Search results for: "The Breath"

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  2. The Mind in Good Shape
     … One way to guarantee that it’s right here is to keep it with the breath. Take a couple of good long, deep in-and-out breaths and see where you feel the breathing process. Send your attention right there. It can be anywhere in the body, because “breath” is not just the air coming in and out of the lungs. It’s the … 
  3. Inner Refuge
     … One way of preventing this is to try to see how interesting the breath can be. There’s a lot going on in the breath. It’s the energy flow throughout the body. It’s not just air coming in and out of the lungs. There’s an energy flow that accompanies the breathing process—which actually is the breathing process. It can involve … 
  4. How to Fall
     … And not only are we teaching it how to stay on one topic as we stay with the breath, but we’re also teaching it how to come back to the breath more quickly: how to catch yourself as the mind begins to let go of the breath and latch on to something else, and to just turn right around, without any problem at … 
  5. Truth Through Training
     … That’s what we do as we think about the breath and evaluate the breath: We’re trying to get a sense of just right with the breath, so that the breath feels good and nourishing coming in, relaxing going out. It’s not too heavy, not too light, not too fast, not too slow. So fine-tune your breathing right now—and then … 
  6. Respect for Happiness
     … Notice how the breathing feels. Where does it feel comfortable? Are there parts of the body where it doesn’t feel comfortable? Sometimes the breathing may be constrained or tense. It can be too long or too short, or maybe too shallow. You don’t feel really nourished by the breath. A good way to start out is to try a couple of good … 
  7. Balanced Breathing
     … Focus on the breath coming in and going out. And don’t let the breath get mechanical. Try to be sensitive to the way you breathe. There’s a lot of information about your subconscious mind in the way you breathe. We were talking this afternoon about clamping down. Some people have the idea that when you focus on breathing in and breathing out … 
  8. Pitching Your Tent in the Present
     … So he contented himself with what are the potentials of the breath. Then he explored them to see how far they could go. He was able to use the breath, working with the breath energies through the tightness in the back of his neck, thinking of the breath coming in the back of the neck, then going down the spine, working through the tightness … 
  9. The Best Work Around
    Bring the mind to the breath in a friendly way. If you treat the meditation as a war, the mind is going to fight, but if you treat it as a process of creating friendship—developing a friendly relation with the present moment—the mind will soften into the present moment and be a lot more willing to settle in to make itself comfortable … 
  10. To See What You’re Doing
     … So we focus on the breath. In the beginning, the mind may not be that still. The breath may not be all that still. But you’re working in that direction. You want to breathe in a way that makes the mind more and more interested in staying here, because one of our big problems in seeing the connection between our actions and their … 
  11. Introduction: Meditation as a Skill
     … Try to be as consistent as possible in staying with the breath. This means you have to develop mindfulness, to remember to stay with the breath each time it comes in, each time it goes out. As for alertness, notice what’s actually going on with the breath. Notice when the mind is actually staying with the breath and when it’s moving off … 
  12. Asking the Right Questions
     … And that’s right here with the breath. The breath itself is a type of fabrication. Your directed thought and evaluation are verbal fabrication. The feelings of pleasure and the perceptions you hold in mind about the breath: Those are mental fabrications. The questions about discernment concern how to view fabrications in a way that gives rise to dispassion. Of course, this doesn’t … 
  13. Reflections
     … There are different ways of perceiving the breath, some of which allow the mind to settle down more fully than others. Thinking of the breath as a whole-body process—your whole nervous system is involved—changes the way you relate to the feelings of the breath coming in, breath going out. You don’t have to pull the breath in through the nose … 
  14. Fear of Concentration
     … You’re not stifling the breath. If you stifle the breath, the body will react. But if it’s got to the point where it doesn’t need to breathe, why force it? So these are some of the fears that people can have as they settle in and some of the ways of dealing with those fears. But the important thing to remember … 
  15. To Make Suffering Crumble
     … You’ve got the breath, which is body or form, and you’re trying to breathe in a way that gives rise to a feeling of pleasure. You use certain perceptions of the breath. Feeling the body and the breath running along the nerves, the blood vessels, the muscles of the body, you talk to yourself about the breath to get it more comfortable … 
  16. Ironclad Technique vs. No Technique
     … the breath in the soles of the feet going up the legs and then up the spine, or the breath starting at the navel and going up the front of the body, whereas in the seven steps he talked about the breath coming in at the heart and then going down through the intestines. So there are lots of different ways you can play … 
  17. To Discern Suffering
     … You can focus on the sensation of the breathing anywhere that’s comfortable. You can explore different parts of the body to see where your comfortable spot is. Then ask yourself, “How can the breath be adjusted to keep this spot right here comfortable?” Learn how to maintain that sense of comfort while you’re sitting here with your eyes closed, when things are … 
  18. Holding on Strategically
     … In fact, ideally, as you’re getting into concentration, you want to have a sense that the body, the mind, and the breath are all one. The breath fills the body; the mind fills the body; the mind is one with the breath. They’re all sitting here together. Then you can use this sense of you inhabiting your space when you’re dealing … 
  19. To Know the Noble Truths
     … And you’re alert to make sure that you actually are doing it. “Is the mind with the breath? Is the breath with the mind?” As long as the answer is yes, you’re fine; you keep that up. That’s the beginning of the third quality, which is ardency: You try to do this well. If you find that the mind and the … 
  20. The Buddha’s Program
     … The way you picture the breath to yourself will have an influence on how the breath actually goes right now. How you tell yourself to focus on the breath will influence how the breath goes right now. This is why we try out different assumptions about the breathing and the breath energy in the body—and why, when the meditation isn’t going well … 
  21. Question & Probe
     … You work with the breath in the body so that even though there may be difficult emotions going on in the mind, you’re here with a sense of well-being, physically at least. And the difficult emotions are not working their way into the body through the breath. The breath forms a cocoon around the body. Then, when you’re coming from that … 
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