… When this sense of mahābhūta-rūpa is nourished with breath and mindfulness in this way, it will grow and mature. The properties will grow quiet and mature, and become mahā-satipaṭṭhāna, the great frame of reference.
This is threshold concentration, or vicāra—spreading the breath.
In centering the mind, we have to put it on the middle path, cutting away all thoughts of past …
… There are different ways you can do that, as there are with savoring a sensual pleasure, such as fine food or beautiful music. Part of the skill of savoring is putting yourself in a receptive mood, part of it is how you talk to yourself, and part of it is opening yourself up physically, especially if it’s listening to music—opening yourself up …
… So try to picture them learning to see to the error of their ways and changing their ways. In other words, you wish for them to start creating the causes for happiness. You don’t feel that you have to settle old scores first before you let them be happy or wise. When you learn how to think in these ways, it helps to …
… The discussion that begins with this paragraph provides an explanation for what is meant by the “middle way” in the Buddha’s first sermon. See also the discussion of pleasure and pain in MN 101.
9. Reading añāṇadassanaṁ with the Thai edition. The other editions have ñāṇadassanaṁ, “that is knowledge & vision,” which doesn’t fit into the general message of the text here.
This …
… That chant we had just now about the four mountains comes from a
passage in the Canon where King Pasenadi, one of the major kings of
that time, came to see the Buddha in the middle of the day. The Buddha
asked him, “What are you coming from in the middle of the day like
this? What have you been doing?” And the king …
… This relates to the fact that
this path is a middle way. If it were an extreme path, pursuing an of
extreme sensual pleasure or an extreme of self-denial, it wouldn’t
require that much sensitivity. You’d just push, push, push in
whichever direction is extreme and that would get you there. The
middle way, though, requires a lot more precision, a …
… But it’s different from all the other
ways you could exert control. It’s the only form of karma the Buddha
says is neither dark nor bright.
When he talks about the middle way, it’s not just a
middling way. It’s very precise in how it
looks at the process of control, and how it leads you to a point where …
… In the front
of the body, think of the breath coming in right at the heart in the
middle of the chest, then going down through the stomach and
intestines. And those are just the beginning.
As you read Ajaan Lee’s other Dhamma talks, you see how he had lots of
other ways of perceiving the breath, too. Ajaan Fuang had his own …
In Charge of Your World
October 19, 2008
There’s a story in the Canon, where King Pasenadi comes to see the Buddha in the middle of the day. And the Buddha asks him, where are you coming from in the middle of the day? The King says, “Oh, I’ve been meeting with my ministers and talking about the sorts of things that …
… In the same way, find a spot in the body where you feel that you can
easily settle down and stay here. It might be in the middle of the
head, the middle of the chest, the abdomen, anywhere in the body where
you feel that your attention can settle in settle in, settle down, and
begin to fit together. All the scattered little …
… Citta Hatthisārīputta interrupted in the middle of their talk. Then Ven. Mahā Koṭṭhita said to him, “Don’t interrupt in the middle of the talk while the elder monks are discussing higher Dhamma. Wait until the end of the talk.”
When this was said, the monks who were Ven. Citta Hatthisārīputta’s companions said to Ven. Mahā Koṭṭhita, “May Ven. Mahā Koṭṭhita not rebuke …
… the middle
of the head, the middle of the chest, the stomach, in your hands, in
your feet. Keep moving around. Stir up the juices of the mind. Stir up
the blood with whatever you find wakes you up, whatever you find
energizes you. That way, you’ve got the energizing qualities, which
are analysis of qualities, persistence, and rapture. When they’ve done …
… Imagine a line in the middle of the body running from the middle of
the head down to the base of the spine. The breath energy comes into
that line, goes out of that line. This way, you sweep out the space of
the body. Any patterns of tension you may feel in any part of the
body: Allow them to be dissolved by …
… the body that are most sensitive to
the breath energy?
For some people, they’re in the middle of the chest. For other people,
in the stomach. For some people, around the eyes. They could be
anywhere in the body where you feel that a particular way of breathing
is especially gratifying. You want to find those sensitive spots,
because otherwise the breath can …
… It’s the strength that allows you to deal with the sufferings of life
and at the same time to find a way out—to be up for the challenge in
such a way that you’re not creating more trouble for yourself but
you’re actually finding a way out of the trouble.
Because a lot of the practice is a practice of …
… You have to give rise to them, and you do that partly by the way
you breathe and also by the way you perceive the breath. When you
breathe in, what’s the image of the breath that you have in mind? Some
people talk of the breath as if it were a tactile sensation—in other
words, simply the touch of the air …
… The way you work with the breath will
have to depend on where you are, what you need in order to, say, give
yourself a sense of relaxation when you feel tense in different parts
the body, or to energize yourself when you’re feeling tired, or to
work with a pain that may be caused by poor blood flow in some part of …
… You realize that, to be
kind, you have to go out of your way. It isn’t the easiest thing in
the world to be kind. Your parents didn’t throw you away the first
time you started crying non-stop and making a terror of yourself. They
got up in the middle of the night. They looked after you. Night after
night after …
… He makes known—having realized it through direct knowledge—this world with its devas, Māras, & Brahmās, this generation with its contemplatives & brahmans, its royalty & commonfolk; he explains the Dhamma admirable in the beginning, admirable in the middle, admirable in the end; he expounds the holy life both in its particulars & in its essence, entirely perfect, surpassingly pure. It is good to see such a …
… That was how he found the middle way.
Now it’s up to us to find the middle way, too. Most of us tend to
indulge either in pleasure or are afraid of the pleasure that comes
from a concentrated mind, that comes from allowing the breath to be
comfortable, and to develop that state. The Buddha said that once
there’s that sense …
Knowledge & Vision | Inner Strength & Parting Gifts: Talks by Ajaan Lee Dhammadharo
… When this sense of mahābhūta-rūpa is nourished with breath and mindfulness in this way, it will grow and mature. The properties will grow quiet and mature, and become mahā-satipaṭṭhāna, the great frame of reference. This is threshold concentration, or vicāra—spreading the breath. In centering the mind, we have to put it on the middle path, cutting away all thoughts of past …
DN 29 Pāsādika Sutta | The Inspiring Discourse
… The discussion that begins with this paragraph provides an explanation for what is meant by the “middle way” in the Buddha’s first sermon. See also the discussion of pleasure and pain in MN 101. 9. Reading añāṇadassanaṁ with the Thai edition. The other editions have ñāṇadassanaṁ, “that is knowledge & vision,” which doesn’t fit into the general message of the text here. This …
