Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Mindfulness and Concentration: Establishing Mindfulness of Feeling and the Second Jhāna

 

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RIGHT MINDFULNESS Establishing Mindfulness of Feeling A person goes to the forest or to the root of a tree or to an empty place and sits down. Having crossed the legs, one sets the body erect. One establishes the presence of mindfulness. (MN 10) One is aware: “Ardent, fully aware, mindful, I am content.” (SN 47.10)   When feeling a mental pleasant feeling, one is aware: “Feeling a mental pleasant feeling”… one is just aware, just mindful: “There is feeling.” And one abides not clinging to anything in the world. (MN 10)

Reflection We forget sometimes that it is okay to feel joy. In fact, it is encouraged. It is attachment to joy that is a problem, not the good feeling that comes with mental pleasure. The aggregate of feeling, which includes both physical pleasure and pain and mental pleasure and pain, is an inevitable and natural aspect of all experience. The challenge is to experience pleasure with equanimity, rather than with desire. Daily Practice Just as you can find both pleasure and pain when you review bodily sensations, the same is true of mental life. Take a few moments to inventory the contents of your mind. Certain things you think of are accompanied by happiness, while others arise with mental pain. Allow yourself to experience mental pleasure when it arises, and carefully observe the inevitable tipping point when the mind becomes attached to that pleasure. RIGHT CONCENTRATION Approaching and Abiding in the Second Phase of Absorption (2nd Jhāna) With the stilling of applied and sustained thought, one enters upon and abides in the second phase of absorption, which has inner clarity and singleness of mind, without applied thought and sustained thought, with joy and the pleasure born of concentration. (MN 4) Breathing in short, one is aware: ‘I breathe in short’; or breathing out short, one is aware: ‘I breathe out short. This is how concentration by mindfulness of breathing is developed and cultivated,  so that it is of great fruit and great benefit. (SN 54.8) Tomorrow: Understanding the Noble Truth of the Cessation of Suffering One week from today: Establishing Mindfulness of Mind and Abiding in the Third Jhāna Share your thoughts and join the conversation on social media #DhammaWheel Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

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