A personal blog by a graying (mostly Anglo with light African-American roots) gay left leaning liberal progressive married college-educated Buddhist Baha'i BBC/NPR-listening Professor Emeritus now following the Dharma in Minas Gerais, Brasil.
Sunday, December 8, 2024
Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Mindfulness and Concentration: Establishing Mindfulness of Feeling and the Second Jhāna
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 pleasant feeling, one is aware: "Feeling a pleasant
feeling." . . . One is just aware, just mindful: "There is feeling." And
one abides not clinging to anything in the world. (MN 10)
Reflection
The second
basis on which mindfulness is established is feeling tone. This does not
refer to our emotional life—feelings of affection or anger or
dismay—but rather to the valence of feeling as pleasant or unpleasant or
neutral (not obviously pleasant or unpleasant). The practice is to sit
down deliberately for some time—even five minutes, if that is all you
can manage—and simply notice pleasant and unpleasant sensations as they
occur.
Daily Practice
As with
mindfulness of breathing, the attitude with which you are aware of
feeling tone is of great importance. The text is guiding us to be fully
aware of a painful feeling, for example, without analyzing it or wishing
it was not happening. Simply notice it as a brief episode of a
particular feeling tone, without clinging in any way either to its going
away if it is painful or to its coming again if it is pleasant. Just be
aware of it.
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 brings inner clarity and singleness of mind, without
applied thought and sustained thought but with joy and the pleasure born
of concentration. (MN 4)
Reflection
The teachings around right concentration have to do with four phases of absorption, also known as jhānas.
When the mind rests steadily on a single object of attention—which is
quite difficult to do at first—it gradually disentangles itself from the
various hindrances and becomes unified, peaceful, and stable. With this
comes inner clarity and the dropping away of the internal use of
language.
Daily Practice
You will know when you have entered into absorption of the jhānas
because the state is accompanied at first by a great deal of physical
and mental pleasure. The physical pleasure is described as being
fundamentally different from any sensual gratification, and the mental
pleasure comes naturally when the mind is free of the hindrances (phase
one) and when it becomes concentrated or one-pointed (phase two).
Tomorrow: Understanding the Noble Truth of the Cessation of Suffering One week from today: Establishing Mindfulness of Mind and Abiding in the Third Jhāna
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