Q&AInsight Meditation Society Retreat10 May 2012
Group F 4 — Maintaining Awareness in Daily Activities and Dealing with Pain
Sayadaw U Tejaniya · 1 hr 51 min
Original audio: Burmese · English interpretation
0:00−1:51:01
Uses compressed audio.
AI-written summary
In this group interview, Sayadaw explains how to maintain awareness during mental work and conversation. He guides yogis to relate skilfully to physical pain and apply right view in daily life.
Topics
Talks in this retreat
Insight Meditation Society Retreat · 28 talks
- 191 hr 49 minGroup F 3 — Seeing Object as Nature and Right View7 May 2012
- 2012 minTaking practice into life7 May 2012
- 211 hr 44 minGroup A 4 — Recognizing Wisdom and Checking the Observing Mind8 May 2012
- 221 hr 38 minGroup B 4 — Observing Defilements, the Illusion of Self, and Cause-and-Effect Chain8 May 2012
- 231 hr 53 minGroup C 4 — Guarding Sense Doors and Staying with Awareness9 May 2012
- 241 hr 47 minGroup D 4 — Working with Wanting, Aversion and Awareness9 May 2012
- 251 hr 10 minDharma teachers group — Right Attitude, Interviewing and Sharing the Practice9 May 2012
- 261 hr 49 minGroup E 4 — Mindfulness of Speech and Noticing Greed in Experience10 May 2012
- Viewing271 hr 51 minGroup F 4 — Maintaining Awareness in Daily Activities and Dealing with Pain10 May 2012
- 2824 minAdvice for taking awareness home11 May 2012
Transcript
English
So this is a recording of Sayadaw U Tejaniya checking group F, for the fourth time, at the Insight Meditation Society on Thursday, May 10, 2012.
English
And with the aid of you who are reporting first, please identify yourself by raising your hands
English
and holding them up there so they can— Yeah. Okay. —make us know who you are.
English
I got it. This time. Some documentary. You're on.
English
What are the causes and conditions for the arising of calm and relaxation in the mind? When checking the mind, there's often anxiety and worry. Right view is the condition for calm to arise in the mind, because without right view, he says, then the
English
mind has wrong view, so there will be wrong thoughts, things it wants, doesn't want. Frightening or worrisome. So if the mind considers things to be frightening, or considers things to be worrying, so that will affect the mind and the— So when there's right view, there's right thinking, then right thinking understands
English
the general principle of cause and effect, and therefore it doesn't unnecessarily worry or— So when we don't know things as they are, whether it's nature or facts about a certain thing, the unknown, things like that, he says, so not knowing
English
creates
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fear in the mind, anxiety,
English
greed, aversion, and so on, the wrong view. So in this context, right view is, "This is as it is. There's nothing that the mind needs to—" It's not that the mind doesn't do anything.
English
Right view or right understanding brings acceptance that things are happening as they are, and then understanding what the right action is, or the appropriate action is, then takes the appropriate actions necessary. Yeah.
English
So when somebody understands things in the right way, then they are not shaken by what is arising. There's not the clinging, the resistance, the aversion, the fear, the desire, because they see it as it is.
[Burmese segment]
English
The Buddha gave a guarantee. He said if people practice the sati pattana,
English
he said it would bring the— Good thing about chanting. It would bring "happiness," quote-unquote, to the body and the mind. It will free the mind of worry and anxiety, and it will enable the flowering of wisdom.
English
Yeah. There often arises in this mind that the thought that this mind is damaged, that this mind can't relax, can't— Relax No, no, no.
English
He says, "Once wisdom comes to—"
English
Mind is— sorry, let's take a breath. Mind can change. Mind can be changed. Yes.
English
But it's wisdom that changes the mind. So there must be the wisdom that can bring change to the mind.
English
It's only because it's not— the wisdom is not there yet.
English
Just yet.
English
Last question. I wanted to thank Sayadaw for the instruction he gave my fellow yogi about relaxing the mind, just moment by moment, with pain in the body. Because I have not some meditation pain, but structural pain that really comes up when I sit on the floor. And I've actually been able to sit on the floor for so much longer than ever
English
in working with that instruction. So I really appreciated that. And I'm wondering if he could say a little bit about what would support maintaining awareness when a lot of cognitive functioning is required. When I'm reading something technical, awareness seems to go out the window, and all of the focus is just on processing the material at hand.
English
And that's an area I'd like to learn to be more aware in my daily life. So reading, or listening to a lecture that's involved, those sorts of activities.
[Burmese segment]
English
He says, "When doing work like that," he says, "the work itself brings concentration very easily." So you're actually helped by the work. So the awareness is actually only to recognize that the mind is doing that work. The mind is reading, is
English
taking up the meaning of what's being read, absorbing, understanding, and all that. And it's just to recognize that the mind is functioning in that way. So. In that context, is it more appropriate to be in somewhat of a more absorbed or focused state? He says it takes practice in the beginning, because if you're too much into what you're doing, you forget to be aware.
English
So you have to remind yourself over and over again. And then you'll find that
English
you learn the skill of how to be aware, so that you're not
English
too much inside, that you block out awareness completely. So enough awareness, and enough to function and concentrate, so. And the other trick, and this is the key, really, he said, is not to try to become aware at that time.
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Sayadaw U Tejaniya began his Buddhist training as a young teenager in Burma under the late Shwe Oo Min Sayadaw (1913–2002). After a career in business and life as a householder, he has become a permanent monk since 1996.…