Search results for: "Focusing"

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  2. Anchored by Skillful Roots
     … You sit here focusing on the breath, and learn to pry the mind away from the distracting thoughts that fly off in all directions. You sit here learning how not to get involved in them, in the worlds of that the mind creates, that pull it here, pull it there. Then, as the mind finally settles down, you find that it’s like an … 
  3. The Patience of a Hunter
     … You’re focused on something you can see right here, right now, that’s been right here, right now. You’ve been looking past it, but now you see. That’s what this is all about. When you solve this problem, you find it’s like pulling a thread out of a stocking. The whole weave begins to collapse. That’s the sudden part … 
  4. Dispassion Isn’t Depression
     … As you stay focused here, you can watch the mind to see what it’s doing to shape the present moment. Use it to settle down until you get the breath comfortable, and get the mind comfortable with the breath. In the beginning, there has to be a fair amount of thought: Think of the image of the bathman or the bathman’s apprentice … 
  5. Technique & Attitude
     … If you have trouble focusing on the breath in the beginning, you can combine it with a meditation word like Buddho. Bud- with the in-breath, -dho with the out-. Some people find it easier to start out by contemplating different parts of the body. Say with the bones: Visualize the bones in your body and just go through the body from the toes … 
  6. Culture Shock
     … There’s no concern about keeping the human race going or keeping your appetites going, but there is a focused concern on finding a true happiness. That one point, that one focus, trumps everything else. And it affects everything within the culture — from the way we walk, the way we talk, what we wear, what we eat, the kind of shelter we look for … 
  7. Acceptance & Equanimity
     … Get the mind focused in such a way that it’s feeling rapture and pleasure. Rapture may be too strong a word sometimes. Sometimes it’s simply refreshment. In other cases, though, it really is that strong. But the point here is that if you’re going to go on to a more all-embracing equanimity, you’ve got to be coming from a … 
  8. Breath Energy
     … See if you can breathe in without tightening up at the spot where you’re focused. When you’ve managed that, then move up the spine even further—section by section, vertebra by vertebra if you can—all the way up through your neck and then into the skull. Think of all the muscles around your head relaxing—and that they can stay relaxed … 
  9. Close to What You Know
     … You’re sitting here focusing on your breath, so notice how the breath feels. If it doesn’t feel comfortable, see what you can to do to make it more comfortable. In other words, notice what you’re doing and notice the results. That’s a very direct kind of knowledge. The sensation of ease or stress or whatever you’re feeling with the … 
  10. Question Your Perceptions
     … So as you’re focusing on the breath, try to notice what kind of perceptions you use. What do you perceive of the process of breathing? How does it happen? And what kind of perceptions help you settle down? As the Buddha said, perception is a mental fabrication. It has an impact on the mind. What ways of perceiving the breath have a good … 
  11. Tranquility & Insight Together
     … You don’t feel confined in the mind; even though it’s focused in the present moment, it has a spacious sense of well-being here. So you’re trying to develop stillness and, at the same time, trying to develop some insight into what you’re doing. Ideally, these two qualities work together. The stillness is called samatha or tranquility; the insight is … 
  12. The World of Conviction
     … As for the world, once you’ve focused on that desire, everything in the world that’s relevant to that desire actually forms the world in that becoming. Whatever is either going to help you get the pizza, or get in the way of getting the pizza, forms the foreground. Everything else falls into the background. Everything else in your own personal identity that … 
  13. A Sense of Duty
     … You can keep up your spirits by focusing more on the good qualities you’re developing. Like the people in the expedition: Their main aim was to do something no one had ever done before, which was to walk across the continent of Antarctica, but that didn’t happen. What did happen was that they cared for one another, saw one another through. And … 
  14. Chew Your Food Well
     … And it’s interesting to note that when the Buddha talks about kamma, the first two things he focuses on are gratitude and generosity. If you don’t see the virtue, the value of gratitude, if you don’t see the value of generosity, it’s hard to do anything else on the path. You have to appreciate the good that other people have … 
  15. The Humble Way to Awakening
     … What he saw was that if you focused on this one issue, all the other issues get cleared up. Either you find that they get answered or you realize that they weren’t worth answering to begin with. It’s important that we realize this as we practice. Some people say that our suffering is such a small selfish issue to be dealing with … 
  16. A Victory that Matters
     … Learn to see that defeat as a warning that you’re focusing on the wrong battles. Then use that realization to set your heart on gaining a victory over your greed, aversion, and delusion; your craving, ignorance, and clinging—so that this very personal suffering that you’re causing yourself can finally stop. Nobody else needs to praise you for this. Nobody else needs … 
  17. The Luminous Mind
     … This is why the Buddha, when he was giving instructions to his son, focused on just this issue, telling him, “Look at what you’re going to do, look at what you’re doing, and look at what you’ve done. Try to be very clear about the results of your actions.” That reflection is how you begin to see through the clouds of … 
  18. Return of Wisdom for Dummies
     … It’s more focused on where your actions were dumb, and now you don’t have to repeat them. Ajaan Lee makes this point in one of his analogies. He says some people think they’re smart. They learn that there’s gold ore in some rock. They don’t want the rock, they just want the gold, so they take a little toothpick … 
  19. Generating Power
     … I’m going to focus on doing what needs to be done right now and I’m not going to try to provide for alternative things to fall back on.” In other words, when the time comes to be focused and concentrated, that’s all you do. Give yourself to it totally. Have a sense of conviction, a sense of confidence in the practice … 
  20. A Divine Seat
     … When a negative emotion comes up, how does it change the way you breathe? Can you change it back to something good? And how are you talking to yourself? What images do you have in your mind? What feelings in the body and feelings in the mind are you focusing on? Can you change the focus? Can you change the inner conversation? You’ll … 
  21. Samvega & Pasada
    Focusing on the breath, trying to get the mind to stay with the breath, can sometimes be a very chastening experience. On the first level, there’s the simple difficulty of getting the mind to stay with one thing: something as simple and nearby as the breath, and yet you find it slipping off, slipping off, slipping off. You start out with the best … 
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