Meditation time is all the time – wholeheartedly and with interest. Stay in the present moment within your 6 sense doors. Outside the door is concept; we are not interested in the concept, we don’t pay too much attention to the concept, we learn more from real nature, from direct experience.
There is no need to see the object clearly, not necessary. You’ll use a lot of effort to focus; when you focus, the object is very close and becomes clear; but how long can you maintain this? It is very tiring because this is not natural energy. This is artificial; cannot stay for long. We need natural energy.
So, we do not try to see clearly, but we try to maintain the awareness continuously. That becomes natural energy and when the energy becomes better and better, it can focus itself. The object naturally appears; there is no need to force because the energy grows naturally.
Less energy means that you can maintain for a long time; and after a long time, this energy becomes stronger and stronger.
Yogis try too hard to see clearly because of craving, but it can only be maintained for a short time. You cannot maintain for a long time.
Meditation cannot hurry; should not hurry because meditation is for life – you should practice in your life, not only during the retreat. You come to the centre to learn how to practice, but meditation should continue for life, not for a short time. So, no need to hurry.
When you understand that seeing is happening and then you look, defilements don’t arise. When you know that seeing is happening and then look, the mind pays attention to the concept but defilements don’t have a chance to come because understanding is present.
After you know that you’re seeing, you look; after you know that you’re hearing, you listen. After you know that there is an object and the mind, then you pay attention to the concept. It’s not a big problem.
Without concepts, we also cannot do anything, right?
I will give you one structure – everything that you know, you say ‘This is nature and there’s awareness' (of this nature). That’s the only analysis that you need.
You need to acknowledge this: ‘This is nature and there’s awareness’; and the next moment ‘This is nature and there’s awareness’. It doesn’t matter where the defilement is coming at you. Just follow that structure.
If you find that when you don’t focus, it feels like you don’t know the objects clearly, never mind. All you have to do is to continuously know blurrily. And if you keep on repeating that, slowly over 1 or 2 days, it will become clearer by itself.
Then, you’ll see the nature of the mind in action, how when you do something repeatedly, it helps to strengthen that quality; you’ll see that happening by itself. Particularly if you’re used to focusing on one object, when you stop focusing, it can become blur; and we find that uncomfortable. Let it be; trust the process.
Don’t have trouble with what you’re experiencing. In a manner of speaking, don’t complain about your experience; appreciate the fact that you know the experience because awareness is present, appreciate awareness in every moment.
What is our endeavour? Our work, our endeavour is to know, to be aware; to awaken. Every moment that we bring awareness to life weakens the darkness of delusion.
Most yogis, the moment we have an unwholesome experience, state of mind, we immediately struggle with it because we think it shouldn’t be there; but we forget that in that moment, it is coexisting with the awareness because it’s the awareness that is actually making us conscious of the unwholesome state of mind.
And that’s what yogis lack now – they forget that awareness has been present. Awareness is not seen, appreciated, understood or known even though it’s there and working. And that’s what we want to get to.
I’m beseeching you not to attempt to see the object more clearly; please do not try to know the experience better.
Because when a little craving comes in, everything becomes tighter. Actually, the more relaxed and open the awareness is, the stronger it actually is. The more simple and honest the mind is in the present moment, the clearer everything will become.
Why is the mind not simple? Because it is wanting something; or the mind is not wanting something.
When we are calm, it is the time to move forward beyond the calm. Calmness is not the destination; it is not the objective. We’re going to use the calmness so that we can move ahead. We investigate a bit more, look a bit more closely, and ask some questions. We start to look at what we have in our awareness.
You are being aware; what are you aware of? How clearly are you aware? Do you understand its nature? What is the awareness and what is the object? And you watch these experiences continually. What is understood when you watch something continuously? Do you see some connections between them?
Samadhi should be a support to gain wisdom. Yogis think that when they stay in samadhi, wisdom will pop up by itself; but that is the misunderstanding. And what happens is that they sit and indulge in it, not recognizing the greed and indulgence. The point is to become more alert when there is tranquility.
When there are sensations in the body, pleasant or unpleasant, always remember to keep an eye on how the mind is feeling towards them.
As we get older, the body is like a machine that is getting old, the machine is not going to get better but we can keep the mind in good shape. The body won’t get better for sure; it will decay.
So, we want to prepare the mind to face this decaying body with the right attitude, and also in a sense, prepare for death.
If we see our bodily pains and aches and all that as nature as well, then it is freeing for the mind and we will feel ready to die, to face death peacefully.
Otherwise, when the mind is not prepared, it will resist death. We will be in turmoil.
Yogis are reminded not to have a fixed plan when you meditate. Whatever you do, you shouldn’t even think about how you’re going to meditate – it’s just the present moment.
You shouldn’t think that you’re going to sit an hour because you’re just setting up the mind – if you don’t sit an hour, your mind is going to feel that it isn’t good enough and if you manage to sit the hour, then you are going to feel like it is a good sitting. It’s all delusion – what is the need. Meditation is always continuing; it is just the present moment
So what one hour – after that you must still be aware. It’s an unnecessary construction of the mind.
When we plan, we must be careful of having a fixed plan – thinking it must happen that way. Planning should be just taking into consideration contingencies. Most of the time the mind doesn’t plan like that - it thinks of what it wants – and If it doesn’t happen just the way we think it should, then we have to deal with our frustrations.
You don’t need to sit so much; mindfulness is important, not sitting. All you need is mindfulness. You can be mindful in daily activities means that you’re doing correctly there – reflect on what you’re doing right there and what is wrong when you’re sitting; why the mind is not working in the same way.
If we sit with the idea that this is not interesting - we’re doing what we’re being told – it can be mechanical. And we have many old habits from past retreats; so, whenever we sit we can get drowsy; but daily activities are fresh, they are new and you never knew what is going to happen next. So, the mind is watchful.
In sitting, it’s some wrong thoughts. It’s very important to find this out; also not to stay sleepy in sitting because the mind develops habits very easily. Whether you are conscious or not, whatever is done over and over again becomes a habit. If we sit and we’re sleepy every sit, it becomes a habit of the mind; we’ll become sleepy every sit.
So, some people get tense when they sit because they’re practicing wrong and it becomes a habit, the tension becomes a habit. The moment they sit, they become tense even when they’re not being mindful. If we don’t want these bad habits to grow, we need to investigate.
Reflect on what you’re doing right in walking and other activities and see whether you can bring the same kind of thinking, the same kind of attitude and approach to mindfulness into the sitting. And you also want to recognize what the mind is thinking, what’s the approach when the mind sits. You want to see that - how the mind works.
Closing the eyes for too long is no good, particularly if we’re not alert. If we’re not alert and we have our eyes closed, it is very easy for the mind to quiet down and get lost in the stories in the head. The moment the mindfulness is not watchful and on the ball, immediately the other side takes over – the tendency for delusion to take over. Delusion is always at the door.
That’s why we’re always having to be mindful; this work must keep going, this work must keep happening. Because if this work is not happening, then the other work is happening.
And when we’re working, of course we always have to be checking how we’re working because we can be mindful with too much effort, too much of this and too little of that, and we have to be checking how we are mindful.
It is important to know our thoughts; we need to be able to know our thoughts.
What is the mind thinking? Is it thinking the right thoughts, the wrong thoughts; is it being skillful, wise, unwise; wholesome, unwholesome? What is the mind thinking?
And as we recognize that the mind is thinking, when we realize something about the thinking mind, that realization is what we’re trying to gain from all the observations that we’re making.
Is thinking dosa? Is feeling dosa? Is sensation dosa? What then is dosa? Dosa is a quality – it has its own characteristics and quality. But you need to continue to watch to understand.
You can understand in many ways; not only this way. If you watch it repeatedly, you can understand the nature of dosa and from different angles. For example, you can understand that dosa mind can become an object because you can feel and know the quality of an object. You can understand it as just an object.
Be interested and continue to watch.