Categories: Dhamma Discussions
Maythe blessings of the Triple Gem be with you all!
These days, does your mind feel a bit sluggish or inactive? Does it seem like your heart isn’t in your meditation? Do you feel a reluctance to practice? Perhaps you feel disheartened or that your mind simply won’t cooperate. It’s a common experience. After practicing consistently for a while, a time often comes when we feel tired of it. This is a normal tendency of the mind.
If you find your mindfulness practice becoming a chore, it reveals a subtle weakness within us. This isn’t a flaw in the mind itself, but rather a reflection of our own attachments. When we are bound to certain things in the world, these attachments are often the primary reason we lose our motivation. It rarely happens for any other reason.
Why Your Mindfulness Practice Naturally Fades (And What to Do)
As you continue your mindfulness practice without interruption, you will inevitably encounter various obstacles. Your life might get busier, and as we have discussed before, all sorts of challenges and problems will arise. This journey is walked with these difficulties, not without them. Problems are a guarantee. Challenges are certain. Your workload may increase.
In the midst of this, it might feel difficult to develop and sustain your awareness. You might feel like you just can’t maintain your mindfulness. This is the very nature of the path. When we try to maintain continuous mindfulness, especially in public or busy places, it can become fragmented or broken due to our increased activity. Please, do not turn this into a major problem.
We must try our best to train in it at all times. Mindfulness, or what we call Sati in the Pali language, is a mental quality of awareness, and its nature is to break. You have experienced this for yourself in your own practice, we cannot hold onto it continuously. Its nature is to be intermittent. Our job is to apply effort, or Viriya, to sustain it. However, we cannot maintain it by force, though we do have the capacity to sustain it for certain periods.
The Secret: Practice Where Your Mindfulness is Weakest
As you develop spiritually, there will be times when mindfulness breaks. So, I invite you to make this resolution: wherever your mindfulness breaks the most, that is where you must practice. For example, if you are busiest in the kitchen and that is where your awareness shatters, then the kitchen is the very place to establish your mindfulness. Do you understand what I’m saying?
Wherever your mind wanders and you cannot pay attention to it, that is the exact spot to place your awareness. Right now, in this calm moment, it might be easy to be mindful. As night falls, the environment becomes peaceful. After your evening chanting, you feel serene. Nature itself feels cool and calm. In these moments, you can practice walking meditation with good mindfulness. But what often follows? Drowsiness. This sleepiness, known as Thīna-middha, is one of the hindrances, and its arising is normal.
But you know where your mindfulness breaks the most. If you know it’s in the kitchen, that is where you must establish it. That is the place you must maintain your mindfulness practice.
Mindfulness Isn’t About Stopping Thoughts, It’s About Seeing Clearly
The kitchen, the dining hall, the busy city, these are the most suitable places. Make a determination every day: ‘I will maintain my mindfulness right here.’ Then you can perform your tasks while watching your mind. The place where your awareness breaks the most is your greatest opportunity.
When I taught you the basic steps of the Four Foundations of Mindfulness, or Satipaṭṭhāna, a few months ago, the core teaching was always about mindfulness. As we develop this quality, we come to understand a fundamental point: mindfulness practice does not mean stopping thoughts. We do not try to eliminate them. We need thoughts to function in our daily lives. According to the Abhidhamma (the Buddhist teachings on the nature of mind), we cannot act without a mind.
What we are working to eliminate are the defilements, known as Kilesa, that hide within our thoughts. Specifically, we are removing the twin roots of ‘clinging and aversion.’ This is what we gradually abandon on this journey. And what is the tool that helps us recognize them? Mindfulness. It is with mindfulness that we identify them.
From Mindfulness to Wisdom: Identifying and Understanding the Mind
Mindfulness helps us to identify a defilement. But what allows us to truly understand it for what it is, to see its real nature? That is wisdom, or Paññā. So, where does your mindfulness get lost? As I speak about it now, the very word ‘mindfulness’ brings the quality of Sati to mind. You think, ‘I must be mindful now.’ This creates a kind of energy or excitement. But after a little while, it fades. Knowing this is its nature is key.
So, if the place you lose it most is at the kitchen, in the dining hall, or at your computer, that is where you must place it. That is where it must be maintained. Because life will never be without tasks. We always have something to do, even if it’s just washing our robes. Let’s say your mindfulness always disappears when you are washing your robes. Then where should you practice? Right there, at the place you wash.
That is where your mindfulness practice must be strongest. In other places, you already have it. When you are offering flowers, if that is when mindfulness is lost, then that is the place to practice. Do you see? This is what must be done. Otherwise, no matter how much we practice mindfulness in easy situations, it is of little use.
Let Go of the ‘Rule’ of Constant Mindfulness
You understand well that mindfulness, or Sati, is a mental factor, a cetasika. It’s a capacity we all have. But there are places where it disappears, places where it weakens. That is what we must recognize. Think about the moments you get agitated. Imagine someone says something, and you feel anger rising. In that moment, there is no mindfulness. So where must mindfulness be established? Right there.
If you lose mindfulness while eating, that is the place to practice. There is no law that you must be mindful at all times. Do not impose such a rule on your mind. It’s an unnecessary burden on our psyche. The only requirement is to have it when it’s needed. If you train yourself to be mindful at the necessary moments, in the kitchen, at the computer, while washing clothes, it will naturally become a habit in other places too. Do you follow? If you learn to maintain mindfulness in the chaos of the city, you will certainly have it in quieter places.
That is the system. Practice where it is absent. That is where you need it most. When we are unmindful, all kinds of things can enter the mind. We don’t know what will come, lust, anger, thoughts of the past or future, a mind overcome by the Five Hindrances. All of this arises in that place of unmindfulness.
Applying Mindfulness When It Matters Most: The Five Hindrances
Now, reflect on this. What use is mindfulness in an unnecessary place if it is absent where it is truly needed? Imagine a fight breaking out downstairs. Everyone is yelling and about to come to blows. It’s useless for us to join in. Instead, we should establish mindfulness and try to mediate, or at least step aside and observe with a non-reactive mind instead of treating it as entertainment. Do you see?
Therefore, whenever your mind is disturbed, when defilements arise, that is the moment. If a thought of lust arises right now and you fail to apply mindfulness, then that mindfulness is useless at other times. If you feel anger towards another person and you don’t use mindfulness to recognize it and take appropriate action, that awareness has no value. That is the crucial moment.
Train your mind to apply mindfulness whenever a powerful defilement emerges. Whenever you are overcome by the Five Hindrances, or pañca nīvaraṇa:
- Kāmacchanda: Sensual desire
- Vyāpāda: Ill will or aversion
- Thīna-middha: Sloth and torpor, or dullness
- Uddhacca-kukkucca: Restlessness and worry
- Vicikicchā: Skeptical doubt
Whenever one of these arises, that is the time to establish mindfulness. If you do this, is it necessary to force yourself to be mindful all the time? No. The rest will happen naturally. Try this and see for yourself.
The Path of the Sages: Normalizing Your Thoughts
This is precisely the practice that those on the path to becoming an Arahant, a fully liberated being, undertook. If a monk on his alms round loses mindfulness at a certain spot, that is the exact place he must re-establish it. If we train ourselves to establish mindfulness, or Sati, in the very place it is lost, the rest of our practice falls into balance. Your mind is not troubled by defilements all the time. They only emerge and bother you at certain moments. It is at those times that we need to develop mindfulness.
Then, whether a thought of lust, greed, hatred, or jealousy arises, it becomes easy to recognize. Once you get used to this, whatever you do in your daily life, you will give priority to the places where you know you might become unmindful. You know, ‘This is where I lose my mindfulness.’ When you go to make an offering at the Buddha shrine with a group of people, if you know that’s where you get distracted, that is where you must be mindful.
When a feeling of desire arises towards a woman, you recognize, ‘Ah, this is where it arises,’ and that is the moment to apply mindfulness. Is it necessary at other times? Imagine ten beautiful women are standing here, but no feeling of lust arises in you. Is there any special need to apply mindfulness to look at them? No, there is no point. It becomes like looking at ten men. It becomes ordinary. This is what we must understand. Otherwise, we get caught up, but with this practice, you become unfazed. Thoughts become ordinary.
Investigating Your Mind When It Is Agitated
Remember this: the first task of mindfulness practice is to allow thoughts to return to their normal, natural state. Like this glass of water, which is not agitated. We cultivate the mind to that level. None of your other thoughts need to bother you. All the thoughts that trouble you are based on some form of clinging or aversion. Do you understand?
So, if your mind is feeling stressed, if a particular thought is bothering you even when you are sitting quietly, not because of an external event, isn’t that the very moment to establish mindfulness and investigate it? That is the time. Establish mindfulness and examine it. ‘What is this?’ Investigate what is happening with this thought. The investigation you fail to do in that moment is meaningless later. There is no point in doing it afterwards, because the best time to understand it is when it is happening.
Right now, your minds are calm. Nothing is bothering you. What is there to investigate? There is nothing to do but to just be with the mind, to remain in mindfulness. But a moment will come that is bothersome. That is when you must be most mindful. As I said before, if looking at a girl does not create lust, why would you need to apply special mindfulness? If looking at a person who was an old enemy does not create anger now, why apply extra mindfulness? It’s not necessary.
How Targeted Mindfulness Leads to Deep Transformation
This practice of establishing mindfulness is deeply connected with wisdom, or Paññā, the two exist together. By following this path, we can even attain a fruit of the path in this very life. We can become a Sotāpanna, a ‘Stream-enterer,’ the first stage of enlightenment.
Why is it said that a Stream-enterer cannot break the five basic precepts? Because their mindfulness arises precisely at the crucial moment. Imagine a Stream-enterer is about to kill an animal. Instantly, mindfulness arises: ‘This is the taking of a life.’ You see? They establish mindfulness where it is most needed. Then, they refrain from the act. That is how powerful the mind of a person who has attained the fruit of Stream-entry is.
So, what should we do? We must establish mindfulness where it is needed. Otherwise, trying to be mindful all the time feels like a great fatigue, a burden. This targeted approach is simple. If we can master these basic steps, the deeper stages of the Four Foundations of Mindfulness will become accessible.
Some people who have practiced in past lives can dive deep into this practice at once. But for us, this is the easiest way. Identify where you become unmindful, where you cannot pay attention to your mind, and establish your practice there. There are many such moments, but we know the ones that are strongest. Those are the places to start.
Start Where You Are: A Gentle Approach to Profound Practice
This method is so simple. You can feel its freedom just by hearing the words. It is just as freeing when you put it into practice. Whenever your mind is bothered by clinging and aversion, practice right then. Whenever information comes through the five senses, eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and it bothers you, practice then.
Remember, we don’t need to mindfully process every single piece of information we receive. That level of immense mindfulness belongs to the Arahants and the Buddhas. This path is like going into the depths of the ocean; it must be done gradually. We are still on the shore. So, that level of intensity is not needed now. Just continue to practice mindfulness from where you are, but maintain it well in the moments it is most necessary. It is through this that you will come to understand the nature of your own mind.
Some people try to grasp the deepest levels all at once, aiming for the mindfulness of an Arahant. Then they get discouraged because they can’t do it. It’s too difficult. You can’t hold it down so tightly. It’s like trying to hold a ball underwater; the moment you let go, it shoots back up. Mindfulness must be practiced gently, little by little. These fundamental steps are what you need to do.
Q&A: Why Do I Feel More Anger and Desire Since I Started Meditating?
Student Monk: Venerable sir, since I started practicing mindfulness, I feel more aversion than before. When I was a layperson, I don’t think I had this much conflict. Or maybe I just didn’t know it was there. Now, with mindfulness, it feels like the friction has increased. Is it because there’s nothing else to focus on here, or is something else happening?
Teacher: No, it’s like this. Compared to your lay life, your clinging and aversion here are much less. But, as we’ve discussed before, even a small thing that arises here feels very big. In your lay life, you might have had a hundred or a thousand instances of clinging and aversion. Here, you may only have fifty. The quantity is lower. But the feeling is just as intense. A tiny thing can bring sadness, anger, irritation, all of it is felt.
The difference is that here, you can see your mind more clearly. It’s not that you couldn’t see it in lay life, but you lacked an understanding of mindfulness. Now, through our discussions, even when you are just sitting, you are aware of the concept of mindfulness. It is within this new awareness that you see the aversion. You think, ‘I have so much aversion inside me!’ or ‘I have so much attachment!’ But this attachment and aversion were there before. The reason you didn’t see them was that you spent your time unmindfully.
Now, having become a monk, you are trying to solve the problem where it actually exists: within the mind, consciousness, the heart, these three words for the one thing. Before, when clinging and aversion arose, you would seek an external solution, by arguing, fighting, or blaming. Now you are realizing, ‘No, the issue is within me.’
The only way to calm the mind is to develop mindfulness. So what you’re seeing is not something new that has increased. You are simply seeing what was already there. The problem is, because there’s less of it, what remains appears huge. It feels like more than before.
It’s the same with sensual desire, or Rāga. Many people say that after they start meditating, their desire feels stronger. It hasn’t actually increased. Before, they had countless opportunities to indulge their desire, so it wasn’t a big deal. They lived in an unmindful state, perhaps not even aware they had desire. They acted on it like animals. But now, on a path to eliminate it, it is felt more intensely. It’s like when you possess a treasured object or person, you don’t feel its value. But if you give it away, suddenly that thing feels incredibly precious.
The same is happening here. When you lived with your defilements, it was no big deal. But now that you are trying to see them clearly, they feel much more prominent. Because that is what you are looking for. So, the answer is still to maintain mindfulness. Nothing has increased. You are just seeing what has always been present. If you recognize this and keep observing it, you can eliminate it. Always make it a habit to mindfully watch the things that trouble your mind and investigate their cause.
Q&A: Exploring Deep States of Calm and the ‘Light Sign’ in Meditation
Teacher: Are there any other questions? How is your practice of Samatha, or calm meditation? The side of developing concentration and the states of meditative absorption, or Jhāna, through mindfulness of breathing, Ānāpānasati? Are you having any trouble achieving results, like a Jhāna or a higher knowledge? However, you can sit for longer than before, can’t you? Your legs are more accustomed to it. That comes with training.
Student Monk: We haven’t yet reached the level of the ‘light sign.’
Teacher: As I’ve mentioned, when we develop mindfulness of breathing, sometimes a light sign, or āloka nimitta, appears. It can look like a light, in colors like yellow, white, or blue. You haven’t experienced this yet?
Student Monk 2: It happens on some days… it lasts for a few minutes, maybe five or ten minutes.
Teacher: If a light sign appears, just keep looking at it. It becomes easier to enter a state of Jhāna from there. When it appears during your breath meditation, you no longer need to concentrate on the breath. Focus your mind entirely on the light. You said it lasts for a while; that duration will gradually increase. From three minutes to five, then to seven, eight, nine, ten minutes. That’s what you need to cultivate.
Great Bodhisattvas have concentration states that do not decline because they are fulfilling their perfections, or pāramī. Their minds grasp these states quickly due to vast practice over lifetimes. For us, it may decline. But that is the path. If someone with deep meditative states were to break a precept, their attainments would collapse and take time to rebuild. For Bodhisattvas, it’s different; they can regain them quickly due to their practice and wisdom. Some of their concentration states are continuous and do not decline, and some higher knowledges are even present from birth. For others, these things fade.
We shouldn’t be discouraged by this. I mentioned it as an aside. For those who practice kasina meditation ,using a visual object like a colored disc to build concentration, they don’t need a separate light sign to arise, as they have already developed one. One of you sees the light sign through breath meditation; another develops it through a fire kasina. Someone else might develop it through contemplation of the Buddha, or loving-kindness meditation.
It can even arise for some while practicing insight meditation, or Vipassanā. It might take a long time to understand some of these things, which is why we get stuck. It’s crucial to discuss these problems so we don’t waste our time. Both of you should work on extending the duration of that light sign, until it lasts for at least half an hour. Eventually, it will remain effortlessly, just like the mindfulness we discussed earlier.
Q&A: When Meditative States Arise Unexpectedly
Student Monk: Venerable sir, when I do walking meditation, with my eyes open, sometimes my surroundings seem to blur. When I bring my attention to the soles of my feet, I can’t see what’s in front of me clearly. Then, suddenly, the walking sensation stops, and I see my kasina object.
Teacher: At that moment, you should cultivate the kasina. The reason it appears is that through continuous walking meditation, your mind has become concentrated. With this concentration, or ekaggatā (one-pointedness), wholesome mental states related to meditation arise very quickly. This is what’s happening. This one-pointedness can sometimes be felt as a pressure between the eyebrows. These experiences can even happen while cooking in the kitchen or concentrating on any task.
Student Monk: Yes, it happens.
Teacher: It can happen while working on the computer or talking on the phone. These are moments of concentration. And because your mind is already primed, the meditation object appears.
Q&A: Navigating the Ups and Downs of Deep Practice
Student Monk: But after the walking, when I see the sign and then sit down to continue, it disappears. Then there’s nothing. Just a deep calm and a feeling like my whole body is numb.
Teacher: That state of ‘nothing’ is itself a state of concentration, or samādhi. It is lightness, freedom.
Student Monk: Yes, and my whole body goes numb.
Teacher: You can just stay with that lightness.
Student Monk: Yes, I can stay in it. But if I think of a certain time, it’s like an alarm goes off, and I come out of it. The first time this happened, after morning chanting and walking, I went to my room to meditate because I could hear the other monks talking. The sound felt like a disturbance. After my body went numb, I didn’t want to get up. I wanted to stay for hours. That was the longest I ever sat. But now I can’t stay that long. If I decide on a time, I can stay for that long, though.
Teacher: That is a very good tendency. When that state comes, you must stay with it. Try to extend the time you can remain like that, forty, forty-five, fifty minutes. Make a resolution for the duration to increase. This is similar to the first Jhāna. In that state, there is no drowsiness, right? No hindrances? No thoughts?
Student Monk: No, nothing.
Teacher: Exactly. You must develop that. The mind becomes so light. Sometimes the physical body seems to disappear.
Student Monk: But I can’t get it whenever I want. It only comes when it wants.
Teacher: Yes, that is because the practice is not yet mature. But you should be happy that it is coming at all! Before, it didn’t even come once. We should be happy about that. So when it comes, receive it with joy, and when it goes, there’s no need to be unhappy. If we get frustrated by its disappearance, it’s because we’ve formed an attachment to it. Never use the lightness you feel to become agitated.
Student Monk: And the feeling of lightness is not the same every day. Sometimes it feels like nothing is there. Other times, the feeling comes from different directions, one day from the left, the next from the right, sometimes from above. My whole body tingles from the bottom up.
Teacher: That is the lightness being felt in the physical body. But the lightness we must cultivate is in the mind. The physical sensation is just an overflow from the mental state. You must give prominence to the mind. Don’t prioritize the physical feeling, because it will fade. In meditation, you will experience many things in the body.
Observe them, see what they are, but don’t cling to them or make them your primary object. If you do, the mental factor will fade. Give your attention directly to the mind, to the lightness arising in the mind. When you prioritize the mind’s peace, the physical sensations will grow on their own. As you continue this way, the duration of these states will increase. This is what we call spiritual development.
Be clear on this and keep training, little by little. It’s not yet stable because there may still be some underlying issues. As we meditate, troubles and obstacles can arise. Don’t make them a burden. They are normal in this world. No problem is permanent. It arises, exists, and ceases, this is its nature, what we call Anicca, or impermanence.
Just continue with the training. One day, the meditation will go well. The next, it won’t. The third day it will, but not the fourth, fifth, or sixth. Then on the seventh day, it suddenly deepens. This is just how it is. We are affected by physical and mental factors. This is the nature of the journey. The only thing to do is to continue without making it a problem. If we proceed like that, we will succeed.
We invite you to walk this path with us. Read our teachings, and most importantly, apply them practically in your own life. as you practice, questions will naturally arise. Please feel free to share your experiences and questions in the comments below, via email or contact form. I will do my best to offer guidance in future talks based on your progress. For now, begin this practice with an open heart and a mind free from expectation. Cultivate it correctly, and may you find the clarity and peace you seek.
Thank you for joining us. We hope this blog will be of great benefit to your spiritual journey.
May you all be well and happy.
May the blessings of the Triple Gem be with you all!
