Search results for: "Thought"

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  2. The Resolve to Let Go
     … He had to think again and again and again about the drawbacks of holding on to his thoughts of sensual pleasures, his passion for sensual thoughts before he was willing to let them go and allow the mind to get into the first jhana. But he was able to do it. And he benefitted from it. And other people, following his example, have been … 
  3. What You Sense Directly
     … Verbal fabrication is directed thought and evaluation, as you talk to yourself about the breath. Mental fabrication is composed of feelings and perceptions. Feelings are the feeling tones you have right here: pleasant, painful, neither pleasant nor painful. Then perceptions are the images you hold in mind that help you stay with the breath—the markers of the mind, the signposts—or the way … 
  4. Modest in Manner, but Not in Goals
    Spread thoughts of goodwill, starting with yourself. Tell yourself, “May I be truly happy.” Put an emphasis on the “truly,” because it’s possible to be happy about all kinds of things on all kinds of levels, but you want to find a happiness that lasts, a happiness that doesn’t harm anybody—a happiness that comes from developing good qualities inside yourself. Then … 
  5. Hindrances
     … Consider your thoughts about all the sensual pleasures you would like to have: tomorrow’s meal, what kind of things you would like to watch or listen to when you leave the monastery. Remind yourself: What do sensual pleasures give to you? They give a little bit of pleasure and then they’re gone. Ajaan Suwat used to make the comment, “Those sensual pleasures … 
  6. The Dhamma Mirror
     … You get hands-on experience with what the Buddha means when he says, “form, feeling, perception, thought fabrication, consciousness.” The same goes for thought distractions. If you’re angry about something, you can ask yourself, “What are the perceptions you have around that? How do you talk to yourself around the anger? How are you breathing around the anger? Can you change the way … 
  7. Safety
     … And then, he says, you develop this concentration with directed thought and evaluation, with a modicum of directed thought, with no directed thought, no evaluation, with pleasure, with ease, with rapture, with equanimity. In other words, he’s talking about jhana, right concentration. So this is your safe space, your safe territory: getting the mind settled in right here. It’s not totally safe … 
  8. Because the Mind Is Purposeful
     … We fabricate our sense of the body, our feelings, our perceptions, and our thought constructs. Even our consciousness has an element of intention. Of course, we don’t fabricate these things out of nothing. We start with raw material—the potentials coming in from our past kamma. And then, for the sake of having an experience of the present moment, we put these things … 
  9. Practicing for Dispassion
     … You’re sitting here and all kinds of thoughts will come up—thoughts of sensuality, thoughts of ill will, restlessness, anxiety, sleepiness, the desire to rest, uncertainty. You have to develop dispassion for them. Otherwise, they pull you away. This is why we have the contemplation of the body to act as a tool for dealing with sensual desire. We develop thoughts of goodwill … 
  10. No Who or Where
     … See each issue simply as a thought, a thought world appearing in the present moment. Then think of the duties of the four noble truths. The four noble truths are not expressed in terms of, “Who’s suffering?” or where the suffering is. It’s just, “This is suffering, and this is its cause”: events. There’s also a path away from suffering. And … 
  11. Coping & Beyond Coping
     … One is the ability to pull yourself out of unhealthy thought worlds, and the other is the ability to create a safe place inside for your awareness to settle. We create that place by giving the mind something good to focus on, something nearby—the breath, the way you feel the body from inside. When we talk about the breath, it’s not the … 
  12. No Happiness Other than Peace
     … As the Buddha told Rahula, all those in the past who purified their thoughts, words, and deeds did it in this way. All those in the future who are going to purify their thoughts, words, and deeds will do it this way. And all of those at present who are purifying their thoughts, words, and deeds do it this way. What this means is … 
  13. Deconstruct Your Emotions
     … As for the perceptions, they’re very similar to directed thought and evaluation. Think of directed thought and evaluation as the full sentences that go through your mind, whereas the perceptions are just words or images. What kind of image do you have in mind when a difficult situation comes up? Are you the judge sitting way up on a seat where you can … 
  14. Do, Maintain, Use
     … When does the appearance of a thought in the mind come totally from past intentions? At what point are you beginning to weave it into something new? That’s a good question to keep you interested in the maintaining and in using the concentration to develop discernment on this level. There will be many times when you assume that the thought sprung into your … 
  15. Four Noble Truths to One
     … You have the sense of the form of the body as you’re sitting here breathing; the feelings of pleasure you’re able to give rise to; the perceptions of the breath, or whatever your object is, that hold the mind in place; the thought fabrications—the directed thought and evaluation as you try to get everything together, to get the breath snug with … 
  16. Right Speech, Inside & Out
     … That, of course, is also connected to right concentration in the sense that the first jhāna contains directed thought and evaluation, and directed thought and evaluation are the way you talk to yourself before you break into speech. So to train your attitude toward the mind’s thoughts as it talks to itself, you focus on noticing: What exactly you break into speech about … 
  17. Loving Yourself
     … You get the impression that before he knew the Buddha he wasn’t a very thoughtful person. He was a king, enjoyed the sorts of things that kings enjoy, especially when they’re intoxicated with power. But he starts hanging around the Buddha and he starts having what you might call spiritual insights. They have a, “Hey! never thought of this before!” quality. He … 
  18. Think
     … The Buddha thought very carefully, thought very skillfully, thought with a lot of circumspection. So, when you meditate and you’re reflecting on what you’re doing, you’ve got to learn how to think. Think in a way that cuts to the chase, that sees things as they’re happening and doesn’t create a lot of needless issues. Years back, one of … 
  19. Death & Goodwill
     … So recollection of death helps with your thoughts of goodwill. Thoughts of goodwill help you with your recollection of death. Both together help put things into perspective. I have a student who’s planning to do battle with some people who want to build a data center in his town. He was telling me some of the things he wanted to say to the … 
  20. In the Land of Wrong View
     … It has its micro-expressions, its micro-thoughts. The more sensitive you are to the body in the present moment, the more you’re going to see the little micro-thoughts, the micro-voices that come flitting through the mind to leave their emotions, leave their ideas, and then disappear. Because it’s only when you can see them clearly that you can do … 
  21. Reflections on Kamma
     … When we’re spreading thoughts of goodwill, what are we actually saying? We’re saying, “May all beings understand the causes of true happiness and act on them.” It’s not the fact that our thought of goodwill is like a magic wand that’s going to spread happiness and light in whichever direction we point it. What we’re doing is getting our … 
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