Tag: yoga

The 16 Breath Meditation

Today I want to talk about what is known as 16 breath meditation. Buddha taught this meditation in his early days and they say if you follow it, that has all the ingredients to be liberated. It is also known as Full Awareness of Breathing meditation. It allows one to generate mindfulness and develop awakening.

Here is how we practice this:

The First Breath: Breathing in a long breath, I know I am breathing in a long breath, breathing out, I know I am breathing out a long breath.

The Second Breath: Breathing in a short breath, I know I am breathing in a short breath, breathing out, I know I am breathing out a short breath.

Explanation: These two breaths remove forgetfulness and unnecessary thinking. This generates mindfulness and allows us to be in the present moment.

The Third Breath: Breathing in, I am aware of my whole body. Breathing out, I am aware of my whole body.

Explanation: This breath puts us in touch with our body making us aware of every part of our body.

The Fourth Breath: I am breathing in and making my whole body calm and at peace. I am breathing out and making my whole body calm and at peace.

Explanation: This breath allows us to realize the calmness and peace in the body and puts body and mind in harmony.

The Fifth Breath: I am breathing in and feeling joyful. I am breathing out and feeling joyful.

The Sixth Breath: I am breathing in and feeling happy. I am breathing out and feeling happy.

Explanation: These two breaths create joy and peace that nourishes body and mind. Happiness and joy arise naturally within you. By being mindful, you are able to transform neutral feelings into joyful feelings.

The Seventh Breath: I am breathing in and am aware of the activities of my mind. I am breathing out and am aware of the activities of my mind.

The Eighth Breath: I am breathing in and making the activities of my mind calm and peaceful. I am breathing out and making the activities of my mind calm and peaceful.

Explanation: These two breaths allow you to look at all the feelings that arise within you whether pleasant, neutral or unpleasant. They enable you to look at these feelings deeply into their roots and nature and make your feelings calm and at peace.

The Ninth Breath: I am breathing in and am aware of my mind. I am breathing out and am aware of my mind.

The Tenth Breath: I am breathing in and making my mind happy and at peace. I am breathing out and making my mind happy and at peace.

The Eleventh Breath: I am breathing in and concentrating my mind. I am breathing out and concentrating my mind.

The Twelfth Breath: I am breathing in and liberating my mind. I am breathing out and liberating my mind.

Explanation: With these four breaths, you recognize all states of the mind—perceptions, thinking, discrimination, happiness, sadness, and doubt. It allows you to observe the activities of the mind and release obstacles of the mind.

The Thirteenth Breath: I am breathing in and observing the impermanent nature of all phenomena. I am breathing out and observing the impermanent nature of all phenomena.

The Fourteenth Breath: I am breathing in and observing the fading nature of all phenomena. I am breathing out and observing the fading nature of all phenomena.

The Fifteenth Breath: I am breathing in and concentrating on liberation. I am breathing out and concentrating on liberation.

The Sixteenth Breath: I am breathing in and focusing on letting go. I am breathing out and focusing on letting go.

Explanation: With these four breaths, we observe true nature of Dharma. First with observation of impermanent nature of phenomena, then with observation of fading nature of phenomena, then contemplating liberation and finally contemplating letting go. Hope this all makes sense and as we develop your practice, you are able to perfect this over time.

How To Access Peace Within Us

We have talked about in the past that within every one of our hearts exists this potential for total freedom from ignorance, complete bliss, and pure happiness, known as our Buddha nature. So today, let’s talk about how to access that peacefulness within us.

We need to learn to experience that nature. We are not able to because we have been habitually caught up with our delusions such as our greed, our anger, and our attachment and we think that’s me. But that’s not us. Those are our delusions.

They are defilements of our minds, our tendencies, our habits, but that is not us. They may be ruining our life but that is not us.

Buddha gives an example of seawater. We can all agree that the sea water is salty. It is salty water. He says no. Water is water. It is the salt that makes it salty. And nowadays, science tells us that we can have a desalination plant and the water is no longer salty! So the water itself is water. It is the salt that made it salty.

In the same way, it’s possible to get rid of the delusions from our mind and leave that clear, pure nature of our mind, which is already there. It’s just that the delusions are making it salty, but it doesn’t mean our mind is salty.   

By nature, we are pure. Our nature is completely peaceful, joyful, and even actually, blissful.

We all have Buddha says our continuously residing minds. Which is the deepest level of awareness. It is completely pure. It is always there. All other minds come and go. So our continuously residing mind is like a clear sky. And delusions and all other conceptions are like clouds that temporarily arise.

We must remember that all the time. That deep down, we are a peaceful person, a joyful person, a blissful person. It’s just that we have all this sand or dirt on top of our golden nugget. But it is a golden nugget and not some dirty rock.

So, therefore, the first step to accessing our pure nature is meditation so that our mind can settle down to its pure nature.

So we are letting the waves die down by focusing on the breath. We’re allowing the waves of our delusions to just die down. This is all we do, to begin with, we just don’t follow our delusions. The way we don’t follow our delusions is by following our breath instead, can only actually our mind can only single-pointedly focus on one thing at a time.

So we like to think we can multitask and stuff. But generally, what’s happening in our mind is just moving all over the place all day exhausting. Trying to do many things at once. Our mind is only actually ever doing one thing at a time. But just moments before it does the next thing in the next thing. Our mind is very much in the nature of the movement. And this is like, go back to the ocean analogy. It’s causing all that disruption. Just the fact that we can’t focus on one thing very well. Sometimes we can. But insofar as we can make lots of things at once, we can’t. But when we focus on breath, then we are focusing single-pointedly as we can one point of focus on the breath. At that point, we’re not projecting any of our other deluded thoughts. You know, what happens to a thought when we stop thinking about it? They go away.

Our delusions are just thoughts. When we stop thinking, those deluded thoughts subside, like the waves sliding into the ocean, that just happens. And we discover that we are actually peaceful, that our mind is actually peaceful, relatively to begin with, right, because it’s quite hard to let our mind completely let go of all the delusions dissolve into this endless deep bliss, okay, that takes some time. But we get a little bit of a taste of the waves dying down, to use the other metaphor, the clouds, clearing a little taste of the blue sky.

And now with meditation, we’re learning to master our mind, control our mind, which is absolutely essential, because if we don’t master our minds, our mind is always going to be in control of us. And when I say our mind, I mean, our delusions are going to control us because they’re what’s running the show at the moment. Right? So if we want to experience peace and happiness, we need to learn to master our minds.

And first step is just making a decision to stay with the breath. We can do a lot based on our decision. If we decide to do something, then there’s every chance we can do that thing. If we don’t decide to do it, then of course, you know, if we just kind of enter our breathing meditation, quiet half-heartedly, and think, Okay, it just seems like something quite peaceful. But we’re not really haven’t made any strong decision to stay with the breath, then we’re going to naturally follow every thought that comes up. Because that’s what we do. That’s what we are used to doing. We’re used to just following every single thought that comes up. But no we’re going to make a decision. I’m going to focus on my breath.

And if a thought comes, we say OK, we are going back to focusing on our breath. If we do this for a while, then what happens is that as the mind starts to settle down, even if it’s just a little bit, turbulence, and delusions, start to die down even a little bit, and we start to sense that depth in that space, that ocean, clarity within our mind, continuously residing, mind our Buddha nature potential, we start to just glimpse it. And that’s why we need a glimpse enough for us to then change the object of meditation from the breath to the peace itself. Again, focus on this peace, I’m going to enjoy this peace the abide by this peace. And focus on that single-pointedly.

When our delusions are not manifesting strongly, our mind is naturally relaxed, actually peaceful, and naturally happy.

Being Mindful

It’s been a while since we talked about mindfulness. I thought we will revisit this topic a little more in-depth today. It seems to me that so much of our life happens in autopilot mode. We seem to be reacting more than making conscious choices more often than not. Let’s first look at what is mindfulness. In the simplest terms, mindfulness is being aware of our mind from moment to moment. It means being fully present in the moment – whatever that moment happens to be.

What does it mean to be mindful you may ask? Being mindful means being aware of our experiences, our thoughts, our senses, our emotions, and so forth. You know the age-old saying stop and smell the roses? The Smelling of roses is being mindful. If you are aware of your mind, your thoughts will not control you.

And here is an interesting point. If we are mindful, we are more relaxed. I know it sounds counterintuitive but when we pay attention to our inner workings, our body tends to get into a relaxed state of being. Our mind is relaxed and overall we feel lighter.

When we are being mindful, we are in present as opposed to dwelling on the past or thinking about the future. If we think about it, all of our delusions come from either dwelling on the past or anticipating the future. When we are doing that, we are paying inappropriate attention to our uncontrolled thoughts. Mindfulness is about here and now.

Mindfulness encompasses two key ingredients: awareness and acceptance. Awareness is the knowledge and ability to focus attention on one’s inner processes and experiences, such as the experience of the present moment. Acceptance is the ability to observe and accept—rather than judge or avoid—those streams of thought.

How do we practice mindfulness? The simplest thing to do is to pay attention. I know, sounds easy right? But for sure not easy to practice. Try to get all your senses involved. Oftentimes, when we eat, for example, we hardly take the time to smell the aroma, before we being to eat. Another way to practice mindfulness is to live in the moment. Enjoy the simple pleasures life has to offer. So often, we are bogged down in chasing one thing or another that we hardly enjoy what is already here. As they say, enjoy the journey, not the destination.

Yet another way to practice mindfulness is to appreciate yourself. I know sounds weird but we must treat ourselves at least as well as treat our best friend. Being non-judgmental is a wonderful way to practice mindfulness. When we are not judging, we are paying attention and when we are paying attention, we are being mindful. Patience is yet another way of practicing mindfulness. Sometimes, things just take more time than we would like. It’s OK. Being curious also helps us be mindful. When we are being curious, we have this fresh energy and we are paying acute attention. We are in the present moment not thinking about the past or the future because we want to learn.

Not striving for more also helps be mindful. You are probably wondering what has that to do with mindfulness. But when we are not striving, we are not in the anticipation of future. That in turn, keeps us in the present. Letting go of the past also helps us be mindful as it prevents us from dwelling on the past. Two other ways to be mindful are my favorites. Gratitude and generosity. When we practice gratitude, we are being mindful. When we practice generosity, we are being mindful as well.

We have discussed a lot of structured ways of practicing mindfulness over the past year including focusing on our breath, M A C meditation, empty sly meditation, savasana meditation, and others.

I think most of you know that mindfulness has several benefits including, lowering stress levels, reducing harmful ruminating, and protecting against depression and anxiety. A Harvard study suggests that mindfulness can help people better cope with rejection and social isolation (https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2018/04/less-stress-clearer-thoughts-with-mindfulness-meditation/).

I read somewhere that I thought put it beautifully. Mindfulness is the energy that helps us recognize the conditions of happiness that are already present in our lives. You don’t have to wait ten years to experience this happiness. It is present in every moment of your daily life. There are those of us who are alive but don’t know it. What a wonderful way to express it!

I hear a lot about I am not able to concentrate or I am not able to meditate and thoughts keep coming. I want to assure you that you are making a progress. Every time you notice that your mind wanders off and you try to bring it back, you are getting better at meditation. No matter how many times you have to bring your mind back (initially, it feels like that’s all we are doing), you are making progress. I can assure you it gets easier with practice. If you develop a regular practice say 10 minutes per day, before you know it, you will be able to focus on peace within you.

Karma

Continuing on our Karma series, let’s talk about the severity of negative Karma. Sometimes we feel that the response to our negative action is not proportional to the action itself. Not every negative Karma results in similar suffering. The degree of suffering depends upon the power of our actions.

This power depends upon six factors including 1) the nature of the action; 2) the intention; 3) the method; 4) the object; 5) how often the action is committed, and 6) the application of the opponent. Now let’s look at each one and understand what it means.

First the nature of the action. Some negative actions are more severe than others. We briefly touched on this during our previous sessions. For example, killing is a lot more severe than idle chatter. So if you recall the ten negative actions: killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, lying, divisive speech, hurtful speech, idle chatter, and so forth; the degree of severity among them is in descending order. Meaning killing is the most severe and idle chatter is the least severe.

The next factor in suffering is intention. For example, to kill in a violent rage is more harmful than to kill in mild anger. But then I don’t who would kill in mild anger right? If we are lying for the sake of lying or lying to hurt someone has a different response when it comes to suffering. One is a lot more severe than the other.

The method is the next factor affecting suffering. How we perform that action. For example, killing an animal swiftly has less suffering attached to it than killing sadistically applying slow and painful death.

The object is also an important factor. If one kills someone who has been kind to them versus someone who is a total stranger, it has more severe implications. Similarly, if someone repeatedly commits the same offense, it has higher consequences as compared with a one-time offense.

The last factor is the application of the opponent. This means that when one commits negative action but along with that one also performs positive actions, then the severity of suffering is reduced.

Now let’s talk about the effects of our negative actions. There are three effects; 1) the ripened effect; 2) the effects similar to the cause and 3) the environmental effect. Let’s look at each one individually.

The ripened effect of a negative action is rebirth in one of the lower realms. For example, if a living being takes rebirth in the animal realm then the ripened effect of that particular negative action has occurred and will not show up again.

The effects similar to the cause have two types; a) tendencies similar to the cause and b) experiences similar to the cause. Tendencies similar to the cause is a compulsion. For example, we know that we are prone to certain types of negative actions even when realize it is wrong but instinctively, sometimes we end up committing those. This in turn creates more negative actions and creates this vicious cycle. Essentially, this effect makes it difficult for us to avoid rebirths in lower realms in the future. We essentially have a compulsion to certain negative behavior. You may have noticed that some kids tend to kill bugs and other insects. Tendency similar to sexual misconduct is being attracted to someone else’s partner. What we have here are tendencies that make one create negative actions that in turn will ripen in future sufferings. 

Experiences similar to the cause are different for each negative action. For example, an experience similar to the cause of killing is a short life full of sickness. By killing, we shortened another being’s life so we are experiencing ill health or shortened life as a result. Experience similar to stealing is a lack of wealth and possessions. Experience similar to sexual misconduct is separation from friends and family. Experience similar to cause for lying is that no one trusts us; divisive speech is difficulty creating harmonious relationships, hurtful speech is people say bad things about us; idle chatter is that no one takes us seriously. Experience similar to covetousness is that our desires are not fulfilled; malice is that we are prone to fear, and holding wrong views is that we have great confusion.

The third effect of a negative action is the environmental effect. This means that it is our living environment that is affected. For example, the environmental effect of killing is poverty; stealing is we live in a barren area; sexual misconduct is we live in unsanitary conditions. The environmental effect of lying is that we live in a place where people cheat and are deceptive; divisive speech is that we live in a place that is hard and inhospitable; hurtful speech is that we live in an area with dense undergrowth that can sting our body; idle chatter is that we live in a place where crops don’t grow. The environmental effect of covetousness is that we live in a place where resources are easily destroyed; malice is that we live in a war zone; holding a wrong view is that we live in a place that lacks water and other basic necessities.

So as you can see negative actions ripen in different ways. To sum up, the worst way it can ripen is birth in lower realms such as the animal realm. Effects similar to cause give us tendencies to perform similar negative actions or provides poor life experiences. The environmental effect makes our surroundings difficult. So that concludes our discussions on negative Karma. Next week, we will begin to look at positive Karma and its effects.

Karma

We have been discussing Karma for the last three sessions. We will continue with our Karma discussion. You may recall we discussed bodily negative Karma in our last session. Today, we will discuss the speech and mental negative Karma. Let’s begin with lying. Lying is a negative action of speech. Although one can commit this action by writing or staying silent.

A classic example of this is Yudhishthira during the Kurukshetra war. Someone asks him if Ashwatthama is dead and he said Ashwatthama was indeed dead not clarifying that it was the elephant and not the Guru. Also for lying to create negative consequences, the object of lying must be present along with determination and delusion. Another important point is that the other person has to understand before action is considered complete. For example, if we utter a lie to an infant who cannot process what we are talking about, then the action is not complete.

Divisive speech is something when we create division between people. A lot of this is going on in our society at this time where people make statements just to incite hatred amongst groups of people. There is also a divisive speech of gossip where people talk about other people behind their backs trying to create a rift among friends. The object of divisive speech is two or more people who have a relationship with one another. The divisive speech causes that relationship to deteriorate or make it worse. One thing to point out is that even if something is true but it can cause harm in a relationship between two people then it is considered divisive speech.

Hurtful speech is again, a type of negative action that is intended to hurt someone. If a person is hurt by our speech, it is hurtful speech. As before, if we intend to hurt John but end us hurting Jim then the action is not complete. Also, if we get angry at a non-living being say weather then there is no hurt caused so no negative action occurs. Sarcasm is also a form of hurtful speech. Before we speak or post something on social media, we should contemplate, is it true; is it necessary; is it kind? If the answer to any of these three questions is no, then don’t do it?

Idle chatter is the least affecting negative Karma. This means a meaningless conversation. Although it is not harmful to others too much idle chatter can prevent us from working on positive Karma. So it is indirect negative Karma if you will.

So those are all verbal or speech negative Karma. Now, we will take a look at mental negative Karma. Covetousness is a negative Karma where one desires something that does not belong to them. It can be a material possession, a job, a higher position, or someone else’s partner. This is one Karma that creates negative results just with a train of thought. For the negative Karma to occur, we must first correctly identify the object of desire. We must be determined to possess it. And we must be influenced by delusion. Usually, we repeatedly consider how we will obtain this object and the action is complete when we chose a method and decide to apply it to procure the object ourselves. I should point out that this does not apply to a free will transaction. For example, if you want to purchase something from someone and contemplate how you are going to approach this transaction, that is not covetousness.

Malice is expressing ill will towards other people to harm them. We engage in malice by repeatedly contemplating the best method to express ill will towards someone and the decision to cause harm by our chosen method. A train of thought that combines all three, causes the negative action of malice to occur.

Holding wrong views is where we reject universal truths such as Karma, the Cycle of birth and death, and so on. We engage in this negative action by repeatedly considering how to deny these universal truths. There are many methods that include repudiating these truths, incorrect ways of reasoning for opposing views, etc.

So we covered all ten types of negative actions over the last two sessions. If we commit ourselves to avoiding these ten negative Karmas, our lives will drastically improve for ourselves and those around us.