3.0 Instruction: Supporting Clarity with More Subtle Sensations of the Breath

That meditation that we just did,

Alan Wallace calls going to the infirmary,

Because that is one that you do when you need first aid,

When you are get beat up,

Meaning that your mind is very distracted,

That there's a lot of turbulence.

And so the reason that's called the infirmary,

Because of all of the four positions,

It is the,

If you were in Shavasana anyway,

That is the most relaxed.

And of all of the objects of the breath,

It is the most coarse.

So meaning,

Because the coarse meaning that movement of the abdomen,

Placing our attention on the abdomen,

It's pretty easy to do,

And it's fairly easy to maintain your awareness or your attention on that object,

Because there's a lot going on there,

Especially in Shavasana,

The rise and the fall.

So that one is especially good when your mind is very agitated.

So if you have just gotten or given a performance review or any other stressful thing like that,

You come home after a day of work and your mind is just very agitated,

That's a good one to do.

But there is also another fault of attention,

As they're called in meditation.

So we have stability on the one hand,

So if your mind is really,

Really agitated,

That's a good one to do.

But sometimes your mind is just not brightly clear,

Your mind is a little drowsy.

You need clarity.

And so there is a synergetic benefit that you get from choosing a more subtle object,

And that is that simply because you have chosen a more subtle object,

The more subtle object that we are going to choose for the next meditation is the sensations of the breath at the nose or the upper lip.

And so that is a much subtler,

Meaning that there's not as much motion,

Not as much action going on with those tactile sensations.

So because you have chosen that as an object,

It requires more acute attention just to find it.

And if your attention isn't acute enough,

You might not find any sensations at all there,

And then you just need a little more training.

This is what Alan Wallace calls developing qualitative vividness,

Meaning that you can begin to feel tactile sensations now in your meditation practice that you couldn't earlier because they were beyond the threshold of your vividness.

You couldn't even notice them.

And so you can become so attuned to tactile sensations with this practice.

Maybe you begin and you don't even feel sensations on the lip or in the nose,

But as you progress in this practice and perhaps as you do some retreat as well,

Very likely,

That you can become so acutely aware of these sensations that you can begin to feel sensations of the breath where you never would expect to look at them,

Look for them,

That is.

Maybe in the palms of your hands,

Maybe in the soles of your feet,

Things like that,

Because maybe there are sensations there,

And what you are doing when you develop that degree of sensitivity to tactile sensations is you are developing qualitative vividness.

And so when you choose a more subtle tactile,

A more subtle object,

It requires more,

There's a synergetic loop.

Because you have chosen a more subtle object,

Requires more acute attention to find it,

That more acute attention reveals a more fascinating object.

That more fascinating object has the ability to compel your attention more,

And that stable attention associated with that compelled attention is also associated with clarity.

There is a as your mind becomes less and less turbulent,

As it becomes still,

You begin to notice something about the mind,

A natural clarity of the mind.

And we'll talk more about what that is hinting at,

Either at the end of the day today or tomorrow,

That natural clarity of the mind.

And so because you have,

This is where we're,

The more subtle objects then are associated with brighter clarity,

So you have stability and clarity now becoming part of your meditation mix.

And then when you get into that zone,

Into that flow,

Meditation just becomes less effortful,

It becomes very enjoyable,

It begins to really work.

You end a meditation session feeling brilliantly clear.

If you were able to balance clarity and relaxation in that very first meditation that we did,

Many of you may have noticed that you just felt really refreshed after that,

Because that's exactly what happens when you can balance relaxation and clarity.

You can do a six-minute,

12-minute,

24-minute meditation session just doing that,

Balancing relaxation and clarity,

And feel very rested when you come out of that.

So the antidotes to dullness,

Basically you need to feed enough stimulation to your attention so that you're not battling dullness or drowsiness for a couple of minutes,

Because if you are just,

If you're nodding off and you go,

Okay,

Stimulate,

You know,

And you're just continuing to nod off or feel not brightly engaged with your object,

Then you need more stimulation.

Enough stimulation so that you aren't battling drowsiness or laxity for a couple of minutes,

Because if you are just battling laxity,

It's like driving home on an Arizona road at 2 a.

M.

After a Deshi Michael teaching at Diamond Mountain and falling asleep driving home.

So if your meditation is like that,

That you're on this open desert road and you're constantly just snapping awake again just before you leave the road,

You're not meditating.

All you're doing is fighting for survival.

So you need enough stimulation.

So one way of doing that is if your eyes are closed,

Open your eyes.

Another way of doing that is if your eyes are open,

Elevate your gaze.

So this is actually a very,

Very subtle and powerful practice.

When your eyes are open,

Your gaze is unfixed and kind of dissolving into space.

So you're not focused on anything out there,

But your eyes are open,

Bringing in light.

Your eyes could be hooded,

Meaning that they're,

You know,

Half your eyelids are half drooping over your eyelids so that you're just seeing what's the lower kind of lower eyeball.

But your gaze is unfixed,

And so that is somewhere out there.

For me,

It's about eight feet or so in front of me is where my gaze just naturally begins to fall.

If it's too low,

What you can begin to do is feel a little eye strain,

And then also that's associated with drowsiness.

So elevate your gaze.

If you're feeling drowsy,

Elevate your gaze a little bit,

And that means like just move your gaze out a degree or two.

You really begin to notice a tremendous difference in the clarity of your attention by the elevation of your gaze.

Just move your gaze out there as dissolving out ten feet in front of you or something.

And if your gaze or if your attention is really distracted,

Lower your gaze.

So also the elevation of your chin.

Another thing to do if you are feeling drowsy,

Check your posture.

Very likely what's happened is that you are sitting like that,

That your kind of your lower back has kind of gotten rounded,

And you're not,

Your spine isn't erect.

So just make your spine erect.

Also elevate your gaze,

But the level of your chin is also very important.

So if your chin,

If you're feeling drowsy,

Just check that.

Is my chin's beginning to slump towards my chest?

Or if you're distracted,

Very often what's happening,

You will notice there's a correlation with your chin being elevated.

And so just lower your chin.

Basically what you're trying to do is maintain a level elevation of your chin.

The sensations of the nostrils are either right inside the rim of the nostrils.

You might feel it as air movement across the nerve endings.

You might feel it as temperature also.

In this room now,

It's probably what 72 degrees,

We'll say something like that,

70 degrees.

A nice comfortable temperature.

And so the air coming into your nose is going to be cooler than the air leaving your lungs.

So you may notice that.

Also pressure differences,

Etc.

But you may notice also a different,

Or sensations,

Maybe not at the beginning,

But after your attention becomes,

You develop a more qualitative vividness,

You may notice sensations on the upper lip.

And especially with the exhalation.

And when you do begin to notice that sensations there,

It's like a neon sign that comes on at dusk.

You know,

It becomes so pronounced because there are so many nerve endings on your upper lip that you go,

I don't know how I could have missed that before.

And that becomes then a very,

Very stable object.

And it could be,

And this is perfectly fine also,

That you are focused on the inhalation sensations at the rim of the nostrils because you're feeling that more.

And that you feel the sensations of the exhalation more on the upper lip.

So we are going to,

Again,

Maintain peripheral awareness and use sound also in peripheral awareness to help just keep that awareness expanded so that it doesn't become non-existent,

It doesn't dissolve simply because you are focused on attention with the tactile sensation.

So we are beginning to really develop that simultaneous awareness and attention at the same time.

So find a comfortable position for a 12-minute guided meditation.