Search results for: "Focus"

  1. Page 94
  2. Assumptions
     … What’s right under the skin? What goes into the body? What comes out of the body? These perceptions help to weaken your focus on the object. And then you can start focusing on the desire itself. Here again, we tend to think of the desire as something glamorous, something alive, but the Buddha provides lots of different perceptions to help you think about … 
  3. Meditate Because You Have To
     … And instead of trying to keep one eye on what landmarks you’re passing, or whether the goal seems to be coming into sight, or whether it seems to be receding away, you just focus on what you’re doing. This is the best way to interpret that statement that the goal is in the path. In other words, you don’t keep one … 
  4. Virtues & Values
     … So we focus on the breath as an anchor here in the present moment because, of all the things in the world, it’s the closest to the mind. When you’re with the breath, there’s no past breath you can watch. There’s no future breath you can watch. You’ve got to be in the present moment to be with the … 
  5. The Governing Principle
     … So you focus the desire on looking for the causes and maintaining what causes you can. Try to be gentle with the concentration. Learn to appreciate it. Learn to treat it with care, because when you look after it, it’ll do a lot of good things for you as well. It’s like that story of the lion and the mouse. The lion … 
  6. Passion, Dispassion, Compassion
     … For most of us, we live in a state of obsession with our pleasures, so that only if we feel somebody else’s pain will we turn from our pleasures and focus on helping them. But a mind free from passion doesn’t need that pain in order to be helpful. You see that there’s suffering and you want to help. That’s … 
  7. Dealing with the Hindrances
     … figuring out what kind of breathing feels best for you right now, where you can create a sense of well-being in the body, and then how you can make the best use of that sense of well-being, letting it spread down the nerves, down the blood vessels, bathing the whole body, maintaining your focus with the breath so the mind is willing … 
  8. Where Your Mind Gravitates
     … We focus on the parts of the body to remind ourselves that this really is not where you’re going to find any true happiness, any true beauty, without a lot of downsides. So that turns you around, and you ask, “Well, what am I doing this for?” The mind is very changeable, so you have to watch for it. It’ll say, “No … 
  9. How & Why We Meditate
     … If you can’t feel it everywhere, focus on the areas where you can feel it, where it’s most blatant. Eventually, as your sensitivity develops, you’ll notice it in areas where you never sensed it before. You’ll start to realize that many of the sensations you are familiar with are actually breath sensations. As with any delicate task, this takes time … 
  10. Unlearning Unskillful Behavior
     … situation is, what the problem is, what your unskillful reactions have been, why you engage in them. Just pose that question in the mind, and then drop it to the side. Focus on the breath. Try to get the mind as concentrated and still as you can. If any nibblings of that thought come up in the course of the hour, say, “No, not … 
  11. Correcting, Fostering, Cutting Away
     … For example, you focus on the breath, but the mind is not settling down with the breath. The question is, what can you correct? Is the problem with the mind, or is the problem with the breath? What attitudes are you carrying in from the day? What can you do to drop them? This is one of the reasons why we have the chanting … 
  12. The Use of the Present
    The Use of the Present November 28, 2016 We focus on the body in and of itself, feelings in and of themselves, mind states in and of themselves, but we don’t make them the goal in and of themselves. We’re trying to take them apart to see what they’re made of, because we’ve been putting them together in all kinds … 
  13. Take Care of Your Tools
     … Those are the issues that are worthwhile to focus on. So whatever comes up in the course of the concentration, there’s always a cure for it. And it’s not that difficult, especially if you stay with the breath. That’s one of the reasons why Ajaan Lee focused on the breath in all his books, because it’s the safest object of … 
  14. Unhindered at Death
     … Maintain your focus on the present moment, because that is the spot where you’re going to be making your choices. If you’re just drifting off, drifting off, the choices are getting made for you in one of the subconscious areas of your mind Now, the subconscious tends to follow old habits. It’s the part of the mind that doesn’t really … 
  15. Fear of Mistakes
     … As you focus on the breath, you have the breath as your topic. You direct your thoughts to the breath and evaluate the breath, evaluate the mind in relationship to the breath: Is the breath comfortable? How do you know if it’s comfortable? Well, you test it. Try different ways of breathing, and then you can decide which one is best for giving … 
  16. The Alternative of Concentration
     … One of the reasons we focus on the breath is because you can create a sense of ease that makes it easier for the mind to settle in. You breathe in such a way that the body doesn’t feel tense. You adjust it so that you don’t go off into the other extreme of getting so loosened up that you get really … 
  17. The Strength of Conviction
     … So as you focus on the breath, don’t expect that it’ll always settle down in the same way. Sometimes you find yourself suddenly focused on the earth element in the body. Everything gets very solid. And depending on how you feel about it, it can be either very pleasant or very unpleasant. It’s unpleasant when you want it to be something … 
  18. Attached to Concentration
     … In his Method Two, Ajaan Lee gives a fairly detailed guidelines on where you can focus on the breath and the different ways the breath can flow in the body, but if you look in his Dhamma talks, you’ll see that he played with the breath in lots of other ways as well. He was always coming up with new ways of conceiving … 
  19. Wearing the Breath
     … Where do you feel the flow of energy as the air comes in, the air goes out right now? Where is it most prominent? Focus your attention there and try to figure out which ways of breathing feel best. Again, you’re feeling it; you’re wearing it. It’s what nowadays we call proprioception: your sense of the body as you feel it … 
  20. Comparing Mind
     … So if you find yourself comparing yourself with other people, try to focus in on the actions that you can learn from. And even then you have to learn how to look all around. Ajaan Maha Boowa talks about the pride he developed over the fact that he was able to observe the dhutanga practices better than any of the other monks staying with … 
  21. Sober Up
     … You have to look at the way you’re breathing, you have to look at the way you’re talking to yourself, you have to look at the perceptions you hold in mind and the feelings you focus on. You have to see where they’ve been kidnapped by your defilements, and where you’ve got to exert yourself to get them back. The … 
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