Search results for: "Feelings"

  1. Page 69
  2. Taking Stock
     … Otherwise, there’s a great feeling of emptiness. There’s a big hole in your life where your father was or your husband was. You’ve got to learn how to fill up that hole. And the best way to do that is to remind yourself that the resources for happiness inside are still there. Those haven’t been taken away. Just learn how … 
  3. Part III : Daily Life
     … Notice where in the body you’re most sensitive to how the breathing has an impact on your feelings. These sensations may be around the heart, in the throat, in the middle of the head. Where are you most sensitive to the impact of the breath? And what way of breathing feels most soothing, refreshing, and nourishing right there? Stay with that spot in … 
  4. The True Cause of Suffering
     … Compassion is a sense of seeing other people suffering and really feeling sorry that they’re suffering. Or seeing people doing the things that will lead them to suffer, and feeling sorry for them. In other words, you see them doing unskillful things but instead of getting upset at them for doing unskillful things, you feel sorry for them. That’s the best way … 
  5. The Importance of Being Focused
     … What kind of breathing would feel best right now? See how the body responds. If it doesn’t seem to respond much in any way, you can push a little bit. Try breathing longer to see how that feels, or shorter to see how that feels. It’s good to start with a couple good, long in-and-out breaths to energize the body … 
  6. The Noble Truths Come First
     … We feel that we get our satisfaction out of feeding, but the Buddha wants you to see that there’s suffering inherent in the feeding and to really comprehend that suffering to the point where you feel dispassion for the whole process. Then you look for why you’re clinging. It’s because you’re thirsty. You crave. That’s what you’ve got … 
  7. Don’t Worry, Be Focused
     … The mind feels weak. The body feels weak, and thoughts are just wandering all over the place with no specific purpose. It’s not that you feel a real need to think about these other things, it’s just that your energy is so low that whatever comes popping up through the nervous system pops right into the mind and you don’t have … 
  8. A Sense of Humor
     … These feelings are your feelings, your perceptions are your perceptions, and so on down the line. But you can suddenly shift around and see, “No. They’re not.” They’re the same things—the same feelings, the same perceptions—but you put them in an entirely different context and they’re entirely different things. That’s the nature of a lot of insight. So … 
  9. Helping Yourself by Helping Others
     … You put up with them, you don’t feel like you’re threatened by them, but at the same time, when your mind can be calm and balanced in the face of other people’s faults, you’re more likely to see the opportunity where something could be changed or a comment could be made and it would actually have a good effect. If … 
  10. A Cure for the Sluggish Mind
     … It’s all too easy to think sluggish thoughts when the body is feeling dry, the mind is feeling dry—so lubricate it. That was Ajaan Fuang’s image. He said your mind needs rapture as its lubricant in the practice, just as an engine needs lubricant. Without it, it begins to seize up. So breathe in a way that’s really refreshing. What … 
  11. Good Fences
     … That’s bodily fabrication, the breath; verbal fabrication, how you talk to yourself; and mental fabrication, the feelings in the body that you’re focusing on. You can make a situation really bad by focusing on how miserable you feel. But you can look for the other parts of the body that are not so miserable. And, of course, you can breathe in ways … 
  12. May You Forever Be Well
     … It’s not the case that we’re sitting around perfectly neutral and then something comes and makes us feel desire or makes us feel anger. All too often, we’re out looking for something to desire or for something to get angry about. So you want to be able to see that, to hold it in check. And sense restraint also means not … 
  13. The Carpenter’s Adze
     … You can reflect on the Buddha, the Dhamma, and the Sangha, on your own generosity or your own virtue when you’re feeling down. Reflect on death when you’re feeling lazy. Learn how to read your mind by watching what it does, how it reacts to different types of training. After all, the carpenter himself has to do that. He’s not focusing … 
  14. The Joy of Renunciation
     … that what we experience in terms of form, feeling, perceptions, thought constructs, consciousness is based on what we’ve fashioned out of the potential for these things. We have certain intentions that make us fashion these aggregates. That applies to feelings of pleasure and pain. The pleasure you’re going to find in the precepts is something you have to fabricate. You do that … 
  15. The Breathing Game
     … Does it feel good? If so, take whichever rhythm feels good and stick with it. Then you can try deep and shallow. What’s really a lot of fun is conceiving of the breath in a different way: not the air coming in and out of the lungs, but just the general feeling of energy in the body. Some types of energy in the … 
  16. Big Desire, Detailed Focus
     … This is why, as you’re with the breath, you try to be as sensitive as possible to how it feels, as sensitive to the least little bit of tension, tightness, or blockage you may feel in the breath—remembering that the breath is not just the air coming in and out through the nose, but also the movement of energy through the whole … 
  17. Seclusion
     … Anything that feels good, feels right, try to develop it. Nurture it. When you nurture it, it’ll provide you with food. The traditional analogy for right concentration is stores of food that give you the nourishment you need on the path. If you’re in a too great a hurry to do your discernment work—trying to figure this out, figure that out … 
  18. Heightened Skillfulness
     … You’re clear about your perceptions and you’re clear about how you relate to the feelings that arise. There’s a feeling of ease, which you allow to spread through the body, saturate the body, but you don’t leave the breath. You don’t let the pleasure that comes from the concentration overwhelm the mind. You let it do its work on … 
  19. Equanimity & Karma
     … Realizing this makes it a lot easier to deal with it and not feel so singled out, Because that’s a lot of what our problems are: We feel that we’ve been singled out somehow for especially bad treatment. So you can depersonalize it and see it as a larger part of the world as a whole. It reminds that you if you … 
  20. Investing Your Happiness
     … So you start by focusing on where the breath feels good coming in, feels good going out. If you can’t get a good sense of ease with the breath, start with thoughts of goodwill. Wish goodwill for yourself, goodwill for other beings. That’s a comfortable thought because it’s not fighting with the wishes of any being anywhere. Everybody wants to be … 
  21. Duties
     … Exactly what are you clinging to right now, how are you clinging, so that you feel that stress, you feel that burden on your mind. It might be form or feeling or perception—i.e., the labels you put on things—the thoughts you fabricate about things. Or you’re simply holding on to the consciousness, your awareness of the six senses. There’s … 
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