No Mistakes Are Fatal
January, 2003
Our minds are pretty chaotic systems, which is why following the middle way is difficult. It’s so easy for a chaotic system to get knocked out of equilibrium, to veer off to the left, to veer off to the right. Staying in the middle is difficult; it requires a lot of balance.
It’s no wonder that …
No Mistakes Are Fatal
January, 2003
Our minds are pretty chaotic systems, which is why following the middle way is so difficult. It’s so easy for a chaotic system to get knocked out of equilibrium, to veer off to the left, to veer off to the right. Staying in the middle is difficult; it requires a lot of balance.
So it’s no …
… Anger & disgruntlement are both a blemish.
“It’s possible, friend, that there’s the case where this sort of wish might arise in a certain monk: ‘O, should I have fallen into an offense, may the monks accuse me in private, and not in the middle of the Saṅgha.’ But it’s possible that the monks would accuse him in the middle of the …
Did the Buddha Teach Free Will?
As with so many other issues, the Buddha took a middle path between the two extremes of determinism and total free will. If all your experience were predetermined from the past—through impersonal fate, the design of a creator god, or your own past actions—the whole idea of a path of practice to the end of suffering …
… Developing strength of mind is in some ways very much like developing
strength of body. To develop strength of body, you have to remember to
exercise it and to nourish it with rest and good food. In the same
way, the mind needs to be exercised. You need to remember to keep it
exercised and to nourish it well.
The remembering there is mindfulness …
… Or
it might be right in the middle of the head in the area just above the
eyes. Whichever part of the body seems most sensitive to the energy
flow, focus there.
Try to maintain a rhythm of breathing that feels really good right
there so that it feels good all the way through the in-breath and all
the way through the out …
… Breath energy coming in right in the middle of the chest and
going down through the liver and the abdomen. Do it in a way that
feels refreshing. Think of the breath energy going all the way down to
your toes, so that your legs sitting here are not just dead lumps.
There’s a flow of energy that keeps them alert, keeps them …
… Avoiding these two extremes, the Tathāgata teaches the Dhamma via the middle:
From ignorance as a requisite condition come fabrications.
From fabrications as a requisite condition comes consciousness.
From consciousness as a requisite condition comes name-&-form.
From name-&-form as a requisite condition come the six sense media.
From the six sense media as a requisite condition comes contact.
From contact as a …
… When you begin to see, though, that the way you put things together is
causing suffering, and you don’t have to put things together that
way—there’s another way—this is how insight cuts through. You see it’s
not necessary, that suffering. You have an alternative. Go for it.
When you develop the mind in this way, you’re getting the …
… And as they say in Thailand, many times when the
middle-level management sends something up, they’ve already mixed it
for you. In other words, they present it in terms that are pretty much
going to force your decision one way or another. So if you don’t get
the mind really clear, really still, really constant in its gaze,
you’re not …
… Look at the way you think, look at the way you breathe, look at the way you hold your body. See if there’s anything you can change. Any ways of thinking that are keeping you down, learn to question them. Any ways of breathing that are stifling your energy, just drop them. Ask yourself: Which parts of the body are getting starved of …
… Look at the way you think, look at the way you breathe, look at the way you hold your body. See if there’s anything you can change. Any ways of thinking that are keeping you down, learn to question them. Any ways of breathing that are stifling your energy, just drop them. Ask yourself: Which parts of the body are getting starved of …
… But the question is, do
you do it skillfully? There’s a skillful way to breathe in, a skillful
way to breathe out. There’s a skillful way to relate to the breath as
you breathe in, breathe out. If it’s nourishing for the body, if it
feels good inside, down to the more sensitive parts of your body, the
mind will respond …
… The way out was not to buy into it, to have a more sensible attitude toward the whole thing. Whatever ups or downs there may be, you don’t have to take them all that seriously. You just stick with your practice. You have to find the middle way between the extremes that the dramatic side of our personality likes to read into things …
… This is one of the main ways that we develop discernment in the practice. If the practice were simply a matter of going to a far extreme, whatever that extreme may be, it wouldn’t require much thought or discernment. It would require just a lot of pushing. As the Buddha said, his path is a middle path, and it’s “middle” in lots …
… This way, when the mind and body are in harmony like
this, both sides benefit. The mind has a good place to stay. The body
has someone looking after it.
One of Ajaan Lee’s images is of a parent looking after a child. The
parent has to make sure the child doesn’t get sick, doesn’t do
anything wrong. And as long …
… The pilings on this bank and that bank aren’t hard to place, but the pilings in the middle are really hard. You’ve got to withstand the current of the river. You dig down and put a few stones on the bottom of the river and you come back with your next load of stones only to discover that the first load of …
… When
you’re still in the middle of the river, don’t be too quick to let go
of the raft or you’ll drown. Wait until you’ve gotten to the shore.
Then you let go.
But all the way across the river, from this shore to the far shore,
it’s a matter of developing attention and intention. You let go of …
… You make them at the end of the year, you make them at the beginning of the year, you make them in the middle of the year. So try to become timeless in the way you hold on to the path, so that regardless of which day of the year the question is asked—“What am I becoming right now?”—the answer is, “I …
… By the time we come to the Dhamma, we’re already in the middle of all
this. What makes the Dhamma special is that it shows us a way out,
because a lot of those muddling mistakes we make create a lot of
suffering for ourselves or the people around us. An important part
about choosing a life of the Dhamma is that you …
No Mistakes Are Fatal | Gather ’Round the Breath
No Mistakes Are Fatal January, 2003 Our minds are pretty chaotic systems, which is why following the middle way is difficult. It’s so easy for a chaotic system to get knocked out of equilibrium, to veer off to the left, to veer off to the right. Staying in the middle is difficult; it requires a lot of balance. It’s no wonder that …
MN 5 Anaṅgaṇa Sutta | Unblemished
… Anger & disgruntlement are both a blemish. “It’s possible, friend, that there’s the case where this sort of wish might arise in a certain monk: ‘O, should I have fallen into an offense, may the monks accuse me in private, and not in the middle of the Saṅgha.’ But it’s possible that the monks would accuse him in the middle of the …
Attention & Intention
… When you’re still in the middle of the river, don’t be too quick to let go of the raft or you’ll drown. Wait until you’ve gotten to the shore. Then you let go. But all the way across the river, from this shore to the far shore, it’s a matter of developing attention and intention. You let go of …
