Search results for: "The Mind"

  1. Page 66
  2. Mindfulness
    Mindfulness July 23, 2011 When the Buddha lists the factors for awakening, he says that there are some that are appropriate when the mind is sluggish. Those factors are analysis of qualities, rapture, and persistence: the qualities that energize the mind. Then there are qualities appropriate when the mind is overly excited, overly energetic: calm, equanimity, and concentration. Those calm the mind down. You … 
  3. Step Back & Watch
     … Most people just start going with whatever impulse comes into the mind, whatever picture comes in the mind, thinking that it must be true. But the Buddha saw that that was not the best use of that knowledge. What’s important about the knowledge of seeing beings dying and being reborn was what determines the good rebirth, what determines unfortunate rebirth. It was their … 
  4. Injustice
     … Even though anger doesn’t come from the body and it’s not going to be solved at the body, when an emotion like this comes up it affects both the body and the mind, and you get into a vicious cycle. As thoughts of anger come into the mind, they trigger certain hormones in the body, and the effects of those hormones last … 
  5. Dispassion Is Freedom
     … But look at the things that the mind actually goes for, and then ask yourself, “Is that putting the mind in a position of freedom, or is it putting it in a position of slavery?” In every case, you’ll find that it’s a slave to those activities. This is when you start thinking that it might be good, as a first step … 
  6. Customs of the Noble Ones
     … What helps the mind to settle down? The Buddha says, “views made straight and purified virtue.” Those are the bases for right mindfulness, and then right mindfulness is the basis for right concentration. So make sure your views are straight: that if there is suffering in the mind, it’s caused by the mind. No matter how much you may be suffering over bad … 
  7. Suffering Is a Feeding Addiction
     … One is because the mind is getting more and more quiet, and you’re right here. You can detect the little things going on in the mind much more easily. Two, you’re going to need practice in not following your distractions. This is one of the most common problems everybody encounters. You sit down to meditate and all of a sudden you find … 
  8. A Sucker for Random Memories
    When the mind has long opportunities to be quiet, you find yourself in the same situation as a lot of older people as they approach death. There’s nothing much happening in the present moment, and old memories start barging in. Things dating back decades that you’d totally forgotten suddenly have an opportunity to come up to the surface. If your days are … 
  9. The Uses of Right Concentration
    The Uses of Right Concentration December 2, 2014 It takes a fair amount of effort to get the mind into right concentration—so much so, that many of us don’t want to hear that there’s still more to be done. We’d rather stop right here and rest. But while it may be true that right concentration is the last factor of … 
  10. Equanimity & Exertion
     … the pleasure of concentration, in which you get the mind totally focused on an object that has nothing to do with sensuality. You start out by directing your thoughts—which is a fabrication—toward a single object, and evaluating the object so that the mind can settle down with it. Like we’re doing right now here with the breath: You work with the … 
  11. Sense Restraint
     … The mind goes running out to sensory objects, and if you encourage it to go running out after anything at all, the motivation for running out gets strengthened in the mind. If you’re used to running out after beautiful sights, sounds, smells, tastes, tactile sensations as you’re going through the day—and a lot of us do that—then when you sit … 
  12. Many I’s, Many Eyes
     … If you have lots of different eyes in the mind, it actually strengthens your meditation. This is how discernment works. One part of the mind is acting and other parts of the mind are watching, so that you’re very clear about what’s being done, why it was done, and what it leads to. So even though having a committee may be difficult … 
  13. Succeeding at Happiness
     … Giving makes the mind serene; joy and gratification arise. The highest motivation is when it’s purely, as the Buddha said, an ornament of the mind. In other words, you’re no longer feeding off what you’re going to get out of the gift. It’s just a natural expression of the mind’s goodness. So try to do this well. Get your … 
  14. Set Your Heart on the Breath
     … being alert to what the breath is doing and also being alert to what the mind is doing. It’s inevitable that the mind is going to wander away. Be alert to the fact that it’s going to happen, and keep an eye out for it, so that as soon as you do catch sight of the mind wandering away, you can bring … 
  15. The Purpose of Empathetic Joy
     … We’re making it as pleasant as possible, to give the mind the food it needs in order to practice, to settle down, be still, and see things as they really are, to see the movements of the mind as they’re actually happening, to see the extent to which you’re fabricating your experience, and then the value of those fabrications: which ones … 
  16. Ups & Downs
     … Try to notice, okay, this is what the mind is like when it’s going well. When it’s not going well, this is how the mind is like when it’s not going well. Then figure out, “Well, what exactly is wrong?” Sometimes you’ll have to see it going not well for quite a while before you catch what you’re doing … 
  17. The Lessons of Equanimity
     … When the mind is ready, it can go in and ask questions about the pain, particularly, “Why is this pain having an effect on the mind?” The effect on the mind comes through your perceptions around the pain. How do you visualize the pain to yourself? What images come to the mind with the pain? This applies both to mental pain and to physical … 
  18. Guardian Meditations
     … So you look at the object of the lust, then you look at the fact of lust in the mind itself. When you can develop dispassion for both, then the mind can become more free. When the Buddha talks about dispassion, he often pairs it with the fact that the mind becomes unfettered, the mind escapes from its prisons that it builds for itself … 
  19. As Days & Nights Fly Past
     … So the mind will tend to go in that direction, especially when there’s pain. Most people don’t see any alternative to pain aside from sensuality. That’s where the mind tends to go to escape pain. Can you resist that pull? This is one of the reasons why we have the contemplation of the parts of the body, the contemplation of all … 
  20. To Comprehend Suffering
     … Every time you suffer, every time there’s a weight on the mind, a fire burning in the mind, darkness in the mind—it’s in the clinging. That’s what’s burning; that’s what’s dark. So, you try to put out the fire, try to bring some light to the darkness, by looking at the kinds of clinging and also understanding … 
  21. Mindful All Day Long
    The basic position when you get started in meditation is to sit with your eyes closed, because you want to give all your attention to what’s going on in the mind and don’t want to have any distractions. It’s like learning how to play the piano. You go off into a quiet room where you’re by yourself. Nobody else is … 
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