Search results for: "Concentration"

  1. Page 93
  2. Questioning & Conviction
     … That’s why we meditate, because part of the solution to suffering lies in developing certain qualities of mind, such as mindfulness, alertness, concentration. To develop these qualities, you need conviction. When mindfulness lapses, you don’t have to debate with yourself as to whether it’s worth wandering off after that distraction. Your conviction tells you No, it’s best to get back … 
  3. Straightening Out the World
     … All the good qualities in the mind—mindfulness, alertness, concentration, discernment: Without these qualities you get careless; you don’t really see what’s going on, even on the surface level. Something pops into your head and you say it, and then you realize afterwards what you said, but then it’s too late—to say nothing of the things going on deeper in … 
  4. Quiet in the Midst of Turmoil
     … Ajaan Fuang went to visit him one time and—even though he had been in the forest many years, and his concentration was really solid—one night next to the railroad tracks, his concentration crashed. He realized that he wasn’t as skilled as he thought he was. So he had to go back and work on the skills of being quiet in the … 
  5. The Dhamma Eye
     … That’s when he remembered an incident from his childhood, when he was sitting under a tree while his father was ploughing, and his mind naturally entered a state of solid and very pleasurable concentration. It felt good just to be sitting there, very quiet, very still. He thought to himself, “Could this be the way to true happiness?” And he realized it could … 
  6. Mindfulness Like a Dam
     … In this case, you’re trying to turn it toward concentration. Here again, it requires mindfulness to remember what works in getting the mind to stay with the breath. And when you finally get a sense of ease and well-being with the breath, what do you do with it? How do you let it soak through the body, seep through the body, and … 
  7. Heedful of What’s Precious
     … As he once said, “One day lived mindfully is better than a hundred years lived mindlessly.” One day lived with virtue, one day lived with concentration, one day lived discerning the arising and passing away of your mental states, is better than a whole hundred years of living without doing any of those things. So what’s really precious here, what’s really valuable … 
  8. The Primacy of the Mind (1)
     … If you already have practice in drawing lines for the mind in terms of your behavior outside, it’ll be a lot easier to stay with your one object of concentration. At the same time, you’ve been training the mind to be active in thinking about generosity, thinking about virtue—and as you’re watching the processes of the mind, those thoughts are … 
  9. Adbusting the Mind
     … And this, as the Buddha said, is one of the reasons we have to do concentration practice. With concentration, you get a sense of well-being here. If meditation doesn’t give you that sense of feeling viscerally really good sitting here, then it won’t be able to do all the things that meditation should. So work on getting a sense of real … 
  10. Normalcy
     … To do this, you develop a sense of the observer in concentration where you’re able to just watch things come and go. Like Ajaan Chah’s example of the monkey. If you don’t really understand monkeys, you become a monkey too. When the monkey jumps around, your mind jumps around with the monkey. But what we’re trying to do here is … 
  11. Awaken to Your Potentials
     … He saw that you can put the aggregates together as a state of concentration. You can use them to create right view, right resolve, all the other factors of the path, and those factors will deliver you to something that’s not fabricated. So, as I said, the four noble truths are about potentials. You’ve got these aggregates and you could hang on … 
  12. Ask Yourself the Buddha’s Question
     … This part of concentration is called directed thought and evaluation. The Pali terms are vitakka and vicāra, and they basically constitute your mind’s conversation with itself. You want to train them so that they engage in an interesting conversation—a useful conversation. Of course, a lot of every conversation lies in the questions you ask. They’re actually what directs the conversation. This … 
  13. For the Sake of the Deathless
     … This is one of the reasons why the Buddha compared concentration to food. The different levels of jhana, he said, are like different grades of food. The highest, of course, is the fourth, which he says is like honey, ghee, and butter, really rich food. We learn to feed ourselves on this, so that the part of the mind that likes to make you … 
  14. Relaxing into the Body
     … The concentration we’re trying to develop here is a lot easier to keep going if it’s based on relaxation rather than on straining and stressing. So you might start with your fingers, go up the arms: Relax things. Some people have trouble seeing the different energies flowing in the body as breath energies. There are some energies that are not really directly … 
  15. Consciousness, Name, & Form
     … everything from right view all the way through right concentration. When you look at things on these terms, it’s a lot easier to do the right duty. You can look at your perceptions and intentions, for instance, to see if they add to your suffering, as part of the first noble truth, or help put an end to it, as part of the … 
  16. The Gift of Speech
     … Right after right resolve, which is the type of thinking that leads you to right concentration, comes right speech. And of course, the first level of right concentration starts with directed thought and evaluation, the way you talk to yourself. The way you talk to yourself will have a big impact on how you talk to others, and vice versa. When we sit down … 
  17. Victory
     … That requires developing strength, which is why concentration is part of the path. We bring the mind to the present moment with the breath so that we can gain some strength from the breath and gain strength from getting the mind to settle down and be still. So gather your thoughts in right now. If you’re going to think about anything, think about … 
  18. Stop Squirming
     … When you encounter something—whether it’s stress or craving or something that’s part of the path, like mindfulness or concentration—you have to know what to do with it. You don’t just watch it come or go. Stress and suffering are to be comprehended. The cause is to be abandoned. The path is to be developed so you can actually realize … 
  19. Licking Yourself Clean
    Licking Yourself Clean May 25, 2005 The Buddha once said that one of the prerequisites for concentration is a sense of comfort, ease, and wellbeing — both physical and mental. One of the reasons we recite those chants on goodwill, compassion, appreciation, and equanimity is to create a sense of wellbeing in the mind. Thoughts of goodwill are good thoughts to think. They feel good … 
  20. Perceptions of Self & Not-Self
     … You’re responsible for doing the concentration. You can’t say, “Well, the concentration is not-self, so I’m not responsible. I’m just watching it happen.” You have to do it. It’s something you develop. That’s the duty there. So you accept that responsibility. The self, along the path, functions in three ways. There’s the self as the producer … 
  21. Intense Stillness
     … That’s the kind of concentration you can live with. That’s the kind of concentration you can put to use. It’s not just resting. It’s part of a quest. You’re here looking for defilements in the mind, and you’re going to see them best when your eyes are bright all around.
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