Mindfulness Like a Dam
August 10, 2017
Upasika Kee has an analogy where she compares mindfulness to a dam across a river. This goes against our usual picture of mindfulness as an open, allowing state of mind that allows everything to flow. But her understanding of mindfulness is closer to what the Buddha talked about. It’s a way of exercising restraint over the mind. You keep in mind the fact that you want to stay with a particular topic—like the body, or feelings, or the mind, in and of themselves—and within that framework, you remember what to do with whatever comes up. If something unskillful comes up, you try to get rid of it, or at least turn it into something skillful. If there’s something skillful there, you try to encourage it. You’re not just letting things arise and pass away on their own.