New York Insight
"Skillful Pleasure"
-skillful pleasure…..
-the Buddha, after much trial and error, came to realize that the path had to include pleasure….
-the pleasure that the Buddha cultivated, and taught his disciples to cultivate, is a skillful pleasure….
-it is crucial that dharma students, following the Buddha's lead, learn the difference between unskillful and skillful pleasure…..
-the dharma student seeks to abandon unskillful pleasure and cultivate skillful pleasure….
-unskillful pleasure……
-leads to suffering…..
-unskillful pleasure is the pleasure we seek in external sense pleasures.....
-this kind of pleasure is inherently stressful and leads to suffering....
-it is impermanent, unreliable and can't bring lasting happiness....
-it must constantly be replenished ... it can never be fully satisfied....
-it is conducive to grasping after ... suffering ... greed......
-as dharma students, we learn to see the drawbacks in unskillful pleasure....
-we learn to lessen our intake of external sense pleasure ... in turn, we seek to cultivate skillful pleasure....
-skillful pleasure…..
-leads away from suffering ... to true happiness
-skillful pleasure is internal pleasure....
-it does not depend on things outside of us....
-skillful pleasure is cultivated in breath meditation practice....
-breath meditation….
-three primary steps:
1-putting the mind on the breath....
2- cultivating an easeful, pleasurable breath....
3-developing an easeful, pleasurable abiding in the body....
-qualities of concentration (jhana)….
-in breath meditation practice we cultivate the qualities of concentration....
-the Buddha's concentration is a specific kind of concentration known as jhana.....
-the four qualities of jhana are…..
1-singleness of mind - the ability to focus the mind on an object and keep it there
2-rapture - a quality of easeful, flowing energy; rapture is an energy that flows throughout the body....
3-pleasure - the way the mind responds to pleasant physical experience; in meditation, it's the way the mind responds to the pleasant, easeful energy in the body....
4- equanimity - the ability to keep the attention on the object no matter what, whether our experience is agreeable or disagreeable.....
-establish & maintain.....
-we learn to establish the qualities of jhana in meditation practice.....
-we learn to maintain these qualities in all postures, in all activities of our lives....
-an important goal of dharma practice is to be able to maintain an easeful, pleasant abiding in all our postures.....
"There is the case where a monk—quite secluded from sensuality, secluded from unskillful qualities—enters and remains in the first jhāna: rapture & pleasure born of seclusion, accompanied by directed thought & evaluation. He permeates and pervades, suffuses and fills this very body with the rapture & pleasure born of seclusion. There is nothing of his entire body unpervaded by rapture & pleasure born from seclusion.
“Just as if a dexterous bathman or bathman’s apprentice would pour bath powder into a brass basin and knead it together, sprinkling it again and again with water, so that his ball of bath powder—saturated, moisture-laden, permeated within and without—would nevertheless not drip; even so, the monk permeates and pervades, suffuses and fills this very body with the rapture & pleasure born of seclusion. There is nothing of his entire body unpervaded by rapture & pleasure born from seclusion. This is the first development of the five-factored noble right concentration."
(AN 5.28)
"Even though a disciple of the noble ones has clearly seen as it actually is with right discernment that sensuality (grasping after sense pleasure) is of much stress, much despair, & greater drawbacks, still — if he has not attained a rapture & pleasure apart from sensuality, apart from unskillful mental qualities, or something more peaceful than that — he can be tempted by sensuality. But when he has clearly seen as it actually is with right discernment that sensuality is of much stress, much despair, & greater drawbacks, and he has attained a rapture & pleasure apart from sensuality, apart from unskillful mental qualities, or something more peaceful than that, he cannot be tempted by sensuality.
"I myself, before my Awakening, when I was still an unawakened bodhisatta, saw as it actually was with right discernment that sensuality is of much stress, much despair, & greater drawbacks, but as long as I had not attained a rapture & pleasure apart from sensuality, apart from unskillful mental qualities, or something more peaceful than that, I did not claim that I could not be tempted by sensuality. But when I saw as it actually was with right discernment that sensuality is of much stress, much despair, & greater drawbacks, and I had attained a rapture & pleasure apart from sensuality, apart from unskillful mental qualities, or something more peaceful than that, that was when I claimed that I could not be tempted by sensuality."
(MN 14)
The body is like a tree: No tree is entirely perfect. At any one time it'll have new leaves and old leaves, green leaves and yellow, fresh leaves and dry. The dry leaves will fall away first, while those that are fresh will slowly dry out and fall away later. Some of the branches are long, some thick, and some small. The fruits aren't evenly distributed. The human body isn't really much different from this. Pleasure and pain aren't evenly distributed. The parts that ache and those that are comfortable are randomly mixed. You can't rely on it. So do your best to keep the comfortable parts comfortable. Don't worry about the parts that you can't make comfortable.
It's like going into a house where the floorboards are beginning to rot: If you want to sit down, don't choose a rotten spot. Choose a spot where the boards are still sound. In other words, the heart needn't concern itself with things that can't be controlled.
Or you can compare the body to a mango: If a mango has a rotten or a wormy spot, take a knife and cut it out. Eat just the good part remaining. If you're foolish enough to eat the wormy part, you're in for trouble. Your body is the same, and not just the body — the mind, too, doesn't always go as you'd like it to. Sometimes it's in a good mood, sometimes it's not. This is where you have to use as much thought and evaluation as possible.
-Ajaan Lee ("Keeping the Breath in Mind")
-Skillful Pleasure
-you can find out more about the book here.....
-you can purchase a copy here.....
-Resources....
some more resources to learn about breath meditation and "skillful pleasure".....
-"Meditations" (Thanissaro Bhikkhu)
-"Keeping the Breath in Mind" (Method 2) (Ajaan Lee)
"Skillful Pleasure"
-skillful pleasure…..
-the Buddha, after much trial and error, came to realize that the path had to include pleasure….
-the pleasure that the Buddha cultivated, and taught his disciples to cultivate, is a skillful pleasure….
-it is crucial that dharma students, following the Buddha's lead, learn the difference between unskillful and skillful pleasure…..
-the dharma student seeks to abandon unskillful pleasure and cultivate skillful pleasure….
-unskillful pleasure……
-leads to suffering…..
-unskillful pleasure is the pleasure we seek in external sense pleasures.....
-this kind of pleasure is inherently stressful and leads to suffering....
-it is impermanent, unreliable and can't bring lasting happiness....
-it must constantly be replenished ... it can never be fully satisfied....
-it is conducive to grasping after ... suffering ... greed......
-as dharma students, we learn to see the drawbacks in unskillful pleasure....
-we learn to lessen our intake of external sense pleasure ... in turn, we seek to cultivate skillful pleasure....
-skillful pleasure…..
-leads away from suffering ... to true happiness
-skillful pleasure is internal pleasure....
-it does not depend on things outside of us....
-skillful pleasure is cultivated in breath meditation practice....
-breath meditation….
-three primary steps:
1-putting the mind on the breath....
2- cultivating an easeful, pleasurable breath....
3-developing an easeful, pleasurable abiding in the body....
-qualities of concentration (jhana)….
-in breath meditation practice we cultivate the qualities of concentration....
-the Buddha's concentration is a specific kind of concentration known as jhana.....
-the four qualities of jhana are…..
1-singleness of mind - the ability to focus the mind on an object and keep it there
2-rapture - a quality of easeful, flowing energy; rapture is an energy that flows throughout the body....
3-pleasure - the way the mind responds to pleasant physical experience; in meditation, it's the way the mind responds to the pleasant, easeful energy in the body....
4- equanimity - the ability to keep the attention on the object no matter what, whether our experience is agreeable or disagreeable.....
-establish & maintain.....
-we learn to establish the qualities of jhana in meditation practice.....
-we learn to maintain these qualities in all postures, in all activities of our lives....
-an important goal of dharma practice is to be able to maintain an easeful, pleasant abiding in all our postures.....
"There is the case where a monk—quite secluded from sensuality, secluded from unskillful qualities—enters and remains in the first jhāna: rapture & pleasure born of seclusion, accompanied by directed thought & evaluation. He permeates and pervades, suffuses and fills this very body with the rapture & pleasure born of seclusion. There is nothing of his entire body unpervaded by rapture & pleasure born from seclusion.
“Just as if a dexterous bathman or bathman’s apprentice would pour bath powder into a brass basin and knead it together, sprinkling it again and again with water, so that his ball of bath powder—saturated, moisture-laden, permeated within and without—would nevertheless not drip; even so, the monk permeates and pervades, suffuses and fills this very body with the rapture & pleasure born of seclusion. There is nothing of his entire body unpervaded by rapture & pleasure born from seclusion. This is the first development of the five-factored noble right concentration."
(AN 5.28)
"Even though a disciple of the noble ones has clearly seen as it actually is with right discernment that sensuality (grasping after sense pleasure) is of much stress, much despair, & greater drawbacks, still — if he has not attained a rapture & pleasure apart from sensuality, apart from unskillful mental qualities, or something more peaceful than that — he can be tempted by sensuality. But when he has clearly seen as it actually is with right discernment that sensuality is of much stress, much despair, & greater drawbacks, and he has attained a rapture & pleasure apart from sensuality, apart from unskillful mental qualities, or something more peaceful than that, he cannot be tempted by sensuality.
"I myself, before my Awakening, when I was still an unawakened bodhisatta, saw as it actually was with right discernment that sensuality is of much stress, much despair, & greater drawbacks, but as long as I had not attained a rapture & pleasure apart from sensuality, apart from unskillful mental qualities, or something more peaceful than that, I did not claim that I could not be tempted by sensuality. But when I saw as it actually was with right discernment that sensuality is of much stress, much despair, & greater drawbacks, and I had attained a rapture & pleasure apart from sensuality, apart from unskillful mental qualities, or something more peaceful than that, that was when I claimed that I could not be tempted by sensuality."
(MN 14)
The body is like a tree: No tree is entirely perfect. At any one time it'll have new leaves and old leaves, green leaves and yellow, fresh leaves and dry. The dry leaves will fall away first, while those that are fresh will slowly dry out and fall away later. Some of the branches are long, some thick, and some small. The fruits aren't evenly distributed. The human body isn't really much different from this. Pleasure and pain aren't evenly distributed. The parts that ache and those that are comfortable are randomly mixed. You can't rely on it. So do your best to keep the comfortable parts comfortable. Don't worry about the parts that you can't make comfortable.
It's like going into a house where the floorboards are beginning to rot: If you want to sit down, don't choose a rotten spot. Choose a spot where the boards are still sound. In other words, the heart needn't concern itself with things that can't be controlled.
Or you can compare the body to a mango: If a mango has a rotten or a wormy spot, take a knife and cut it out. Eat just the good part remaining. If you're foolish enough to eat the wormy part, you're in for trouble. Your body is the same, and not just the body — the mind, too, doesn't always go as you'd like it to. Sometimes it's in a good mood, sometimes it's not. This is where you have to use as much thought and evaluation as possible.
-Ajaan Lee ("Keeping the Breath in Mind")
-Skillful Pleasure
-you can find out more about the book here.....
-you can purchase a copy here.....
-Resources....
some more resources to learn about breath meditation and "skillful pleasure".....
-"Meditations" (Thanissaro Bhikkhu)
-"Keeping the Breath in Mind" (Method 2) (Ajaan Lee)
