Search results for: "Focusing"

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  2. Karma for Freedom
     … This is one of the reasons why we meditate, and why the meditation is focused on what we’re doing right now in the present moment. You make up your mind to breathe in one way, and you can watch the results. If you don’t like the results, you can breathe in another way. Heavy, light, fast, slow, deep, shallow, short, long—there … 
  3. The Analytical Mind
     … When we learn, say, scholarly method or the scientific method, that’s when you’re focused on your actions, and those lessons can be useful. Whatever background you have in gaining a sense of what you’re doing is useful to apply to your meditation. We’re trying to get the mind quiet, so that it learns the skill of how not to think … 
  4. Centered in the Body
     … Even when you’re very focused in walking meditation, you still have to be aware of how the body is moving, when you’re coming to the end of the path. That slight bit of distraction can often leave a little bit of an opening. As they say in Thai, suam roi: The defilements can step in your footsteps as you’re looking out … 
  5. Take Care
     … You just keep focusing on the quality of your intention, right here, right now. Be careful of what you do, careful of what you say, and careful of what you think. As when you’re sitting here meditating: Be very careful to stay with the breath. Be very careful to notice even the slightest hint that the mind is going to wander off. Catch … 
  6. Success with Breathing
     … If your desire isn’t well focused, if your efforts are lackadaisical, you don’t pay much attention, and you don’t try to figure out when things are going wrong why they’re going wrong, then it’s not going to grow. It’s not going to succeed. You have to be confident that you can succeed with the breath. That’s all … 
  7. The World Offers No Shelter
     … When we do some of the reflections to develop a sense of heedfulness, they end by focusing on where the problem is. When we do the five reflections, they end with a reflection on karma. Here, the reflection ends with a reflection on craving. No matter how insufficient the world is, we keep wanting to come back. That’s what the problem is. That … 
  8. Samatha, Vipassanā, Jhāna
     … You stay focused on the breath in and of itself. You’re ardent, alert, and mindful. As for anything else that’s not related to the breath, anything that’s related to the world, you just put it aside. Then you get more and more refined in how you stay with the breath, more and more solid in your concentration. You learn things as … 
  9. Ready for the Truth
     … before, renunciation doesn’t mean just giving things up. It means looking for your pleasure in an area that has nothing to do with sensuality—like we’re doing right now: focusing on the breath, trying to make the breath comfortable, putting the mind at ease with the breath, and seeing that this really is a good place to be. Then, the Buddha said … 
  10. Ajaan Suwat 100 Years
     … And it starts with being really steadily focused right here. And then watching what comes up. Then, when things come up, remember the Buddha’s instructions. If it’s something unskillful, put it aside. As for the skillful things, ask yourself: Is this the right time and place for them? Because there are some things that will come up in the mind that aren … 
  11. The Search for Something of Substance
     … But you don’t sit here with one eye on the breath and one eye further down the path to see, “Well, when are all the great things going to happen?” It’s by focusing full attention on the breath—really getting involved with it—that you get fully involved in the present moment, and the mind settles down. And the qualities you want … 
  12. Breathaholic
     … A common habit while we’re focusing on the in-breath and out-breath is trying to make a very clear line between the in-breath and the out-breath. We usually do that by tensing up the muscles a little bit. But remind yourself that that’s artificial, an unnecessary stress and an unnecessary strain on the breathing. So learn to conceive of … 
  13. The Dhamma Is in the Method
     … How do you end the suffering that comes from this endless round? He focused in on his own intentions, he focused in on his own views there in the present moment. That’s how he was finally able to gain awakening. So he didn’t rest content. He kept searching: “Given that I have this, what’s the skillful use of it? And if … 
  14. Full Attention
     … The mind state that stays focused here, that’s the mind. Then, of course, there’s the mental quality of mindfulness, along with all the other factors for awakening. The thinking here is the thinking that tries to analyze how well all this is going. You make adjustments and then evaluate how well it feels. If you sense that it would be good to … 
  15. A Slave to the Dhamma
     … Everything gets dropped and everyone focuses on that one project. Ajaan Fuang’s style was to work on a project until it was done no matter how late in the day it kept you up: sometimes 4 a.m., sometimes dawn, all night long working on something, because, as he said, he didn’t like to have projects hanging over your head. So you … 
  16. Sensitivity & Skill
     … Where your desires are focused is going to determine who you are, the identity you take on. The lower the level of the desire, the lower the level of happiness, pleasure and well-being you’re looking for—that’s all covered by one word in Pali, sukha—then the lower the state of your mind. As we meditate, we’re trying to reverse … 
  17. Joyous Discernment
     … You’re focused on one particular thing, and that means you miss something else that you’re doing, something else that’s going on around you. This is especially clear when you’re preoccupied with something and you miss other things because they’re not in the radar of your particular preoccupation. This is something we have to watch out for as meditators. We … 
  18. One Foot in the Present
     … Setting goals like that in meditation is not useful, because you’re focused too much on the results you want and not on the causes. It’s better to set a goal to be mindful of this breath, and then this breath, and then this breath, and be fully aware of the whole body, say, for this breath, and the next, and the next … 
  19. Chewed Up by Your Food
     … Then there’s the fabrication, which thinks about the breath, works with the breath, evaluates the breathing, how well the pleasure is going, evaluates the point where the pleasure is full enough, so you don’t have to evaluate much anymore, but just keep focusing on the breath sensations, and staying there with this expanded sense of awareness. It’s when you’re nourishing … 
  20. The Power of Perception
     … The difference between simply breathing and focusing on the breath lies in this perception, your ability to maintain the perception of breath without dropping it. So as you concentrate on the breath, there will be that label in the back of the mind. When the breath is coming in, when the breath is going out, there is still “breath, breath, breath.” It may be … 
  21. Turn Off the Automatic Pilot
     … Even though it may be disorienting in the beginning, you find that everything goes a lot better when you put the time and energy into focusing on the area of life where you really do have responsibility, you really do have the opportunity to make the choice, and you shape things in a direction that’s for the good of everyone.
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