Simply This Moment - Buddhist Meditation and Theravada ...

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ūpaloka, even though we are only abandoning them temporarily. We have toabandon things temporarily so that we can get used to being apart from them, and theneventually we can abandon them fully. It is just like a person who comes to amonastery temporarily, then goes back into the world again, then returns a secondtime and a third time, until he gets used to abandoning the world. He can thenabandon it fully and permanently. But first it is important to abandon the world atleast temporarily, to see what that is like. So, this is the goal that I encourage you toaim for during this Rains Retreat: to gain a jhāna, just the first jhāna. Having madefirst jhāna one’s goal, one then develops the desire, the energy, the application ofmind, and the investigation to gain that goal.Application of the mind is called citta samādhi. The mind has many functions; one ofthese functions is sati, or mindfulness. You have to maintain mindfulness throughoutthe meditation period. The maintenance of mindfulness means that one maintains fullknowledge of what one is doing. Always, as it were, checking up on oneself – not ona verbal level, but just by knowing what one is doing and fully experiencing thecontent of one’s consciousness from moment to moment. Mindfulness also meansremembering what one is supposed to be doing and the goal that one has assigned tothe meditation. Mindfulness is maintaining the desire for that goal, the energy, theapplication of the mind, and the investigation.If you do not keep a map with you on the journey you will get lost. You need tomaintain that map in your mind. That is why it is helpful – in order to maintain thegoal and the instructions – to very carefully make a resolution to yourself at thebeginning of a meditation. It is well known, even to Western psychology, that if wecarefully make a resolution to ourselves we will remember it. For example, bymaking a resolution three times with as much care and mindfulness as we can, we findthat we recall it, and we remember it for a long time. The more effort we put intomaking that resolution the more impression it makes on our mind and the longer itstays in the mind. By making that firm resolution at the beginning, it shows that weare meticulous in the process of meditation. We will not waste time with thewandering mind.7
The Experience of BreathingSo, having made a resolution, this is what you are aiming for: to keep the iddhipādasgoing, to maintain the desire for this state, to maintain the energy; the application ofmind, and the investigation. At that point you can start looking at your meditationobject. The easiest meditation object you will find to gain jhāna will be the breath.You can try other things, but I would encourage you to keep the main object ofmeditation the experience of breathing. That was the meditation that the Buddha usedand that the forest monks in Thailand use. It is the most popular meditation objectand there is a reason for that. It is the most convenient way into the jhāna states.Other ways may be used, but if you can’t sustain your attention on the breathing it isvery unlikely that you will be able to sustain your attention on other things. It is theability of the mind to sustain attention that is the function of samādhi and it is thatwhich leads one into jhānas. The meditation object is not as important as one’s abilityto hold it.If one is going to use the breath, then there are a couple of tricks that are extremelyuseful. The first ‘skilful means’ is to make sure that you are watching the feeling ofthe breath, not the thought of the breath. There is a great difference betweenexperience and commentary. If you get accustomed in your meditation to knowingand staying with the experience and discarding the commentary, then you will findthat your mediation becomes much easier. You can discard the commentarythroughout the day. Make a resolution that you will try to restrict the commentaryyou make on life and become more attentive to the bare experience of life. Themaking of that resolution will arouse the mindfulness necessary to stop the innerconversation. You do not listen to it; you are not interested in it. You are moreinterested in the actual experience.Secondly, when you are watching the breath, have the full experience of the breath.Do not think about it. Do not note it; do not say anything about it; just know it. Thesimpler you can make the meditation object, the more powerful it will become. Thisis the reason why I encourage you to put your attention on the breath and not toconcern yourself about where the experience or feeling is located in your body. If youare concerned about where the breath is located in the body, that concern brings up8
Page 2 and 3: Simply ThisMoment!A COLLECTION OF T
Page 4 and 5: CONTENTSPage1 Ways and Means into J
Page 6 and 7: This gives one great insights into
Page 10 and 11: too much body-awareness. With body-
Page 12 and 13: and thoughts - apart from the exper
Page 14 and 15: faculty of the mind to sustain and
Page 16 and 17: - and this is a natural phenomena -
Page 18 and 19: involved I stress the word ‘fully
Page 20 and 21: though he was a Noble disciple pass
Page 22 and 23: Anyone who claims the experience of
Page 24 and 25: Sometimes people have so little con
Page 26 and 27: the shelf and we know how this whol
Page 28 and 29: The Delusion of Freedom‘That whic
Page 30 and 31: monk telling me once that his fathe
Page 32 and 33: say that in the Anupada Sutta (MN 1
Page 34 and 35: it’s been still for a long time,
Page 36 and 37: 3 DETOXIFYING THE MIND2 nd of Febru
Page 38 and 39: consciousness - or as I would prefe
Page 40 and 41: is letting go of the pleasures of t
Page 42 and 43: never overcome thirst in that way.
Page 44 and 45: Use the triple practice of sãla, s
Page 46 and 47: after another, hundreds, thousands
Page 48 and 49: much fire in their minds. This is w
Page 50 and 51: 4 LOOKING FOR THE SWEET CHILLISeeki
Page 52 and 53: Listening to fine music. Is this it
Page 54 and 55: freedom is not freedom at all becau
Page 56 and 57: We have a story in Buddhism of the
Page 58 and 59:
This is real contentment! This is r
Page 60 and 61:
Watch this inner conversation going
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monastic life does respect the sile
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delusion because it has kept us goi
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This is the opposite of suffering.
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ight view. It’s very hard for a h
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always be on the wrong path, and on
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“Look, if this is causing sufferi
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out of control. The monastery goes
Page 76 and 77:
the past and the future, and we’r
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at all. Who can trust memory? In me
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can. Give it full attention every m
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in the morning, afternoon or evenin
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yourself from all that’s happened
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mutti is releasing and anālaya is
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instructions without question.It’
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comes into the mind, then we start
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hold in the mind’s eye and I was
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of letting go, not stages of attach
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Sayutta there is something that imp
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pushes you out of sasāra whether y
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7 DHAMMA PRACTICE10 th May 2000I’
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Adult people look after their own k
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many people in the world who write
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What if you make that your goal, an
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things really complicated. It’s s
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‘The monks here, or the teacher,
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and surrender to the path. Surrende
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8 HUMAN RIGHTS IN BUDDHISMDhammalok
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doesn’t really have any meaning o
Page 119 and 120:
These things are not freedoms, they
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told me in Malaysia and Singapore t
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When Jerusalem fell in 70AD, becaus
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To question is a right for people.
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embarrassed by my fellow Buddhists.
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many countries between laws which a
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It’s a very narrow truth. The tru
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guilty you have to be punished! You
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the Zendo - but the more you smile
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Having planed off the rough parts,
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got the flu and cancelled your appo
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I was taught to choose to watch the
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From Diversity to UnityMeditation i
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usually if someone is dead they wou
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There are other cases like that. On
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10 CONDITIONED REALITYDhammaloka Bu
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The Buddha very clearly outlined th
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even your bare perception is alread
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way, there has to be some other exp
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Seeing Truth and RealityI want part
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talked with one of the people - who
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was able to follow to get into deep
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ideas are not actually the true Nib
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that the air around it is not movin
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and find out what that pain really
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mantras, all words of instructions,
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just observing. Surely the thinking
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without valuing, without weighing o
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so difficult to attain. It is becau
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12 REFLECTIONS THAT ARE CONDUCIVETO
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the mind, and that’s the jhānas.
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need the calm which is developed by
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can try it with virāga.VirāgaPeop
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with all of its difficulties and al
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clinging stops us from experiencing
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the thirteenth giving up the critic
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13 THE OUTFLOWINGS OF THE MIND12 th
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from peace. The will ‘to be’ is
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the future, to fantasies, to the pa
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taught here. Going into the present
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that the core of all this is ‘emp
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14 STARVING THE TIGER TO DEATHOverc
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inappropriate for a monk to be doin
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When a person really understands wh
Page 207 and 208:
getting angry and upset. This way y
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You will find simplicity means that
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use them to make progress in your m
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By developing seclusion from all th
Page 215 and 216:
People in the world say everything
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15 THE LAW OF CONDITIONALITY3 rd Ja
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elate that sort of smell to a very
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When you start to see the will ceas
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up. You see that anger is not the c
Page 225 and 226:
Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be a
Page 227 and 228:
Once you can see this whole cause a
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whether you like it or not. So you
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anymore than you can break the laws
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is the barrier of the five hindranc
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experiences, resting on them, based
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attention to the sensory world, we
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Instead of having kāmacchanda we h
Page 241 and 242:
distraction of ill-will? Outside, w
Page 243 and 244:
Sloth and TorporSloth and torpor ar
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wherever you want mind, I’m compl
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Wherever there’s thinking, it goe
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17 I KNOW YOU MĀRA25 th August 200
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“Come on, who do you think you ar
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you don’t have a clue, that so ma
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unfolding. In fact, the more you le
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they’ve got into that habit. What
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As the Buddha said in the Indriya S
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about anything because worrying is
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seeing clearly. Sometimes people ge
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There is just so much happiness. Th
Page 267 and 268:
see so much detail. It was always t
Page 269 and 270:
after us, yet there is this loud mu
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When you start to see that, it’s
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this. So if we see where that disco
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mindfulness, you get pīti, more jo
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you can meditate, you can teach, be
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and restlessness cannot survive. Th
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19 PERFECT STILLNESS29 th June 2005
Page 283 and 284:
Have You Come Here to Die?At one re
Page 285 and 286:
At the last retreat I taught in Ipo
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process is about. You also understa
Page 289 and 290:
go of everything. Letting go is wha
Page 291 and 292:
the moment. It doesn’t matter wha
Page 293 and 294:
moving up and down, the nimmitta is
Page 295 and 296:
So, look upon your life as a journe
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Nirodha. Nirodha means cessation, t
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20 THE ENDING OF EVERYTHING7 th Dec
Page 301 and 302:
delusion, to think of things as bei
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samatha and also the word upasama b
Page 305 and 306:
quoting the suttas here; they are t
Page 307 and 308:
I was talking earlier this evening
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opposite is true. The less ‘self
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senses are. Before that it’s just
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The mind creates; this is what it d
Page 315 and 316:
Get into the jhānas, the real jhā
Page 317 and 318:
whatever things come into existence
Page 319 and 320:
2. Dukkha - suffering.3. Anattā -
Page 321 and 322:
Painissagga: “Letting go”, aban
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