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Introduction to Insight Meditation, Session 3: Mindfulness of Feelings
by Philip L. Jones
I. Beginning
Meditation - Mindfulness of Body Sensations (10 min)
A.Review
the instructions (see handout)
II. Discussion
(10-15 minutes)
A.Questions
from previous session and from week's practice
III. The
Progression of Practice
A.Eihei
Dogen, a 13th century Japanese Zen master, said "When you first
seek dharma, you imagine you are far away from its environs. But dharma
is already correctly transmitted; you are immediately your original self."
"Actualizing the Fundamental Point," Moon in a Dewdrop, North
Point Press, 1985, p. 70.
B.We
can think of the term "dharma" as referring, in this case, to the same
thing that Thich Nhat Hanh spoke of in the quote I read in the first session.
He said "Peace
is all around us -- in the world and in nature -- and within us -- in our
bodies and our spirits. Once we learn to touch this peace, we will be healed
and transformed." -- Touching Peace, Parallax Press, 1992,
pp. 1-2.
C.What
keeps us from seeing that "you are immediately your original self" or that
"Peace is all around us ..."?
1.It
is our tendency to get caught in our experiences.
2.We
get caught in our experiences because we don't see their true nature.
a.We
see our experiences as being permanent, satisfactory and as having a
solidity to them.
D.So
through this practice we begin to investigate our experience so that we
can see for ourselves what is true about our experiences and how we get
caught in them.
E.Each
week we will be exploring a different aspect of our inner experience.
1.The
first week we learned how to ground ourselves, how to settle ourselves
using the sensations of breathing.
2.Last
week we explored opening to our physical sensations and discovered a number
of insights about how we relate to them.
3.I
think we also had a taste of deepening our practices as we were able to
do multiple sittings and feel the momentum of concentration and mindfulness
carry over from one sitting to the next.
F.As
we move to different aspects of our experience, we begin to focus on more
and more subtle experiences.
1.Sometimes
they may be easy for us to see, at other times quite difficult.
2.It
mostly depends upon how much concentration and mindfulness we have been
able to develop.
G.Tonight
we will be focusing a little on working with distractions and then mostly
on Feeling
IV. Working
with Distractions
A.(Mention
and refer to Handout)
B.The
basic rule of thumb in insight meditation is that nothing is a distraction,
everything is an object of mindfulness.
1.Easier
said than done.
C.Try
to meet experiences with kindness
D.If
getting irritated or frustrated, first just notice it,
notice the desire that things be different than they are.
E.Then
see if you can simply bring non-judgmental awareness to that irritating
or frustrating thing. ... This is sometimes called opening to itor
surrendering to it.
1.It
is the ability to simply be with whatever comes into our lives, the ability tolive
with contentment.
V. Working
with Feeling
A.One
effective way to learn to work with "distractions" and "difficulties" is
by practicing Mindfulness of Feeling
B.Feeling
refers to what I call the tone of an experience, whether it is pleasant,
unpleasant or neutral
C.Feelings
are distinct from emotions, even though we often use the words interchangeably.
1.Feelings
are the responses we have to sensory input, whether that is through the
five sense doors or through our thoughts.
2.Emotions
are much more complex and involve moods, such as anger
, desire, and even joy, as well as physical sensations and thoughts,
often stories we tell ourselves.
a.Next
week we'll work some with emotions.
D.Feeling
actually is the foundation upon which emotion is built, so developing some
ability to be aware of feeling allows us to be less caught up in our emotions
as well.
E.Important
to be aware of feeling because this is what keeps us hooked into our conditioning:
1.Pleasant
sensations lead to desire and attachment, we want more and think that more
will make us happy or will keep us happy
2.Unpleasant
sensations lead to anger, fear and aversion. We want to get away from the
unpleasant and believe that doing so will make us happy
3.Neutral
sensations lead to boredom which then allows other mind-states to become
strong, usually states that undermine our meditation such as sleepiness,
searching for something exciting or perhaps some conversation in our heads.
F.The
key way of working with these states is through mindfulness. Simply being
aware, in a non-judgmental way, of whatever comes into awareness. Simply
being aware of whether it has a pleasant, unpleasant or neutral quality.
1.The
ability to recognize the feeling tone of an experience allows us to break
the identification with it. We can begin to see it as just an experience
that is happening, rather than "my experience" or "me."
2.As
we break the identifications, we can experience more freedom in how we
respond, rather than simply reacting based on our past conditioning.
VI. Discussion
(5-15 min.)
VII. Exercise:
Tasting Pleasantness & Unpleasantness (10-15 min.)
A.Tasting
raisins, not as eating meditation but as a way to become aware of pleasant
or unpleasant feeling and then the reactions to those feelings.
VIII. Discussion
(5-10 min.)
A.What
was this experience like for you?
B.Any
questions or comments?
IX. Meditation,
Mindfulness of Feeling (15 min.)
A.Use
various bells, gongs and scratchy sounds intermittently during this sitting
to provide more easily noticeable objects of feeling (ie, sounds.)
X. Discussion
(5-15 min.)
A.What
was this experience like for you?
B.Any
questions or comments?
XI. Meditation,
Mindfulness of Feeling (15-25 min.)
XII. Closing
A.What
we have been practicing is one of the tools in this practice. So far we
have worked on three tools: mindfulness ofthe
sensations of breathing, mindfulness of physical sensations and now mindfulness
of feeling tone.
1.When
you practice on your own, you can use these tools in two different ways.
a.You
can focus your attention on one aspect of your experience to develop a
more comprehensive understanding of it,
b.Or,
you can use whatever tool is appropriate as different experiences arise
into awareness.
2.I
would like to encourage you to do both things this week.
a.Take
a day and just try to be aware of the feeling tone of your experiences
and how you react to them.
b.Then
on another day simply try to bring mindfulness to your experience when
physical sensations arise or when you notice the feeling tone.
B.--
quote from Ajahn Chah
1."When
the heart grasps what is painful, it is like being bitten by a snake. And
when, through desire, it grasps what is pleasant, it is just grasping the
tail of the snake. It only takes a little while longer for the head of
the snake to come around and bite you."
-- Ajahn
Chah, A Still Forest Pool, The Theosophical Publishing House, 1985,
p.52.
XIII. Handouts
A.Mindfulness
of Feelings (meditation instructions)
B.Working
with Distractions and Difficulties