Search results for: "Focusing"

  1. Page 91
  2. Skills to Make You Free
     … In the same way, here you’re focusing on the parts of the body that are not immediately calling for your attention, but you can make them comfortable. Then you can think of that sense of comfort spreading through the area that has pain. Say there’s a pain in your knee. You let the comfortable breath energy go down the leg, through the … 
  3. Independent Values
     … We’re focusing our attention on other things, so we don’t see the potential of the breath: that it really can provide a soothing energy throughout the whole body. When the breath feels comfortable, think of that that sense of comfort spreading out, seeping out, permeating the whole body. Then see if you can maintain that. It requires a sense of balance, so … 
  4. The Time & Place to Let Go
     … Right now you have the responsibility of getting the mind to stay focused, so you can identify with that. But as for other things that might come up that demand your attention, you can say, “Wait a minute, you’re not really me, you’re not really mine. I don’t need you right now. This is not the time and place.” As long … 
  5. Not-self as a Raft
     … We’re focused on the question of “Why is there suffering? What am I doing that’s causing suffering? What can I do to stop?” because this is the big problem in life. We’re constantly acting, constantly making choices, all for the purpose of happiness, but so many times those choices lead to suffering. What are we doing wrong? That’s where we … 
  6. The Mirror Inside
     … Just make sure your reflection is focused on what you’re doing. Concentration is maintaining that focus. Discernment lies in seeing how well you’re doing it. It’s very closely related to evaluation. In fact, Ajaan Lee says that that’s the discernment part of concentration practice: the evaluation. There’ll be times when the mind can put down the evaluation and simply … 
  7. Overwhelmed by Freedom
     … Part of us is afraid we’ll feel bored with nothing to do but focusing on the breath; nothing to do but sitting and then walking, and then sitting and walking. And part of the fear comes from the sense that we don’t know how to measure progress. The mind has this tendency to go up and down, it seems to make some … 
  8. Judicious vs. Judgmental
     … They’re the reason the Buddha focused his teaching on the four noble truths. You need a sense of goodwill to be even interested in the question of trying to understand suffering, because you want to find an effective way of dealing with it. You want to be rid of suffering, to experience wellbeing, precisely because you have goodwill for yourself and for others … 
  9. Virtue Contains the Practice
     … To begin with, you’re focusing your attention on the most important issue in life, which is what sort of impact your actions are having, and particularly what kind of impact your mind states are having. After all, the source of action is in the mind. If you’re uncertain about different mental qualities, then watch. Try developing goodwill; try being generous; try observing … 
  10. Common Sense
     … the way the mind focuses on the pain. You can increase or decrease the amount of suffering by the way you focus on the pain. The same with pleasure: Certain forms of pleasure, if you really focus on them, are helpful in making the mind clear and still. A sense of ease and well-being that comes with the breath: That’s a helpful … 
  11. Strength in Humor
     … That means that it’s something that you can stay focused on at all times, and nobody gets harmed or hurt. It doesn’t mean that everything in the world is going to suddenly go the way you want it to. But you do find that you’re not causing any unnecessary suffering and you’re actually helping the situation around you as much … 
  12. Insight Is Seeing What’s Worth Doing
    Try to stay focused on the breath, wherever you feel it most vividly. If you don’t know where it’s most vivid, take a couple of good, long, deep in-and-out breaths. Let it calm down until it feels just right—not too heavy to be comfortable, but not so light that you can’t follow it. And don’t put too … 
  13. Battling Negativity
     … It’s all open and aboveboard and it’s focused on one thing. There was a famous thinker, Kierkegaard, who said, “Purity of heart is to will one thing.” And the principle in general applies to Buddhism as well: You will the end of suffering. You will the end of your attachment to ordinary happiness by looking for a higher happiness. You keep that … 
  14. Strength Training
     … This is where the Buddha really showed his wisdom, in focusing on the skills to strengthen the mind. Those can see you through all kinds of difficulties. Strength of the body can help you through certain difficulties but it can only go so far. And as I said, there becomes a point where no matter how hard you exercise, the body’s just not … 
  15. Relationships
     … So even though it may seem like a strange exercise, focusing on the breath, relaxing the patterns of tension here, relaxing them there, still, as you work at it, it goes deeper and deeper, and seeps deeper and deeper into the mind until it has more and more of a profound effect on the whole way you relate to yourself. The way you relate … 
  16. To Comprehend Suffering
     … The first step is to develop your powers of mindfulness and alertness, as when you’re focusing on the breath. Because when you’re face-to-face with pain and suffering you need to remind yourself of the fact that it’s something there right now but it’s not always there. It hasn’t always been there; it’s going to go away … 
  17. Horror Stories
     … As I said earlier, the place where you’re going to find awakening is a place you’ve been many, many times before, just focused in the present moment, noticing how the breath changes, how it has an impact on the body, how it has an impact on the mind, how the mind has an impact on the breath, and how your perceptions have … 
  18. Getting Back on Your Feet
     … As a result, were able to totally reorganize people’s knowledge by focusing on the basics. It’s the same with our practice. We can reorganize our practice, restart our practice when we go back and look at the basics very carefully. So if your practice is falling apart, take it as an opportunity to reorganize your practice and get it on a much … 
  19. Moving Between Thought Worlds
     … Even though a state of mind may have some features that are very true—you can verify it by looking at things outside that, yes, this situation really is difficult or whatever it is that you’ve focused on—but then you can ask yourself: “Do you have to suffer around this?” And the Buddha’s answer is always, “No, you don’t have … 
  20. Suffering Is a Feeding Addiction
     … You’re supposed to be focusing on your breath, but suddenly you find yourself mulling over something that happened three or four months ago. Well, you drop that. Come back to the breath. And each time you come back, don’t berate yourself. Just reward yourself with a good breath so that it feels good to come back. But be alert. The mind is … 
  21. Mastery
     … Develop a sense of shame around that—shame here not being focused on your sense of yourself as a bad person, but on the action. You realize that was a shameful action—either ignorant in the intention or shoddy in the execution—and you’d be ashamed to do it again. This is actually a sign of high self-esteem, that you’re better … 
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