Search results for: "Concentration"

  1. Page 70
  2. Heightening the Mind
     … You lift it above your ordinary, everyday activities and you get into a good state of concentration. In the beginning, the mind and the object seem to become one when you’re really absorbed. But as you allow the mind to stay in that state for a while, it begins to separate out as well. You begin to see the object as one thing … 
  3. The Path of Adventure
     … We come to the practice with some virtue, some concentration, some insight already. But we also come with a lot of other things that are not part of the path. They’re obstacles. Our virtue is not all around. Our concentration and insight are not all around. Sometimes there are little gaps, sometimes the gaps are enormous. So as we come to the practice … 
  4. Part I : Basic Instructions
     … Qualities like mindfulness, alertness, concentration, discernment: These are all good things to have when the unexpected happens. So rather than plan specific strategies for how you’re going to deal with this, deal with that, remind yourself that often you have to think up and adjust your strategies in line with the situation, and that’s best done if you’re really alert and … 
  5. Trustworthy Judgment
     … This requires all of the skills involved in concentration: mindfulness, alertness, discernment, tranquility. If an idea comes in your mind, you don’t get swept away. You watch it for a while. You think about it. If you were to make that decision, where would it lead you? Go through the steps. If something strange comes into the mind, learn how to recognize it … 
  6. What You Sense Directly
     … But what advantage do you gain from saying that? It’s more useful to realize that what you’re experiencing right now, as you try to put this state of concentration together, is the root of the bodily, verbal, and mental actions that could lead to rebirth. After all, to move your body, you have to breathe. To speak, you have to engage in … 
  7. Look after Your Mind with Ease
     … Don’t think of it as an unfortunate obstacle as you’re trying to get the mind concentrated. It’s an essential part of the concentration that you learn how to rope in the mind’s thoughts and gather them in closer and closer and closer to a sense of stillness. So, right now, talk to yourself about the breath. How is the breath … 
  8. A Flammable Mind
     … Sometimes people can develop strong powers of concentration, but if there’s no real discernment to go along with it, then even that cool fire can go out. The mind is then back to what it was, the same old flammable state. This is why concentration has to be coupled with discernment—the discernment that sees how the mind creates these issues, how it … 
  9. Locate Your Craving
     … This is why the Buddha said that when you do jhana, or right concentration, you’re developing not only tranquility but also insight. The insight and the tranquility help get you into concentration, and the concentration helps sharpen both of these qualities of the mind. This is why we stay with the breath—not because we want to get the breath but because it … 
  10. Inner Strength, Inner Wealth
     … Built on these is the strength of concentration, the ability to get the mind to be really, really still. As the Buddha said, have respect for concentration. It’s not something you just want to stick into the random free moments of your life. You have to give it some priority. Set aside some time for it. This is your time to be by … 
  11. Useful Thinking
     … The Buddha talks about concentration practice as the heightened mind. You’re giving the mind a sense of pleasure that doesn’t have to depend on sensory objects. He calls this the pleasure of form. Or if your concentration gets really solid and very refined, you’ve got formless pleasure as well, which lifts the level of the mind. As long as you’re … 
  12. Establishing Priorities
     … As the Buddha said, using your powers of analysis is actually one way of leading the mind into concentration. For people who can’t calm the mind simply by sticking with the breath, it’s good to look into the breath as a process to explore. How does the breathing affect the body? How does the effect of the breath on the body have … 
  13. No Who or Where
     … This is a state of becoming that we’re creating as we get the mind into concentration, but the more you can keep it at the level of events, it’s a transparent* *becoming. You get to see the process as it’s happening. It enables you to see the process that happens when parts of the mind want to destroy the concentration and … 
  14. A Slave to Craving
     … As the Buddha says, when the mind is settled in concentration and is satisfied, when it has a sense of enjoying being here, Mara can’t find you. Mara can’t see you. This is even before you’ve gained awakening. So this is a safe pleasure. Once you see a safe and blameless pleasure, then you can look at the other pleasures you … 
  15. Visakha Puja – True Homage
     … The flowers stand for concentration as the mind blooms. The candles stand for discernment that throws light on our actions, revealing to us how we cause suffering and how we can learn how not to cause suffering. Those are the symbols, but we don’t want just the symbols. We want the reality. So let’s meditate. Focus on your breath. Know when the … 
  16. Preparing to Meditate
     … That’s when simple mindfulness practice turns into concentration practice as you develop this awareness of the whole body breathing in, the whole body breathing out, and then the breath growing calmer. So focus on what you’re doing with the meditation, and the results will have to come. All too often we sit here and say, “When are the results going to come … 
  17. The Wisdom of Tenacity
     … Many people come to meditation wondering, “When is the mind going to settle down? I don’t see any concentration at all.” The problem is that it does settle down in little bits and pieces, but then we trash those little bits and pieces of concentration, those little bits and pieces of stillness. They don’t seem impressive. They don’t seem like anything … 
  18. Comfort Dhamma
     … What are the most useful conventions for getting you to what really is the ultimate truth, which is release? Sometimes it’s hard to let go of your old way of looking at things, and the practice of concentration helps smooth the way because of some of the things you learn about yourself as you get the mind concentrated. One, you learn about your … 
  19. Stepping Out of the Waves
     … There is a pleasure that comes when the mind settles down, and that’s actually part of the concentration. You don’t want to let that go quite yet, but the excitement that comes when the meditation is going well, and the opposite mood that comes when the meditation is not going well, are things that you have to steer a clear course through … 
  20. Riding an Elephant to Catch Grasshoppers
     … You may wonder why he doesn’t include concentration in the list. It may be because virtue and right view are the foundations for right mindfulness. Right mindfulness, of course, is how you get the mind in concentration. So once you’ve got the foundations, you’ve got the rest of the building as well. Your right view keeps you focused here inside: What … 
  21. Three Recollections
    One of the basic principles of getting the mind into concentration is that you have to gladden it first. There are lots of ways of doing this. Sometimes just thinking about doing the concentration is enough to get you glad. You have an opportunity to sit here with your eyes closed, and with no other responsibilities right now. You don’t have to deal … 
  22. Load next page...