Well
     … remaining focused on one thing in and of itself—something that has nothing to do with sensuality—while putting aside greed and distress with reference to the world. What’s a good place to remain focused? Try the mind, in and of itself—awareness here in the present moment. You’ve got the breath as your anchor to make sure you stay in the … 
  11. Where to Look in the Present
     … So this is why we’re focused here, and this is where we’re focused: in the present moment. It’s not because the present moment is a wonderful moment. A lot of times you can think of lots of present moments that weren’t pleasant or wonderful. The reason we focus on the present moment because it’s the important moment. It’s … 
  12. The Treasure Hunt
     … What’s important is the particular combination of the stillness of your focus and the point where you’re focused, right at this issue of intention and its relationship to pleasure and pain. This is why breath meditation opens things up in the mind, for it’s focused on the real issues. The Buddha once said that insight is knowledge of sankhara, fabrication, and … 
  13. The Riddle Tree
     … Which sense door are you focused on? Are you focused on the visual sense door or the bodily sense door? This is where you switch from issues of the aggregates to issues of the sense doors. Stay simply with the bodily sensation of space. Don’t go off into the visualization of space, because the sensation of space can be really pleasant but the … 
  14. Informing the Whole Committee
     … There will be part of the mind that’s intent on actually doing the work, focusing on the breath. And you notice there is another part of the mind that’s watching, that can be alert both to the breath and to the conscious effort to stay focused. So learn to make use of that observer. That’s the observer that allows for alertness … 
  15. The Wisdom of Ardency
    When Ajaan Lee discusses the establishing of mindfulness, he focuses on three qualities: mindfulness, alertness, ardency. Mindfulness means keeping something in mind. Like right now, you’re keeping the breath in mind—and keeping in mind the fact that you want to stay with the breath. Mindfulness also means remembering to recognize what’s coming up in the mind. In Thai, they use the … 
  16. Stop Shooting Yourself
     … It’s a useful technique because you’re not focused on the pain. You’re not focused on, “Why me?” or “Why did that person do this to me?” You’re letting your mind be larger than the pain. This connects with that teaching on not suffering from your past karma, by developing a limitless mind like the water in a river. You could … 
  17. Using What You’ve Got
     … Sometimes, when you use a very focused concentration, the pain will actually go away as long as you’re focused. Other times, you can take that sense of well-being and just smother the pain—the well-being that comes with a comfortable breath spread out through the whole body. As long as you focus on that, the pain goes into the background, and … 
  18. What You Bring to the Meditation
     … Maybe you’re not focused on the right spot. If you find being focused in the head is giving you headaches, move your focus down into the throat, into your chest, down to the abdomen. If the process of breathing feels laborious, ask yourself, “How do I perceive it?” Do you feel that you have only these two little tiny holes in the nose … 
  19. Scramble the Image
    Scramble the Image December 9, 2014 A common habit when you focus on the body is to tense up at the spot where you’re focused—which may help maintain the focus for a while but it’s going to cause problems in the long term. It blocks the flow of the blood, makes you uncomfortable, makes it hard to stay. So you’ve … 
  20. Look Around as You Follow the Trail
     … Try to stay focused on the breath. When a sense of well-being comes with the breath, realize that that’s part of why we’re focused here, but it’s not the whole story. We’re also trying to develop our own powers of observation. As the Buddha said, your discernment is what allows you to realize the goal, so you have to … 
  21. Concentration Develops Right View
     … As the Buddha said, you’ve got to see where is your craving focused. It’s not focused on sensuality in general or anger in general. Specific issues have their specific strips of Velcro, and if you’re going to shave off the Velcro, you’ve first got to find out where it is. So as you try to get the mind to settle … 
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