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Roots of Mindfulness Practices Retreat
questZENer
Veteran
Greetings, all!
In the last weekend I attended my first "Insight Meditation" day long retreat. It was an interesting experience. Jack Kornfield was the leader of the retreat and I learned quite a bit about "Insight Meditation" practices. Because several members here are not able for various reasons to attend such sessions, I thought I would post my personal summary of what Mr. Kornfield called "The Roots of Mindfulness", four basic meditation practices that help develop wisdom. The four roots are indicated by roman numerals.
I. Attention to Breath.
Basic practice: Pay attention to this breath. When the mind wanders, gently bring it back to this breath. This is always the 'grounding' practice for whatever other meditation is done.
Variation: Bring attention to this inbreath or this outbreath. Be present with one half-breath at a time.
Variation: Attend to when the in-breath is at the beginning, in the middle, and at an end; attend to when the out-breath is at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end.
Variation: Walking meditation. Focus on the breath but rather than in a sitting position, do it walking. Most people prefer to start very slowly, one breath per step. If you become distracted, stop, close your eyes, and recenter yourself on your breath. When you feel refocused, again, start walking. Alternate sitting meditation (20-25 minutes) with walking meditation (20-25 minutes). Others can do walking meditation with quick walking. It is also helpful to vary walking from one session to another, e.g., walking slowly one time; walking medium another; walking quickly yet another. This helps train your awareness in different states of walking.
Variation: Eating meditation. Eating is usually something we do quickly and without mindfulness. For eating meditation, eat in silence. First, examine the various qualities of the food: how it looks, smells, its textures, tastes. Then, examine the experience of the food in your mouth, how it changes from unchewed to chewed, the experience of the food in your mouth as the various different foods are separate but blend together while chewing, how the food feels sliding down your throat and into your belly. In particular, noting when you stop eating--when your belly is full--or do you keep eating because of how much is on your plate, how good it tastes, etc.
These meditations are meant as a means to cultivate awareness or a felt sense or felt experience of the body now at this moment.
II. Meditation on what's pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral (Vedna practice)
Basic practice: Pay attention to the body. What parts feel un/pleasant or neutral? Notice and mentally label the feelings, but don't judge it. There is no "should be" in this practice. After noticing and labelling, sit with that for a moment and let it go. Return to the breath.
-For example: feel your feet. what do they feel like? Hot? Heavy? Cool? Light? Pleasant? Unpleasant?
Variation: feeling sleepy. Move attention around to more parts of the body in rapid succession. This meditation follows the maxim, "where attention goes, energy flows". Moving the attention around the body, "assessing" or "noticing" different parts of the body in rapid succession helps energy move around, thus helping dissipate sleepiness.
Variation: feeling excited or anxious. Fous attention to one body part for a more sustained period. Return to breath periodically.
III. Working with thoughts, emotions, and experiences.
Basic practice:
1. Noticing x arising.
Example: an itch!
Example: remembering something that happened
Exampe: feeling angry or upset
2. Name it. A partial list of possible labels/names:
sadness desire anger fear restlessness boredom
pride planning remembering imagining
3. Bow to it, i.e., acknowledge that it's there. Validate it by telling it "this, too".
4. Pay attention to it, i.e., give it space to grow by following that emotion to see where it "goes" and how it changes.
Example: if your something hurts, knees/back, pay attention to the pain. How does it shift? How does it change? Does it stay the same? Does it get worse? Does it go away? Is it hot? The main idea here is to see that rarely do things we think/experience stay "the same", but they change and, eventually, dissipate with attention.
5. Return to the breath. Regard everything else like the crashing of ocean waves around you.
Variation: count how many times a particular thought/emotion/experience occurs within one sitting.
This meditation helps to experience impermanance.
IV. Metta/Generating lovingkindness
See: Karaniya Metta Sutta
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/buddharakkhita/wheel365.html
This gives a much better description than I could!
Peace,
In the last weekend I attended my first "Insight Meditation" day long retreat. It was an interesting experience. Jack Kornfield was the leader of the retreat and I learned quite a bit about "Insight Meditation" practices. Because several members here are not able for various reasons to attend such sessions, I thought I would post my personal summary of what Mr. Kornfield called "The Roots of Mindfulness", four basic meditation practices that help develop wisdom. The four roots are indicated by roman numerals.
I. Attention to Breath.
Basic practice: Pay attention to this breath. When the mind wanders, gently bring it back to this breath. This is always the 'grounding' practice for whatever other meditation is done.
Variation: Bring attention to this inbreath or this outbreath. Be present with one half-breath at a time.
Variation: Attend to when the in-breath is at the beginning, in the middle, and at an end; attend to when the out-breath is at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end.
Variation: Walking meditation. Focus on the breath but rather than in a sitting position, do it walking. Most people prefer to start very slowly, one breath per step. If you become distracted, stop, close your eyes, and recenter yourself on your breath. When you feel refocused, again, start walking. Alternate sitting meditation (20-25 minutes) with walking meditation (20-25 minutes). Others can do walking meditation with quick walking. It is also helpful to vary walking from one session to another, e.g., walking slowly one time; walking medium another; walking quickly yet another. This helps train your awareness in different states of walking.
Variation: Eating meditation. Eating is usually something we do quickly and without mindfulness. For eating meditation, eat in silence. First, examine the various qualities of the food: how it looks, smells, its textures, tastes. Then, examine the experience of the food in your mouth, how it changes from unchewed to chewed, the experience of the food in your mouth as the various different foods are separate but blend together while chewing, how the food feels sliding down your throat and into your belly. In particular, noting when you stop eating--when your belly is full--or do you keep eating because of how much is on your plate, how good it tastes, etc.
These meditations are meant as a means to cultivate awareness or a felt sense or felt experience of the body now at this moment.
II. Meditation on what's pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral (Vedna practice)
Basic practice: Pay attention to the body. What parts feel un/pleasant or neutral? Notice and mentally label the feelings, but don't judge it. There is no "should be" in this practice. After noticing and labelling, sit with that for a moment and let it go. Return to the breath.
-For example: feel your feet. what do they feel like? Hot? Heavy? Cool? Light? Pleasant? Unpleasant?
Variation: feeling sleepy. Move attention around to more parts of the body in rapid succession. This meditation follows the maxim, "where attention goes, energy flows". Moving the attention around the body, "assessing" or "noticing" different parts of the body in rapid succession helps energy move around, thus helping dissipate sleepiness.
Variation: feeling excited or anxious. Fous attention to one body part for a more sustained period. Return to breath periodically.
III. Working with thoughts, emotions, and experiences.
Basic practice:
1. Noticing x arising.
Example: an itch!
Example: remembering something that happened
Exampe: feeling angry or upset
2. Name it. A partial list of possible labels/names:
sadness desire anger fear restlessness boredom
pride planning remembering imagining
3. Bow to it, i.e., acknowledge that it's there. Validate it by telling it "this, too".
4. Pay attention to it, i.e., give it space to grow by following that emotion to see where it "goes" and how it changes.
Example: if your something hurts, knees/back, pay attention to the pain. How does it shift? How does it change? Does it stay the same? Does it get worse? Does it go away? Is it hot? The main idea here is to see that rarely do things we think/experience stay "the same", but they change and, eventually, dissipate with attention.
5. Return to the breath. Regard everything else like the crashing of ocean waves around you.
Variation: count how many times a particular thought/emotion/experience occurs within one sitting.
This meditation helps to experience impermanance.
IV. Metta/Generating lovingkindness
See: Karaniya Metta Sutta
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/buddharakkhita/wheel365.html
This gives a much better description than I could!
Peace,
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