Search results for: "The Breath"

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  2. Working from the Inside
     … Or do new things with the breath. Think of the breath as coming in different parts of the body that you don’t normally think of it. If there’s a pain in a particular part of the body, you may want to see what the breath can do for the pain. If you know that one of your organs is malfunctioning, see if … 
  3. Lust
     … This can either be directing your thoughts to the breath and evaluating the breath, or thinking about the defilement simply as an event in the mind, and analyzing it, noticing what stress it creates in which parts of the body, and how it clouds the mind. In other words, instead of looking at the object of your lust or the object of the anger … 
  4. Inner Voice Lessons
     … Sometimes that means introducing new voices — like the meditating voice that says, “Hey, stay with the breath, stay with the breath, make the breath comfortable, allow the breath to be comfortable. Give us some room here.” This is why the Buddha didn’t encourage his monks to take a vow of silence. There’s a story in the Vinaya of a group of monks … 
  5. Customs of the Noble Ones
     … No one can force you to breathe in an uncomfortable way, and yet we’re always letting ourselves squeeze the breath, force the breath, because we’re interested in other things. It’s as if we’re stepping on the breath to see something else, trying to climb over the breath to see what we can see other places. As a result, this basic … 
  6. Look after Your Baby
    Look after Your Baby October 1, 2016 All too often it happens that when you sit down to concentrate on the breath, you stay with the breath for a little bit and then you’re off someplace else. You come back, you stay with it a little bit longer, but then you’re off again. This happens so many times that you begin to … 
  7. Discernment in Concentration
     … Can you learn how to stay at that spot and release the tension at the same time, and yet maintain your focus? And how do you figure out what way of breathing is best? How do you adjust the breath? If you put too much pressure on the breath to adjust it, then no matter how much you adjust it, it’s not going … 
  8. Momentum Through Restraint
     … Then, to keep the mind from feeling starved, you give it something good to focus on, which is why we work with the breath, trying to make the breath comfortable, trying to make the breath energy interesting in the body, realizing that, if you have any chronic illnesses or chronic pains, you can use the breath energy to help alleviate those illnesses and pains … 
  9. Honesty
     … For example, right now you’re going to keep the breath in mind. Each time you breathe in, each time you breathe out, you remind yourself: Stay with the breath. You don’t go wandering off. Then you’re alert, both to what the breath is doing, and to whether you’re staying with the breath or not. If you find yourself leaning into … 
  10. Opportunities Everywhere
     … You look at how he taught breath meditation over the years after that, and you’ll see that he would change his ways of describing the levels of breath in the body, the directions of the breath would flow, different ways of conceiving the breath. All this came from his willingness to use the breath to deal with whatever diseases he had. So when … 
  11. Experimental Intelligence
    Experimental Intelligence August 7, 2007 One of the most important principles in meditating on the breath is learning how to experiment with it. Try different kinds of breathing to see which rhythm, which texture of breathing feels best for the body right now, and which is also best for the mind. Some ways of breathing can put you to sleep, other ways of breathing … 
  12. Enjoying the Path
     … It’s not just an idle pastime, working with the breath energy in the body. It’s not a distraction, because as you work with the breath energy, you begin to see the results of the movements of the mind. The breath energy may be flowing perfectly fine for a while, and then suddenly your mind goes running off to something else. You come … 
  13. Mindful Judgment
     … You’ve got the breath coming in and going out, and as long as you’re alive it’s going to be coming in and going out. So it’s a good place to start. You focus on the breath going in, you focus on it coming out. After a while, you realize that in order for the mind to stay with the breath … 
  14. Escape Routes in the Present
     … Simply being with the breath can be a pleasurable experience. You’ve got this whole field to play with: the breath energy in the body. You want to be able to tap into that whenever you need to, so that things that are difficult outside don’t weigh so heavily on you. As for the things we don’t endure, they come in two … 
  15. Stress
     … You work with the breath, think about the breath, adjust the breath. Once you’ve got something good, you try to maintain it. Once you’ve maintained it, you try to spread that comfortable sense of energy flowing freely through the body. It’s a fair amount of work. Think of the bathman having to knead the soap powder and the water all day … 
  16. This Fathom-Long Body
     … When you focus on the breath, you actually do get a sense of being one with the breath. You begin to have a sense that your sense of “I” is located at some part of the body—most often, up in the head. But then as you work with the breath in the body, you begin to realize that staying exclusively in the head … 
  17. Dhamma Medicine
     … And it’s the same with working with the breath energy in the body. This is one of those general tonics that’s useful in all kinds of situations. If you learn how to think about the breath in a way that immediately brings ease to the breathing, this is a good tool in almost any situation, because if you’re coming from a … 
  18. Not What You Are, What You Do
     … You’re directing your thoughts to the breath and evaluating the breath. You use certain perceptions, and certain feelings get involved. These are all elements in the factor of fabrication, which comes right after ignorance. We breathe ignorantly. We perceive things through ignorance. Our thoughts about things, the way we evaluate things, and our use of language generally are done with ignorance. As a … 
  19. The Seven Factors for Awakening
     … You’re trying to keep the breath in mind. Then there’s alertness, watching what the breath is doing and watching how the mind is relating to the breath. These two qualities, the Buddha said, are always appropriate. They’re always skillful. Then he goes on to describe how the rest of the factors for awakening depend on the situation. Three of them are … 
  20. Things Aren’t as They Should Be
     … You can take something simple like this—the fact that you’re talking to yourself about the breath, focusing on the breath; you have a perception of the breath, an image of how the breath flows in the body; you’re trying to create a feeling of well-being: Okay, that’s the activity. You can watch yourself doing that activity and you’ll … 
  21. Doubts
     … If, for example, you notice that you’re wandering off because the breath is too weak, you strengthen the breath. Or if it’s not comfortable, you ask yourself, “What can I do to make the breath more comfortable?” So you are engaged in some thinking as you’re staying here—thinking related to staying with the breath—but you have to fend off … 
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