Search results for: middle way

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  2. Settling In
     … Watch that for a while until everything feels easy and open there, and then move up to the solar plexus, the chest, the base of the throat, middle of the head, and then move down the spine, past the hips, down the legs to the tips of the toes. Then start again at the back of the neck and this time, go down the … 
  3. A Taste of Freedom
     … The ways of the world don’t offer any way out, but this path of developing the mind does offer a way out. As the Buddha said, it’s good in the beginning, good in the middle. It’s even better in the end. So look at each opportunity to meditate as just that—an opportunity, and not a task, not a chore. A … 
  4. The Perception of Inconstancy
     … The question is, how do you relate to the body in such a way, how do you relate to the breath in such a way, that you can actually bring this out? You have to look at the way you breathe. The problem is that you’re used to your way of breathing, and it’s hard to think, “Maybe there might be other … 
  5. Generating Desire
     … They say, “Do a moderate amount of practice”—which is the middle way of the defilements. They say, “Well, do it a little bit but don’t take it too seriously.” So the practice is always going to be countercultural. This is why, as Ajaan Mun said, you have to replace the culture you were raised in with the culture of the noble ones … 
  6. Page search result icon MvV: cammakkhandhako
     … Lord, just as in the Middle Country (we use) eraka grass, moragū grass, majjāru grass, and jantu grass: In the same way, lord, in Avantī and the Southern Route, (they use) hide-coverings: sheepskin, goatskin, deerskin. appevanāma bhagavā avantidakkhiṇāpathe cammāni attharaṇāni anujāneyya eḷakacammaṁ ajacammaṁ migacammaṁ “‘Perhaps the Blessed One would allow, in Avantī and the Southern Route, hide-coverings: sheepskin, goatskin, deerskin. (Mv.V … 
  7. Book search result icon Bases for Success Generating Desire
     … They say, “Do a moderate amount of practice”—which is the middle way of the defilements. They say, “Well, do it a little bit but don’t take it too seriously.” So the practice is always going to be countercultural. This is why, as Ajaan Mun said, you have to replace the culture you were raised in with the culture of the noble ones … 
  8. Mindfulness of Death & the Deathless
     … So that if, in the middle of a task, you suddenly realize you can’t stay in your body any longer, you can drop the work outside, focus on the work inside, and prepare yourself to go. To go well. That’s the whole purpose of this. Because the way the Buddha teaches mindfulness of death, it makes sense only in the context of … 
  9. Caring Enough to Doubt
    There are two ways you can have doubts about the practice or doubts about your own ability to do the practice. One is from caring a lot, and the other is from not caring at all. The second kind is not encouraged, of course. You say, “Well, I doubt that anyone could overcome sensuality or I doubt that I could overcome my anger or … 
  10. The Skill of Happiness
     … tip of the nose, the base of the throat, the middle of the chest, just above the navel—anyplace where you can clearly notice now the breath is coming in, now it’s going out. You breathe with a sense of refreshment. We’re trying to master this skill because it opens the way to other skills as well. As the Buddha says, you … 
  11. Discernment Through Ardency & Evaluation
     … Once you’ve got a good way of breathing that maintains a good sense of fullness in at least one spot in the body, in one of the centers—in the middle of the chest, the base of the throat, the roof of the mouth, the nose—try to expand that sense of well-being because you’re going to be trying to inhabit … 
  12. Guiding Truths
     … It’s like the watering hole in the middle of a desert or savannah. If you want to see what’s living in the savannah, go to the watering hole, for all the animals have to go there in the course of the day. So watch there at the pain, at the suffering, to see what else comes around. See what arises together with … 
  13. All-around Alertness
     … Messages get sent up through the bureaucracy and some of them get blocked, say, at middle-level management. Others make their way all the way through to the president of the corporation. But when they get blocked half-way up, you have to wonder: “Is there a good reason for blocking them, or is there a bad reason for blocking them?” If you’re … 
  14. Perfect Breathing Isn’t the Goal
     … You try to create that well-being by focusing on the breath, by adjusting the way you breathe, by adjusting your perceptions of the breath, and adjusting the ways you talk to yourself about the breath. You can try different rhythms of breathing. You can try different images in the mind of how the breath comes into the body, how it goes out, and … 
  15. The Fortress
     … That way, it gives rise to a sense of pleasure and rapture. That’s the food. Because as we’re practicing, there are lots of things we have to give up. Like right now, you’re taking the eight precepts. Ways in which the mind used to go looking for food outside are suddenly cut off. But you’ve got better food inside, to … 
  16. Book search result icon The Heart a Flowing Stream Thinking about Jhāna
     … So, just as the Buddha’s path to the end of suffering follows a middle way in general, his teachings on the practice of right concentration teach a middle way, too. Of course, the middle here is not simply a matter of finding a halfway point between two extremes. It requires that you be sensitive to where you are in the practice and to … 
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  17. Courage
     … There had to be another way. And so he kept looking for another way—and then he finally came across the middle way. Notice here that courage doesn’t necessarily mean stubbornness. It means facing down difficulties, not letting yourself get waylaid, not letting yourself get discouraged by those difficulties. When the Buddha met up with pain, it took a lot of courage to … 
  18. The Mind’s Ostinato
     … You see that you have a habitual way of thinking about the world, a habitual way of thinking about yourself, a habitual way of looking for pleasure in sensuality, and that reduces everything to kamma. And there are better habits—the habits of the noble eightfold path, which are things you do. You develop the habits of right action, right speech, right livelihood, the … 
  19. A Blameless Happiness
     … There was a period when he actually thought the best way to find true well-being was to deny yourself all kinds of pleasures He finally realized, however, that that’s not the way. And he found the middle way because he was able to realize there was more to life than just pain and sensual pleasure. There were other kinds of pleasure, other … 
  20. Question Your Actions
     … One of the other ways we suffer is, once we’ve got an identity of that sort, we don’t like it. We want to destroy it or see it destroyed. So we go back and forth, dropping one identity, taking on another, not liking that, trying another, trying another. The Buddha says, one of the ways to get out of this dilemma is … 
  21. Look at Yourself
     … Yet you can look at the rest of the world and try to straighten out the rest of the world as much as you like, but, one, the world refuses to be straightened out in a lot of ways; and two, you can develop a lot of unskillful qualities that way. So you’ve got to turn around and look at yourself. Some people … 
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