Day 114/365: Guided Meditation | Ajahn Brahm

Okay,

So I have three o'clock now.

So welcome to our regular Saturday afternoon meditation class.

And we have also started the Introduction to Meditation class and that is being held in the community hall which is to the north of this hall.

In other words,

Just the other side of the reception area here,

Through the gate and turn right,

The next little hall there.

And that's being held this month by Bianca.

Bianca is a very lovely teacher.

So anyone who's coming to the Introduction to Meditation class,

The series of four lessons for those who haven't meditated before,

That's being held in the hall called the community hall,

Just a little to the north,

The other side of the reception area.

In this class,

We do a 40-45 minute meditation but also start off with little instructions on meditation.

And one of those instructions is to learn just how to deal with any of the difficulties and problems which arise in meditation.

You'll find that sometimes your meditation is nice and easy.

But you have very good energy,

You can sit down,

It's reasonably peaceful and you can let go of the body very much and focus on something like the breathing and have a very peaceful time.

And there are other occasions when you find you can't stop thinking or you're sleepy or weird things happens in your body or somewhere else and you wonder why this seems to be an obstacle.

And a lot of times we learn by our own experience but also by listening to some of the teachings from monks and nuns or from the books about how to deal with the obstacles of meditation.

And the two main obstacles of meditation are always just either thinking too much or being dull,

Sleepy.

And of those two obstacles,

The being sleepy is not the hard one to overcome but the thinking too much is a little bit difficult.

I think I mentioned earlier somewhere recently that to change one's perceptions,

Look at the problem in a different way.

And imagine your mind like a lake,

A body of water which is a very old archetypal way of looking at this thing we call the mind,

Like a lake.

And the thoughts are just on the surface,

They're like the waves on the surface of the lake.

And if you want to calm those waves down,

Just putting your hands on top of those waves and try to smooth them out doesn't calm them down at all.

However,

Instead of trying to calm down the waves that way,

We just look underneath the lake,

Underneath the lake a few inches,

A foot,

Maybe two foot underneath the surface.

It's very calm there,

Very peaceful there.

So one of the ways of overcoming those thoughts is to look underneath them,

Beyond them.

Because otherwise,

If you start to pay attention to those thoughts,

You find they keep going on and on and on and on and on.

You can't stop them.

But go underneath them and always get a bit of a perspective,

A calm place underneath which the waves can't act at all,

They can't know them.

And that place is very peaceful and still.

And as soon as you start to recognize that stillness,

Which is there all the time in the lake,

You go to the place where that stillness exists,

Then you're very peaceful during the meditation.

And when you don't put so much effort into trying to stop those thoughts,

Of course your tiredness disappears.

The mind has a certain amount of energy coming into it all the time.

And if as long as we don't waste that energy,

Of course we overcome our sleepiness and our tiredness.

It's one of those things which happens on special meditation retreats.

You find that when you start meditating,

You may be tired,

But as you continue meditating,

Your tiredness disappears,

The mind becomes energized,

It becomes alert and it becomes much more powerful mindfully.

It's just the nature of the mind.

The mind is weak because it's been doing too much.

You stop,

Relax,

Be peaceful and the energy of the mind starts to regenerate.

And you know that the mind is getting energized,

Is getting stronger mindfulness,

Because you can see more,

Hear more,

Whatever you see or hear becomes much more delightful.

It is the joy of meditation starts to arise.

It feels good,

It feels something you love doing,

It's pleasurable.

And that delight of mindfulness when you start to get still and relax a lot is not just a pleasure,

It means that you don't need to put effort to focus on whatever you're watching.

It's a general form of delight there.

And to give you those examples,

I've wrote about those examples many times,

But one of those examples which comes to mind,

The very first meditation retreat which I did as a student many,

Many,

Many years ago,

That I was allowed on this retreat to go for a walk for one hour every morning.

I went to the local botanical gardens where I sat in front of a clump of bamboo.

I was supposed to have exercise but the clump of bamboo was so beautiful,

So gorgeous,

I couldn't stop looking at it.

And I spent 50 minutes every morning for eight of those nine days,

Just staring at the most beautiful clump of bamboo I've ever seen in the world.

Now I often remark why that happened,

Why afterwards when I went to visit that bamboo it wasn't beautiful at all.

How can you expect bamboo in botanical gardens in a cold country like England to actually to flourish?

But to me it looked beautiful.

The reason was because my mindfulness was very strong.

But the point I'm going to focus on now is not just it looked beautiful,

What I'm focusing on is I could watch it for 50 minutes just easily and I never got restless,

I never got tired,

I never thought I was getting bored.

You could always see something more in what I was watching.

And that is what I mean by saying that when it's joyful you don't have to focus.

Focus happens naturally.

Whatever you're watching it draws you into it.

And you can sit there for the only reason I left after 50 minutes because there was a reasonably strict retreat and that was the time for breakfast and so I had to walk back to get my breakfast.

So the point I'm making is that the idea you have to focus on something and use your effort and struggle to make sure you stay there,

That is not the way meditation works.

Meditation works because you are calm,

Still,

Relaxed enough,

The mind becomes energized and what you're watching becomes naturally enjoyable.

So little by little as we relax more we let the joy come and the stillness come.

And so often our meditation,

I find,

My teachers used to teach this,

You will also experience this,

That when you learn how to relax and let go the mind becomes still all by itself.

It's a wonderful thing to observe.

The best meditations,

You never do them,

They just happen.

They just happen because you're relaxing,

You're being still,

You're not doing stuff,

You're not disturbing the process of meditation.

You must all have heard so many times in spiritual places like this center or by listening to meditation the power of letting go or letting things be,

Not trying to go places to gain things,

To make things happen but just letting this moment be.

Because when you stop trying to change things you let it be.

You're not trying to achieve anything or get rid of things,

Just letting this moment be.

You're not doing any business,

You're not reacting to the world,

You're not making things happen.

You're just getting outside,

Like being what they sometimes called the separate observer,

Just watching without judging,

Without trying to make things happen.

You're letting things be and you will find after a while of letting things be,

Not interfering with this nature of your body and mind,

You'll find the body relaxes,

It knows how to relax,

Much better than you do.

It knows how to be still,

It knows how to just be aware and you'll find all the very best meditations occur when you aren't doing anything.

When you're just watching,

Being still,

Being peaceful and letting your mind calm down.

So we have all of the introductory ways of encouraging this and of course I always lead this meditation session starting off with being aware of your body,

To be able to relax it,

Not just be aware of the body for some medical science but being aware of it so you can learn how to notice which part of it is a tense and how to relax those tense parts of the body.

It's not that hard to do,

You focus on an area which is tight,

Where the muscles are stretched or they're just being squashed or they're injured and they're bruised or whatever.

You focus on that part and just with kindness,

Not trying to make it better,

Not trying to make it worse but like you give a little animal you meet on the street,

A little kitten or a cat or a dog,

To give that some kindness.

It's amazing when you do give kindness to an animal,

Just how they feel safe and how they will relax and be at peace in your presence.

Sometimes not so much here in Australia,

Sometimes you see a snake in monastery but a lot of times I remember all those snakes you came across in Thailand and in this monastery there are snakes all over the place.

They never bit any monk.

The reason was because the monks weren't tasty.

What any snake want to bite a monk for?

It's not their type of food but more than that the monks were always calm and peaceful and kind.

You find if you give calm peace,

Especially kindness to something like a snake,

They will never oppress you at all.

They will never attack you because they feel at ease.

So little by little when we give kindness to our body,

An ache,

A pain in the body,

You can find it relaxing,

You can feel that happening.

And of course sometimes being in forest monasteries for all my life,

Which is a long way away from the nearest doctor usually,

If there was ever any sort of illness,

Sickness,

Wound or something,

That's how I learned how to deal with those pains in the body,

Injuries to the body.

To focus on it,

Give us maximum kindness,

Awareness and kindness.

You could feel it relaxing,

The tightness,

The tension,

Mostly created by the fear of what might happen.

All of that relaxed and the body healed itself very,

Very well.

And even internally,

You could heal.

So little by little we're understanding how when we do a meditation and we're aware and we're kind to parts of our body,

The whole body relaxes.

And that is an important part of our meditation,

To be able to relax that body.

Because once the body is relaxed,

It just settles down.

When it settles down,

Relaxed,

Then we can watch our emotional world,

The mind,

And we can make that become peaceful.

And then after a while,

Then we can watch things like the breath or whatever meditation object we choose to look at.

And in all the years I've been teaching meditation,

It's as if Pearson tries to watch something like the breath too soon.

They haven't got enough relaxation in the body,

Enough calm in the mind.

They're wasting their time.

They'll try to watch the breath but thoughts will come up,

The body might move,

There might be aches and pains.

They become very restless.

It's not the correct way to meditate.

We allow our mind to become very peaceful first,

Our body to become very relaxed and at ease.

That's why we have these nice chairs to sit in,

Cushions,

Little stools to sit on to meditate in to try and get as comfortable as possible.

I don't mean that comfortable laying down on the ground,

Because actually that's not that comfortable.

Sometimes I wonder why didn't we learn how to meditate lying down,

Being your own pillow and mattress and come meditate on the floor here.

And the reason is if you ever notice when you actually go to sleep,

You're always tossing and turning,

You always move.

If you're sitting down,

You find you can sit down and remain motionless for much longer than you can do when you're laying down on a bed,

No matter how comfortable that bed is.

Something about the sitting posture which is able to be maintained without movement for a long period of time.

So that's why we learn how to sit down,

Make ourselves comfortable and after a while the body is really happy just sitting down.

And after that occurs,

Then you can,

You've got the freedom now to calm your mind down.

So this big amount of busyness has been settled and now we can learn how to calm our mind.

Calm your mind,

Very similar,

You're aware of what disturbs your mind and you let that go.

All the things which disturb your mind as usual are the past and the future.

You're thinking that all that sort of stuff,

The judging,

The wanting,

And after a while one sees all of that disappearing.

Just the mind becomes peaceful and it becomes more delightful when you are in this moment and you're putting aside the past or the future for the time being and having a rest.

And this meditation I'll try to introduce when I get to this part of the meditation,

The simile of the carrying the two heavy bags.

But that will come in a few minutes time.

And after the past and the future have been softened,

Then we go off to watching our,

Say something like the breath.

And it's very easy then,

Just like I could watch a clump of bamboo for an hour.

You can watch the breath for an hour very easily because your breath starts to appear very beautiful.

Delightful experience,

Peacefully just watching your breath go in and your breath go out.

So why do we have to do this?

We do this because it's peaceful and the longer we stay on a peaceful object with delight and relaxation,

The more energy we get,

The more happiness we get.

Our mindfulness really starts to increase a lot.

That means we can really relax very,

Very,

Very deeply.

Of course hopefully that's what you'll find out.

So anyway,

There's the introduction of how obstacles occur and how they're overcome.

Hopefully that can be of help.

So now we're going to start our meditation.

It's just gone past quarter past three.

And again once more if anyone for the introduction of meditation class that is in the room call the community hall,

Just a little bit outside of here.

Okay so now if you're not already in your meditation posture,

Please adopt that meditation posture.

Keep yourselves comfy.

And close your eyes.

We will be meditating till four o'clock.

But I will lead the meditation at the beginning,

Then I'll be quiet for about 20 minutes and I'll just start speaking again just before the meditation finishes.

First of all,

We bring our attention to our body.

How are you sitting now?

With your eyes closed,

You can actually feel the way you're sitting.

Especially to start with your legs.

How are your legs positioned right now?

And are they comfortable?

If you need to move your legs,

Please do so now.

To make sure that they're in a position where you can maintain comfort for a long enough period of time,

That basically your awareness of the legs vanishes.

They're not a problem anymore.

Once your legs are in a reasonably comfortable position,

Of course then you move up to your butt,

Making sure that's comfortable on top of the cushion.

Lending your back.

If you're sitting on a chair,

Sometimes you might like to try leaning back against the backrest.

Other times you want to straighten your back.

Move your shoulders.

Sometimes you just be aware of that part of your body.

Even just give it some care,

Some kindness,

Wishing it well.

Like sometimes you may get an email from an old friend.

They just ask,

How are you?

Things going okay during Covid time?

Just the fact that they have expressed their care for you,

Makes your body feel that much better.

The fact that you care for your own body,

Makes the body relax.

You go down your arms to your hands.

And find the best possible posture for you.

Go back up to your neck.

Making sure the head's well balanced on top of the neck.

To your face,

Relaxing the muscles around your eyes and mouth.

And hopefully you can notice that when you do relax your body,

It feels not just comfortable,

But delightfully comfortable.

Same sort of delight if you're soaked in a hot tub or had a massage.

Or reclined if you remember on holidays,

On a recliner by the beach.

With nothing to do,

Just do relax to the max.

Okay.

And once you've relaxed parts of your body individually and see if you can be aware of your body as a whole as a unit all connected together the body in which you live and as you just notice it,

If there's any part of it which is still not fully relaxed focus on that area,

Zoom in let your focus go deeper and deeper into that area let other areas just fall off the screen as you go deeper into that one area you can give it much more kindness,

Acceptance,

Peace just being there like a mother will look after a child and see if you can notice that part of the body become more relaxed and open and less fearful fear causes so much tightness and tension in the body the kindness overcomes that fear you and then once the body is very relaxed see if you can notice that in that delightful feeling see how that delightful feeling can take the relaxation further as a meditation object,

It's almost that delightful feeling of relaxation that joy the body which is at ease and when the body is relaxed enough then we go to our mind,

Our emotional world and it's helpful,

I recommend to start off with noticing how peaceful one is or how agitated how does the mind feel?

Talking about the peace-ometer,

How peaceful are you?

If you wish you can give it a number from one to ten one is really,

Really peaceful,

Ten is agitated how peaceful are you now from one to ten?

What makes that peace deeper?

What causes agitation in your mind?

One thing which causes agitation you will notice is when we own our past and own our future to the point that we can't let that past or future go so in order to help let the past and future go I'm going to introduce this meditation exercise called the two heavy shopping bags you've gone shopping before you've carried bags which are very full and very heavy you know what it feels like so imagine you've been carrying these two heavy shopping bags one in your left hand,

One in your right hand and they're both just packed to the brim and really heavy so heavy that your arms ache and your shoulders hurt and you look at the shopping bag in your left hand and it has the words on the,

Or rather the letters on the outside of that bag,

Four letters P-A-S-T because in that bag are the contents of your past pleasant memories,

Troublesome memories,

Even traumatic memories you've been carrying them around for such a long time that's why your arms ache and your shoulders hurt and in the right hand that's also a bag very full and that has the letters on the outside F-U-T-U-R-E because that represents your future where you carry your plans,

Your dreams,

Your hopes and your anxieties as well that's also extremely heavy and it's a burden to walk with them you just focus on the bag in your left hand representing your past you notice how heavy it feels in this imaginary exercise then you imagine leaning to the left which allows you to lower the bag in your left hand slowly to the floor and when it meets the floor all of the weight,

The burden vanishes the ground now supports it which allows you to uncurl the fingers of your hand move them away from the handle and move your left arm up by your left side you've let go of your past so you can relax and be free for a while you focus on the bag in your right hand representing the future,

Your fears and anxieties and hopes and dreams as well and then you lean to the right lower the bag in your right hand to the ground when it meets the floor that is not a burden anymore there's no weight the ground is supporting it,

Not you you can move your hand away from the handle move your right hand up by your side allow your right hand and arm to recover,

Re-energize and then you look down on the ground the past and the future you've let them go for a while you don't need to worry because no one is going to take them away they're going to be there for you afterwards but now you have the freedom,

The rest,

The opportunity just to be in this amazing space between the past bag and the future bag you're standing between them in this place called the present moment free,

Resting knowing that those two things are safe you're not carrying them now you're at peace in this moment I found a very good little exercise to help put down the past and the future so to be in this place between the freedom of now that usually makes this present moment very peaceful once you see its delight,

Its benefits,

Its joy not having to worry about the past and the future it's all safe down there this is the time you can relax once you can delight in being free the present moment now will be easy to maintain and in this moment it becomes more and more unlikely that thoughts will come up because thoughts are about the past and the future mostly all wanting needs a future to land in all ill will,

Negativity needs a past all fuel discontent it's like it's a gas supply,

A petrol supply of discontent is your past in this moment you can feel a great sense of being free in a place where you can relax with no burdens on you at all now you can feel that relaxation being in this moment,

Mostly silent feel that,

Be established now if you want to focus on say your breathing you notice the breath as it comes in and goes out so easily you can sustain that attention without any effort as the breathing becomes delightful it's all you're doing watching your breath come in watching it go out always in this moment enjoying it I will now be quiet will you carry on whichever way,

However deep you wish to go when I start speaking again I'll be just a couple of minutes before the end I will now be quiet.

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