#525 Bare Attention Cultivation

     "... keep your attention focused on the tactile sensations of the breath, which change from moment to moment. ... let your mind be as conceptually silent as possible ... during the out-breath, release any involuntary thoughts that have cropped up. ... arouse your attention (counteracting laxity) during the in-breath, and relax your attention (counteracting excitation) with each out-breath. But don't relax so much that you become spaced out or dull. In this way, with each complete breath, you remedy the two major defects of attention.
     Meditation is a balancing act between attention and relaxation.
     The kind of awareness cultivated here is called bare attention, in which the mind is fully focused on the sensory impressions appearing to it, moment to moment, rather than getting caught up in conceptual & emotional responses to those stimuli."
 
       B. Alan Wallace. "The Attention Revolution. Unlocking the Power of the Focused Mind." Wisdom, Boston, 2006.  

     Wondering about your ability to meditate? See: http://mindfulnessforeveryone.blogspot.ca/2014/04/519-feeling-of-im-no-good-at-meditating.html

 

Jimmy Chin, National Geographic   http://photography.nationalgeographic.com

#521 "Ordinary Unhappiness", Ideas about Happiness & the Real Thing

     Freud believed that the optimal state human beings could achieve is "ordinary unhappiness." 
     Today, the pendulum has swung to the opposite extreme. We seem to be obsessed with comfort & happiness. "How can I be happy?" is the central quest for many. Many seem to think that stable happiness is achievable, though they'd much prefer that their level of happiness steadily increased - why not go for the (imagined) "lifestyle of the rich & famous"?
     Don't most of us come to mindfulness practice because we can't realize our ideas about happiness? What if our ideas were "way off"? Can we, instead try, OPENING UP to REALITY?

Claudio Galli    www.dpreview.com

#372 Direct Perception of the Flow of Experience

     “… healing occurs as we learn to move from the realm of concepts to the world of direct experience. Our mental concepts and ideas about things, about people, objects, or feelings, are static and unchanging. But the reality of experience is an ever-changing river. Direct perception drops beneath the names of things to show us their ephemeral, mysterious nature. When we bring our attention to the direct perception of experience, we become more alive and free.”               Jack Kornfield

#327 Ideas about Happiness vs the Real Thing

     We all hold ideas about what it takes to make us happy. These concepts are cultural, familial, as well as those that are unique to us as individuals. We are constantly comparing current reality with this potent ball of 'must haves' - the closer the match, the greater our happiness ... and vice versa.
     To the extent that these requirements for happiness are unexamined, unconscious, and thus NOT of our own choosing, they have a stranglehold on our life.
     My late aunt repeatedly said that as long as her only daughter remained with her partner (whom my aunt disliked), my aunt could never be happy. This type of vow is common and effective. My aunt died unhappy.
     This is tragic AND completely unnecessary. We need to become consciously aware of all the barriers *** we ourselves erect to keep us from embracing life fully. We need to become consciously aware of all the hounds that chase us, as if we were rabbits - and - all the rabbits that we chase, as if we were hounds. Most of us, most of the time, without any apparent choice in the matter, are in fact flipping between hound and rabbit roles. This is both exhausting and miserable.
     Fortunately, we know the PHYSICAL FEELING of chasing, and also of being chased. When we become aware of this common form of being OUT OF CONTROL, of "being driven" instead of doing what we want to do, we can pause, center ourselves with the feel of our breath in our belly, bring ourselves into the present moment, and choose to do what is appropriate to the present circumstances. FRESHLY EMBRACE THIS VERY MOMENT. This is the definition of sanity by any standards.

***      "Growth fundamentally means an enlarging and expanding of one's horizons, a growth of one's boundaries, outwardly in perspective and inwardly in depth. ... Growth is reapportionment; re-zoning; re-mapping; an acknowledgment, and then enrichment, of ever deeper and more encompassing levels of one's own self."
        Wilber K. "No boundary. Eastern and Western approaches to personal growth." Shambhala, Boston, 1979.

Wong Heng Meng   http://travel.nationalgeographic.com