Session 031: Anatomy of Mindfulness
Anatomy of Mindfulness
Dhamma Talk + Guided Meditation Session 031: Aug 5th, 2020, by Sophia Ojha Ensslin and Cristof Ensslin
Banner Photo by Lesly Juarez
Introduction
Last week Sophia presented the anatomy of a visual journey. Let’s continue the theme of anatomy by looking at the anatomy of mindfulness.
We have talked about mindfulness before. It’s what we are practicing in meditation: observing the present moment as it is, not as we’d perhaps like it to be.
But it’s also what is to be practiced in every moment of daily life. We need it for preparing for meditation, so that our meditation can become deeper. We also need it for practical matters: first of all to survive and not to be run over by a car or cut ourselves while slicing onions, but also to do the right thing at the right time and to make good karma, in order to continuously lead our life toward more peace and happiness.
While mindfulness in meditation is quite straightforward - we watch the breath, focus on a mantra, scan the body or send well-wishes to all beings - mindfulness in daily life may be a bit more obscure. So let’s look at it in more detail.
Watch the talk’s video recording on your right or read on below.
Dhamma Talk by Cristof (video recording coming soon)
Meditation Guided by Sophia (video recording coming soon)
Handout
This week we have prepared a 5-page handout for you. It is posted left/below as blog content. Plus, you can download it as PDF by clicking on the following button:
I Have Arrived in the Present Moment
In a dhamma talk by Thich Nhat Hanh, the revered Vietnamese monk and best-selling author of books on mindfulness, meditation, and how to live a happy life, begins by saying: “I have arrived, I am home. It’s really simple.” (https://youtu.be/MNQhj82jDRQ)
The point of mindfulness is to feel at home in the present moment. It’s your ticket to peace, which in turn leads to happiness. When we breathe in and are aware of nothing but the breath in our body, we can understand what that means. Body and mind are together in unity.
When we drive in traffic, work on our computer or talk to a friend on the phone, we may get all-consumed by narratives, worries, troubles. Body (meaning: what we are doing, including what we are thinking about) and mind (meaning: what we are aware of) are not together in that moment.
How do we go about extrapolating the meditation experience of mind-body-unity into daily life? According to Thich Nhat Hanh, a quick moment of feeling the breath in the middle of us doing something can bring about wonders. It will bring us back “home” into our physical body. And from that, we can go deeper: we can practice clear comprehension in every waking moment.
Clearly Comprehending the Present Moment
We already know that mindfulness consists not just of awareness. Having security staff on duty to be aware of a burglar is necessary, but not sufficient. They also have to do the right thing that the moment calls for: stop the uninvited intruders and call the police. That’s the other part of mindfulness, namely “clear comprehension”. It is made up of four elements, four steps if you will:
Knowing the purpose of what we’re doing right now.
Knowing whether we’re applying the best possible method known to us to fulfill that purpose.
Double-checking whether we’re doing it all within our understanding of karma and whether we’re sowing the right kind of karmic seeds - meaning having the right intention (non-greed, non-hate, non-harm, and their less extreme brothers and sisters) behind our thought, word or action. Meaning: are we making peace with what is? Are we being kind? Are we being gentle?
Proofing the pudding: have we actually achieved the purpose?
I would like to quote from Ayya Khema’s book Being Nobody, Going Nowhere as to what these four parts of clear comprehension mean. On page 164 she puts it all in very practical terms and uses the example of speaking as she writes:
Whenever we speak without purpose, mindfulness and clear comprehension have been abandoned. When we speak with a purpose, but don’t know how to express ourselves, we have no skillful means at our disposal. Our discriminating awareness helps us to realize whether we are thinking, speaking, or acting in accordance with the truth of Dhamma. If we don’t get the results we want, we obviously haven’t used the right means.
As a result, we can stay peaceful in the face of difficult, unpleasant emotions arising in us. Ayya Khema continues to write:
When we live with mindfulness there is a marked difference in our awareness. We know what’s happening with ourselves, but we don’t become involved in it. When anger arises, we know it’s arising, but we don’t have to become angry. That’s a great skill. When there is boredom, we know boredom has arisen, but we don’t have to become bored or frustrated. We just know the arising and also the ceasing of all mental states.
And then, Ayya Khema hits a home run with the bases loaded, by finishing the section on mindfulness and clear comprehension with these words:
Mindfulness is available to everyone and is used by everyone for survival, but since survival is a lost cause, we might as well use some more mindfulness in order to become liberated and free. Mindfulness is the skillful means and clear comprehension, the wisdom that can discriminate. Mindfulness is nonjudgmental, but clear comprehension has the aspect of differentiating, so we can change our direction if necessary.
In other words, clear comprehension empowers us to incrementally work on our mind and our habits to steer them towards peace and happiness independent of outer circumstances. That’s the full power of mindfulness.
Taking It From the Cushion into Daily Life
In meditation, we practice mindfulness by being aware of the breath or another meditation object. The purpose is to calm the mind, find stillness, and gain insight into an absolute reality in which we can find peace no matter what is happening to us. The skillful means we are practicing every time we sit down to meditate or embark on our walking meditation path. It’s obviously making good karma as we simply observe our body, feeling, and mind. We may even actively replace the unwholesome thoughts that pop up with wholesome ones, for example words of love and kindness. As our practice progresses, the results become obvious.
Learning to add the 4-step-process of clear comprehension (purpose, skillful means, alignment with karma, and reconciling results with the intended purpose) to our daily life can bring the practice from the cushion to the kitchen, the car, the living room, the office, and all the people we come in touch with.
We can use it to go way beyond taking care of our body’s basic needs to stay alive. We can develop our mind to make it brighter and more peaceful. The more we do this, the more habitual it becomes. That way, we can create our own inner peace, on and off our meditation cushion, at all times.
Let’s meditate together now.
