Search results for: "The Mind"

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  2. Gather ’Round the Breath
     … your awareness of the breath, your awareness of the mind together with the breath. You want your mindfulness to think about the breath, and to think about the mind, and your alertness to pay attention to both: How are things going with the breath? And to what extent is the mind staying with the breath? In the beginning, you have to go back and … 
  3. The Adventure in the Present
    We’re here to train the mind, because as the Buddha said, it’s when the mind is well trained that you find happiness. If your mind isn’t trained, it’s like a puppy that hasn’t been trained. No matter how beautiful your house may be, the puppy can make a mess anywhere. In other words, no matter how well things may … 
  4. Watch What You’re Doing
     … Watch more and more carefully for the next time the mind is about to slip off. Look for the steps, so that you can see exactly where mindfulness lapses, and then immediately stitch it all back together again. You begin to see that the mind’s wandering off does have an intentional aspect. You learn similar lessons even as the mind gets more and … 
  5. Death Is Normal
     … The values of the mind are, in some ways, inverse to the values of the world. In the world, the more things you have, the better. For the mind, it’s not the case that the more thoughts you have, the better. Actually, it’s better to strip things down, to get the mind centered around one thought. Think of a rare fruit in … 
  6. Insight into Pain
     … Now, to see the movements of the mind as it’s applying these perceptions to things, creating the bridges that allow stress to come into the mind: that requires a lot of stillness, which is why the Buddha said that genuine insights require really strong concentration. You can have insights about other things without much concentration—you see little movements in the mind here … 
  7. Happy to Be Here
     … Often we think that only after we get the mind in concentration will it be in a good mood, but that’s not the case. When the Buddha talked about it, he said that you start out with a sense of joy, a sense of gladness, and that provides a place where the mind can settle down. You want to be happy to be … 
  8. Appropriate Attention
     … Just focus on the affairs of the mind in the present moment. Just be aware in the present moment. Use the breath as your anchor to keep you here. As you work with the breath—trying out long breathing, short breathing, fast, slow, heavy, light—you provide yourself with a way of staying interested in the present moment. You’re not just forcing the … 
  9. Get Out of the Way
    Get Out of the Way December 7, 2010 The mind has its ups and downs, and we have to learn how not to get upset by the downs or complacent about the ups. This is where patience and equanimity, combined with conviction, are important elements in the path. On days when you’re down, when the mind is just not cooperating, realize that it … 
  10. Poison Your Fantasies
    Buried down among the many layers of voices in the mind is a voice that’s always asking a question: “What to do next? What to do next?” This is because the mind is active. It can’t just sit still. It keeps moving, moving, moving; planning this, planning that; trying to decide, when it realizes it has a choice, what the better choice … 
  11. Customs of the Noble Ones
     … I need to train the mind.” The only way you’re going to find happiness inside is by training your mind. Thinking that way gets you ready to settle down with the breath because the mind can come up with all kinds of reasons for not staying here. You’ve got work you’ve got to do; things you’ve got to plan—whatever … 
  12. Look at Yourself
     … You do it in a way that gets the mind to settle down, because the concentration is then needed for discernment. You can gain discernment from reading books, of course, without much concentration, just enough concentration to read. But to really see these things happening in your mind, you have to get the mind really, really still. At the same time, in getting the … 
  13. Practice All Day
     … Get a sense of which part of the body is more sensitive to tension in the mind, events in the mind, so that when the breath seizes up at that spot, you know something’s happened. You breathe through the spot, and then if you have time, you turn around and look at the mind. If you’re in the midst of a conversation … 
  14. A Unified Committee
     … But because of each of us has a different set of rules of order for how the mind works, the nature of the discussion tends to be different. This is why each of us, as we’re settling in, will have very different experiences as the mind gathers into oneness. It’s important, if you listen other people talking about their meditation, that you … 
  15. Battling Darkness
    Battling Darkness August 6, 2005 One of the standard analogies for meditation is that you’re going into battle with all the habits of the mind that create suffering. They’re called defilements because they darken the mind. As the Buddha once said, the mind is luminous, but these defilements come creeping in. If the mind didn’t have some luminosity, you wouldn’t … 
  16. The Triple Training
     … What we’re doing here is lifting the level of the mind, training the mind in a way where the three aspects connect with one another. Heightened virtue is meant to make it easier to get the mind concentrated. Heightened discernment is meant to make it easier to get the mind concentrated. Heightened mind helps with your virtue, it helps with discernment. And your … 
  17. Serenity
     … In this way, you make the body more serene and the mind more serene at the same time. These are qualities that help give rise to concentration. Another way of making the mind more serene is to develop the brahmaviharas, the sublime attitudes: immeasurable goodwill, immeasurable compassion, immeasurable empathetic joy, immeasurable equanimity. These thoughts are soothing to the mind. In the beginning, you have … 
  18. Training in Right Resolve
     … Just working through the tensions in the body helps the mind to calm down. It doesn’t solve the problems in the mind, but it puts the mind in a position where it’s more likely to want to solve them in the correct way. When you’re feeling tight and irritated, all too often you want to go for a quick fix, whatever … 
  19. Look after Yourself with Ease
     … But, the Buddha says, if you think that way for a whole day and a whole night, it may not lead to unskillful actions, but it will tire the mind. These are good ruts for the mind, but you don’t want to get too rutted in them because they are better things to get the mind into: i.e., into good concentration. Goodwill … 
  20. Transparent Becoming
    Transparent Becoming December 8, 2007 The mind is used to wandering around. That’s what the word samsara means. It’s not a place; it’s an activity. It’s something you do. For most of us, it’s a matter of going from one desire to another desire. Then either you get what you want and then you say, “Okay, enough of that … 
  21. Glad to Be Here
    The Buddha’s instructions on how to get the mind in concentration start, on the one hand, with the reminder that you have to get past sensuality—your fascination with thinking thoughts about sensual pleasures. You can’t let the mind wander off in those areas. The Buddha says you should have a definite sense of the dangers of those places. That’s why … 
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