Dear Friends, In Afternoon Instructions – Mindfulness of Mind, Jill looks at different mental processes and leads a reflective practice for the participants. Jill speaks again about the “wheel” model of how body and breath are related to getting lost in proliferation. It might look something like this: Here’s how Jill explains this: To continue exploring the model… Read More »
Dear Friends, Joseph Goldstein has said, “For the purpose of meditation, nothing is particularly worth thinking about.” This means thoughts can come and go as they wish, but we don’t need to become involved with them. (Joseph also says, “it’s simple, but it’s not easy.”) Bhante Gunaratana lists five ways to work with mental states, based on the… Read More »
Dear Friends, Chapter 9 of The Four Foundations of Mindfulness in Plain English is titled “Mental States”, and it delves into the specifics from the discourse, where we are instructed to know whether the mind is greedy or not greedy hate or not hateful deluded or not deluded contracted or distracted (or not) great or narrow surpassable or not… Read More »
Dear Friends, Bhante Gunaratana started chapter 8 with a recounting of the Two Kinds of Thought discourse, where the Buddha described a way we can classify and reflect on thoughts: Suppose I divide my thoughts into two classes. On one side, I set thoughts of sensual desire, ill will, and cruelty. On the other side, I set thoughts… Read More »
Dear Friends, We will spend the next few days looking at the third way of establishing mindfulness – mindfulness of mind. In Chapter 8 of The Four Foundations of Mindfulness in Plain English, Bhante Gunaratana first explores the nature of mind and consciousness. First a side-note: “mind” in this context is a translation of the Pali word citta, and it… Read More »
