Search results for: "Feeling"

  1. Page 97
  2. The World Offers No Shelter
     … Even though he’s king, when he gets sick, he can’t command that his courtiers take a portion of his pain so that he doesn’t have to feel all of it. No matter how much treasure he gets, he’s going to have to leave it behind. But then Ratthapala asks him, “If you were told that there was a kingdom to … 
  3. A Multilingual Mind
    A Multilingual Mind April 2, 2005 One of the things you notice in meditation as you start looking at your thoughts, looking at your feelings, looking at sensory input, is that the solidity of your world starts dissolving away — both your sense of the world outside and your sense of yourself inside. And in some cases, just that much feels liberating — free from the … 
  4. Harmless & Clearheaded
     … You’re not trying to put yourself into a trance, you’re simply here to follow the way the breath feels, all the way in, all the way out. You can focus on any part of the body where the sensation is clear that now the breath is coming in, now the breath is going out. And explore to see what rhythm of breathing … 
  5. Constructing & Deconstructing
     … But as the Buddha said when he gave breath meditation instructions, you’re trying to look at the breath as bodily fabrication, and your feelings and perceptions around the breath as mental fabrication. When you see things in terms of fabrication, that’s insight. For the time being, we’re not watching them just arising and passing away. We’re trying to give rise … 
  6. The Advantages of Many Selves
     … Bring it out, especially when you’re feeling discouraged in the practice. Realize that if you don’t do something to train yourself, you’re going to be a weight on other people, and that’s going to make you feel bad about yourself. So try to find the altruistic you in there. There’s the you in there that knows how to say … 
  7. Breath Teaches the Bramaviharas
     … Take a couple of good long deep in-and-out breaths first, to highlight your sense of the body as you feel it from within. And if long breathing feels good, keep it up. If it doesn’t, you’re free to change. Try shorter breathing, or in short, out long; in long, out short; fast, slow; heavy, light; deep, shallow. Try to get … 
  8. Mature Strategies
     … Find the breath sensations in the body that feel comfortable and stick with them. Allow them to stay there, undisturbed. As that sense of comfort begins to grow, be careful not to get sucked into it too much. Try to maintain your mindfulness and your alertness so that the mind doesn’t start drifting off. That’s one of our problems: We get a … 
  9. Concentration & Renunciation
     … When the breath feels good, you know the breath feels good and you work with the pleasure, but you don’t leave the breath. If you leave the breath and just soak in the pleasure, the basic cause for the pleasure is going to dissipate. As the Buddha said, it’s active attention to the breath, consistent attention to the breath, that allows the … 
  10. Respect for the Training
     … There are a lot of people who don’t like rules, who feel that rules make you a very small-minded person: that they make you think that by abiding by the rules and trying to get a good mark on your rules, you’ll get by. And that’s a very immature attitude towards the rules. Both of those attitudes are immature, i … 
  11. A Full Life
     … The third level was the meaningful life, where you feel that your life is serving a larger purpose. And the fourth was the full life, where you were able to enjoy all three. He mentions Buddhism in the course of the book, putting it on the first level—just a life of pleasure. The only Buddhism he knew about was the mindfulness of savoring … 
  12. 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 … 
  13. 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 … 
  14. 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 … 
  15. 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 … 
  16. 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 … 
  17. 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 … 
  18. 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 … 
  19. 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 … 
  20. 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 … 
  21. 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 … 
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