Day 4 Foundations of Mindfulness and the Hindrances -Retreat Talk

and tranquility in the mind but then maybe a few hours later maybe a day later something comes up and triggers the mind and that very same hindrance that very same thought that you suppressed comes back with full force and now you are back in the mire of craving and aversion and delusion and so the Buddha saw this and he understood that the way to engage skillfully with these hindrances, with these unwholesome states, is to let them go, not to push them away. There is a difference between pushing away and letting go.

To push away means that there is an aversion to that hindrance. To let it go means that I hold it gently in my hand. I'm aware of it. I have presence of mind with regards to it. In some sense, you will see on the website of Dhammasukha, some suggestions which I really like. It's like you're welcoming the hindrance for a cup of tea. Oh, here is a hindrance.

Welcome. Let's have a cup of tea, and you can go when you need to go. So the release step and the relax step. Where in the release and relax step do you see it saying to suppress and push? In fact, the forerunner of the 6R's was something known as drops. Don't resist or push, soften and smile.

Whatever hindrance comes up in the mind, don't resist it, don't push it, soften the mind and smile. When you do this, the hindrance becomes lighter, the energy of that hindrance becomes softer. And that hindrance, because of your action of letting go, of dropping it, fades away. And when it fades away, what is remaining? What is remaining is, shameless plug, a mind without craving.

In that moment, the mind is free of any kind of craving, any kind of aversion, any kind of identification. And because of that, your mind is uplifted naturally. The smile brings that up. And from there, the mind can become collected. There is a logic to this process. There is a certain way in which the Buddha has explained the path, discovered the path, and shown how this process works. He has applied it for himself to see whether it works or not.

There is no trying too hard to push and pull apart things in this practice. There is an understanding, an awareness. There is a process of experiencing joy and lightness and ease of mind. These are not my words, these are the Buddha's. You see it in the Sutta called the Upanisa Sutta. We will extract the steps from that Sutta in a few days, so you can see for yourself what I'm talking about.

But in that, there is joy, there is gladness, there is ease, there is tranquility. There's none of this trying very hard, I'm going to sit and I'm going to meditate and I'm going to just go at it as much as I can. You will break your mind. You will break your mind if you do this.

And I'm very serious about that. Time to relax, take time to be joyful, to cultivate gratitude, to cultivate the smile, to cultivate the ease that happens when you are in mindfulness. So when we say remembering to observe how mind's attention moves from one object to the other, what are we saying exactly? The nature of the mind is to continuously take up one or another object. The mind will continue to go towards something or another; that is the nature of the mind. The default mode network of the brain is always thinking about this, that or the other: about the future, about the past, about who am I, in the present, what do I own, who is in my life, all of these different ruminations. This is the nature of that mind, that thinking mind. So what are we doing with meditation?

What are we doing with mindfulness? We are learning to replace that default mode network with what is known as the task positive network. What do we mean by that? Taking up. First of all, what is meditation? How would we define meditation? Meditation, there are two types of meditation. The first type of meditation is taking up one object, a singular object, to the exclusion of all other thoughts.

This is different from one-pointedness. The second type of meditation is where no objects are taken and the mind just observes. Eventually, over a period of time, as you're practicing, you will see both. For the purpose of those who are starting on this path, the meditation with object is best recommended. Because when you get into a meditation without object, it's very easy for the mind to fall asleep. It's very easy for the mind to become or have sloth and torpor. Your mind being the way it is, all our minds being the way they are, have restlessness and agitation.

Our minds are constantly seeking, constantly looking, constantly desiring for something. So what do we do? We bring up an object that the mind can take up to the exclusion of all the others. And when we do that, we are channeling the attention. So mindfulness is, or I should say meditation, is like a performance on stage. What does that mean when I say this?

The performer on stage is your object of meditation. You know, performing, walking past, walking here and there, doing whatever it is they're doing on stage. The attention that is given to the object is the spotlight. So your attention is on one object. The intention to stay with that object is the spotlight operator, the guy who has to make sure that he's on the performer at all times.

And the mindfulness is the stage manager that makes sure everything is running smoothly. So remembering to observe how your mind's attention moves from one place to the other is the process of utilizing the spotlight of your attention to make sure that it is staying on the performance or on the performer. And you do this in the simplest terms of practicality using the 6R's.

When we're doing meditation on loving-kindness, loving-kindness is the object. When we're doing meditation on compassion, compassion is the object. When we're doing meditation on joy or equanimity, those are the different objects. So the objects are the anchors to bring our awareness and our attention in a specific direction. So why then do we have these four foundations? What is up with these four foundations? Well, when we talk about the body as a foundation, what the Buddha is saying is you can use the body, you can use feelings

we'll talk about what that is in a moment. You can use mental states or you can use phenomena to bring your mind back. It's not that those are the objects necessarily, but they can be. For example, when we talk about mindfulness of the body, what are we talking about? Primarily, the Buddha introduces here, Anapanasati. What is Anapanasati?

Anapanasati means, ana is from the word apana, which is inhalation or exhalation, and pana, which comes from prana, which can be the inhalation or exhalation. So the mindfulness of the in-breath and the out-breath is anapanasati. So that is directed in the body, is it not? Does not the body inhale and exhale? So you're using the breath as an anchor in this case.

Another form of meditation that the Buddha provides is seeing the body in its different parts. Seeing the body as different elements. Seeing the body as in various forms of decay. These are different meditation objects dependent upon the type of mindset that a mind or person possesses. So, for example, if a person is very lustful, they have a lot of craving with regards to sensual pleasures. Seeing the body as made up of all of these different organs or seeing the body in the various forms of decay helps to disengage the mind from lust.

But this is not a practice that you necessarily need to do on this retreat. The body is just used as an anchor to bring the mind's awareness back to the present. That's it. How do we do it in regards to this practice? When we tranquilize, this is very important to understand. In the Sutta it says, he tranquilizes bodily formations.

In other words, he relaxes the body. He relaxes the tightness and tension in the body. This is what is the crux of right effort, the crux of the 6R's, to relax the tightness and tension. When you relax the tightness and tension, you are relaxing and letting go of craving. You're letting go of hindrances. You're letting go of any form of identification.

Why am I talking about identification? Because that is the whole crux of why we suffer, because we take things way too personally. We believe that this body is mine, this body is me, this body is myself. This body is just made up of various different minerals and plants and meat and food and all of the different elements that we have.

That's all this body is. Every time we go take a shower and we brush our teeth and we comb our hair, we're not doing it to ourselves. We're just doing it to our corpse. That's it. Because ultimately that's the nature of the body. It decays. Now, are we saying that we have to no longer pay attention to the body? Are we saying that we no longer have to take care of the body? No. We're saying to take up skillful means of perspective to not get engrossed in the identification with the body, to realize that what we see as the body as ourselves is actually impermanent, it is subject to change, and that which is the so-called self is understood to be permanent,

a source of eternal happiness. The body is not that. So that mindfulness of the body helps to do that at a deeper level. So whenever we bring up the feeling of loving kindness, what do we feel? We feel a somatic experience of warmth in the heart. We feel a somatic experience of the feeling going up into the head.

We feel an experience of expansion from the body, or away from the body. We are still in the body. The body is doing its own thing. It takes care of itself. When you're in cessation, the body continues to function the way it needs to function. But you're not in control of the body. We're not in control of what happens.

We're just in for the ride. The mindfulness of feeling. What do we mean by feeling? Are we talking about being in touch with our feelings? Are we talking about our emotions? Are we talking about anger and sadness and happiness and joy? No. When we say feeling, here it comes from the word Vedana. Vedana means to experience. So within that umbrella of experience can be pleasant states of feeling, or unpleasant states of feeling, or neutral states of feeling. A feeling can be physical.

A feeling can be emotional. A feeling can be mental. What is a pleasant feeling of the body? Experiencing wonderful sights, experiencing wonderful sounds, experiencing fragrances that are beautiful and wonderful to the olfactory bulb, experiencing wonderful tastes, exquisite tastes, which I am biased, you will only find in Indian food. Okay, you can argue with me all you want, it's okay, but I am right. Or experiencing comfortable clothes, comfortable bedding. These are all pleasant sensations, pleasant experiences.

What are unpleasant experiences? Things that are displeasing to the eye, things that are ugly to the eye, things that are like a cacophony of sound to the ears, things that are malodorous to the nose, things that don't taste good. Like American food. Or things that are too itchy, like wearing an itchy Christmas sweater, right?

These things are unpleasant. And when we talk about neutral, there's no valence to it. There's no emotionality to it. There's no kind of projection of perception of pleasant or unpleasant to it. It's just experience. And then there's something known as unworldly. So when you say worldly, it's talking about the five physical sense bases. When you talk about unworldly or otherworldly, it's happening in the mind. You're talking about mental states, mind feelings, mind experiences.

For example, a pleasant experience of loving kindness. A pleasant experience of gratitude, a pleasant experience of joy, a pleasant experience of tranquility. Or an unpleasant experience of anger, an unpleasant experience of grief, an unpleasant experience of despair and sorrow. So these are otherworldly, not because they transcend, they're unworldly because they have nothing to do with the physical senses, they're happening in the mind.

Or in the heart, if you want to say that. And then neutral experiences are primarily equanimity. But you can be thinking about something in the past, whether it was pleasant or unpleasant in the past, and you can have equanimity towards it, or no emotion tied to it anymore. And then we have mental states, mindfulness of mental states.

What do we mean by mental states? A mental state is a state in which the mind can be contracted or exalted, distracted or unsurpassed or surpassed, liberated or unliberated, collected or not collected. So, different kinds of mental states. When we say mental states, I really like to use the word mindset. Just as you have a mood, which is basically a collection of many different emotions that are thematically connected to create a mood, a mindset is a collection of similar kinds of thoughts that create that particular mental experience or state. So in this case, when we talk about a contracted mind, what do we mean by that? A mind that is tense, a mind that is tight.

A mind that is trying too hard. A mind that is trying to get somewhere, because what happens is you lock in and you focus and the mind contracts around that. A mind that is distracted, obviously, a mind that has some kind of a hindrance in which the attention of the mind is dispersed. The spotlight operator has fallen asleep and we don't know where the performer is anymore, so there the mind is distracted. A mind that is exalted, this means a mind that has experienced something that is super mundane and transcendent. Exalted in what way? Exalted because it is free of hindrances.

It's exalted from the world into the space of what is called jhana. A mind that is exalted is a mind that experiences transcendental joy, transcendental happiness, transcendental peace. A mind that is unexalted is one that doesn't experience it, obviously. A mind that is surpassed. What do we mean by that? A mind that has surpassed the experience of form and enters into the space of the formless jhanas, into what's known as infinite space, infinite consciousness, nothingness, and neither perception nor non-perception.

Some of these words might be confusing to some of you, but we will get into it. I don't want to inundate you with too much information. I'm giving you this so you understand how to observe your mind, how to observe what is going on. Because meditation is not about just chanting Aum, lighting an incense, and in 30 minutes you're done. That's not what meditation is.

Meditation is the culmination or the fusion of Samatha and Vipassana. This is what TWIM stands for: Tranquil Wisdom Insight Meditation. Meditation is the fusion of Samatha, that's the tranquility, and Vipassana, which is the wisdom and the insight. It's not about just being with your mental object, your meditation object. It's about when you do the six R's, you are teaching yourself how the mind's attention moves, and to what does it move, and how to redirect that movement using right effort. So when we talk about a mind that is surpassed, we're talking about a mind that has surpassed the territory of form.

Gone into these formless states. A mind that is unsurpassed, obviously, is one that hasn't done that yet. So mindfulness is just that: it is recognizing, okay, the mind is in this particular space right now. If things are going great, nothing needs to be changed. If things are not going great, how do we change it? The six R's. So you don't need to use the six R's like a swatting thing. You don't need to keep beating the hindrance down like a whack-a-mole.

A lot of people initially do that prematurely. They'll just use the six R's and try to get pushed down all the distractions and so on. No, no, no. The distractions will be there. It's okay. Come to terms with the fact that distractions will never leave you. The distractions will be there. How you choose to engage with them is imperative.

How you choose to deal with them provides you freedom or further suffering. The distractions of themselves are not the thing that you need to work with. Your relationship to the distractions, your aversion to the distraction, first and foremost. Because once you have understood that, then the distraction goes from, as Bhante would say, something huge and a big deal, to it's only this.

So when you treat distractions in those ways, in that way, when you treat hindrances in that way, then the mind is at ease, naturally. The game of meditation is not to become completely distraction-less. The game of meditation is to develop insight and wisdom, because that's what liberates you from suffering. The distractions will go away on their own when you have wisdom and insight.

So the culmination of meditation is right effort and right mindfulness, which leads invariably to right collectedness. Now, when we talk about the different mental states, we talked about liberated and unliberated mind. What is a liberated mind? Well, in the very traditional sense, it's the mind that has experienced one of the stages of awakening. Very simply put, it has experienced one of the stages of awakening.

Or it's unliberated, it hasn't experienced that yet. But another way of looking at it is, is the mind liberated from this particular hindrance in this moment or not? Is the mind liberated from the distractions of the world at large or not? Because the jhanas, which we'll start to talk about from tomorrow, are seen as temporary liberations: liberation from the hindrances, liberation from coarser mental experiences, liberation from subtler mental experiences, and liberation from all feeling and perception completely, where the mind experiences total stillness.

Such deep stillness that nothing penetrates it anymore, and it experiences Nirvana or Nibbana. But in order for us to get there, first we need the sila, first we need the ethics, which allows our mind to be collected enough, utilizing the tools of right effort and right mindfulness. When you have this, when you have this order, collectedness, when you have this sequence, naturally follows. A lot of people have a topsy-turvy approach. They want to meditate first. They want to get right to it, and they want to sit down and concentrate and become one-pointed and have single focus on a mantra or the breath or a point below the nose or whatever else it is, and they go there for 10 days, and they say, oh no, the first seven days were terrible, just awful.

And then something happened by the eighth day or the ninth day, and I had some kind of psychedelic experience that was wonderful, and they have a podcast about it, and they talk about it, and they say, you know, we went to this retreat, and we did this, and we did that. And then after two weeks and three weeks, they realize nothing's really changed. So what do they do?

They go back to retreat again the next year, and the next year, and the next year. It becomes a process of experience chasing. I would rather not be an experience chaser, and I would rather not have that for you guys either. Do not chase after experiences, because all experience is conditionally dependent. All experience is impermanent. Have the intention to be free of all experiences.

Have the maturity to be wanting to be free of all experiences. When I see people who just want to go on retreat and they want to have this jhana and that jhana, they're babies, they're infants. They're toddling about in meditation, not realizing that there is gold beyond all that dirt. There is the fruit of ambrosia if they only dig deeper, if they only climb higher. They become very content with jhanas.

So, the last of the four foundations is known as Dhamma. Dhamma, in terms of Dhamma as the plural of phenomena. Excuse me. So, these are mental phenomena, primarily, and they're discussed in the form of the five hindrances. Those are mental phenomena. When you recognize, here is sensual craving. When you recognize, here is ill will or aversion.

When you recognize, oh, here is restlessness. When you recognize, here is sloth and torpor. Or when you recognize, here is doubt. That is the mindfulness of mental phenomena in regard to hindrances. So what are these hindrances? Let's get into what are the qualities of these hindrances. How do they come about? What is their sign? The hindrance of sensual desire is where we start to get caught up in a sense experience that comes up that is pleasing generally to the eye, the ear, the nose, the body, the tongue, even the mind.

And that thought process of wanting to own that particular sensual object becomes rampant in the mind, takes us away from our object. And we become obsessive around that. And so we use right effort to let that go and bring our mind back, to recondition our mind, to get to that task positive network. When we talk about aversion, we're talking about a mind where you experience something that is distracting to the mind, and you get caught up in that. You get caught up in the sound of the lawnmower, you get caught up in the sound of the door opening and closing.

You get caught up in that and you have aversion towards it. You're upset by it, you're frustrated by it, you're irritated by it, you want it to stop. Restlessness is a mind that is anxious, or a mind that is overly overthinking about this, that or the other. There is agitation in the mind. It's like wind-whipped water, as they would call it.

So here the mind is either trying too hard, it's pushing too much, which ripples, creates ripples in the mind, and that's the agitation. Soften. Don't resist or push. Soften. Smile. That relieves the mind from that restlessness. What is sloth and torpor? There comes a point in your meditation where you're thinking that you're with your object. And you think you're staying with your object.

And after a while, the mind slowly drifts away from its object, and it experiences sloth. And there is a fogginess to the mind. There's a dullness to the mind. And it's like a black cloud over the mind. There's a heaviness to the mind. And you don't realize it until you've fallen asleep. Until it's too late. Then there's something called doubt.

What is doubt? Are we talking about doubt in terms of the practice? Are we talking about doubt in terms of the Buddha, Dhamma and Sangha? We're talking about doubt in terms of being confused of what is the difference between what is wholesome and unwholesome. So practically speaking, we're talking about doubt in terms of not being aware what particular state of mind is present right now.

I can't tell whether I'm experiencing jhana, I can't tell if I'm experiencing a hindrance, I can't tell if I'm experiencing joy, whatever it might be. I can't tell if I'm with my object of meditation. So how do you deal with these hindrances? Yes, we've talked about the general idea of the six R's. But there are certain kinds of antidotes to these hindrances.

And this is where we get into the territory of the mindfulness of the enlightenment factors. What are the enlightenment factors? There are seven of them: mindfulness, investigation of states, energy, joy, tranquility, collectedness, and equanimity. So mindfulness is the first enlightenment factor, which means you can't do anything without mindfulness in the practice. The ability to be present with what is going on, that is the mindfulness.

The investigation of states is the understanding of what is present in the mind and what is not present. This is the antidote to doubt. Joy and energy, or energy and joy, however you want to put it, these are the antidotes to sloth and torpor. You have a certain level of interest in what you're doing, that's the joy, and you raise your energy because of that, so now the sloth and torpor becomes lighter, that fog starts to clear away. Tranquility helps to let go of the agitation and the restlessness in the mind. So, collectedness, what does collectedness do?

Collectedness helps to keep the mind still. It keeps the mind stable. It doesn't get agitated by aversion. It doesn't get agitated by craving. When you experience this joy that I'm talking about, you become less interested in sensual pleasures. When you experience piti, which is the joy of jhana, you become less interested in any kind of sensual pleasure.

You become more aware of the lackluster nature of worldly kind of joy. You might become disenchanted with it, and that's totally fine, because you take refuge, you find comfort and stability in the inner joy, the joy that is not dependent upon anything outside. And obviously when you are joyful and collected, you won't have aversion, because things just pass right through you.

You don't get irritated by things. You find the joy in every moment. You have the collectedness to see, and the equanimity, which is the fruit of all of this. Now, the beautiful thing about this practice is when you are doing it the way that the Buddha intended, you don't need to focus on one individual factor or one individual foundation of mindfulness. It all works together.

In what way? Well, for example, when you are meditating with loving-kindness, what is happening? You are bringing up your object of meditation, that is a mental object, that is also a feeling of loving-kindness, that is also a sensation of warmth in the body, let's say. And you are aware of your mindfulness, you're aware of the joy that arises, the jhanic states that arise.

Now, when a hindrance is present, when your mindfulness has faltered and you come back and see and recognize here is a hindrance, there too you're utilizing mindfulness. Now, when you recognize that hindrance, you're utilizing the mindfulness factor and the investigation of states factor, because you're mindful in that moment and you're aware here is a hindrance. The mind is not free of the hindrance.

When you release and relax, you now are engaging with the energy factor. You're balancing the energy, you're tranquilizing the body, you're tranquilizing mental formations. When you bring up the smile, or bring up an uplifting object, you are dealing with engagement and interest in the form of this joy. And when you bring your attention back to its object, you're engaging with the collectedness enlightenment factor. And when you do this in such a way that you don't choose to push or resist or control the outcome, you have equanimity.

So it all works together. It's not something you need to do individually. It's a full package that you're doing when you're doing this practice. There are so many other things and elements that are present, like what are known as the 37 requisites for awakening. But I won't go into that much detail because it's not necessary. It's just to be aware that you are practicing mindfulness when you're doing meditation in this way. You are practicing right effort when you are letting go in this way.

You are practicing the other factors of the Eightfold Path when you keep to the precepts, when you engage with the world and in the world in a way that is not causing you harm and not causing others harm. The Buddha always talks about this. He talks about it in the form of: the wholesome and the skillful is that which does not cause you harm, nor causes others harm.

So, when you sit down for meditation and you're practicing in this way, trust in the fact that you're already engaging with the factors of the Eightfold Path, that you're already engaging with right effort and right mindfulness in this way. That every time you utilize the six R's, whether it's in meditation or in life, you are balancing the enlightenment factors.

That when you recognize the five hindrances, you're utilizing mindfulness over there. And finally, there's the mindfulness of the four noble truths. This is the ultimate fruit, let's say, of the Buddha's awakening: the knowledge and vision of the Four Noble Truths. What are the Four Noble Truths? The first is that there is suffering in life. The second is that there are causes and conditions for the suffering. The third is that there is a cessation of the suffering. And the fourth is that there is a path that leads to the end and cessation of the suffering.

So now let's look at it in the context of meditation. I'm meditating, I have loving-kindness, or I have compassion, or I'm radiating, and I'm doing well for the first three minutes, for the first five minutes, for the first ten minutes, or maybe even just for the first thirty seconds. And after thirty seconds, after forty seconds, after a minute, a hindrance arises.

My mind is no longer on its object. The performer has disappeared. The stage light operator has fallen asleep. Mindfulness is nowhere to be found. Scuttling about, trying to find what's going on. But as soon as I recognized, oh, I got distracted, my mind is distracted, what happened? The stage manager found the spotlight operator and said, wake up, do your job.

And so now the spotlight is back on the object. Now I have recognized, ah, here is the hindrance. That hindrance is the first noble truth of suffering. That hindrance is suffering. What is causing that suffering? In that moment, what is causing that suffering? The identification with that hindrance. The engagement with that hindrance. The resistance to that hindrance. The desire to control how that hindrance comes and goes.

So I release my attention that causes the continuance of that hindrance. You heard that statement, right? Energy flows where attention goes. So if our attention is on the hindrance, it's providing more energy to that hindrance. But if I release and relax, I have let go, abandoned that cause for suffering in that form of that hindrance. And in that moment I have experienced the cessation of that hindrance.

Why? Because I'm utilizing the path which is encapsulated in the six R's. So every time you do this process you are engaging with the Eightfold Path. You're engaging with the four foundations of mindfulness. You are learning to understand for yourself what is suffering, learning how to abandon the causes of suffering, learning to experience the cessation of suffering, and learning to cultivate the path that leads to the cessation of suffering. You don't need to be studying some kind of diploma course for a year or go to a university to get a PhD in Buddhism to learn all this. Just do the meditation, just apply the Eightfold Path, keep your precepts, your wisdom will develop naturally. You will be wiser than any of the greatest Buddhist scholars that have ever lived, because none of them have actually meditated in their lives; they've just been reading books all their lives.

They're great translators. They're great transliterators. They're great scholars. They can tell you, just by memorizing, this is what this sutta says. This sutta 5.2 point, whatever it is, in this particular line, that's what it says in Pali. This is what it says in Sanskrit. This is what it says in the English. This particular word means that. So what?

So what? But when you develop the practice the way that you're developing here, you will be wiser than all those guys, because you will see for yourself how this path works. You will see for yourself what the Buddha meant when he said, "This is the Dhamma that is easily, just come and see for yourself." It is easily effective.

It's quick and effective. Because the moment you take those steps, you start to see how your mind disengages from suffering. So that's all I've got for you today. Does anybody have any questions? I've never heard anyone else say that, but actually when you're feeling the practice, you are already feeling that, so that means two things: the cessation of perception and feeling, and secondly, the freedom from identification with experience, which is the cessation of suffering, which is nibbana. Anatta is synonymous with emptiness, or shunyata, which is the emptiness of identification with that phenomena in that moment.

So in other words, there's a wonderful Sutta which the Buddha... it's very, very, very concise. It's one that I often talk about or often refer to, and it's called the Bahiya Sutta. And in that Sutta the instructions are: in the seeing there's only the seen, in the hearing there's only the heard, in the sensing there's only the sense, in the cognizing there's only the cognizing. In other words, experience flows just as it is, but without coming from the engagement of an I or me or myself.

To see through that and see experience as just an impersonal process is anatta. Any other questions? Okay, let's share some metta. May suffering ones be suffering free, and the fear-struck be fearless. May the grieving shed all grief, and may all beings find relief. May all beings share this merit that we have thus acquired for the acquisition of all kinds of happiness. May devas and nagas of mighty power share this merit of ours. May they long protect the Buddha's dispensation.