Search results for: "Discernment"
- Page 63
- An Island in the Flood… the nutrition of conviction that what you do is going to come back at you, so you want to do things well; the nourishment of persistence, sticking with something again, and again, and again, making good things habitual; the nourishment of mindfulness, concentration, and discernment. There are all these good things here on this island in the middle of the flood. So do your …
- The Real World Isn’t for Real… The Buddha has you feed on mindfulness, concentration, discernment—finding joy in all these things. When you can find joy in this path, you can look at the pleasures that the world has to offer, and you can see that they’re dangerous, either because they make you complacent or because they sometimes require that you do underhanded things to gain them. So either …
- Dwelling in Emptiness… In this way, you’re getting into concentration at the same time you’re exercising your discernment. You’ve got calm and tranquility on the one hand, and you’ve got insight developing on the other. They work together like this. The important thing is, if you want to see subtle levels of disturbance, subtle levels where the first and second noble truths are …
- Beyond Duality… It’s in this way that the practice of concentration leads to the practice of insight and discernment. There’s a passage in Luang Puu Dune where he says, once the mind settles down and is still, to start contemplating things in pairs. This is precisely the Buddha’s advice: Look at things in pairs, but not just as any old pair. Pairs of …
- Practice at Home… Figuring that one out when you’re dealing with the back and forth of lay life is a really good test of your discernment. Two further states of mind get developed that way. One is a mind of goodwill, and the other is a mind of sympathy. They’re not quite the same. Goodwill is a basic wish for happiness for all beings—for …
- The Role of the Observer… As the Buddha said, it’s only through discernment that we cut through these things. Mindfulness is like a dam. It holds things in check for a while. The ability to watch something, hold yourself back, not engage in it: That holds things in check, but it doesn’t solve the problem. The solution to the problem comes from insight. And insight is often …
- Single-minded… You can’t say, “The higher levels are going to be superfluous, so why bother with them? I’ll just hang out here.” It requires a lot of discernment in order to get an awakening from the first jhana. Sometimes you need a lot more quiet in the mind in order to gain the kind of insight that would be radical. In some of …
- Don’t Believe Everything You Feel… The phrase we chanted just now—chandam janeti, generating desire to abandon what’s unskillful and to develop what’s skillful—is a sign of wisdom and discernment. When there are things you feel like doing that you know are going to be harmful, you’re able to talk yourself out of doing them. As for things you know are good for you, but …
- Issues… Which means that you have to look at the question of controversies and show some discernment: Which ones do you get involved with to figure out who’s right and who’s wrong? Which ones do you try to cut through with the up-and-down axis? This applies not only to controversies outside, but also—and especially—to controversies inside your own mind …
- Centered on Concentration… And it’s interesting that of a three main aspects of the training—training in virtue, training in concentration, training in discernment—the one that the Buddha singled out to the stress in those verses we chanted just now is respect for concentration, the ability get the mind centered in the body, with a sense of ease, even with a sense of fullness, refreshment …
- Being a Buddhist… When you practice concentration to develop your discernment, you realize that the concentration—even though it’s a better pleasure, a more stable pleasure than you can gain from sights, sounds, smells, tastes, tactile sensations, or thinking about things—is still fabricated. And remember how good fabricated things can be: They can fall apart. You want something that’s not fabricated, something that’s …
- Conceit… And learn to develop your discernment. Watch out for those fangs of ignorance: the “I am this” or “I am that” or “I’m not used to this,” “I can’t stand this,” “This is hard for me.” Drop the “I,” the “me,” and things get a lot easier. So even though it may be hard, you can do it. The things that are …
- Arising & Passing Away… The questions you bring to someone who’s good at clear seeing are: “How are fabrications to be viewed? How are they to be seen with clear insight?” This is where the Buddha’s definition of discernment comes in. He says that discernment means seeing things arising and passing away in a way that’s penetrating and leads to the right ending of suffering …
- The Middle Way… You want to feed the mind so that it’s willing to listen to what your discernment has to tell you: Yes, you’ve been remiss. Yes, you’ve been sloppy. You’ve been complacent. You’ve been self-indulgent—messages we don’t like to hear. You’re more likely to listen when the mind feels well fed, when it feels nourished. But …
- From Compunction to Release… Right there you’re combining two principles of discernment. One of them is right view, the view that actions do have consequences and that the consequences are based on the quality of the intention underlying them. Then there’s right resolve, which is the desire not to be harmful.* *It’s a very basic emotion. You see somebody you’d like to hit, and …
- The Dhamma Without Price… The practice of merit is the first answer to the Buddha’s question that lies at the beginning of discernment: “What, when I do it, will lead to my long-term welfare and happiness? What is skillful? What is blameless?” Looking for happiness in generosity, looking for happiness in virtue and universal goodwill: These are blameless ways of looking for happiness. And the Sangha …
- Guardian Meditations… The same with virtue, concentration, discernment: These are things we all have to some extent. It’s simply a matter of learning how to make them all-around. So when you’re tempted to go for the quick but short happiness, remind yourself, “The Buddha says that true happiness is possible, and that it can be gained through human effort.” Do you want to …
- Metta Meditation… There is a happiness that comes from training the mind—a happiness that comes from doing good things, developing qualities of mind like integrity, generosity, virtue, concentration, discernment. These are all good things to work on. The causes are good; the results are good. If you look at the human enterprise from this perspective, it takes on a whole new cast. And particularly if …
- A Good-Natured Attitude… Good-natured discernment, comes a lot more easily. So work on developing your inner resources. Learn how not to be threatened by the fact that you can laugh at yourself. This has a lot to do with being good-natured in your humor about other people. If your humor is aimed solely at making fun of them, then the quality of being good-natured …
- The Wrong Uses of Right… In other words, your discernment has to be all-around. You can’t just hold on to the fact that you’re right. You have to look to the question: Is the way you’re holding on to your rightness causing suffering or not? Always refer back to the four noble truths and look at yourself in terms of those truths. Look at what …
- Load next page...
