Tag: mind

Notice the space, not the furniture

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Consider a room, which is naturally spacious. However we organize the furniture in the room will not affect its intrinsic spaciousness. We can put up walls to divide the room, but they are temporary. And whether we leave the room clean or cluttered and messy, it won’t affect its natural spaciousness. Mind is also intrinsically spacious. Although we can get caught up in our desires and aversions, our true nature is not affected by those vexations. We are inherently free. Once the mind is calm, instead of fixating on the chairs, tables, and so on, you see its spaciousness. Practice is life and all of its “furniture.” Practice helps us see the room and not attach to the furniture.

Guo Gu, You are Already Enlightened

Be fully there for your life today

Karl Duffy2 Comments

Mindfulness is the quality and power of mind that is deeply aware of what’s happening — without commentary and without interference. It is like a mirror that simply reflects whatever comes before it.

It serves us in the humblest ways, keeping us connected to brushing our teeth or having a cup of tea.

Joseph Goldstein, Here, Now, Aware: The Power of Mindfulness

The ‘knowing’ mind.

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Cat-observing

In our practice we develop that quality of mind which knows – the ‘knowing’ mind. Not ‘reacting’ mind, but ‘knowing ‘ mind. It’s very different. Within the quality of knowing you can see everything. You can see the reactions. You can see the pain. You can see the joy. You can see the peace. You witness everything.

Ajahn Sundara

Just being fully present

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Here it is – right now.

Start thinking about it and you miss it.

Huang Po, Chinese Zen Master,  died 850

Always labelling

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File:Red and green grapes.jpg

When we taste something, what is the ‘realness’ of it? We can say, ‘It tastes nice’ but this is what we think about it, not what the taste is. We can say, ‘It’s a grape’, but that’s a designation, a perception, isn’t it? What is the actual taste? We say, ‘It’s sweet’, but ‘sweet’ is a judgment, isn’t it? We come to understand that the reality of it is indefinable, and that for most of our life we are operating at the level of interpretations and classifications, of secondary experiences, rather than living the actuality of it.

Ajahn Sucitto, Gnosis and Non-Dualism

The Basics of Practice 3: Training the mind

Karl Duffy1 Comment

File:Treadmills at gym.jpg

Each meditation session is a journey of discovery to understand the basic truth of who we are. In the beginning the most important lesson of meditation is seeing the speed of the mind. But the meditation tradition says that mind doesn’t have to be this way: it just hasn’t been worked with. What we are talking about is very practical. Mindfulness practice is simple and completely feasible. And because we are working with the mind that experiences life directly, just by sitting and doing nothing, we are doing a tremendous amount.

Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche