Search results for: "Concentration"

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  2. When Your Will Is Ill
     … Something’s wrong with your intention, and it’s going to get in the way of your concentration. That’s what all these hindrances are: They’re obstacles to your concentration, they obscure your discernment, they obscure your awareness. So you’ve got to get past them. The first step in each case in trying to get past is to see that they’re … 
  3. Tranquility & Insight Through Jhāna
     … There’s no place where the Buddha says, “Go, do samatha,” or, “Go, do vipassanā,” but he does say, “Go, do jhāna.” It’s in the practice of right concentration that you develop* *both tranquility and insight. You need some tranquility and some insight in order to get into jhāna, and then, as the jhāna deepens—as you get more skilled at it—the … 
  4. A Post by the Ocean
     … When you’ve let go of things outside your concentration, then you can turn and look at the concentration itself. You realize that your concentration and discernment have taken the mind this far, but they can take it no further. The only thing that’s keeping you from going further is the fact that you’re holding on. That’s when you let go … 
  5. Shelter
     … The desire has to be motivated by a sense of heedfulness and a sense of pride in your skill, a sense of appreciation—the quality they call “respect for concentration.” The Buddha had to emphasize that twice. In the passage we recite, he talks about having respect for the Triple Training, and goes back again and mentions respect for concentration. Concentration is already there … 
  6. Dwelling in Emptiness
     … And that’s the kind of concentration that all the ajaans teach: You get the mind really, really still, and then you pull out a little bit. Watch the mind in its stillness and ask yourself: What disturbance is still there? As you’re getting the mind into concentration, the first thing you’re letting go of is unskillful mental states. There’s a … 
  7. Beyond Duality
    Practicing concentration is a process of making the mind one. You focus on a single object, and the longer you stay with it, the more the object and the mind seem to blend into one. Take the breath for example. When you begin, it seems that you’re in one part of the body watching the breath in another part of the body. But … 
  8. Bad Stuff Happens
     … It’ll complain, but if you develop some solidity in your concentration, you’re not going to be swayed by the complaint. It’s when the concentration’s not strong and it’s not giving you a sense of well-being: That’s when it’s very easy to say, “Well, this is getting boring,” or “Nothing’s happening,” or “I need some entertainment … 
  9. Getting Your Head Around the Goal
     … We’re developing concentration. Instead of focusing on our ideas of awakening, we’re focusing on the actual sensation of the breath. Instead of trying to figure out the goal, we keep coming back to the breath, exploring and figuring out what we’ve got here. It’s through these exercises of mindfulness and concentration that the mind’s powers of perception can grow … 
  10. Inner Discontent
     … That’s what’s going to make your concentration more solid, your mindfulness more continuous. Once you’ve developed that mindfulness, developed that concentration, then you try to develop it even further. You find in the beginning that it comes in phrases. There’ll be little phrase of concentration, and then it disappears. Then you start up again, it’ll go for a while … 
  11. Dethinking Thinking
     … This is why when the Buddha gives us instructions for concentration—which are actually in the description of right mindfulness, which tell how you do the concentration—there are two activities. One is to stay focused on one thing in and of itself, and the other is put aside greed and distress with reference to the world. This is going to require you to … 
  12. A Becoming Critic
     … A good part of the skill of concentration is learning how to stay centered no matter what the circumstances are around you. Now, we try to create an ideal environment here, or as close to an ideal as we can, making it quiet, promoting a set of values that recognizes the worth of this practice. But for concentration to be really good, you have … 
  13. Single-minded
     … Whether your concentration fits into jhana yet or not, that’s not the issue. The issue is, can you see when you’ve settled in and feel secure and feel solidly here? Is there anything in the concentration itself that is still a disturbance? After all, the directed thought and evaluation are necessary at the beginning, but after a while they do become a … 
  14. Skillful Fears
     … And that leads to concentration, which is where you get your real nourishment. The Buddha compares concentration to food for the mind: the sense of well-being, the sense of rapture that can come when the whole body is permeated by breath, and the breath flows smoothly. It’s nourishing to all the parts of your body and mind. That gives you a place … 
  15. A Gift of Strength
     … This leads ultimately to concentration, keeping the mind focused, keeping it intent on one thing for long periods of time. This is nourishment for the mind. Of the various qualities along the path, the one the Buddha consistently compares to food is just this: concentration—staying with one object, like the breath, or whatever object you find comfortable, effective, at any one time, staying … 
  16. Sensuality Is a Fetter
    The path factor of right resolve is very directly related to the path factor of right concentration. The beginning of the formula for right concentration says that being excluded from sensuality, secluded from unskillful qualities, you enter the first jhana. “Unskillful qualities” here are the wrong versions of the factors of the path, everything from wrong view down through wrong concentration. You have to … 
  17. Sensuality
    In the beginning phrase in the description of right concentration—vivicca *kamehi vivicca akusalehi dhammehi—*secluded from sensuality, secluded from unskillful mental states: What does it mean to be secluded from sensuality? I’ve read a couple of different explanations. One is that you’re secluded from sensual pleasures. But that’s impossible. Just sitting here in the cool evening: That’s a sensual … 
  18. The Karma of Not-self
     … Ultimately, when the concentration has done its work, and you’ve let go of everything else that would destroy your concentration or knock it off balance, then you can start turning around and looking at the concentration itself, seeing that it, too, has limitations. You start applying the perception of not-self to this as well. That’s one way that you can break … 
  19. Slings and Arrows of Ordinary Fortunes
     … Mindfulness leads naturally into concentration this way. The concentration gives you a sense of well-being. And if you find yourself getting worked up about how the mind is not settling down tonight, tell yourself there must be someplace inside here where things are at ease. If you don’t like focusing on the breath, if the breath is getting all tangled up—the … 
  20. The Right Touch
     … We’re not here to do only “right” mindfulness or “right” concentration; we’re trying for “just right” mindfulness or “just right” concentration. Think in *those *terms. Think in terms of balance. The image in the Canon is of a person holding a baby quail in his hand. If he holds it too tightly, the quail’s going to die; if he holds it … 
  21. Doing the Right Thing
     … And if it’s not there after you leave concentration, maybe it wasn’t that important to begin with. That’s how the concentration helps you to see clearly, and how it gives you some insight already just in learning how to wrestle the mind down to get still. You’ve learned some things about your mind right there. Then there’s the issue … 
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