Search results for: "Mindfulness"

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  2. Perceptions as Targets
    When you focus on the breath, try to be sensitive to the image you hold in mind of what the breath is doing, and of where you are when you focus on it. Use those images as your targets to help keep you with the breath. And notice the impact that those particular perceptions have on your breathing. If you find that the breathing … 
  3. Looking for Happiness Inside
     … It’s the same in your mind. When the breath is very, very still, you see movements in the mind that you didn’t notice before. You see how the mind’s perceptions, say, create a sense of where your body is right now and a sense of the shape of the body, and how those perceptions can be dropped. Then what have you … 
  4. One Hand Clapping
     … Sometimes it’ll switch to the mind. Is the mind steadily with the breath? Or is it beginning to waver a bit? And again, as long as you’re focused on how the mind relates to the breath and what can be done to make it relate in a better way, that’s fine as well. You’ll be going back and forth among … 
  5. Discernment Through Ardency & Evaluation
    When Ajaan Lee talks about mindfulness practice, he emphasizes the three qualities that we bring to the practice: mindfulness, alertness, and ardency. Mindfulness is keeping something in mind. Alertness is watching what’s actually going on, both with the breath, if that’s your object, and with the mind—making sure they stay connected. Ardency is the quality of doing it right, trying to … 
  6. The Dhamma Eye
     … And right mindfulness, keeping the proper object in mind. In this case, we’re focusing on the breath. Be mindful of the breath. In other words, keep the breath in mind. Be alert to it, what’s happening. And be ardent in trying to stay settled with it, concentrated on it. This combination of mindfulness, alertness, and ardency is what brings the mind into … 
  7. Making the Dhamma Your Own
     … The problem is that a lot of those unskillful mind states are not just mind states. You feel them in the body as well: the sense of irritation; the sense of dis-ease. And because they’re in the body, you’re going to be in that mind state too – that’s the normal way of thinking. So it’s important that you learn … 
  8. The Acrobat
     … establishing a frame of reference—such as the body in and of itself, or feelings, mind states, mental qualities in and of themselves—and learning to stay there, keeping those things in mind. That’s the concentration element in mindfulness practice: being ardent, alert, and mindful. Mindfulness means that you keep your frame of reference in mind, and you keep in mind the idea … 
  9. A Questioning Attitude
     … But for him, just sitting is asking questions about the just sitting. “Is your mind sitting in the body? Is your mind in the sitting? Is the body sitting in the mind? Who’s doing the sitting? What are your perceptions around the act of sitting?” Even with something as simple as that, you learn how to question it. You learn how to raise … 
  10. Directed Thoughts, Random Thoughts
     … The first step is admitting they’re there, then asking yourself, “Who in the mind likes them?” This is where it’s useful to have the image of the committee of the mind in the back of your mind, so that you don’t get quite so upset about seeing yourself going for those thoughts. It’s just one little part of yourself. There … 
  11. Determined on Goodwill
     … I’ve often said that the mind is like a committee. Sometimes the good members are working on something, and some unskillful members sneak in. All of a sudden, you find that the task you had assigned to the good member gets taken over by somebody else. This is why the Buddha says you have to be determined on this mindfulness, keeping in mind … 
  12. 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 … 
  13. Skills to Take Home
     … Even though the seclusion isn’t total—we’re not living in silence—still the basic values are conducive to looking into your own mind, because that’s the bottom line here: Each of us is training his or her own mind, so we don’t feel strange or out of place. The values here point inward, and that set of values is as … 
  14. Strategies for Generosity
     … This is where meditation comes in, because simply the way the mind relates to itself uses up a lot of excess energy in a very unnecessary way. When you give in to greed, anger, and delusion, you’re destroying your energy. There’s a battle going on in the mind all the time. When the mind doesn’t know how to relate to the … 
  15. The Desire to Be Free from Desire
     … And this faculty of right effort, which includes skillful desire, underlies right mindfulness—like we’re practicing right now, trying to get the mind into concentration by being very mindful of the breath in and of itself. You have to want to focus on the breath and to put aside any thoughts that would pull you away. The Buddha recommends three qualities to help … 
  16. Think
     … Part of the mind will say, “Oh, of course not.” But there may be a part of the mind that says, “Well, it seems like it.” The only way you’re going to find that second part of the mind is to ask questions. You can ask if the pain is coming at you. Actually the pain doesn’t have a direction, but if … 
  17. Breath, Tranquility, & Insight
     … Verbal fabrication is your directed thought and evaluation, as when you bring up a topic in the mind and then evaluate it. This is how we create sentences in the mind, ask questions in the mind. The third type of fabrication is mental fabrication, which is composed of feelings of pleasure, pain or neither pleasure nor pain, and then your perceptions. Those things—feelings … 
  18. It’s What You Give
     … Phenomena are preceded by the mind, excelled by the mind, made by the mind. The people who put that statement first in the Dhammapada knew what they were doing, because it expresses a principle that holds all the way through the practice: The mind comes first; the heart comes first. We live in a world where we have to put a lot of energy … 
  19. Past & Future in the Present
    Close your eyes and make up your mind that you’re going to stay with the breath for the rest of the hour. Watch the breath as it’s coming in, and watch it as it’s going out. And remember to stay here. It’s very easy to forget. You’re basically doing three things. You make the intention to stay, which is … 
  20. No Foolproofing
     … The one thing the Buddha has you develop at all times is mindfulness. But mindfulness is not simply awareness of the present moment. It means keeping in mind what you need to know. So mindfulness is not simple. You have to keep these instructions in mind. It doesn’t mean that you keep repeating them to yourself all the time, but it does mean … 
  21. An Auspicious Day
     … This is why we practice mindfulness. Again, there’s a misunderstanding that mindfulness means being in the present moment with a nice, spacious, non-judgemental awareness. The Buddha never defines it that way. In fact, he defines it as a quality of your memory, being able to keep things in mind. It’s your active memory: not just sitting around thinking about things in … 
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