We don’t so much experience phenomena, but the citta affected by phenomena. The sense of “I am” keeps us fascinated and hypnotized by the resulting feelings and reactions. The process of purification is to clear citta of defilements and hinderances. Cultivation of samadhi and suffusion of wholesome qualities are means for purification and healing.
In meditation we try to establish a clear center from which to look at the various inputs and outputs happening in the mind. This process of centering is done through direct experience of body. The wholeness of body gives rise to a simple, centering effect.
Meditation is a relational experience. There’s the knowing that you’re being affected and how you respond to that. Relate to what arises with dispassion, calm, sensitivity and openness. In this relationship we learn all the skills of wisdom, compassion, clarity and non-clinging. This is nibānna here and now.
Our habitual tendencies and conditioning weave a web of saṃsāra that we keep running around on. But we can generate new formulations and programs to steady and calm the mind, get it fit for the work of liberation. Mindfulness of body and breathing, and brahmavihāra cultivation are recommended practices.
Citta doesn’t start out liberated. It has to come through ignorance, craving and grasping. We can learn from this, what is the wrong path and what is the right path. The right path gets obscured by feeling and perception. Steady the energies and stay out of the activities of mind – the right path is there, it’s an open road.
Refreshing and regenerating energy is a necessary part of our practice to counter tense, constricted and disconnected states. Mindfulness of breathing is a means for toning up. We can go to the energetic bases of these tendencies and clear them.
When full ground is not properly established, thinking creates the thinker. With proper ground, it’s possible to hover over the thought process and listen deeply to the underlying emotional stream. Establish ground using a simple meditation object that the mind can easily access and stabilize on.
In our practice we’re looking not so much at what we want but what we want to release ourselves from – clinging. We challenge the compulsiveness of our reactions, to fight or to grab, with a commitment to lightness. We apply ourselves with deliberate, steady, lightness of touch so things can move and release.
To relax the activity of the mind, awareness – citta – needs something else to stand on. We set up internal and external foundations that generate the sense of steadiness and stability. This enables us to get perspective and step back from the stream of energies and mind-states that we call ‘myself.’
On Āsalha Puja we commemorate the occasion when the Buddha gave his first teaching on the Four Noble Truths and the Middle Path of Practice. By cultivating this Path, the mind stops looking outside of itself – it finds pleasure in itself.
