2. Day 0 evening: Meditation Instructions

This is our first meditation instructions that we will be giving you this evening. We’ve mentioned that our meditation technique is known as satipatthana bhavana. Satipatthana is made up of two words: sati and patthana. We’re going to have to say much about this word and these practices called sati over the coming days. Its regular translation is mindfulness but we use the word awareness as well interchangeably. Mindfulness and awareness. Its meaning is attentiveness directed to the present moment. When we’re mindful, we are directing our attention to whatever is occurring in the present moment. So we’re directing our attention to the present. We are activating present moment awareness. We are switching it on, we are turning on our mindfulness. Patthana can have two meanings. It means either establishing or arousing. In its passive sense, it means establishing our awareness in the present moment or directing our attention in the present moment on to something, on to a foundation. There are four foundations that we will be talking about. Physical sensations, feelings, emotional states and thoughts – the four foundations on which mindfulness can be directed. Patthana can also have an active meaning. It means arousing. Arousing awareness in the present moment, arousing our attention in the present moment. So satipatthana, that is what our meditation practice is called.

We will be observing and activating our awareness in the present 16 moment on the very fast flowing range of objects. We will be starting with the physical sensations in the body, because they’re a little bit slower, a little bit grosser and easier to see. We will be transitioning in our meditation practice so that we can watch feeling, pleasant and unpleasant and emotional states and our thought patterns as well. Bhavana means mind development, mind cultivation or mind training.

So establishing mindfulness in the present moment on one of the four foundations of mindfulness – that’s what we are doing here this week. And your ability to establish your awareness in the present moment on whatever object is arising will lead you to see that object as it really is. We see things as they really are. And this is what is meant by clear seeing or Vipassana. Vi-passana. Pass means to see. Ana means it is a noun. Vi is an intensifying prefix. We are seeing things really clearly. We are seeing things so well, that the mind disengages, stops identifying with it, stops taking it as me, being for me or happening to me or as mine or as being I and let’s it go. We have clearly seen that object.

So satipatthana is the cause, Vipassana is the result. We establish our awareness in the present moment on one of the four foundations of mindfulness and that allows Vipassana to occur, clear seeing to occur.

And what is it that we’re having insight into? We’re observing not only the contents of our mind, but we’re observing the structure of our mind. We are seeing that all objects arise and pass away, but in particular all objects also have certain particular characteristics. They’re all impermanent, they’re all relatively unsatisfactory, in relation to the unconditioned element and they’re all non-self. They don’t belong to anybody. It’s all impersonal. It’s an impersonal flow that is going on.

When we see the structure of our experience in this way, it allows us to let go of things. The sense of self is let go surely and gradually. Thoughts of me, mine and I become less and eventually this leads to the complete cessation of being. The complete cessation of suffering. And that’s an experience the Buddha called nirvana – that cessation of dukkha.

Tonight, so that we can begin our practice, we have divided our instructions into three parts.

First of all we will be having a look at the practice of virtue, because 17 it’s one of the major conditions that we need to put in place. We will be having a look at our sitting meditation and also our walking meditation. These instructions are for the formal sitting and walking periods. The practice of virtue is all day everyday whilst we’re on the retreat. So be continuous in your mindfulness and practice throughout the day in order for Vipassana knowledge to unfold. As I said this afternoon, these Vipassana insights that arise from satipatthana meditation are conditioned. Conditioned by satipatthana. Conditioned by your ability to maintain your awareness in the present moment, to maintain your awareness internally, and your ability to continuously do this over and over again over a period of time. When these conditions are in place, the results start to flow naturally. As I said, there is nothing you can do to stop them from unfolding naturally in the mind.

2.1. Sila

The practice of sila or virtue begins with abstaining from unwholesome verbal and physical actions. The most gross of our three intentional doorways we have through body, speech and mind and our virtue practice will be to moderate our verbal actions and our physical actions. Purification of virtue is said by the Buddha to be the base upon which all other meditative practices are based. So if you are sincere in your effort and you wish to have the experience of insight, it is well recommended to you to maintain virtue. Tonight I’m not going to give you a sermon on morality but since the success of your meditation practice is conditioned by the practice of virtue, it’s worth taking note of these things. Of the noble eightfold path, the third, fourth and fifth factors are all concerned with virtue. So three out of eight factors of the noble eightfold path are to do with sila or morality.

The first one is called samma vaca, meaning right speech. Basically we are abstaining or stopping four types of unwholesome speech occurring. Of course in the retreat you’re all in silence. So this one is pretty much covered. For the sake of completeness we avoid telling lies to others. We avoid hard, rude speech to others. We avoid back stabbing others, that means talking about somebody to someone else in the hope that your opinion of that person will be conveyed to another person. The fourth one is gossiping.

The fourth factor of the noble eight fold path, samma kammanta means 18 right action. We abstain from three types of particular actions. We don’t kill anything, we don’t steal anything or take something which has not been given to us and we abstain from sexual misconduct. Sexual misconduct means relations with people that are inappropriate for us to have sexual relations with, whether they are people who are minors, or younger or children, whether they are people who are already in a relationship. Or even the kind of activity like raping somebody. This is all sexual misconduct. Adultery where taking someone’s husband or wife and having sexual relations with them. This is something that is very harmful for the other partner unless they have of course some agreement between themselves.

The fifth factor is samma ajiva or right livelihood. It means earning a living without harming anybody else. Having a right livelihood, having a livelihood which is beneficial for other beings. Specifically we avoid trading in things like guns or poisons or drugs or intoxicants. We try to make sure we don’t sell flesh from animals. We don’t make it to our business to be killing beings or taking unfairly the resources from other beings using them for ourselves or profiting by them for ourselves.

So we are practicing right speech, right action and right livelihood whilst we’re on the retreat here. This is a very firm base on which we can practice our meditation.

Whilst we’re on the retreat here, we will be following what is known as the eight precepts. In the morning we will chant the eight precepts. Basically they are no killing, no stealing, no lying, abstaining from sexual intercourse, abstaining from drugs and alcohol and abstaining from high and luxurious seats and beddings, abstaining from eating in the afternoon and not using any jewelry or flowers or trying to look fancy in any way, not listening to music or watching any shows.

An additional rule is not to speak with contempt about somebody who has already attained the noble eight fold path, somebody who has already become enlightened. You should be careful about this. This can disturb your meditation practice, maybe not in the beginning but later on, if ever you have said something detrimental or something negative about somebody who has become enlightened. You should make an apology – just in your own mind and then forgive yourself for making that mistake. That can clear certain 19 blockages away.

2.2. Sitting meditation

How do we do the sitting meditation? First of all we’re going to start to have a look at the position. When we’re sitting in meditation we need to try to be as comfortable as possible. We want to be comfortable for at least 45 minutes. That can be quite difficult in the beginning stages. When you’ve sat for a full session, you feel very much invigorated. You feel like you’ve been successful and you will find that you can sit for 45 minutes again and again and again once you have broken through that limit.

What I’m going to show you now is a few of the sitting postures. The most simple of them is just the cross legged position. It’s called sukhasana. Happy posture if you like. The problem with this posture is that all your weight will be distributed on to very small areas around your ankles and on to the sit bones. So after a while it becomes quite painful.

The second posture that we use as well is called the quarter lotus. That’s done by putting your foot up on the calf of the other leg. Normally, we put the left leg under the right leg. But other traditions have other styles. If your legs are not properly stretched, you will find some tension points underneath because there’s not a great deal of flatness.

Then we have what is know as the half lotus. Half lotus is the posture I like to sit in personally. We take the sole of our foot and tuck it into our groin. Nice and close and then you put the sole of your foot on the inside of your thigh. Your leg is kind of turned over a little bit that your anklebone is not even touching the floor. It’s kind of tucked under. All the weight is along this shinbone. So it’s a nice and continuous flat surface that doesn’t have any pressure points.

Another very comfortable posture is the posture that the Burmese monks and nuns like to take. It starts with the same thing, sole running on the inside of this thigh and then instead of putting it up on the thigh, leave it in front. That’s the most comfortable one. The most important thing is that you are flat and comfortable.

Those who want to get the little fancy can try to do the full lotus posture. Quite uncomfortable, quite painful for most people. You can get it 20 going for a few minutes and after that it starts to become uncomfortable. You can try to sit in the shallow water on the beach whilst you’re here on the island. Gravity in the water is a little bit different.

We mentioned this afternoon the numbness in the legs, which can quite often happen if we are leaning over our legs. So make sure that your back is up straight. If you start leaning forward, all the weight will go down on your legs and you start to get numb. If you find that you’re getting a little bit numb, you can try just to leaning back a little bit. For a minute or two you just lean back and take away the weight of your legs. We don’t want to be tense with our back. We are not trying to stretch the head and touch the roof, but we’re not leaning over either. You just want to be with a straight spine up in a row allowing the spine and skeleton to support the weight of the body rather than trying to use your muscles. In that way the breath can flow in and out quite comfortably.

Where do we keep our hands? I like to keep my right hand on top of the left and allow the thumbs to touch a little bit sometimes. If that becomes a little bit too warm for you, you can move your hands and put them half way. You can even spread your fingers a little bit. So they just sit down there in the lap in a comfortable position. Some people like to put their hands on their knees. That’s fine as well. That can be nice and stable as well. Just be careful when you start to put your hands on your knees, it doesn’t make you start leaning forward. And then your legs might become numb and your breathing won’t be flowing as smoothly as it could be. Hands on the knees is fine or even half way down on the thighs as well is fine.

As far as your eyes are concerned, you can keep your eyes open or you can keep them closed or you can do a bit of both. Most people will meditate with their eyes closed. But also meditating with the eyes open is very, very effective. There’s nothing to stop us to come into the present with the eyes open. In fact, as our practice develops, you’ll be meditating with your eyes open more and more. Especially in our daily life, we have our eyes open most of the time when we are awake. So you can start keeping your eyes open, but eventually they will close down when you become more and more concentrated. – Just lightly close your eyes. As beginners, we often want to see things with our eyes in the meditation, however, meditation is not carried 21 out by the eyes. It’s carried out by the mind. We are trying to see with the mind. – Try to let the eyes go. I know it’s a place where consciousness very often arises. It arises at the eye door. It arises at the ear door. Continuously, over and over again. Consciousness is used to being in these areas of the body process. – So in our practice, we try to resist the urge to use the eyes all the time in our meditation.

That’s the preliminary instruction. You’re setting yourself up, the posture. We want to be able to maintain this sitting for at least 45 minutes. If during the sitting, it becomes extremely painful, of course, you can move your legs a little bit. When I started to sit in meditation, it was extremely painful. I started by lightening an incense stick which burns for 45 minutes. I started sitting for 15 minutes cross legged, and then I moved by putting my leg on the side, and do that for another 15 minutes, and then when that became too painful I put my legs to the other side. And that was the first few months of my meditation practice.

If you find that it is really, really uncomfortable, just stand up. You can stand up for a few minutes and then sit back down again. Just because you are changing postures from sitting to standing to sitting, it doesn’t mean that your meditation has to stop at all. Your meditation can continue in the present moment as you change your body.

We learn to meditate by sitting as still as possible because it’s easier. Once you have the hang on it, we don’t need to meditate in a still sitting position. We can meditate throughout the day in anyone of the four postures, walking, standing, sitting, lying down, and in fact, in any of the other postures we get the body in when we’re doing other activities.

2.3. First stage: Internalizing awareness – letting go of past and future

So let’s have a look at our sitting meditation now with the first step. We have established our body, found a comfortable position to sit in. What’s the first thing we do? We start paying attention to the present moment. This is the beginning of our mind development. We are gathering the mind into the present moment. It likes to wander into the past and future. We are just bringing it back and internalizing our awareness. We do this continuously 22 the first few moments of our meditation sitting. The first minute, at least, this should be your only object. Don’t come into the hall and start immediately watching your breath. You need to establish your awareness in the present moment and you need to internalize your awareness. So our first step is continuously directing the mind to the now. And just hold it with that as the object now. Just being aware of now. Present. Present. Just keep directing the mind bringing it into the center. Again and again. If it wanders off, don’t be upset. We just bring it back and start again. Be aware when thoughts arise of the past – memory, or of the future – planning, and bring yourself back into the present. If your mind goes into the past or future, stop it quickly. Be aware and alert that you’ve just exited meditation and you’re just sitting on the floor in a hall on a mountain, no longer meditating. You’re engaging in your thoughts. You’re no longer present, you’re no longer here. So bring yourself back to the present. Many will find that this is a major part of their meditation practice for the first few days that they are here. – This is the first stage in letting go. We are letting go of the past and future, we are coming into the present.

2.4. Second stage: Feeling body sensation – letting go of the body

Once you’ve been able to do that, then we direct our attention internally. We direct this present moment awareness, we have established in the first minute and bring it inside. We climb inside the body. We direct our awareness to become aware of the whole body as it is sitting on our mat. Do you become aware of how it feels like? What does the sensation of a whole body feel like? Bring your mind in, be actually inside your body. Climb inside it. If you can’t catch the whole body posture of sitting at once, start at the top and know what the top half of your body feels like and then become aware of the bottom half of the body. Become aware if there is something sitting on the mat. There is something sitting on the mat and it’s breathing! So climb inside and feel what it’s like to actually have that sensation of a whole body sitting there. Start from the top, work your way down. You can even move through your body, if that helps. We’re directing our attention to the sensation of the whole mass of the body as it is sitting there.

23 How do you know that you have a body when your eyes are closed? How do you know it’s there? Just examining that. Can you feel that there is something sitting on the mat? You can’t see it when your eyes are closed and you can’t smell it and you’ve stopped thinking about it. Conceptually you can create an image of your body in your mind, so you can perceive the body. We can perceive the body through the eye door. We can perceive the body through the mind door as a concept. We can even smell the body. We can hear it, making sounds. So there’s many different ways to perceive the body. But what we are interested in here, is perceiving the body through the body door itself. Through the skin! Through the internal sensations of the whole thing. We are not looking at the body, we are not hearing the body, smelling or even licking the body. We want to experience the body through the sense door of touch.

So this is the second object of our meditation practice. And we do this for the second minute of each sitting. Some people will experience the sensation of the body as being all around them. Some people will have the experience being aware of the body from some viewpoint up on the shoulders somewhere. We are not trying to picture the body, to create a mind image of the body, of what you think the body looks like when you’re sitting on the mat. That’s not the object we’re doing here. The object is just the sensation of the whole thing as it’s sitting here. It’s a very subtle physical sensation. You can move your mind in and out, up and down. You can move it, you can feel it. This sensation is there. We are observing the whole body.

First, we let go of the past and the future and we stick with the present. Secondly, we let go of the external world and we are focusing on the internal world. This is the second stage of letting go. Our meditation practice is letting go only. How far, how much can you let go of in the present moment. If you’re noticing and identifying that you are attaching with something, let it go. Our practice is only about letting go. The Buddha’s teaching is only about letting go. Letting go of the idea that you have a personality, that you are a self. In fact, enlightenment takes place, when you have completely let go of the sense of self. That is what we are aiming for. First we’re going to let go of the past and future, we are going to let go of the external world, and then we’re going to start to let go of the physical body. And then we are 24 going to let go of the mental states as well. When we have let go of everything, when there’s nothing left to let go of, the mind experiences that which is beyond conditioned realm. It experiences the unconditioned.

2.5. Third stage: Using the breath to maintain awareness

The third stage of our meditation practice is to start paying attention to the breath. We start to become aware that the breath is flowing in through the nostrils, down through the body to the abdomen. The breath is flowing in and the breath is flowing out. We are going to use the breath, that occurs many times a minute, 12 times in and 12 times out, if you are a regular breather. Sometimes it’s faster, sometimes it’s slower. We are going to be using this flow of the breath as a concept to maintain awareness in the present moment. We are using the breath! As a conceptual structure to maintain our awareness in the present moment. What we are really looking to paying attention to, though, is the physical sensations that are created by the breath that flows in and out of the body. This practice is called chatu dhatu bhavana manasikara, which means paying attention to the four elements. The four elements is what makes up this body. This physical mass that is sitting here, it’s a combination of six elements, actually. We are going to use four of them for our meditation practice in the beginning days. We can cover the other elements later. So what we are directing our attention to is the physical sensations created by four of those elements. We normally just refer to them in English as earth, water, fire and air.

2.6. The four elements

The body is made up of these four physical elements. Don’t take those words literally. Don’t think of a handful of earth, a glass of water, or a mouth full of breath. That’s not what we are talking about here. This is very different from what those words mean. So don’t get lost in the translation.

All along the breath path, as the breath flows in and as the breath flows out, various physical sensations will take place. Some of the sensations will be around the nose area, some of them will be around the throat area, or around the heart area, some of them will be down in the abdomen. It’s possible to feel the breath right up through the head and right away through 25 the body down to the legs. The anatomists and physiologist tell us, that the breath is coming from the nose into the lungs and it does come out again without going any further than the lungs. That may well be true. What we’re actually interested in, however, is the sensations created by the breath as it flows in and out. And the physical sensations go further than the lungs. The physical sensations flow right away through the body. In fact, when your lungs expand, your diaphragm gets pushed down and your stomach moves out. So the oxygen exchange is happening in the lungs. The physical sensations that the breath creates are happening throughout the body. And this is our main object of meditation in the first days of practice. The physical sensations that are created by the breath.

These physical sensations are the characteristics of the four elements. They are the manifestation of the four elements. Those four elements in Pali are pruṭhavī, āpa, teja and vāyu. Earth, water, fire and air. We can think about them in various ways.

• The earth element is really the element of extension. It’s the element of solidity. Anything that is solid within this mind and body process sitting here, whether the bones or flesh or the ligaments or the skin, they’re all solid things. There is a certain solidity to our body. It’s a base. It’s something real. My one weighs about 90 kg at the moment. It’s a solid mass of stuff. This is just a foundation for the other elements to play in.

• There is also the fire element. The fire element is just the element of temperature. This body does have a temperature aspect to it. 37 or 38°. Sometimes it feels very warm, sometimes it feels very cold which may be just a temperature fluctuation of half a degree or so. But the fact that this thing has any temperature aspect to it at all, means that the fire element is there.

• There is also the air element which manifests in many different ways. It manifests as the breath and it manifests in other various ways as well. As pressures and tensions, tingling and vibrations. The air element is flowing throughout the body. The air element is not restricting itself to the nose, the lungs and back again. It’s the energies that flow throughout the body. Different traditions will have different names for 26 the air element. In the Chinese tradition it’s known as chi. In the Indian tradition it’s known as prana. In this Pali tradition it’s referred to as vāyu . This is the element of forces. There are those various forces that are happening in the body. It’s the air element that activates the body and moves it from here and there. The solidity and the fire get pushed around by the air element combining together.

• These three elements would be completely separate from each other, if there wasn’t for the water element. The water element is the element that combines these things together. The solid base, the temperature and the energies and forces, that are moving throughout the body, are all held together into a unit, compacted into a body that we call mine, my body. So the water element is cohesive. Now just imagine when you are making some bread, you put some flour which is a powder, some salt which is a powder, some yeast which is a powder in a metal bowl and spin them around. So these three ingredients are there but they’re just powder in a bowl. As soon as you start to add some water to it, it starts to come together to a dough, into a solid mass. Well, this is what our body is. It’s a combination of the earth element, the fire element, the air element and the water element.

• There’s also the space element, akasa. It’s also there. It’s very subtle. It’s a different type of meditation practice, but it’s there. We are concentrating on the four elements when we are investigating the body.

These four elements can manifest in different ways. They manifest as different physical sensations. An element can either be strong or weak and they are always fluctuating, always flowing.

If the fire element becomes stronger, then the body becomes warm. If the fire element and gets weak, then the body becomes cool. There’s a sensation of coldness. The fire element has a weak aspect and a strong aspect. The other elements are the same as well.

If the earth element manifests in a strong way, it will be manifesting as hardness, roughness and heaviness. It’s like your teeth are hard and solid. Your fingernails are hard and solid. There’s kind of a roughness if you run your hand through your hair if your hair is short. The earth element can also manifest in a weak manner. It can manifest as softness, smoothness and 27 lightness. Touch your lips with your tongue. There is softness there. The earth element has two aspects to it. It can be either weak or strong. How its characteristics are manifesting, will give you different physical sensations. Hardness, roughness, heaviness, softness, smoothness, lightness. The same thing, they are all the earth element and they will be manifesting in your body continuously. Sometimes the body feels hard, sometimes it feels soft, sometimes it feels very heavy, sometimes it feels very light. It’s the earth element playing around.

The air element, which we will be focusing on a lot this week, the breath in particular as it flows in and out and the abdomen as it rises and falls, displays many different physical sensations. If the breath is fast, then the physical sensations will be pushing and pressure and resistance. If the breath is long and smooth and calm, you will get those smooth and comfortable sensations. You’ll feel gliding, you’ll feel flowing. So depending on how you are breathing, different physical sensations will start to manifest. When the air element manifests at full strength, it will appear as forces rising up, from near the buttocks’ area and forcing up your back. Pushing, supporting your whole back. You feel the energy keeping the body erect. If it wasn’t for that air element, the body would just collapse on the floor. It’s the air element constantly flowing up through the back around and up. It’s consistently flowing. Our arms extending and bending, it’s all the air element.

We’ll be watching out for these physical sensations as our meditation unfolds. In fact, this is the main object of our meditation practice. To become aware, to fully understand, to clearly see the physical body. The physical body needs to be let go of. We’ve been attaching and identifying with it too long already. It has caused a lot of troubles when we attach and identify with the body. So this meditation is to allow us to see the body as it really is. We see the nature of the body and will be able to let go the body. Letting go means not identifying with the body.

Our meditation practice will transition. We will start to use the breath. It flows in and it flows out. This is a conceptual framework that we follow. What we are really interested in, however, are the physical sensations created by the breath. I want you to pay particular attention to three areas as the breath is flowing in and flowing out. In particular I want you to pay 28 attention to the nostril area, the area around the upper lip. Can you feel the breath flowing in? Is there a physical sensation of touching? Can you feel the warmth as it comes out, the coolness as it goes in? Can you feel the vibration that is occurring? Vibrating, it’s the air element. Warmth or coolness, that’s the fire element. Touching sensation, that’s the earth element. Can you feel it flowing down through the body? So we are following it all through the body. We are really only interested in the physical sensations created by the breath. We are not interested in the images or little maps, that you create for yourself of the body.

As it flows down to the chest, you feel some rubbing or some gliding. And then I want you all to pay particular attention to the abdomen as it rises and falls. You breathe in, the abdomen rises. There’s a certain physical sensations that occurs there. As the abdomen falls, there’s a certain physical sensation as well. In fact, there are many different physical sensations. Pushing, twisting, pressure, vibration, tingling, throbbing. All those sensations are there for you to pay attention to.

These physical sensations are not the four elements themselves. These physical sensations are the manifestation of the four elements. We are going to be bringing ourselves into the present moment, internalizing our awareness, then we start paying attention to the breath as it flows from the nose to the abdomen, and from the abdomen to the nose. We are using this concept of the breath to get in touch with the physical sensations. And we’re going to do this continuously over and over again.

We can give you an example of the type of knowledge that arises when we start to watch this way. First of all we are looking at a conceptual thing. And then we are looking at physical sensations. And then we will breakthrough and we will see the actual elements themselves. But this doesn’t happen automatically. We will give you an example of the car down there in the carpark. If someone was to ask you, «so what is it that is sitting there in the carpark?» Our first reaction is, «it’s a pick-up, or it’s a Toyota or it’s a car.» That is a conceptual answer. Yes, there is a general thing there that we call a car. If we look a little bit closer, however, we will start to see actually, what we call car is just a conceptual idea. It’s actually made up of car parts. As we try to describe what it is, «well, there is some wheels, there is some 29 doors, there’s a bonnet, there’s a tailgate, there’s an engine». It’s actually not a car that is sitting there. It’s just an arrangement of car parts. Parts have been arranged in a particular way and so it produces this image of car. That’s what we are normally used to dealing with – concepts! We don’t normally deal with ultimate realities. If they keep asking you, «well, what’s really there?» What is really in the carpark? When you really examine what is sitting there in the carpark, you will find out it is just metal, just glass, rubber and plastic. You will see the car in that way. So our perceptions can change in the way that we see things. We are used to see the body as a conceptual thing. As being my body. We are going to start to have a look at it a little bit more closely. We will start to observe, okay, let’s make our mind present, let’s internalize our awareness, and let’s really have a good look and see and find out what this body is. We come to an understanding of the four elements by going through the physical sensations created by the breath. The breath sensations contain all the four elements. The elements change and the way that we can perceive their change is through the physical sensations that make up the body. In fact, the body is nothing other than these physical sensations and our concepts that we paint on top of it. So that’s what is actually happening in real-time. There is the real things, your physical sensations created by the four elements and then there is what you paint on top. Your conceptual notions of yourself, what you believe you are. Whether you believe it’s a man or a woman, or it believes it’s this nationality or that nationality. Whether it believes, it’s a smart person or a stupid person. Whether it believes it’s rich or poor. Funny or serious. It’s painted all these different things on top of it. We’re going to strip off all those concepts that you painted on yourself and we just want to have a look and see actually what the body is. And this is what our meditation practice starts with.

In order for us to break through and really see these elements as they really are, we will need to pay attention continuously to the present moment. Being able to pay attention to the present moment, means we need an object which is continuously there. The breath is such an object. It arises, stays for a while and ceases. So when we begin practicing mindfulness of breathing, we are aware of the breath as it comes in, and we are aware of the breath as it goes out. We are aware at the beginning of the breath, we are aware of the 30 breath as it flows, we are aware of the breath as it finishes. Three things to pay attention to. When it first starts, as it continues and when it finishes. And then there’s a little gap. And then it starts, continues and finishes. And then there’s a little gap. You can pay attention to all of those things.

There are many advantages of watching the abdomen rising and falling. Make an effort to follow the breath down, and follow the breath up. We will do this for the first day of our meditation practice. Keeping ourselves in the present, keeping ourselves internally, following this concept of a breath coming in and out. If we can follow the breath in and out, make the mind continuous, then it starts to stabilize. It starts to concentrate. The concentrated mind allows us to see beyond the physical sensations. We really see the elements themselves. And that is something that you will breakthrough in time. But you will need to be continuous. Continuity is the secret of success in meditation practice.

In the old days, they used to make fire by rubbing two sticks together. If you try to rub two sticks together, you can do it for 10 minutes and stop for five minutes and do it again for 10 minutes. If you do that, you will get very tired and there will be no smoke or even flame, even any kind of fire produced. Because when you’re working and stop, it cools down again. You work and it cools down again. Just stopping and starting. Our meditation practice is exactly the same. You will need to be continuous in your efforts and then eventually you will make some fire. If you can be continues for half an hour, you will be able to make fire. If you start for five minutes and stop for five minutes, you can do that for 30 years and you still never get a fire! The stop and start method doesn’t work, it doesn’t produce any fire. Even after many, many years of practicing. But after just 30 minutes of continuous application, it starts! So continuity is the secret of meditation practice. You will need to resist any urge that the mind has for going at delighting in some kind of objects. Delighting in the past, in the future, in the present at the sense doors. That is when the mind is going out, that is when the sticks have stopped rubbing. To reactivate your sticks, bring your mind back into the present moment and internalize your awareness. Notice every time your mind wanders away from the breath and bring it back as quickly as you can. Do not entertain any thoughts. Do not entertain, «oh, I should be meditating. 31 I just want to think this story out a little bit. Just let that think a little bit and then I will do my meditation.» That is wasting your time here! And this is precious time! Only seven days that we can practice with full intensity.

So please try to maintain your awareness of the breath continuously as it is flowing in and out. We are paying attention right at the beginning.

In fact, you can follow it all the way through and at the end of the inbreath, you can just say, «now», if you want to. Bring yourself back to the present. At the end of every out-breath you can bring yourself back to the present. You can do this over and over again. Be aware it is starting, finishing, now. Exiting, finishing, now. You keep bringing yourself back into the present moment, observing what is exactly there. Not what you’re imaging to be there, not what you like to be there but just seeing what is there over and over again. We are training the mind. We are narrowing the place where we allow it to run. We allow it to run just into certain objects, certain places. We are following the breath as continuously as we can, noting when it goes in, we know that it’s going in. When it’s coming out, we know that it’s coming out. If we notice any physical sensations as we are following the breath, we pay attention to them. We can make a little note of them. ’In, out’, if you feel the expansion in your chest, make a little note to yourself ‘expanding’. If you feel the pushing, make a note to yourself ‘pushing’. This is the real life experience that you are experiencing. This is the real thing. There is actually a physical sensation taking place in the present moment. This is what we want to come to understand. We want to put ourselves in a position, where we can watch so clearly and so closely the present moment, that whatever physical sensation arises, we know it. We know exactly what it is and we see it clearly for what it is. In this way we won’t attach to the body. We will be able to let go of the body.

Normally, the elements will be nicely balanced. 25, 25, 25, 25%. Occasionally one of the elements will become unbalanced. The earth element will become 40%, the other three will be 20, 20, 20%. At that time you will feel that the body becomes hard. There will be some hardness there. So the whole body is becoming hard. Maybe the fire element becomes unbalanced. You will feel warmth. So the four elements are always adjusting in ratios and the four elements are manifesting in the present moment as sensations in your 32 body according to those ratios. We want to come to understand those physical sensations.

We are going to follow the breath that comes in. When it finishes, we know that it’s finished. This is very important. As soon as one breath finishes, tick the box, done. And then follow the next breath. One by one. We don’t want to get ahead of ourselves. We don’t want to be thinking, «I’m going to meditate for two hours now. I’m going to watch the breath, every single one or even for the next 45 minutes». Just try to do it for that breath, that’s occurring right now. Just follow one breath successful, and then follow another breath. Successful of one, follow another breath. Until you start to follow the breath more closely. In the beginning stages it’s all over the place. The breath will be coming in and out, in and out, your mind will be catching it and then wandering away. Try to come back again. Your awareness is not going to be able to follow it, but eventually, you will start following it a little bit. You come back again, lose it. And then, oh, you’ve latched on. You’ve come into the breath a little bit. Your awareness is starting to become internalized with the breath. You’re getting closer and closer to it. You’re coming inside the body. You are starting to experience the inside nature of the body. So different breath, different physical sensations. Short breath – hard punchiness, long breath – smooth and gliding. You can make a note of this phenomena. You can start to understand that the time to breath in, short breath or long breath, will cause different physical sensations. You can start to see that there is some cause and effect happening here in the present moment. You can start to see that the breath is conditioning the body. There is some conditioning going on. It is not so important to pay attention to this now, but if it starts to become clear to you, make a note of that. There is cause and effect happening between the body and the breath. Cause and effect happening between the breath and the mind as well. All three are linked together. Physical sensations, breath and mind. They’re all adjusting. One is the cause, one is effect. Changing and swapping positions who is causing, and who is affecting who. The mind and body process continues to go on day and night. The breath continues to flow in and out regardless of what you think, regardless of who you are. The four elements are the same. Your four elements are the same as my four elements. The same as the four 33 elements outside. The internal elements are the same as the external four elements. This body is just a physical manifestation of your mind state. We will talk about that later as well.

So become aware of just following the breath. I want you to try to follow the breath as closely as you can. From beginning until end. From beginning until end. We follow them from the nose tip, paying attention to the touching sensation. We follow it down to the abdomen. I want you all to follow and chase the breath in and out. If you find that one place is more comfortable than another to watch, especially I want you to be aware of the rising and falling of the abdomen, if you want to watch the breath just there or if you want to watch the breath just at the nose, you can do that for a little bit. See which one feels more comfortable. But try to follow it in and out the whole way and keep your attention and awareness continuously in the present moment. And then the characteristics of those four elements will start to become clearer and clearer. They will only become clear if you have been able to watch the breath, let’s say for five or 10 minutes. We start to be able to continuously watch the breath over and over again without missing and these physical sensations come to life. They start to display themselves quite clearly and then you’ll break through. Instead of seeing a car or car parts, you will break through and you will see metal, plastic, glass and rubber. You will see the actual reality behind the concept of car, behind the concept of breathing, behind the concept of body. You will see actually what is there. And it will surprise you. It will shock you. It will amaze you, that the mind can actually know the body in such away.

In fact, it has been able to do it for a long time already. We just haven’t trained the mind to do that in our societies. We don’t train the mind in this way. We are not taught to observe to look inside the body. Most of our knowledge in our sciences comes from observing things through the eyeball. Whether it’s the external world or whether it’s the body itself. We look through microscopes. Our knowledge arises through the eye door. We see things and then we think about it, and then we develop some theories and it becomes knowledge. It becomes truth. But all this information only comes into through the eye-door. We will be experiencing the body in a very different way that physiologists don’t experience, that anatomists, the 34 doctors don’t experience. Doctors have been trained to examine the body through their eye-door. They have a vast knowledge of the body, that they have managed to accumulate through the eye-door. The eye-door leads to certain kinds of knowledge and types of information but it doesn’t lead to wisdom in that way. Of course, wisdom arises when we notice and know and let go at the eye-door. But that is not what the scientists have done. So we are going to observe the body in a radically different way than scientists observe the body. We’re not interested in looking at protons, neutrons and electrons. We’re not interested in looking at bone marrow. We are not interested in looking at amino acids. All these things have been investigated for a long time and nobody got enlightened from doing so. That’s because they’ve been observing through the eye-door. We’re going to be using the mind door to investigate the body. The first stage is to become aware of the whole body as it is sitting in its posture.

So when we come into the room, we establish our awareness in the present and then we climb inside. So we are deep inside the body and we are watching the breath as it flows in and flows out. Gliding in and gliding out. We are doing that over and over again. This will give us some knowledge about the nature of the mind and body process.

So we have been talking about sitting meditation. This will be enough for us to get started tomorrow morning when we hit the mat at 4:30.

2.7. Walking meditation

I also want to talk about our walking meditation. In fact, let’s all stand up and as you are standing up there, just bring your awareness into the present moment and become aware of the whole body as it is standing there on the mat. See if you can just become aware of the physical sensations on standing. Close your eyes. How do you know that you have a body? Don’t think about it, experience it. Experience the body with the body. Know the body. Put your mind into your left foot. Now put your mind into your right foot. See if you can swap your mind from the left foot to the right foot. How does it feel like? Is there a different physical sensation when the mind is in the foot as when the mind is not in the foot? Can you experience your mind, your awareness, your consciousness jumping from one foot to the other? Do 35 you feel the physical sensations of softness when you are standing on a mat? There are two objects very present. There is the standing posture, that’s one object. And then there is the touching sensation of your feet on the mat. This is standing. Standing and touching. Left foot touching, standing posture, right foot touching, standing posture.

You can move back and forth. If you need to stand up during the meditation practice, you can stand up and become aware of the hole standing posture. You can become aware of the touching sensation of the feet on the mat. You can move your consciousness from your nose, down to your abdomen. Move your mind around inside your body.

We always start our walking meditation with the standing posture. That’s how we start. We become aware, bring our mind into the present, we climb inside the body. We become aware of the whole thing that’s standing there. There is something standing there. It’s breathing. It’s got holes in the side of its head, it hears stuff. It’s got eyes in the front of its head, it sees stuff. Smelling and tasting go on as well. There’s something there. It thinks about itself a lot. In fact, that’s all it thinks about. Its favorite subject, me. It’s been all its day and all its night thinking about its past and future. It’s completely and totally obsessed with itself. But now it’s just standing. Just standing. – Okay, you can sit down now.

During the retreat we are going to alternate between walking and sitting meditation. We do 45 minutes of walking meditation and do 45 minutes of sitting meditation. As I said before, try to join these two sessions together. Try to make them into an hour and a half. One continuous session if possible. When the formal walking meditation takes place, we try to find a place where we can walk from one place to another. We’re walking from A to B, 15 paces long. 10, 15, 20 as space permits. We’re walking from one place to another place, turning around, and walking back again. We are all going to choose a place where we are going to do this for the week. Some of you like to walk in the meditation hall here. That’s possible. There is also places to walk around the Buddha hall. You can walk around the outside of the Buddha hall or you can walk inside the Buddha hall. You can also walk on these sandy areas. You can also use the yoga hall for your walking meditation practice. Find a place where you won’t be disturbed. Many people tell 36 me that they get disturbed by other people walking around them. Find a place where you can lower your eyes and pay attention to your walking meditation. It should be between 10 and 20 steps long. More than this will make your mind wander. Try to keep it to a back-and-forth process. Walking around a circle sometimes just leads the mind wandering and then you end up with a body just walking around and a mind a million miles away.

Just like in the sitting meditation, where the breath is used as concept for maintaining our awareness in the present moment, we are going to be using the steps of the body to lead us to the physical sensations in the body. What I mean by that is, in the sitting meditation, we are using the breath as a concept, in, out, in, out. If we can do that continuously, we start to become aware of the physical sensations in the body. We are using a concept to get back to real objects, the physical body sensations.

We are going to use the walking meditation to do exactly the same thing. In the beginning stages, you can just use two steps. ‘Lifting, placing, lifting, placing’. This is a concept. The foot lifts up and the foot gets placed down. We are walking back and forth. We’re becoming aware of the beginning of the step and the end of the step. Beginning of the step and the end of the step. If we can put our mind into our feet and can follow along with this, the physical sensations in the body will start to become clearer to us.

You can start by doing the two stage walking meditation or we can start by doing the three stage walking meditation. Up to you! We will explain all of them in a few moments. We can also do the one stage walking meditation. Most of the time we will do, what we call the four stage walking meditation practice. ‘Lifting, raising, moving, placing’.

The physical sensations that are produced in the feet, are our object in this meditation practice. This is the most important thing that we’re paying attention to. We’re keeping our mind in the present moment. We’re keeping our mind internally. We are using a conceptual framework to maintain our awareness in the present moment and we are noting and knowing exactly what is going on. At this stage of practice, just the physical sensations produced by walking. They’re all there. All four elements will be manifesting themselves in the feet.

First you become aware of the standing posture. You stand completely 37 still and bring yourself into the present moment and become aware that the whole body is standing and that the feet are touching the floor. In the walking meditation we don’t need to pay attention to the breath. We are paying attention to the present moment physical sensations that are occurring in the feet while we’re moving the feet.

‘Lifting, raising, moving, placing’. You can use these words if they’re helpful to you. The most important thing about the walking meditation is keeping your mind in your feet. Just like in the sitting practice, we are keeping the mind following the breath. In the walking practice, we must keep our mind inside our feet. Specifically, try to keep your awareness on the sole of your foot that is moving. We want to keep our mind in the moving foot at all times. We’re not just walking around with our minds traveling here and there. We are keeping our mind just in the part of the foot that is moving.

I want you to pay particular attention to the beginning and end of each of these movements. You start to lift and it’s finished. Moving – it’s finished. Placing – finished. Each of these stages comes to an end. It starts and it finishes. There’s a present moment event taking place. It starts and it finishes. And then the new event takes place. It starts and finishes. The moment is arising and passing away. Nothing else continues on from that moment. It’s finished. It’s finished. Things are passing away continuously. So pay attention to this, keep your mind in your feet during the walking meditation.

Where do we keep our eyes? Our eyes in our walking meditation should be lowered. We want to keep our eyes looking at about two meters in front of us. We have our eyes closed a little bit. We don’t want to be in complete darkness – you can try that as well, it’s very effective. But we don’t want to have our eyes open so that we can look at other people. We are not going to spend our time looking at other peoples’ bodies. We are not going to walk around looking at the trees or looking at insects or creatures that we’ve never seen before. There is lots of things to look at. But looking doesn’t lead to meditation practice. We want to keep our awareness inside the body as much as we possibly can. We’re not allowing the mind to run out through our eyes. We are keeping all our energy packaged within the body. We are not looking at anybody. If you hear some sound, don’t go following and try to chase it. Don’t go out trying to identify what that sound is. Is that a car or 38 a motor bike? We are not interested in what the sound is. We just note that some hearing occurred and it’s gone. That’s it. You hear a dog bark and then all the stuff you paint on top of that can be minutes’ worth of nonsense. Just from one noise, one sound – hearing occurring. Hearing is very natural. You have holes in your head. There is sounds outside. Hearing occurs. It doesn’t belong to anyone. There’s nobody there that’s hearing. It’s a natural process. Seeing is the same. There’s nobody who sees anything. But the sensitive matter in your eyeballs can detect light and forms, they are out there, it’s functioning, they’re coming together, seeing is occurring. There’s no person there that needs to be a seer. It’s all natural. An impersonal process. Hearing takes place. Seeing takes place. So in our walking meditation this can be very distracting.

So we try to keep our heads lowered, keep our eyes focused on the ground, we are not looking at other people, we hear some sounds, we just disregard it – okay, hearing occurred, finished, no longer interested in.

A good position for our hands in the walking meditation is just in front. Some people like to keep their hands behind. That’s fine as well. You can keep your hands still at the side. So we want to be as still as possible except for the moving parts that we’re paying attention to. The lifting, moving, placing. So the most important thing is to keep your mind inside your feet while you’re doing it.

Some people become frustrated with the walking meditation. They think it’s not working. When I ask them where their mind is, they say, «what do you mean?» You can’t follow the breath unless your mind is following the breath. You can’t do the walking meditation unless your mind is in your feet. This is where we see the sensations taking place. There is all kinds of sensations happening in the foot. As we lift the foot up, there is one type of sensation. We push the foot forward, there’s another type of sensation. As we place the foot down, there’s another type of sensation. In fact, there is five or six different sensations in each one. Lightness, vibration, softness, pushing, hardness – all there. You can feel them as you do the practice and it will start to unfold.

To give you a demonstration: We stand, we start, bringing ourselves into the present moment, bringing ourselves internal, establish our awareness 39 in the feet, left side, right side, left side, right side, lower the head, open the eyes a little bit so that the light comes in, make a note ‘seeing’ is occurring, and then when you lift your heel have your mind really right in your foot, ‘lifting’, stops, ‘moving’, stops, ‘placing’, stops. It’s really, really important that you have gaps between these three stages. There needs to be a definite stop. There needs to be a lifting. Stop. ‘Moving’. Stop. ‘Placing’. Stop. ‘Standing, standing’. Bring yourself into the full body again. And then when you turn around, ‘lifting, turning, placing’. You’re coming into still again. Standing is taking place. ‘Standing, standing’. And off you go again. 10 steps or 15 steps, back-and-forth, keeping your mind in the present moment, keeping your mind inside the body.

Looking out for physical sensations as they are arising and passing away. The most important thing, keep your mind in the present, keep your mind internal, keep your mind in your feet, when you are doing the walking meditation practice. Make sure there are gaps between the three stages of the walking practice. You need to be able to see the arising and passing. Arising and passing. Arising and passing. Doing a step as you normally walk, there is no breakup. There is no arising and passing away. The sensations will be shifting and changing too rapidly for your mind to be able to catch up to them. So we need to slow down with the walking meditation. We are walking relatively slowly. In particular, the last 20 or 30 minutes of the walking meditation should be much slower than the first 10 or 15 minutes. The first 10 or 15 minutes you establish some rhythm. You should try to be continuous in the rhythm like a watch. ‘Lifting, moving, placing, lifting, moving, placing, lifting, moving, placing, lifting, moving, placing, lifting, moving, placing’. So the mind gets a bit into a rhythm and starts to become aware and contained in itself.

In the beginning stages you will find it quite boring. You won’t be making much sense of it. But once it starts to work, it really works well. For many newcomers to meditation, walking meditation gives them the results before the sitting meditation. So don’t think that the walking meditation is somehow secondary. Many people had some wonderful, deep and profound insights, life changing insights on the walking path in this monastery. Just by walking and paying attention you can learn a lot about the mind and the 40 body process. You can learn a lot about cause and effect.

Try to perform the turning around efficiently. When you hear the bell at the end of the walking meditation practice, walk slowly to the meditation hall. It should be a slow and gradual transition from the walking path into your seat. There shouldn’t be any gaps of unmindfulness to occur. We want to be continuous with our awareness.

You start to see things that you normally don’t see. You start to see weird sensations in the feet. If you are new to walking meditation, I suggest that you walk on a hard surface for the first few days. Walk inside the hall here. Walking on the sand may be a little bit tricky for the first stages of the walking meditation. We also do walking meditation, when we move around the monastery. When you are moving from this hall to the dining hall or when you are moving from the dining hall to your dorm. Try to be aware of the walking posture as well. There’s a whole thing that’s walking. Try to keep your awareness internalized. You can pay attention to the touching of your feet on the floor if you like. No shoes will be helpful for this. This is something I should mention. During the walking meditation we should not use shoes, no flip-flops, no rubber sandals or anything else. We use just our bare feet.

So we need to activate our awareness in the present moment, bring our awareness inside the body and start paying attention to the physical sensations that are occurring, using the concepts of the in- and out-breath, using the concepts of lifting, moving, placing, we can bring our mind into an experience of nature. Into an experience of reality.

I want you all to pay very much attention making your walking meditation smooth and continuous. Just like the clock. Tic-tic-tic-tic-tic-tic. This happens very smooth and continuously. So should our walking meditation be. Lifting, moving, placing, lifting, moving, placing. Try to get yourself into a rhythm.

Of course, there is going to be thoughts coming up. There are two types of thoughts. Two ways that we can deal with thoughts that happen on the walking meditation path. Some thoughts are just going to be little ones, that just kind of bubble up and don’t lead anywhere. You just have a thought about something and then it’s gone again. When those kind of thoughts 41 happen, you can just note it. Thinking is occurring. And then continue with your walking practice. If you find that thoughts come up and turn into a bit of a story, if you find that you are just walking around, lifting, moving, placing, but your mind is thinking about other things then you need to stop. You need to stop and stand still and become quiet for a moment. And then start again. During the first few days this may happen very often.

For a warm up you can just stand on one foot. Just lift one foot up, keep your awareness in the front of the foot, in the middle of the foot, and than just drag it back keeping your mind inside your foot. And then push it forward. And pull and push. Keeping your mind inside. Can you feel the physical sensations on the bottom of the foot? On the sole of the foot? There is some vibrations going on there. Keep your mind in your foot while you’re pushing it forward. It is really a push. We say moving, but it’s really pushing the foot through. Feel the friction and the resistance that’s there if you push and pull your foot backwards and forwards. Like you’re pushing it through water.

Sometimes our walking meditation feels like we are on cross country skis or we are ice skating. We are really pushing the foot and pulling the foot. Try to catch that physical sensation there on the bottom of the foot. It’s the physical sensation which is the object of our meditation. That is what we follow. That physical vibration on the bottom of the foot.

It may take some time to get used to it. You’re certainly used to walking. But you’re not used to putting your mind in your feet. The mind normally goes out to enjoy the sensual pleasures. Something delightful through the eye, ear, nose, tongue or body door. Something to think about. We’re keeping the mind inside the body and we’re paying attention to the physical sensations. If you like, before you start the walking meditation practice, just warm your feet in this way up for your walking meditation. Push, pull, push, pull. About 10 times on each foot. Just kind of warm-up your awareness for that physical sensation. And then once you have warmed it up, try doing your walking practice and you will find, that you will be able to follow along a lot easier.

There’s a few other things. No shoes when we do the walking meditation. We don’t need to lift up the feet high either and we are not walking one 42 foot in front of each other either. We’re not on a catwalk in kind of some balancing act. Just the normal way that you walk, the normal height that you walk. In fact, if you keep your feet lower to the floor, you will have a better balance.

This is how we practice the walking meditation. The walking meditation instructions will be updated almost daily and we will go further and further and so will be the sitting meditation practice.