Search results for: "The Breath"

  1. Page 69
  2. Calm & at Ease
     … The Buddha says there are times when you’re trying to focus on the breath but it feels like there’s a fever in the breath; you focus on feelings, there’s a fever in your feelings; you focus on the mind, there’s a fever in the mind. Okay, you drop those topics and think about the Buddha, the Dhamma, or the Sangha … 
  3. Protection
     … Keep in mind the fact that you want to stay with the breath. And you’re alert to both the mind and the breath. What’s the mind doing right now? Is it staying with the breath? If it’s not, bring it back. If it is, try to make it as sensitive as possible to how the breathing feels. This is a quality … 
  4. Always Looking Inside
     … And where do they happen? They happen right here where the body in the mind meet at the breath. So focus your attention right here. See what moves here. A lot of the movement, of course, has to be physical: the breath coming in, going out, other things happening in the body. But as the breath grows more and more still, you begin to … 
  5. Mindfulness the Seamstress
     … You want to develop that aspect of your awareness and then bring it to the breath meditation, so that you can see the processes of fabrication going on in the breath and in the mind, and sort out which ones are skillful and which ones are not. How are you going to know what’s skillful? You look at the results. Part of this … 
  6. Unchanged by Loss
     … So, look for that “something inside.” It’s going to be very close to the breath, which is one of the reasons why you work with the breath as much as you can. Or, if you have trouble working with the breath, try to develop qualities of mind through other meditation topics that will give you some of that solidity. Think of all the … 
  7. The Intelligent Heart
     … The meditation we’re doing here—getting the mind to settle down, being at ease with the breath, finding a sense of well-being inside: That’s the food that keeps us going on the path. We find that simply by focusing on the breath in a way that’s comfortable allows the mind to settle down and feel at home in the present … 
  8. Whole-body Consciousness
     … That’s why we talk about not watching the breath, but feeling the breath, being surrounded by the breath, being bathed by the breath. That begins to equalize everything inside. There was a book that was printed years back, Above All, with pictures of the high mountains in California. The photographer was a student of a more famous photographer who liked to take very … 
  9. Potentials
    Potentials August 27, 2020 Direct your thoughts to the breath and evaluate it. You’ll notice when you’re evaluating it that you’re not simply saying that this is the way it is, passing judgment and leaving it there. You’re also evaluating what can be done with it. If it’s not comfortable, what can you do to make it comfortable? How … 
  10. The Six Properties
     … That’s element meditation or property meditation as a preliminary for getting the mind to settle down with the breath. Ajaan Fuang would have you also use this kind of meditation as a method for solidifying your concentration. I just mentioned states where the breath stops in the body, not because you’ve suppressed it, but simply because you feel no need to breathe … 
  11. Doing Nothing
     … Or you can move around the body, trying to calm the breath energy in the different parts of the body, relax the breath energy in the different parts of the body. Let the excess energy flow naturally out the palms of your hands and the soles of your feet. The mind that seems to be jumping around will have less and less reason to … 
  12. Two Hands Washing
     … Then once you’re with the breath, you can ask questions on a different level: “Exactly what sensations are breath? How does the body relate to the breath? Where does the in-breath begin? How do you tell if the breath is comfortable or not? What are your standards for comfort?” Again, you ask these questions when the mind is still having a little … 
  13. Skills Needed at Death
     … As you’re dealing with the breath, one way of obliterating those signals is to try to make the breath as comfortable as possible, as gratifying a sensation of the body as you can imagine. Which means you have to ask yourself: “Which parts of the body are not particularly enjoying the breath right now? In what ways is the breath getting mechanical?” Give … 
  14. Broaden Your Range of Choices
    Some of the first steps of breath meditation deal with being aware of that energy of the breath through the whole body and then calming that energy, calming the effect of the breath on the body. In other words, they deal with sensitizing yourself to the energy flows and channels—just the general sense of different energies in the body and how they’re … 
  15. Rooted in Desire
    When you listen to a Dhamma talk, give only one percent of your attention to the talk, ninety-nine percent to the mind with the breath, right here, right now. Think about the time of the Buddha: People were listening to the talks he gave and they gained awakening. Not simply by listening to the talk—they were looking at their minds. When the … 
  16. Feelings Not of the Flesh
     … You do it through focusing, say, on the breath, and then talking to yourself about the breath. How does the breath feel? Is it too long? Too short? Too fast? Too slow? What would feel good right now? As the Buddha says, you try to give rise to feelings of pleasure, give rise to a sense of refreshment or even rapture, and then you … 
  17. Training Your Minds
     … Now, if you’re working with the breath, this might mean changing the way you breathe. If the breath is calm, you may need to breathe in a more energetic way—or vice versa. Or you may decide that tonight’s not a night for the breath. If the problem is lust, you can think about the different parts of the body. Make a … 
  18. Interconnectedness
     … Adjust the breath. You do have this freedom right here, this element of choice with regard to the breath. The breath is one of the few bodily processes that can be automatic but also can be shaped by your choices. So work with it, explore it. Try to become more sensitive to this aspect of your awareness. As you become more sensitive to the … 
  19. True Friends & False
    Take a few deep, long in-and-out breaths, and notice where you feel the breathing. You may feel it in the chest, down in your abdomen, anywhere you feel the motion of the body that brings the air into the lungs. Allow your attention to settle there. It’s easy to get there, but not necessarily easy to stay. It’s the staying … 
  20. Understanding Happiness
    Focus your mind on the breath. Try and be on good terms with the breath. After all, it’s the energy of life. And if the energy feels healthy and nourishing, it’s going to nourish both the body and the mind. It’s probably the most important thing in life, and yet we very rarely look at it. We’re always concerned about … 
  21. Freedom
    We’ve got a whole hour now to focus totally on the breath. There’s nothing else you have to think about, there are no other responsibilities, just be with the breath. Notice how it feels when it comes in, notice how it feels when it goes out. Notice which parts the body are involved in the breathing process, and which ones aren’t … 
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