Search results for: "Feelings"

  1. Page 96
  2. The Path Is in the Details
     … There’s a potential for form, for feeling, perception, fabrication, consciousness, but with your present intention you choose how to put those things together and turn them into actual forms, feelings, perceptions, and so on. This is something very quick. We’re very adept at it. Because it’s so quick, it’s hard for us to catch sight of it. And because we … 
  3. The Five Hindrances
     … The things for which you feel sensual desire: They really are worthy of desire. They’re really desirable. The things for which you feel aversion really are bad. When you’re sleepy, well, it’s a sign that the body really does need some rest. When you’re worried about something, restless and anxious about something, you can find all kinds of reasons for … 
  4. Taking an Active Role
     … getting that one part feeling really comfortable, really good, and then thinking of spreading it either systematically or just wherever it wants to go. The other way is to keep your awareness full-body and then notice the breathing as a full-body process, making adjustments wherever necessary, so that the effect of the breath is calming. In the beginning, it may require that … 
  5. Success by Approximation
     … The calming ones are useful for when the mind is feeling frenetic; the energizing ones, for when the mind is feeling sluggish. So even with skillful qualities, you have to learn how to make distinctions. Beyond that, there are levels of concentration, levels of equanimity, levels of right view. These things will progress as you go on the path, until the mind is totally … 
  6. Crossing the River
     … So even though it may involve work, and you can see that this breath, too, is inconstant, nevertheless, don’t let the effort leave you feeling daunted, and don’t focus on the inconstancy of the breath too quickly. Look for its other side as well. It’s constant in that, as long as you’re alive, there’s always going to be the … 
  7. Taking Responsibility
     … When you’re feeling exasperated or beset upon, victimized, you tend not to want to ask questions or not want to question yourself, let’s put it that way. Especially when you feel that you’ve been treated unjustly: That’s one of the strongest senses of self there is in the world. When you’re in that position, you don’t want to … 
  8. A Positive-Sum Game
     … No one’s forcing you to breathe in an uncomfortable way, so explore to see what kind of breathing feels good. It might be longer or shorter, deeper, more shallow, heavier or lighter: You’ve got room to experiment. Because that’s how you learn. You learn by experimenting. You can’t just sit watching passively and hope to learn anything at all. If … 
  9. Swept Downstream
     … He has no power over the disease to say, “Can you courtiers take out some of this pain that I’m feeling so that I can feel less?” Even though he’s king, he has no sovereignty over his pains. And even though he has storerooms filled with gold and silver, he can’t take that gold and silver with him when he dies … 
  10. Rewriting the Mind’s Song
     … Usually, we’re very particular about who we feel goodwill for and who we feel ill will for. The Buddha is training us to try to erase that line so that there is no ill will. Or the ill will is seen as something abnormal, and you replace it something better and new. This may sound artificial, but all our thinking is artificial. It … 
  11. Catch Yourself Lying to Yourself
     … This is one of the reasons why the Buddha was so strict about a person who feels no shame at telling a deliberate lie. He says there’s no evil that person will not do. And we’ve seen that recently. But in particular, you want to look at yourself. Are there times when you would feel it’s okay to lie? Or that … 
  12. Energy & Efficiency
     … In other words when you’re sick, when you’re not feeling well, the practice goes one way. You may spend less time putting physical energy into the practice, and you may not be able to gain the levels of concentration or very precise mindfulness that you want, but do the best you can given the circumstances. When your energy level is high, don … 
  13. Carrying Your Duties Lightly
    Ajaan Suwat often called the monastery here, “a quiet corner,” a place where people can get away from the cares of their lives and just be with the body in and of itself; feelings, mind, mental qualities in and of themselves—to drop the general context of work, family, all the narratives that get built up around work and family and other issues outside … 
  14. Old Kamma & New
     … You want your ability to feel compassion to be all around. You want your ability to feel empathetic joy to be all around. And the same with your equanimity: all around. In other words, you want to be able to tap into these things whenever you need them. In cases where some people are difficult, learn how to have goodwill for them regardless. As … 
  15. Admit Your Stupidity
     … Then you have mental fabrications, which are perceptions and feelings. The perceptions are the images you hold in mind; feelings are feeling tones of pleasure, pain, neither pleasure nor pain. So you can ask yourself what kind of perceptions would be useful to get the mind to settle down. In fact, this is one of the ways in which you can develop tranquility and … 
  16. The Uses of Equanimity
     … Learning how to be with the breath in a way that induces feelings of pleasure, feelings of rapture or refreshment is an important source of strength both for the body and for the mind. This provides you with a general pattern that you can use throughout life. When you run into limitations, you test them first to make sure they really are limitations. If … 
  17. The Fangs of Conceit
     … There are the movements of feelings—when you feel things, when you perceive things, when you fabricate things in the mind for certain purposes. When you fabricate a thought, it doesn’t mean that you’re lying about it. It’s simply that you cobble things together for whatever purpose you have in mind. This is how we get through the day. This is … 
  18. Goodwill as a Guardian
     … If you’re thinking this way, you should feel embarrassed, because here’s someone else who has goodwill for you, who wants to see you put an end to suffering—and you’re going to let someone else have more goodwill for you than you have for yourself? Thinking in these ways shows how goodwill is one of the guardian meditations. It’s one … 
  19. A Slave to the Dhamma
     … So as you’re doing battle with the defilements, you have to be ready to do whatever is required, to make whatever sacrifices are required, whether you feel they’re fair or not, whether at that particular moment you feel up for it or not. If that’s what required, that’s what you do. That’s one of the best attitudes to have … 
  20. Tools of Perception
     … This is how you get the mind into deeper and deeper concentration until the point where you really don’t feel the need to breathe. The energy sources in the different parts of your body nourish everything else. The mind is still enough so that you don’t need a lot of oxygen to nourish the brain. The oxygen you get through the pores … 
  21. Poison Your Fantasies
     … When you feel that the object is good enough, you can just be with the object. Just be with the breath. It gives you something to rest with. When you can have that answer—just, “Nothing new, nothing new. Just stay right where you are”—that’s restful. As the Buddha said, there’s no happiness, there’s no pleasure other than stillness, other … 
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