To start the new year, back to basics….A lovely text on how the mind proliferates on the basis of a simple feeling and makes a whole story out of it. We will probably get a lot of opportunity to practice with this as we return to work this week and the holiday excitement fades. So this Monday, like every day, we start over again….. becoming more and more aware of this process, and creating a gap.
The outflowing of the mind is what one is witnessing in meditation when the mind surges off into sights and sounds, opinions, thoughts or feelings. It is most important to get acquainted with what that is like for the mind: the attention pouring out into different things. One can see how, first of all, there is just a vague thought of a memory, or a shape that you notice, and it is quite ephemeral; there is nothing very much there, you just remember some event. Then it catches our attention and, as the mind goes into it, suddenly what was just a vague and insubstantial thing comes to life – and our attention has brought it to life. We have breathed life into that thought with the act of attention.
As we give attention to it and it comes to life, then the whole flow of feeling along with that increases and develops – whether the feeling is pleasant or painful or whatever. If there is no mindfulness, then that feeling conditions self-centered desire; if it is a pleasant feeling, a desire for more of it; if it is a painful feeling, a desire to get away from it. Then that desire turns into attachment and the attachment turns into what is called ‘becoming’ – like a wave gathering strength. Then, as the attachment and the becoming increase, we find ourselves thoroughly caught up with some melodrama and carried away on the whole cycle of birth and death. We are born into a memory, a hope or a worry, born into a piece of music or a feeling; and if we are born into it then we die with it when it comes to an end. Suddenly we find ourselves stranded and lost in another world.
If there is wisdom then we realise – “This is a feeling” – and we follow it as it goes through its cycle of life. Then, as the feeling fades, there is nothing there creating more momentum around it. The feeling fades like a sound and then there is silence.
Ajahn Amaro, Silent Rain.
When a thought arises that’s strong enough to take your attention away from the breath, simply note it as not breath. Whether it’s the most beautiful thought in the world or the most terrible, one you would never disclose to another soul, in this meditation, it’s simply not breath. You don’t have to judge yourself. You don’t have to get lost in making up a story about what triggered the thought or its possible consequences. All you have to do is recognize that it is not a thought. Some of your thoughts may be tender and caring, some may be boring and banal; all that matters is that they are not the breath. See them, recognize them, very gently let them go, and bring your attention back to the feeling of the breath.
