Day 062/365: Guided Meditation | Ajahn Brahm

This is a guided meditation with Ajahn Brahm. About 15 minutes of Dharma talk/meditation advice and inspiration. About 20 minutes of guided meditation and about 25 minutes of silent meditation practice. These are followed by a Q&A session/closing thoughts after the meditation practice.

Transcript

Welcome to another meditation session,

Here we go,

At the Buddha Centre in Nallamara.

And again for those of you who are coming for the Introduction to Meditation class that is being held in the room to my right,

This is the ongoing class for those who have meditated before.

We sit a bit longer here which gives more time for the mind to become quiet,

For it to settle down.

The whole idea of things settling down,

Getting more calm and more peaceful is an important perception in meditation.

Because if we think of things settling down,

We know that whenever we do something,

Whenever we interfere,

Whenever we try and get somewhere or get rid of things,

All we are really doing is disturbing that whole process of settling.

And sometimes the only thing we can do and the best thing we can do is just to look on,

Just to look on with equanimity and just watch as things become calmer and quieter.

And a lot of times I describe meditation just as a journey in which you are the passenger,

Not the driver.

You find if you are the driver,

Then you tend to agitate the mind and it never settles down.

So even just thinking or conceiving of the mind as you are not the driver of it,

But the passenger,

Even like separating yourself out,

This mindfulness,

This knowing and what you are experiencing are two different things.

You put space between the knower and what you are knowing.

If you put space between those two,

You will find then you have the opportunity to actually do something,

In other words to let go.

When I was in Singapore a couple of weekends ago,

Instead of being here,

Someone was presenting some of the latest techniques of psychology and I noticed there was one psychologist over in the eastern states and he had borrowed something which I knew was from me.

You have often heard me here talk about how big is the hand.

When I put it in front of me I say my hand is so big I can't see anything in the whole world.

It's not my hand's problem,

It's perspective.

I should put my hand where it belongs at the end of my arm.

And apparently there is some psychologist who has created a method,

Which he is making a lot of money out of,

Maybe Chris might know this guy.

And he did the same,

He said,

This is your thoughts and if you put your thoughts right up here all you can see is your thoughts and you get obsessed with your thoughts.

If you put your thoughts out here where they belong,

Then you have some opportunity to let them go.

They are not so close to you,

You get perspective,

You can just leave them alone.

They are not so entangled in those thoughts.

So at least my talks here are being listened to by people,

And I suppose they are making some money for their family on it.

But this is actually how you can deal with some of the thoughts which you can get entangled in when you are meditating,

Which is usually the biggest problem.

You are trying to settle things down but the thoughts go on and on and on and on.

So how you stop that,

Please put the thoughts outside of you,

At a distance,

Two or three feet in front of you.

And then you are just in here,

Just watching these thoughts.

Then it is easy not to get entangled.

In the same way,

You may be watching a movie at home and you will find when you first turn the movie on,

You are sitting in your armchair and the movie is happening on the TV screen.

But after a few seconds,

You are right in that TV screen.

You are right there,

So much so that if somebody gets shot,

You start crying.

If somebody,

I remember this when I was a young man going to the movies with your friends,

If somebody is creeping up to kill the hero,

People in the audience would shout out,

Hey,

Look behind you!

And it was just a movie,

They couldn't hear you.

But still you would shout out that,

Hey,

Look behind you.

And that is the same if any of you watch football on the TV.

You can see these guys sitting in their armchairs at home,

Watching a soccer match going on,

Say,

In Brazil somewhere.

And they shout out,

Kick the ball,

Kick the ball,

Stupid!

Can the person hear you?

They are not even in the same country.

Actually,

It is just a TV you are shouting out and the TV has got no ears.

You are wasting your time.

But why do people do that?

Because you get involved,

You get entangled in this fantasy going on on the TV screen.

That is actually what happens with your thinking.

Your thinking backwards and forwards,

You are entangled in it.

Which is why it keeps going on and on and on and on.

If you could just remember,

You sit back here,

Your thoughts are out there just like a TV,

Then you don't bother with it.

Then you can let it go.

Then you can see that most of the thoughts in your mind,

They are just like soap operas.

Not good soap operas either.

I have lost my sound.

Hello,

Are we going anywhere?

They are just like soap operas,

Not good ones.

They are crazy stuff.

Have you told your thoughts to somebody else?

Would they be interested?

Absolutely not.

So the best thing for you to do is to let the thoughts disappear.

When you find a distance between you and the thoughts,

Then there is no entanglement possible anymore.

So if you are meditating,

You are trying to settle everything down,

You have thoughts coming up.

Try and look at the thoughts,

Like things acting out on the screen,

Like a movie or like on the TV screen.

It's not yours.

And then because you are not entangled,

It's so easy to let them go,

To let them disappear,

To let them fade away.

And then things really settle down.

Remember,

A lot of the thoughts are what actually excite you,

What give you an emotional hit,

Which means your mind still goes on and on and on.

So if you can just let them go,

Imagine just how easy it is to settle down and become peaceful.

So that's why the thinking mind is one of the biggest distractions of all.

So see if this meditation,

If you are thinking,

Just put them outside a little bit,

Put some space between you and the thoughts.

Then you become disentangled,

Because you are disentangled,

You see them for what they really are and you can let them go pretty easily.

And then you can have a nice peaceful meditation.

What happens next?

You get very still and very peaceful.

And even this method of meditation,

Which I've been teaching for years now,

I know that someone said the other day,

Well,

What about the breath?

You are supposed to be doing breath meditation.

I said,

Yes,

But the breath comes out by itself.

When you start settling down and becoming calm,

Then you find that quite naturally you will be aware of the only thing which is moving,

Which is the breath going in and out.

And if it comes up naturally,

In other words,

You don't force it,

It just comes to you,

Then you will find the breath is always really,

Really peaceful and very easy to watch.

When things are easy to watch,

Easy on the eye,

As they say,

Then you don't have to put effort to watch the breathing.

The breathing is just there for you and you settle that down as well.

Everything becomes calmer,

More peaceful,

More still.

If that's what you do,

You still start to enjoy the peace.

I say enjoy the peace,

It has a certain pleasure to it.

And I love people noticing the pleasure of just a peaceful mind.

If you notice the pleasure of a peaceful mind,

Then that peaceful mind stays with you for a long time,

It doesn't go anywhere because you are enjoying it.

Once you get to that stage,

The enjoying,

Enjoyable,

Peaceful mind,

Everything else goes very quickly and very peacefully and very smoothly.

So that's actually how we are meditating.

So having given you that one little piece of advice today,

You're trying to put some separation between you and your thoughts when you're meditating and then you can find you can let them go pretty easily.

Now we can actually give it a try to get some meditation actually going.

So if you like to,

If you're not already in your meditation posture,

Sit down,

Adjust your body,

Get your bottom just in the right place,

Close your eyes and now we can meditate.

So with your eyes closed,

Please bring awareness to your body.

Just ask the body,

How are you feeling?

Is there anything I can do for you to make you more comfortable?

If there is something which you can do,

Then please do it as soon as possible.

Scratch,

Blowing your nose,

Coughing,

Whatever you wish to do,

Please do it.

So real compassion is not just thinking kindness,

It's doing kind things.

So everybody needs to become more comfortable,

The more it is.

So you.

So you.

So you.

Still be aware of your body and find out how you can relax it even more.

How are your feet now?

Are your feet comfortable?

Your legs?

Be aware of these parts of the body and you relax them until you can feel they're really comfortable.

Scanning your body from toe to head,

Make sure you haven't left anything out.

Your bottom sitting on the chair or the cushion,

How comfortable is it?

Remove it if necessary.

Your waist,

Your chest,

Shoulders.

You review every part of your body.

Your arms and your hands,

Can you feel them?

They need to be rearranged.

The neck and head.

I like to ask people to be aware of the muscles around the mouth.

Shows a lot about your attitude.

If your mouth is screwed tight,

It means you're trying too hard.

There's a little smile on the face,

It means you're looking forward to meditation.

That is the best posture,

A tiny smile.

You're aware of your body,

You're being kind.

It's called kindfulness.

The body reacts by being peaceful,

By being comfortable.

And hopefully you can experience like I'm experiencing now,

The delight of a comfortable body.

Once the body is relaxed,

Really feeling comfortable,

Then that's the time to let it go.

By focusing on the body so much,

It helps weaken the thoughts,

Settling the mind by settling the body.

When you let it go,

You can now settle the mental world.

If there are thoughts in the mind,

Put a distance between the thoughts and you.

Imagine them like clouds in the sky or like events on a screen when you're sitting a few feet away,

Watching,

Unentangled,

Not part of the thoughts as you're not part of the movie.

It's the voice that controls your conditioned behavior when it comes to your current thoughts.

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Reviews

How delightful to have the opportunity to listen to these talks and meditations. Today the time flew by. Finding much peace. Thank you. ☮️💖🙏🕉️