This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Kindness; Supporting Samadhi (2 of 5): The Immeasurables. It likely contains inaccuracies.
The following talk was given by Liz Powell at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.
Welcome, everyone. I’m taking a lot of joy out of reading your chat messages from all over. Thank you so much, and welcome to our week of practicing supports for Samadhi1 as well as Samadhi, and doing a little bit more independent practice, working with the instructions that we’ve received from Gil.
Yesterday, I shared the wisdom from the sutta: “Whatever one keeps pursuing with one’s thinking and pondering, that becomes the inclination of one’s awareness.” The invitation was to see how you use your attention throughout the day and to understand what supports Samadhi, and perhaps some of the things that lead to a distracted mind or a mind that has more difficulty settling. All of this was also part of an invitation to strengthen both Samadhi and Sati2. Sati, mindfulness, strengthening that during the day by coming back to it as often as you remember, noticing any hindrances that are happening in sitting practice and in daily life, and meeting them with compassion.
The more we see them, the more we disentangle from them, because just by seeing them, we’re already taking one step towards freedom, away from dissatisfaction, stress, and suffering. There was also the experiment yesterday to visit for just a few minutes at a time, perhaps throughout the day, that place of deep stillness, and to join a second sitting or to practice in a second sitting on your own.
So, we’re dedicating the week to helping support what helps us with Samadhi, discovering what supports us with Samadhi and what stands in the way. Today, again, we’ll continue to cultivate it in the way that Gil’s been teaching it, extending the time that we spend in this morning sitting by just a few minutes. We’ll do the same technique, if it works for you, to count the breath very softly in the background. The primary focus is on the sensations of breathing and staying with being present with the entire breath, from the very beginning through the entire inhalation, maybe a little pause if it’s there between the inhalation and the exhalation, and following the entire exhalation, beginning and returning perhaps in a place deep within of stillness.
Then, very softly in the background, see how softly it can work for you, using counting. Gil introduced several different types of counting, and he encouraged this week that we try counting the breaths from 1 to 10. That could be each whole breath as one, two, etc. Or it could be, if you need more stimulation to maintain mindfulness, one with the in-breath, two with the out-breath, three with the in-breath, four with the out-breath. There are lots of different ways to count, and whichever one you find that works for you, settle in with it, commit to it, and work with it throughout the practice. It could just be “one” and with the next breath, “one.” So, using the method that you find most helpful. We’ll settle into meditation here.
Allowing yourself to settle in gradually, perhaps taking several long, slow, deep breaths. Letting the breathing return to normal, naturally. And taking in, in this moment, how you are in the mind, the heart, the body. What’s here right now?
Noticing if there’s anything mentally or physically that could be relaxed in this moment, consciously relaxing it. And if there are areas of preoccupation or tightness that cannot be relaxed, it can be helpful to soften around that and to appreciate it’s here just as it is, with some kindness for what’s here. If there’s some tightness, perhaps deliberately releasing it with the out-breath.
However you are in this moment is simply showing you things as they have come to be. There’s no right or wrong way to be in meditation. We can greet all experience in this meditation as we would greet a very dear friend: recognizing our friend with kindness, relaxing, and listening to them with kind attention. Experience is a friend in meditation, simply showing you things as they have come to be.
Perhaps beginning with a few minutes of Metta3, this practice of sending wishes of goodwill, of kindness or friendliness, and doing this in a way that is supportive for you. I’ll offer some phrases, and you can silently repeat those in your mind. Or, if it’s more conducive for you to simply radiate the feeling of goodwill from your heart and mind, letting the phrases fade into the background. Whatever way of coming to this that feels right to you.
Beginning by allowing yourself to acknowledge the goodness, the wholesomeness of your intention for meditating, the goodness of your intention for developing Samadhi. Recognizing those good intentions, sending wishes of support for yourself and for those here in this meditation.
May we be well and healthy. Really allowing that to fill your heart, fill your mind.
May we be free from inner and outer harm, safe.
May we be happy, contented in the practice, contented with what we’re discovering about ourselves, but mostly about things as they have come to be.
May we practice with ease.
As you take these in and radiate them outwards, allowing yourself to come into more silence, more stillness. Really centering on that very still place deep within, perhaps.
And turning attention towards the experience of breathing. As the inhalation arises from stillness, following it as it comes into the body. Present for any tiny pause, and then the exhalation, following it as it leaves the body.
As we’re feeling the expansion and contraction, the rise and fall, perhaps beginning in the background, very quietly, counting the breath. Leaving the counting in the background and the experience of breathing, the sensations of breathing, in the foreground of awareness.
If the mind drifts away, sending some kindness, some understanding for the natural way human minds drift. And gently, with goodwill, bringing awareness to where the mind has drifted for just a few moments, and then gradually turning awareness to the sensations of breathing with a light touch and resuming counting in the background in whatever way supports maintaining awareness. Sticking with it as soft noting in the background while keeping the sensations of breathing in the foreground.
As we come to the end of the meditation, extending some appreciation. Allowing yourself to feel a little appreciation for any amount of time that awareness was settled, stable. Appreciation for how awareness was able to return to attention to the breathing again and again.
And radiating the benefit of this practice to everyone around you, everyone your life touches, those you know and those you don’t know.
May all beings be healthy and well.
May all beings be free of harm, be safe.
May all beings be peaceful.
May everyone, without exception, be free of suffering.
As we’ve been practicing, an integral part of this practice of Samadhi are these wellings up of goodwill, compassion, appreciation, and equanimity. Thanissaro Bhikkhu4 wrote this translation, a part that I’ll read to you of one of the numerical discourses of the Buddha called the Samadhi Sutta, subtitled “Immeasurable Concentration”: “Wise and mindful, you should develop immeasurable concentration, that is, concentration based on immeasurable goodwill, compassion, appreciation, or equanimity.”
So these four qualities of heart—goodwill, compassion, appreciative joy, and equanimity—are often called the immeasurables. They are also called the Brahmaviharas5, which translates as “divine abodes.” In other words, really beautiful, elevated places to hang out mentally, with the heart and body and mind. We could consider them beautiful qualities of mind. This reference to “immeasurables” means that as we practice them regularly, they grow and grow to the point where they’re capable of encompassing all beings. They’re boundless.
Maybe many of you have already had experience of the way that goodwill, compassion, appreciation, and equanimity tend to grow the more you practice. And maybe you’ve even noticed them welling up spontaneously at times. This is one of the beautiful things that happens with continuity of mindfulness. It’s often one of the gifts of being on retreat, is just out of nowhere feeling the heart fill with kindness or with compassion.
So these Brahmaviharas support the calm and peace, the stability, the settledness that help Samadhi to become stronger. We can apply the Brahmaviharas during the cultivation of Samadhi, both in formal sitting and also we can apply it in daily life, certainly.
So one invitation today would be to see what it might be like to greet everything that arrives with one of these Brahmaviharas. Perhaps treating everything as though it were a gift from the Buddha, a teaching from the Buddha. So you could ask yourself in any particular moment that stands out, or when mindfulness comes back to mind, what might it be like in this moment to greet this experience as if it were a dear friend?
Sometimes our friends call for just a general feeling of goodwill. So what might it be like to greet this with goodwill? Sometimes friends are in trouble, and we greet them with compassion. So there may be moments that arise that could be greeted with compassion. Of course, we take joy in the things that our friends have in their lives that bring them happiness or good fortune, so you might greet some experiences with that appreciative joy. And then there are times when what a friend is going through pulls us so hard that we need to find our own balance or keep our own balance. Some equanimity is called for.
So we can ask ourselves, what might goodwill or kindness or friendliness teach us today about ourselves, about practicing in daily life? And what might compassion help us understand that might be perplexing at this moment? What might it be like to greet certain things with appreciation? So for example, something unpleasant arises or something you don’t like. What might it be like to have some appreciation for it as a teaching, as something we need to learn, or as one of these moments that has arrived just as things are in this moment, or as they have come to be? And what might we learn about equanimity or balance being an ally at times that feel tumultuous?
What can we learn today about freedom from dissatisfaction, freedom from stress, freedom from suffering? Practicing in this way throughout the day with whatever arises, with hindrances as they arise, may bring further stability to Samadhi.
And again, an invitation today is to find your way through both the difficult places that arise, not to pave over them with this practice. Because if you do that, if you just try to substitute paying attention to breathing for some difficulty that you know is going on, there’s a way in which that actually stands in the way of Samadhi. So if something tough is happening, noticing it, taking a pause, meeting it as a friend, understanding it, listening to it. And if something beautiful arises, greeting it as a friend.
The invitation today is again to come back to mindfulness as often as you can during the day, in addition to greeting things as if they were dear friends with Brahmaviharas. And then, as I will do each day this week, I’ll offer a silent sitting this afternoon for 20 minutes on Zoom. You can find the Zoom link and the password that you’ll need on the IMC calendar. You’re welcome to join that, or if that’s not a good time for you or you just prefer to practice on your own, maybe consider finding another piece of time during the day when you can practice. And also coming back to this practice, noticing a still place or the calm, noticing the breath here and there throughout the day for even just a few minutes. It all counts.
May this practice bring all of us greater and greater stability, subtleness, presence. And may that radiate out from us and support everyone else in our lives, so that everyone feels that calm, that peace, that collectedness of mind, the mind that can be with everything and anything that’s happening right now. May we help those around us in this way. May all beings be free. Thank you.
Samadhi: A Pali word for a state of meditative concentration or a collected, unified mind. It is a key component of the Buddhist path. ↩
Sati: A Pali word for mindfulness, the quality of awareness and remembering to pay attention to the present moment. ↩
Metta: A Pali word meaning loving-kindness, goodwill, or friendliness. It is the first of the four Brahmaviharas. ↩
Thanissaro Bhikkhu: Original transcript said “Tanis biku.” Corrected to the well-known American Buddhist monk and scholar. ↩
Brahmaviharas: Often translated as “divine abodes” or “immeasurables.” These are four sublime states of mind cultivated in Buddhist practice: Metta (loving-kindness), Karuṇā (compassion), Muditā (appreciative joy), and Upekkhā (equanimity). ↩