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Ajahn Amaro guided meditation

Posted: Sat Mar 17, 2018 11:07 pm
by Meezer77


My understanding is that the kind of thinking he describes helps to train you to become less emotional and more detached. But how do we do this without becoming too cold and clinical?

Re: Ajahn Amaro guided meditation

Posted: Sat Mar 17, 2018 11:51 pm
by Sam Vara
Meezer77 wrote: Sat Mar 17, 2018 11:07 pm
My understanding is that the kind of thinking he describes helps to train you to become less emotional and more detached. But how do we do this without becoming too cold and clinical?
I think that there are two possibilities. The first is to combine this type of practice with something that generates positive states for us; something like metta bhavana, or the cultivation of gratitude, or concern for other people.

The second is to apply the detachment described to those feelings that are cold or clinical, or to our fears that we might become cold and clinical. There is the assumption that if we become less attached to fabricated emotions, then the underlying cold reality will be revealed. But the belief that this is cold, and a reality, is also fabricated, and can also be abandoned. "Clinical" is something that we do, just as "needy" and "jealous" and "remorseful" are things that we do. We don't have to do it.

Re: Ajahn Amaro guided meditation

Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2018 1:25 am
by bodom
This video is not meant to be stand alone in relation to his other talks and meditation instructions just like the satipathanna sutta is not mean to be isolated from the rest of the teachings in the Canon. Ajahn Amaro has plenty of guided metta meditations online. Watch them inconjunction with this video.

:namaste:

Re: Ajahn Amaro guided meditation

Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2018 3:04 pm
by Meezer77
Sam Vara wrote: Sat Mar 17, 2018 11:51 pm
Meezer77 wrote: Sat Mar 17, 2018 11:07 pm
My understanding is that the kind of thinking he describes helps to train you to become less emotional and more detached. But how do we do this without becoming too cold and clinical?
I think that there are two possibilities. The first is to combine this type of practice with something that generates positive states for us; something like metta bhavana, or the cultivation of gratitude, or concern for other people.

The second is to apply the detachment described to those feelings that are cold or clinical, or to our fears that we might become cold and clinical. There is the assumption that if we become less attached to fabricated emotions, then the underlying cold reality will be revealed. But the belief that this is cold, and a reality, is also fabricated, and can also be abandoned. "Clinical" is something that we do, just as "needy" and "jealous" and "remorseful" are things that we do. We don't have to do it.
That makes sense. I liked this meditation as I feel I could benefit from becoming a bit more detached, but I bet it can take years to master depending on your temperament. I mean it's hard to imagine that you're sitting there in a terrible mood and being able to just say, "so?"

Re: Ajahn Amaro guided meditation

Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2018 7:48 pm
by paul
The practitioner cannot anticipate what will happen when they take a step to follow the path, they just have to take the step. Following the path means viewing conditioned things as impermanent and then implementing that understanding in daily life. The dhamma is a reality and cannot be personally discovered without penetrating new territory. That’s the way progress on the path is initiated. The Buddha exhorted practitioners to strive, and that word refers to right effort, one of whose ‘efforts’ is to overcome, and a tactic of overcoming is to apply the opposite, in this case wisdom, i.e. the understanding of impermanence, over ignorance. Taking this knowledge from the mental sphere into daily life is known as guarding and anchoring, and the spirit of it is this:

“What is proper resort as guarding? Here “A bikkhu, having entered inside a house, having gone into a street, goes with downcast eyes, seeing the length of a plough yoke, restrained, not looking at an elephant, not looking at a horse, a carriage, a pedestrian, a woman, a man, not looking up, not looking down, not staring this way and that”. This is called proper resort as guarding”.

“What is proper resort as anchoring? It is the four foundations of mindfulness on which the mind is anchored; for this is said by the Blessed One: “Bikkhus, what is a bikkhu’s resort, his own native place? It is these four foundations of mindfulness” (SN 47.7).” This is called proper resort as anchoring.”—-Vism. 1.50,51.

"Wander, monks, in what is your proper range, your own ancestral territory. In one who wanders in what is his proper range, his own ancestral territory, Mara gains no opening, Mara gains no foothold. And what, for a monk, is his proper range, his own ancestral territory? The four frames of reference. Which four? There is the case where a monk remains focused on the body in & of itself — ardent, alert, & mindful — putting aside greed & distress with reference to the world. He remains focused on feelings in & of themselves... mind in & of itself... mental qualities in & of themselves — ardent, alert, & mindful — putting aside greed & distress with reference to the world. This, for a monk, is his proper range, his own ancestral territory."
---SN 47.7
This gives an indication of how the lay practitioner progressing towards stream winning must break away from the attitudes of the puthujjana.

Re: Ajahn Amaro guided meditation

Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2018 3:27 am
by Saengnapha
Meezer77 wrote: Sat Mar 17, 2018 11:07 pm

My understanding is that the kind of thinking he describes helps to train you to become less emotional and more detached. But how do we do this without becoming too cold and clinical?
When you let go of the content of your experience, it changes your feeling about experience. You are not defending any longer. It is more like an embrace and that is anything but cold and clinical. Experience becomes immediate, full and empty at the same time, and love is present. This is to be experienced in one's practice.

Re: Ajahn Amaro guided meditation

Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2018 10:24 pm
by Meezer77
Saengnapha wrote: Tue Mar 20, 2018 3:27 am
Meezer77 wrote: Sat Mar 17, 2018 11:07 pm

My understanding is that the kind of thinking he describes helps to train you to become less emotional and more detached. But how do we do this without becoming too cold and clinical?
When you let go of the content of your experience, it changes your feeling about experience. You are not defending any longer. It is more like an embrace and that is anything but cold and clinical. Experience becomes immediate, full and empty at the same time, and love is present. This is to be experienced in one's practice.
Thanks 😊 That's a nice way of explaining it

Re: Ajahn Amaro guided meditation

Posted: Wed Apr 11, 2018 2:01 pm
by tellyontellyon
I heard another talk by Ajahn Amaro where he talks about a story of the Buddha and his disciple Ananda eating a beautiful meal. Ananda began to talk about how wonderful it was that the Buddha was indifferent to the taste of the food. But the Buddha told Ananda that he was wrong and gave Ananda some food to eat from his own bowl. This allowed Ananda to taste food as a Buddha tastes food. The food was incredible, bursting with flavour.
The lesson was that Buddhahood is not a state of indifference or numbness, a Buddha actually feels even more intensely pleasant and unpleasant feelings, the difference is in not having attraction or aversion... and so there is no suffering.