So good morning.
Today we'll continue with this series of talks on the 16 Steps of Mindfulness of Breathing.
And we've come to the last tetrad,
The last section,
And it's on observing.
So this last tetrad consists of steps 13,
14,
15,
And 16.
And all four steps have in common this new verb really,
Which is to observe,
To observe.
And this is the first time in the discourses on the 16 Steps of Mindfulness of Breathing that observation comes into play in this particular way.
If you read through the teachings of the Buddha in the suttas,
We see most commonly that observing is a very well-developed practice in which the mind is able to be really centered in the present and concentrated.
The strongly concentrated present mind is one that begins doing this practice of observing.
And there is something about the continuity of mindfulness,
This continuity of mindfulness of breathing that allows us to observe things,
But helps us not latch on to them,
Not to cling or to hold on.
So through staying with the breathing,
There's kind of this continual letting go.
Breathing is where the mind can rest.
And we notice that all kinds of things happen,
But we're letting go of our involvement to do anything with what's happening.
You know,
Without trying to,
We're seeing the mental formations happening,
But we're not trying to change it or think about it.
We're just kind of going along with the breathing and going back to the breathing.
And this kind of letting go is a way to keep ourselves soft and relaxed.
We're sort of letting the whole psychophysical system have a break from our active involvement.
And when we do that,
We allow for something deeper to happen that can only really happen if we get out of the way.
So as we get quieter and quieter,
What we have left is this ability just to observe.
And we learn to trust and settle back.
You know,
Okay,
Now I'm just observing.
I'm observing what's happening in the body and the mind.
I don't need to interfere or judge it.
I don't have to fix or adjust anything.
Just watching.
Just watching.
And observing becomes a very important part of these final steps because we really want to get out of the way and not overlay our concepts or our ideas or our judgments on top of whatever experience we're having.
We just want to be able to take things in more closely just to observe.
So in this last tetrad,
There is a shift from practices that are meant to be more concentrating and focusing.
Now we're switching to vipassana.
So observing is where vipassana,
Insight practice begins.
And classically,
Insight practice is built on the foundations of the mind that are actually quite stable and concentrated.
A mind that is at ease and content and safe.
So now the mind is ready for insight practice.
And insight practice,
Open awareness practice is built on this capacity just to observe.
Just to observe our experience.
And just to say that vipassana practice,
This is what we've been doing,
It doesn't have to be done only with a strong basis of concentration.
It can be done directly as a practice,
Which we've been doing together since 2016.
A lot of what people are doing is just practicing directly and immediately sorting through all the ways in which they're not concentrated.
All the ways that the mind,
The body,
The sensations are activated.
That's a lot of what we're doing.
We're becoming wise about what distracts and hinders the mind.
So vipassana,
This is the medium,
Which we're exploring the next four sets of practices in this mindfulness of breathing.
And when we don't overlay our ideas and concepts,
What we see is that everything is changing all the time.
You know,
The day changes,
The light changes slowly over time from when we start practicing and it's dark and then it starts to lighten up.
Sensations in our body are changing throughout the day.
You know,
We can watch the changes as we get hungry and then we eat and then we don't feel hungry.
You know,
We feel uncomfortable and then maybe we get engaged in the body in a different way and different muscles are used at different times.
Different sensations come into play.
There's constantly a shifting and a changing.
The landscape of our bodies are changing.
The landscape in our minds are changing.
Our focus changes what we take in.
So this 13th step of mindfulness of breathing,
It reads,
One trains observing inconstancy.
I breathe in,
One trains observing inconstancy.
I breathe out.
So inconstancy is one word for change.
We really begin to appreciate and see the depth of which things are changing all the time.
So if we're thinking about the past,
The past is not changing anymore except maybe how we remember it,
Right?
The future doesn't really exist to change.
It's a projection of our imagination.
But the present is where we can see change.
This is where the river of change flows.
One of the first Buddhist books that I read was the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying by Sogal Rinpoche.
And in it Rinpoche writes,
When you look deeply,
You realize there is nothing that is permanent and constant.
Nothing.
Not even the tiniest hair on your body.
And this is not a theory,
But something that you can actually come to know and realize and see with your very own eyes.
I ask myself often,
Why is it that everything changes and only one answer comes back to me?
That is how life is.
The paradox in meditation is the more still and stable the mind,
The more the mind observes change and impermanence.
And the more unstable,
The more scattered and preoccupied the mind is,
The more we assign permanence.
We tend to get caught up in our ideas and our thoughts and they can carry,
You know,
We get carried along with them.
And then it feels permanent,
Like this is the way things are.
This is just how it is.
It's really interesting to start to see that.
So,
This might be the practice for the next couple of days for you,
Just to notice change.
Notice how change arises and transforms depending on whatever the conditions may be.
And also kind of noticing your role,
Like where you find yourself in change,
Your relationship to it,
How you relate to it.
Are you resisting and fighting or attached to change?
Or is it more of this open observation?
In this moment it's snowing.
It will change.
So I'll close with a reflection from Sogal Rinpoche.
The realization of impermanence is paradoxical.
The only thing we can hold onto,
Perhaps our only lasting possession.
It's like the sky or the earth.
No matter how much everything around us may change or collapse,
They endure.
The realization of impermanence is paradoxically the only thing we can hold onto,
Perhaps our only lasting possession.
