Search results for: middle way

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  2. Dimensions of Right Effort
     … 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 … 
  3. Occupy Your Space
     … 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 … 
  4. First Principles
     … 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 … 
  5. Steering the Raft
     … 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 … 
  6. In Charge of Your World
    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 people obsessed with their power talk about:—which … 
  7. A Much Better Place
     … 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 … 
  8. Factors for Awakening
     … 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 … 
  9. Book search result icon First Things First Did the Buddha Teach Free Will?
    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 … 
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  10. One Thing at a Time
     … 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 … 
  11. Grounded in the Breath
     … 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 … 
  12. Different Minds, Different Bodies
     … 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 … 
  13. Established in Full
     … 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 … 
  14. The Good Side of Kamma
     … 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 … 
  15. Remembering Ajaan Suwat
     … We can’t say we’ll just do a middling effort. The effort has to be appropriate for the occasion. We also have to make our words appropriate for the occasion. We have to be very careful about what we do, say, and think to make sure that it’s just right. He liked to make the comment that “The Buddha says a lot … 
  16. A Pleasure Not to Be Feared
     … 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 … 
  17. No Mistakes Are Fatal
    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 … 
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  18. Off to a Good Start
     … 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 … 
  19. Strengthening Your Goodness
     … 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 … 
  20. Constant, Easeful, Self
     … 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 … 
  21. The Skills of Merit
     … If you try to get in the middle of the road and stop the traffic, it runs over you. Here you’re stepping out. You’re not in the road. You’re in the present moment. This is one of the skills the Buddha taught. All of his teachings are basically skills. Even right view is a skillful way of thinking that leads you … 
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