Breath for Peace and Insight

A talk about how to train with mindfulness of breathing meditation as an excellent tool for developing true peace, insight and wisdom.

Transcript

Our minds need objects and there's always mind objects arising and when we attend to sights outside,

Sounds outside,

Think about other people,

Various concepts,

The past,

The future,

Then our mindfulness becomes scattered,

Which is normal.

It's just learning how to understand what a mind is,

How it works.

It's actually quite extraordinary among modern peoples how little attention people give to understanding what a mind is,

The very thing that experiences life.

Very few people have a genuine interest in understanding what it is,

How it works,

And the level of fascination with things outside.

It's not very balanced.

Well,

It's actually completely imbalanced.

And as Buddhists we're very fortunate because Lord Buddha explains to us mind is the forerunner.

You look at some central simple teachings in the Dhammapada,

Mind is the forerunner.

Other simple teachings,

What the mind attends to,

The mind becomes like that.

It takes on attributes of things it attends to.

So as students of Lord Buddha,

Due to the compassion and wisdom of our teacher,

We get a lot more help than other people.

He explains to us in the Four Foundations of Mindfulness teachings,

When we are aware of the body,

Just aware of the postures,

These things are so subtle and so simple that we overlook them because concepts are fascinating.

Lord Buddha is saying pay attention to this.

Know when you're sitting,

Know when you're walking,

Know when you're lying down.

He even says know when you're defecating,

When you're urinating and defecating.

One should know what one's doing with one's body.

So what he's basically saying is this awareness of what you're doing with your body should be consistent in all postures.

So keeping your mind a percentage of your awareness established in your body.

Then with feelings,

The instructions are to know pleasant feelings as pleasant feelings,

Neutral feelings as neutral feelings,

Unpleasant feelings as unpleasant feelings.

And this is where we come to our breath meditation.

I encourage you all now to try to be aware of the feelings of the in-breath and the feelings of the out-breath.

Coming through the nose,

The chest,

Into the abdomen,

Out from the abdomen,

Chest and nose.

So it's not a concept,

It's not an idea,

It's not a visualization,

And it requires absolutely no controlling.

So this is difficult for modern people.

We like distraction,

We like sophistication.

And this act of being with bare attention,

Bare awareness can seem difficult.

The only reason it's difficult is because we haven't applied ourselves in trying to do it frequently enough,

Often enough,

Consistently enough.

Experienced meditators,

People who make a commitment to meditating daily,

Especially people who meditate a couple of times a day,

Notice that once the mind understands the benefits,

Because we're all trying to be happy,

We're all looking for pleasure in our own way,

And the mind doesn't yet understand that to be still,

To be collected,

Not to be fascinated,

Is actually extremely pleasant.

And so we have to go against the current of the world.

We have to be interested,

And at first we have to trust.

Trust Lord Buddha when he said cultivating the four foundations of mindfulness leads to the deathless,

Merges in the deathless.

The deathless means nipana,

Enlightenment,

Liberation,

Unshakable peace.

So that sounds very interesting for all of us who are interested in going beyond every type of suffering.

That's a very clear instruction,

And it gives cause for optimism.

And so we have to commit with a certain degree of faith in Lord Buddha and his enlightened disciples.

And so we're just placing the awareness and trying to stay,

Knowing one in breath,

Knowing one out breath.

Usually we'll find in breath meditation that when we come to the sitting,

Thoughts take us away,

Sometimes some heavy sleepiness,

We fall asleep for a second,

Wake up.

Thoughts can carry us away,

And we don't feel much of the breath.

We might get parts of it.

But in this act of keeping on trying,

Inclining towards knowing the breath,

We become aware of more parts of it.

So it's important not to get impatient,

Frustrated,

Not to try too much controlling.

We just keep trying,

So it's more about gentleness and consistency.

Come back,

Come back,

Start again,

Start again.

When the mindfulness gets a little sharper,

You'll find that you're able to be with more of that experience,

The felt experience of breathing.

It's like we have to take,

If you imagine,

A simile of a hand which is holding many different tools,

Multitasking.

The mind is like that.

It's picking up the past,

Picking up the future,

Picking up thoughts about other people,

Picking up thoughts about oneself.

And we're taking,

We're dropping those objects,

Putting them down,

Putting them down,

Putting them down,

Putting them down.

You place your hand one on top of another in active meditation with your mind.

Your mind has to put down all these objects.

So when you recognize that you're picking something else up,

It's okay.

You recognize it,

Put it down.

Picking something up,

Put it down gently.

And we're picking up the awareness of the breathing.

And in placing the awareness on this object,

We're able to put down the other objects.

The thing which is different about this object,

Mental object,

Meditation object,

Is that it's in the very center of your conscious experience.

And so what happens when you're able to be with this experience,

With this meditation object,

Is that the energy which has been being dissipated starts to collect.

And when the mental energy collects,

There's an experience of being more awake,

There's an experience of clarity.

And we might not realize that for many modern people,

The mind is very tired,

Moves between thinking about many things and then falling asleep.

And Ajahn Chah explains to us that a large part of practice is keeping the mind in the middle.

So becoming aware of neutral feelings and being mindful of neutral feelings,

Such as the feelings associated with breathing,

Allows you,

It helps you to stop craving for the pleasant and having aversion for the unpleasant.

Because craving for pleasant experiences and trying to run away from unpleasant experiences is very tiring.

And you'll never succeed.

You can't only have pleasure.

You can't avoid all this pleasure.

But in being able to be in the middle,

You can restrain the craving and the aversion.

Craving and aversion are hot.

Talking about the four foundations of mindfulness,

When you become aware of the mind object of anger,

Place your awareness in the heart area when you're angry,

You'll notice heat.

Similarly with craving.

If you have a strong craving and you might notice some kind of spinning and dizziness in the head,

The mind is dizzy with desire.

In placing the mind in the middle,

Trying to restrain the mind,

Keep it in the middle,

What you'll notice is that spinning slows down and that heat cools down.

And the more consistently that you're able to just be with the awareness of the feelings of the breath,

These neutral feelings,

Your mind becomes cool.

When we think about the past,

We think about the future,

We think about the people,

Think about things we want,

The things we don't want,

The mind feels cluttered.

It's like you're bumping into things,

Sharp things,

Hard things,

Reacting to things.

But when you're able to keep the mind in the middle with this breath awareness,

A sense of space opens up and you realize that the mind,

When it doesn't pick up these objects,

Has an empty nature,

Empty awareness.

The mind's nature is just to know.

No sights,

No sounds,

No tastes,

No thoughts.

But when mindfulness is weak,

We're lost in those things,

We don't know them.

Not knowing as a concept.

Knowing with this bare awareness,

Clear awareness,

Mindful awareness,

Buddho.

When you know these things as they are,

A feeling is just a feeling.

Physical feeling is a physical feeling,

A body is a body.

Thought is a thought,

An emotion is a mind object,

It's a mental feeling.

Memories are memories,

Perceptions are perceptions.

When you know those things with some aloofness,

With some equanimity,

Equipoise,

The mind is able to rest and there's an experience of spaciousness,

Clarity,

Silence.

And it's very pleasant.

The wonderful thing about breath meditation is that as your awareness becomes more clear,

More refined,

The breath becomes more shallow,

More refined as well.

And then you have to refine your awareness to know the more refined breath.

And so this beautiful meditation tool,

Lord Buddha describes as the crown jewel of meditation methods.

Because it takes you from an ordinary,

Coarse,

Agitated state to a very refined and peaceful state.

What you also notice is what starts as neutral feelings,

As the awareness,

If it can truly be with knowing the beginning,

The middle,

The end of an in-breath,

The space holding that awareness,

In the very same space we are aware of the breath,

And then knowing the beginning,

Middle and end of an out-breath,

A rapture can arise in the mind.

And the feelings associated with the breath become very pleasant.

So what starts as a neutral feeling becomes a very refined and pleasant feeling.

And if you stay with that awareness of a refined breath,

That sense of clarity becomes crystal clear,

And the sense of coolness can become deep like an ocean.

These people have these experiences of this deep,

Cool,

Clear clarity.

And the awareness of the breath,

The feelings are very pleasant.

And rapturous feelings also arise.

Sometimes people's hairs go on end.

Sometimes people have tears running down their face just from being aware of the breath.

So we have to give ourselves to this practice with a lot of interest and trust.

The Lord Buddha is pointing us in this direction.

The crown jewel of the meditation methods is no small statement.

Four foundations of mindfulness merge in the deathless,

A state completely beyond all suffering.

That is not a wishy-washy statement.

That is the most profound statement the Buddha could make.

These methods will liberate you.

This awareness,

When cultivated fully,

The mind is purified of its greed,

Its hatred,

And its delusion.

Sometimes this process is likened to refining gold.

You have to take the other elements out,

And all that's left is the gold.

And so all we do is we just keep coming back.

If you are quite with the awareness of the breath,

Then the practice is just to stay,

Stay in the center.

Ajahn Chah uses the simile of being the one that sits in the seat of the mind,

Not allowing other guests to come and take that seat.

So other guests could be the cravings for,

Cravings not for,

Thoughts about the past,

Thoughts about the future.

When you're sitting in the chair of the mind,

They can't come and take over.

They can't sit down.

See them as if from a distance and don't let them sit down.

They walk in the door and they walk out the door.

But when mindfulness is fuzzy or weak or scattered,

All sorts of guests come and sit.

Some of them welcome,

Some of them not welcome.

And so just keeping on applying the mindfulness of breathing,

Being aware of those feelings and neutral feelings,

Becoming refined feelings.

And then this rapture can arise in the mind and then tranquility can arise in the mind.

You go through the rapture.

Sometimes rapture is likened to being like the waves on top of the ocean.

These thrilling sensations can fill the entire body.

A sense of,

In Pali it's called piti.

Other people can feel heavy and solid like a mountain.

That's one form of rapture.

Other people can feel a sense of vast empty space like the sky.

Other people can feel like they're floating.

These subtle mental feelings all arising just because the mind is collecting and being still.

And people have some experience of these things and develop some skill.

They realize this pleasure is superior to the pleasure that comes from pleasant tastes,

Pleasant touch,

Pleasant sights,

Pleasant sounds.

They realize this is what I've been looking for.

I've been looking for happiness.

I've been looking for pleasure.

And this pleasure,

Lord Buddha says,

Peacefulness is the highest pleasure.

But we don't know that until we experience it.

And we don't experience it until we develop consistent mindfulness.

In the act of being more aware,

More centered,

More in the center of conscious experience,

You begin to see mind states as mind states as objects.

You can see it's not you.

Mindfulness is scattered and fuzzy.

You think your thoughts are you.

And you think about your thoughts.

You wish you didn't have those thoughts.

You wish you had good thoughts.

You wish you didn't have nasty thoughts.

You're sick of thinking these thoughts.

You're sick of yourself.

Very painful.

Develop a little mindfulness.

Develop some skills.

Being aware of the breathing.

And you just see a thought as a thought.

You don't have to identify with it.

You don't have to like it.

You don't have to not like it.

Don't have to wish you didn't have it.

Don't have to not like yourself for having those thoughts.

It's such a relief when you establish mindfulness of breathing.

Just aware of an in-breath.

Aware of an out-breath.

And a thought comes up.

It's just a thought.

You don't have to pick it up.

You don't have to identify with it.

How wonderful.

A wonderful sense of relief.

You don't have to carry around this identifying with everything as being oneself and liking it and not liking it.

So seeing mind states as mind states.

A mental object arising and ceasing.

We also understand that the reason we have the thoughts is because we've thought them in the past.

So you can't annihilate them,

Nuke them,

Wish them away.

They're arising due to conditions.

And those conditions can often be away in the past the way you've thought for lifetimes.

So don't have to destroy all of the bad thoughts.

You just need to know.

Wholesome thought,

Not self.

Neutral thought,

Not self.

Unwholesome thought,

Not self.

Arising,

Ceasing.

Arising,

Staying for some time,

Ceasing.

In terms of cultivating insight,

When the mind becomes more peaceful,

More clear,

When the mindfulness is really there,

You're seeing the beginning,

The middle,

The end,

The space,

The beginning,

The middle,

The end,

The space.

You can then just choose to notice the moment of cessation.

One in-breath,

Arising,

Staying for some time,

Ceasing.

Space.

One out-breath,

Arising,

Staying for some time,

Ceasing.

There's a little birth and little death in every free breath.

And when you have a little more space in the mind,

A little more clarity,

A thought comes in,

You don't pick it up,

You see a thought arising,

Ceasing.

Arising,

Ceasing.

And just notice the cessation.

This is called niroda sannyā.

Become aware of the cessation.

Even if you don't develop amazing,

Profound,

Vipassana jñāna,

Insight,

Knowledges,

You do develop more wisdom,

Banyabharami.

You develop more wisdom,

Spiritual faculty,

Spiritual power,

So that next time you might be deluded by an unwholesome mind state,

There is that in the mind that knows it will cease.

This is very,

Very valuable.

If people have accumulated spiritual practices in past lives,

This breath meditation can lead into absorptions.

The way my teachers explain it,

At a certain point the mind isn't aware of the breath.

The breath becomes more and more refined,

Very subtle,

And the space is more and more subtle,

And the space between the breaths becomes longer.

And as the mind is experiencing more rapture,

More tranquility,

That deep feeling of contentment and peace becomes the object,

The meditation object,

And the perception of the breath falls away.

Many people get confused here,

They think they've stopped breathing.

The breathing is still occurring,

But the mind is still turning inwards.

It's not aware of the feelings.

And if you just stay,

Many people can see light,

Often white light or gold light at this point.

You just stay with the peacefulness.

The mind,

When it's ready,

Will come out of that state,

And it will come out of the state of peace.

When it's ready,

It will come out of that state,

And it will have more power and more clarity.

You can use that.

Go back to the breath meditation.

When it comes out of that peacefulness,

The mind becomes full of peace to the extent that it will.

Going inwards,

It goes in,

It rests,

And then it comes out again.

And then it's important then to pick up the meditation object again and then really notice that cessation,

Cessation,

Cessation.

And try to see with the extra clarity,

Mind object as a mind object,

Physical feeling as a physical feeling.

And we can investigate when there is a little more integrity,

Stability in the mind,

A sense of having a center.

Then things like knee pain,

Back pain,

Can actually have a closer look without aversion,

Without fear,

Without resentment.

Just having a closer look,

And you'll see it's not just one feeling.

There's an extraordinary amount of feelings there,

And they're changing constantly.

So when the mind is dull and mindfulness isn't very clear,

Knee pain appears like this solid thing that you want to get away from.

If you're with the breath,

It's a bit more peacefulness,

A bit more clarity.

You have a look at knee pain and you see this incredible play of very complex feelings intermingling and moving.

So you'll see in that area the pain is moving.

It's actually very interesting.

And once again,

If the mindfulness is able to see that with clarity,

A rapture can arise in the mind so that the pain is one thing,

The unpleasant feeling is one thing,

But that part of the mind which is knowing it as a feeling can be experiencing a great deal of rapture.

And so with that kind of space and joy,

Internal nourishment,

The knee pain becomes something that can be investigated,

Which is very interesting.

And you learn a great deal about the nature of feelings.

And you learn that many things that we learn.

We learn that when mindfulness is weak,

We suffer.

We identify with things.

We want them.

We don't want them.

It's suffering.

The chelaza,

Which are latent in the mind,

Swell up in the mind and fill the mind.

The mind becomes dark.

It can even become black.

These things are very powerful.

Defilement.

Mindfulness is likened to diamond-like clarity.

So when mindfulness is in the mind,

Held in the mind,

Knowing these four foundations,

These four bases of reference,

The darkness can't swell up in the mind.

And you see,

The more mindfulness you have,

The more wisdom you have,

There's very little suffering.

There's a mind that is able to be with unpleasant feelings.

And that part of the mind which can be with those things is experiencing mental peace.

And the mindfulness is fuzzy.

There's a sense of me,

My body,

My knee pain,

My back pain,

My bad habits,

My sleepiness,

My restlessness.

And it's quite oppressive.

So this crown jewel,

Something that you can use this method to realize your inner worth,

Your true inner worth.

As a conscious being,

As a human being,

To be born human,

A lot of merit has been accumulated,

A lot of good deeds,

A lot of kindness,

A lot of patience,

A lot of virtue.

You get this human form and this human mind which has these sophisticated abilities.

Ajahn Chah said,

Having a human mind is like having a mansion.

Most people spend their whole lives in one or two cramped,

Dusty,

Dirty rooms.

He says,

Once you learn what a mind is,

How to use it,

How to train it,

You realize that there's these beautiful,

Many beautiful rooms in this mansion.

That's your inheritance.

Most people don't pay any attention to their inheritance.

I heard just today,

We went to the art gallery.

A friend told me that somewhere in France,

Somebody knocked down a wall in the apartment and they found this masterpiece behind the wall.

It was worth many,

Many,

Many millions of dollars.

Our minds are like that.

We've got these walls that we've built up through delusion that we can knock down with mindfulness and wisdom and you suddenly see this treasure there,

Great treasure.

What kind of treasure?

The Four Divine abides,

Abidings,

Abodes,

Loving-kindness,

Compassion,

Empathic joy,

Appreciative joy,

Equanimity.

You train the mind to incline to these divine states,

Sublime states.

It's extremely pleasant.

The Lord Buddha calls them the divine abidings because we can abide in them.

It's like a heaven realm in the here and now.

You don't have to be reborn in heaven.

Train your mind in meditation,

In mindfulness,

And then incline the mind once you've established some clarity,

Some stability.

Consciously pick up loving-kindness as a meditation object.

And this,

When people are disciplined,

Can be cultivated to a state which is described as boundless.

They're sometimes called the immeasurables because there's no limit to the extent to which they can be radiated from a trained mind into the conditioned universe.

Amazing.

But it requires a committed discipline.

It's one of,

In terms of the pursuits,

The various things that we pursue,

Many of them aren't worthy of the attention and the energy that we give them because they don't give very good results.

These practices give wonderful results.

A divine abiding,

A sublime abiding,

A heaven-like state here and now.

If you train in just picking up the perception,

The way these things get powerful is through repetition.

Train yourself to have compassion.

Train yourself to have metta.

The people who used to upset you,

The people you used to react to,

See these things coming and if you have it,

It's like a muscle.

Once that muscle is strong,

You can decide to respond with metta instead of being upset.

Whereas before you used to get upset,

You had no choice.

Here she comes,

She says it again.

That same person,

You train your mind,

They're coming,

They're saying it again,

You can look at them and you can smile.

Understanding that their mind state is just a mind state,

It's not them.

Understanding that it's painful,

You truly wish that that person could be free from painful mind states and you don't identify with it either.

It's not their mind state.

I don't see them as that mind state.

I don't have to react to that mind state.

It will arise,

Stay for some time and cease.

It's just a feeling,

It's just an energy.

You can look that person in the eyes,

You can smile and you can think,

May you be well,

May you be happy.

These things require cultivation but they're well worth the effort.

Not only do they reduce the suffering,

A pleasant abiding here and now,

They generate enormous amounts of merit.

Lord Buddha says there's no other quality conducive to heavenly rebirth than the practice of loving kindness.

And so just this simple training in coming and sitting,

Inclining the mind to be with the felt experience,

Knowing that it's sitting,

Just trying to know the breath,

Letting go of other perceptions,

Past,

Future,

Other people and just keeping on trying and just gently restraining and just staying,

Staying,

Staying.

Such a simple activity but leading to profound states of samadhi,

Leading to great insight,

Liberating wisdom,

An incredibly blissful boundless state.

Hopefully I've aroused your interest and faith in the practice of breath meditation,

Metta.

And just try to really know the beginning,

Middle and end of an in-breath.

Really know it was a feeling,

Just aware,

Hold it in awareness,

Keep the mind in the middle.

Allow a sense of clarity to rest in the present.

Don't pick up the past or the future,

Other people.

Allow yourself to rest.

Keep the mind in the middle.

Sit in the chair in the mind.

Reviews

Wonderful pearls of wisdom in this talk. Much Gratitude 🙏

Excellent learned so much and been following this Teacher . All the best

Thank you Ajan. I was greatly helped by a strong practice. Then I let it go. May your talk bring me back to awareness.
🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽

Thank you, thank you 🙏
My meditation has taken a different angle now, thanks the clarity of your explanations. I know on my the right path now. 🦋🦋

Incredible… a complete new
Way to peace… thank you

This is a life changing lesson. Blessings to you!🙏❤️

clear simple subtle about the essence of breath meditation 🙏🙏🏿🙏🏻🙏🏽🙏🏼🙏🏾

These talks are such beautiful reminders of the power of meditation and the Buddha’s teachings.

Powerful. Practical. Instructive. This talk brings peace and hope that one can train, one can learn how to be more peaceful. That, indeed, this is possible!

My second time listening. And recognizing how wise this talk is . Simple yet practical and entertaining. Thank you 🙏

I know it’s a Dhamma talk but the words here supported a great deal of insight for me this morning, especially in regards to realizing that mental passivity isn’t what we ought to be inclining to.

A very calm voice .simple clear explanation.thank you

Very informative, I need to listen and try to understand.

Thank you for this message that will help my practice. I learn so much from you.

Chanh Tue
🙏🙏🙏

Truly insightful.

Wonder teaching. Easy to understand and apply.
With much gratitude. Thank you.

Breath!
The center of peacefulness. Thank you for this informative guide🎈🎈🎈

One of the best talks on mindfulness of the breathe

Keep the mind in the middle. Yes. Thank you. I enjoy your talks immensely. ✨🙏🏽🌸💜☯️✨🤗☺️