This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Stroking the Cat; Samadhi (24) The Inner Pleasure of Samadhi. It likely contains inaccuracies.
The following talk was given by Gil Fronsdal at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.
Warm greetings. It’s raining here, and there’s a teaching that the Dharma is like the rain in the forest. When it rains, all the different plants, small plants and big trees, each of them absorbs the amount of water they need for their life. So when hearing the Dharma, reading the Dharma, being in the Dharma, each of us will take in what we need at any given time. Trust that.
The topic this week around Samadhi1 is organized under the category of pleasure. It involves a range of sensations, like pleasant sensations, but also involves emotions like gladness, joy, and happiness, and even more intense forms of well-being. In the teachings of the Buddha, the condition for concentration is some form of happiness. To really get absorbed in Samadhi, for Samadhi to really arise as we meditate, is to have some form of happiness. The condition for happiness is to have some form of tranquility or being relaxed and at ease. The condition for relaxation is some joy, and the condition for joy is to have gladness, a delight.
This is called the gladness pentad: gladness can lead to joy, joy to tranquility, tranquility to happiness, and happiness to Samadhi. Some people find this strange because the whole reason to practice meditation and maybe have Samadhi is to be able to feel some deep sense of well-being, and here it’s in reverse order: well-being first, and then Samadhi.
This gladness pentad is said to begin by being inspired by something. One of the inspirations is Mudita2, a kind of appreciative joy, appreciating other people’s maturity and development in the Dharma practice. To see people becoming freer, more at ease, more peaceful, having more integrity, somehow becoming freer in the process of practicing, can be very inspiring. To be delighted in this, rather than jealous or envious, is to be inspired so that gladness arises. That gladness, as we practice, can create space for some joy, and joy some space to relax in a deep way—tranquility, and then to happiness.
Another source of inspiration that’s classic in Buddhism is in the three refuges. The primary refuge is the mindfulness practice itself—to have experienced, or to know, or to intuit that the practice of mindfulness, the practice of being attentive and clear and being here, is such a blessing. It is such a significant way of coming to refuge, where refuge means a deep sense of being at home in this world, home with oneself, a deep sense of belonging in this universe, belonging to oneself. And to feel glad for that.
There are a few other things that are mentioned. One of them is ethics: to be inspired by our own ethical life. For some people, that’s very hard to imagine, just because we are sometimes the greatest critic of ourselves. But if we read what’s going on in the newspapers and the news of how unethical people can be, maybe it’s easier to understand that you are a wonderful alternative to that, and be inspired by that, glad for that. So, to be inspired, to feel a certain pleasure—the pleasure of gladness.
So, assume a meditation posture. For people who meditate a lot, the posture can be just a habit of sitting into, but for people who have been meditating a lot, it’s also that they know the goodness of the posture. They know the goodness of being in this space of meditation. And just sitting down, if we take the time to appreciate it, can be an inspiration. “Wow, this is good.” I know I’ve been delighted and happy to sit down to meditate, even when I was not happy. I was agitated, upset, things were difficult for me, but wow, was it good to sit in the middle of it. To sit was so much better than the alternative, even better than being distracted from it.
Gently closing the eyes, and start by not doing anything, not meditating, and simply checking in. Checking in with yourself, in your body, how it is, and your mind and your heart or your emotions, without beginning to meditate, without being mindful, without concentrating on anything. Just allow yourself to be as you are and check in. How are you, here and now? Answering that question with what is present for you. And maybe, just maybe, appreciating the simplicity of just being present and checking in. This is how it is.
And then beginning to center yourself on the breathing. Checking in, maybe you’re still not meditating, but now check in: how is your breathing? What parts of the body are active as you breathe? What sensations come into play as you breathe? This simple experience of breathing—breathing in, breathing out, the sensations that come into play—is probably the same or almost the same as what the Buddha experienced when he sat down to meditate with his breathing. In a certain way, you are sharing an experience that the Buddha had, and which practitioners down through the ages have had. Practitioners who’ve gone into a Samadhi of breathing to mature deeply.
And then, if you have some feeling for not meditating, just sitting here quietly, being the breathing as it is. Almost like the next thing to doing nothing, a gentle, quiet becoming attuned to breathing. Becoming centered more in the breathing, so that the attention to breath has a light quality, a light touch, where the awareness of breathing doesn’t carry much baggage of judging the breath or oneself, straining or pushing for something to happen, expecting anything. Just a light touch of awareness with breathing as it is.
And noticing if there is a settling point, a grounding point deep within, where the first sensations of inhale begin. If that place is in the belly, maybe there’s an ever so slight lifting up out of that grounding point as the inhale spreads with the expanding rib cage, and then returning to that settling place with the exhale.
And gently, lightly, be aware of the whole length of the inhale, the whole length of the exhale, with the tenderness or the care, maybe even the love, that you might have in gently petting a cat, stroking across the hair, going with the grain of the hair, not against it. The inhale is a gentle stroke through the whole length of the inhale, and so is the exhale.
And if there’s any pleasure, pleasantness in mindfulness of breathing, maybe letting it be the purr of the cat, a contented purr. Enjoyment of what is good or pleasant about awareness of breathing.
And then you might try to have a small smile on your lips, just big enough to feel some sensations of pleasure around the mouth, the cheeks, maybe even up into the eyes. And if you do feel that pleasure, can you connect that to something you’re inspired with in relationship to the practice? Something that brings you a gladness, glad that you’re here doing this practice, with a small smile that gives embodiment to that delight.
With a light touch of awareness, riding the whole inhale, the whole exhale, maybe a small smile supports the pleasure and goodness of relaxing into breathing, relaxing with the exhale, letting go of thoughts as you exhale, as you settle into the grounding place.
Appreciating the pleasure of a light touch of attention on breathing. Allowing yourself to feel whatever pleasure there is of meditation. A pleasure which helps the mind feel more at ease, that kind of ease that allows a thinking mind to become quieter and still. And the pleasure of being present with the breathing becomes central to our sense of being here.
And as we come to the end of this sitting, to again, as we began, to sit here without meditating. Just allow yourself to be. And without any formal meditation, letting awareness of just being have the lightest possible touch. Not trying to do anything, not trying to change anything. The lightest touch on this present moment experience of just being. Maybe awareness is like a gentle breeze moving over the landscape of you just being here.
And then with awareness, together with imagination, having your awareness, that breeze of awareness, the lightest of touch, bring into view the people of your life. People you might see this morning or today. And let them just be, as you just be. And with the lightest touch of awareness, know them as they are, without being for or against, without wanting or not wanting anything. Just allowing people to be themselves.
And then to spread that breeze of awareness out across the lands. Maybe a difficult task, but possible, to allow all things, all people, just to be as they are. Not because you agree or disagree with them, but independent of your discernment and judgments. As if letting everything just be as they are, with the lightest touch of awareness, is medicine for the world, is medicine for yourself.
And may you have the wish, if you like, to go into the world today thinking of yourself as medicine for the world, medicine for what ails us in this world. And to go into the world with the medicine of goodwill, the medicine of being able to see people as they are without preferences, without judgments, so there might be a hope that they can see themselves as they are in the gaze of kindness, the gaze of goodwill that you offer.
May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free.
And may each of us gaze upon the world kindly. May each of us contribute to the sum total of goodwill and kindness that can exist on this planet. May all beings be happy.
Thank you.
So hello and welcome to this 24th talk on Samadhi. This week the topic is the pleasure of Samadhi. Pleasure takes different forms at different times. Sometimes it can feel like pure physical pleasure, but it also can morph into the pleasure of delight, the pleasure of gladness, the pleasure of joy, the pleasure of happiness, the pleasure of tranquility, the pleasure of equanimity, the pleasure of release and freedom, and the pleasure of refuge—the pleasure of knowing we have a home that brings a certain degree of safety, care, orientation, and meaning to this life of ours. All are aspects of refuge.
Pleasure is an important part of Dharma practice, and maybe we can call it Dharma pleasure. In the teachings on mindfulness, the Buddha makes a distinction between two kinds of pleasure. There’s a pleasure that comes from what we might call sensual pleasure, if we understand it to be that our senses are being stimulated by an external source. So if I eat tasty food, that would be called sensual pleasure in the taste because it comes from the food. If I stand in the warm sun on a cold day and feel the pleasure of that, that would be called sensual pleasure because it comes from outside and touches the nerve endings and does something nice.
When we’re thinking about things, there’s a way in which the thinking mind represents something almost like it’s outside of ourselves. I can have a fantasy about something, and the fantasy can bring a lot of pleasure. It’s still kind of on the outside; certain kinds of thinking are on the surface and stimulate the surface pleasures of the mind. Even though many of us would think the mind is not part of the external world, it’s almost as if certain kinds of surface thoughts are an external world which are providing an external stimulus. There’s not necessarily anything wrong with any of this.
But there is an alternative, which is pleasure that is not of the senses, not of the sense doors that take in the external world. There is the pleasure that arises in a more diffuse way, that swells up, emerges, arises inside for no particular external reason, that comes from meditation. It’s a radically different pleasure because it doesn’t depend on the world, doesn’t depend on getting the world in shape, getting everything just perfect in the world and feeling content and happy with how the world is and how our external relationships are. But it comes with a kind of coming into harmony with ourselves, a deep inner sense of sensing the beingness of our life as that beingness comes into harmony, as that beingness comes into a kind of tenderness or wholeness or orientation that feels very meaningful in meditation.
There are pleasures in meditation that are certainly welling up, and I’m sure there are some nerve endings that are being stimulated, but it’s not because they’re stimulated from the outside in, but rather from the inside in. Something, a deep welling and inspiration. There are also unpleasant sensations that are of the senses, that come from the outer world or thinking about the outer world. Or there are unpleasant sensations that can well up that are not of the world exactly, not of the sense world, but also come from when we feel something is profoundly out of alignment in this world. So there’s a feeling of, “something is not right.”
But in meditation, what we’re beginning to give birth to—and this is the language the Buddha used, the language of birth—we’re giving birth to a deep wellspring of pleasure, a wellspring of well-being. This sense of well-being is closely connected to a number of things. It’s connected to faith or inspiration or confidence that’s represented, I think, with a big “yes.” “I’m here, this is good. I know this world, I’m inspired by it, I have refuge in it.” So we’re more inclined towards being present here for our experience, rather than continuing to be in the thinking mind that’s maybe thinking about the external world, that has this external, disconnected relationship to everything. Even if we’re thinking about something we did yesterday, and maybe we did something that was harmful and we feel regret now, if we spend too much time in the imagination of that event, we’re kind of removed from something deeper here. The idea is to come into this deeper place.
In meditation, there can be a sense of well-being, a sense of being at home, a goodness here, an inspiration about what this is about. So, faith. And there can be a wonderful sense of “yes” to being present for it, the effort, the energy of it. But here, we look for how to apply oneself in meditation so the very application itself is enjoyable. Maybe it’s a very light touch, maybe it’s with inspiration. It’s just a delight. Sometimes we can put a lot of energy into meditation and it just feels like play, almost, or feels like a delight to do it. And sometimes we need to do very, very little effort to get the best results from meditation. So finding how you can enjoy being focused, how you can enjoy being present with attention.
Then there’s mindfulness, and mindfulness brings joy because it brings safety. With mindfulness, we see everything clearly enough that we learn to not pick up, not continue involvement with things which are harmful for ourselves. Mindfulness creates the open space in which things can just be and evolve and change, and we can learn to delightfully trust that if we’re present, things move towards health—maybe not directly, but over time.
And then there is Samadhi, beginning to feel absorbed, connected here. Kind of like the joy of a cat that’s being petted, stroked. Being able to really center ourselves here and begin to feel more whole, more settled, more calm. There’s a strong correlation with Samadhi and calmness. As we get calmer in meditation, that’s the pleasure that we start appreciating.
And then there’s the more subtle pleasure of wisdom, of being able to be happy that we can see clearly enough to find the path, to find our way. Meditation is onward-leading. Samadhi is an onward-leading path where it’s not that we’re expecting something or trying to make something happen, but it’s kind of like we can see, feel, sense, “Here’s where the path opens up. Here’s the top of the slide that’ll take us deep on that wonderful Dharma slide.” Or, “Here’s a path in the forest.” Maybe it’s not so easy to see at first and we’re lost, but then we start seeing traces of the path. “Ah!” And the delight of knowing it, maybe after being lost in the wilderness, there’s a great joy and lightness and pleasure of finally having seen the path. The function of wisdom is to help us find that path so we don’t get caught in attachments, expectations, aversions, desires, but we see the path of what’s wholesome, what’s good, what’s healthy for us—a healthy way of being present, a supportive way of entering the world of Samadhi.
There are many forms of pleasure, of goodness, of rightness, of wholeness. And one of those words for this pleasure that comes along with time is harmony—that Samadhi is entering into a state of being in harmony, all things harmonious here and now.
So, part of what we’re doing in going into Samadhi, developing Samadhi, is becoming an expert or a connoisseur of pleasure within us. And so we can find that onward-leading pleasure which is not there because of the world in any particular way, or a fantasy of the world being any particular way, but something that’s deeply connected, that wells up from within. And where we discover that just to be alive is wonderful. Just to rest in our beingness without needing anything else to happen is very, very meaningful and significant.
So, the Samadhi of pleasure. Today you might go around maybe with a smile on your face, or maybe with the lightest touch of beingness, to see if you can feel that there’s a different kind of pleasure that’s not there because the world is providing pleasure. Maybe it’s the wholeheartedness with which you wash the dishes. Maybe it’s the full embodiment as you’re walking down the street, that you’re really there for the walk from the inside out, rather than studying the world around you. May this day be a day of deep, varied pleasure, so that you learn more about this world.
And then, I wasn’t going to say anything about our fundraising today, but last night I talked with someone who used to work for Save the Children, has many friends who still work there, and an IMC member who’s kind of been our connection there. She said that many of her friends, many of the people around the world who are doing the good work of Save the Children, their positions were funded by the Agency for International Development, and so they lost their jobs. And so, I think that our fundraising drive to support Save the Children is even more important and meaningful now than it would have been even some weeks ago. And maybe it has even greater value to be able to support this wonderful organization to continue their work at a time when the world really needs it. You can read more about our fundraising drive on IMC’s website under “What’s New,” or there’s a red banner on top of the website. May this be one of the ways that our wonderful YouTube community steps in to care for this world. Thank you.
Samadhi: A Pali word that refers to a state of deep meditative concentration or absorption. It is a key component of the Buddhist path, leading to tranquility, insight, and wisdom. ↩
Mudita: A Pali word meaning “sympathetic” or “altruistic joy.” It is the joy that one feels in the happiness and success of others, and is considered one of the Four Sublime States (Brahmaviharas) in Buddhism. ↩