This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Absorbing Pervasive Pleasure; Samadhi (25) Pleasure for 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.
Hello everyone, welcome. Welcome to this, the end of this week on the pleasure aspect of Samadhi1. One of the things to consider when you’re interested in Samadhi is that as you meditate, there’s value in taking in, absorbing whatever healthy sense of pleasure is present, and to become wise over time what forms of pleasure support the settling, the calming, support our mind and body feeling a sense of stability.
We become in the present moment, awareness is in the present moment in a stable way. Often our attention is agitated or flighty, quick to disappear, wander off with our thoughts, our preoccupations. Sometimes even if we are in the present moment, it’s flighty or agitated because of anxiety. We might be very much in the present moment, hyped up in the present moment, where every sound is of concern, and the stability of the mind is lost in the constant searching out, “Am I okay?” Or it might be that we’re not so stable because we have expectations or ambitions around meditation, and we’re riding every moment kind of breathlessly to see, you know, how to get further. So, to find the joys, the pleasures which support a calming, a stabilizing, a quieting of the mind and body.
Often in the beginning of a meditation, I emphasize relaxing. The Buddha’s way of doing the same, maybe with somewhat the same effect, is to emphasize a calming—a calming of the body, calming of the mind. The difference is that calming maybe goes a little deeper than relaxing. It’s also, calming might be more of a pervasive influence on our system than relaxing, which might be just relaxing the shoulders or the belly, particular muscles. But to calm the system, to calm the nervous system, and then to see if there’s any pleasure in that calmness, any pleasure in the relaxing, any pleasure in being here and now, any pleasure in being connected to the body, any pleasure in how we’re aware.
In a sense, the deepening Samadhi is a wonderful joining together of the body and mind. So the mind is in harmony and in connection and in cooperation with the body, and vice versa. And so how we’re aware is very important for that. Sometimes I think of my body as being shy, and it appreciates when the mind approaches it with a relaxed, gentle awareness—unforceful, undemanding, unjudged. And sometimes I think of my mind as an overactive engine that really appreciates when the body receives it, so the mind’s attention can rest with the body. So in this way, mind and body come into harmony, and that feels pleasant. That feels good. It might even be a sense of joy.
So, to gently close your eyes. With the eyes closed, feel your posture from the inside out, and feel it the way that you feel it. Feeling is kind of the mind, and the sensations we have is kind of like the body. So to feel the body with a soft mind, a gentle mind, and to adjust the body to be a body and posture conducive to attention and calm.
In this coming into harmony of the mind and body, the mind directs the body to take a few long, slow, deep breaths. The body provides great more sensations, more connection for the mind to be aware of. And the place where sensations occur is the same place as we’re sensing, and that’s the meeting place of the mind and body. And let that meeting be calm, maybe gentle, light.
And as you exhale, to let there be a calming of the body, maybe a pervasive sense of, like a wave of calm traveling through the body, softening the muscles, the tensing, the bracing.
Letting the breathing return to normal, and taking some time to feel your body, almost like you’re checking in with your body with a wide-angle lens. And just very relaxedly take in, absorb the sensations of the body, throughout the body, without searching or trying to do it right. Whatever way the body reveals itself, a wide-angle lens for your body.
As you exhale an ordinary exhale, let there be a calming wave being carried by the exhale, a calming wave through the mind, a settling of the mind. Perhaps a calming on the edges of the body, a softening, maybe a calming on the edges of your heart, the edges of the feelings, emotions you’re feeling. A softening on the edges.
And then feeling, sensing whatever is pleasant that feels like it’s part of this meditation practice. The simple pleasures of settling, sensing, being present. The pleasure of being more embodied. Maybe there’s a very subtle hum or glow or vibrations through your body, somewhere in your body, that feels like a settling, like a pleasant abiding here and now.
And then within that, becoming aware of the breathing as if breathing is a gentle, or maybe not so gentle, movement within a wider field, atmosphere of calm pleasantness.
And being aware of the body breathing in a light way, gentle way, but also in a committed way, devoted way, without any strain. The mind meets breathing softly, gently, and the body receives the mind so it can rest in the body, be at ease, know it’s okay to soften and relax into the present moment.
Breathing in for whatever pleasure there is, however subtle. Maybe on the inhale, this inhale is like a drinking or breathing in throughout the body that pleasure. And the exhale is further spreading through the body whatever pleasantness, whatever feels good about being here, meditating.
Feeling the pleasure, taking in and registering in your body whatever is pleasant about breathing and attending to the breath, being in the body, letting it, absorbing it, spreading it. As if there’s a gentle attitude of “yes.” Maybe even the subtle word “yes.” Maybe even a small smile supported by this “yes” to being with the breathing.
Being aware of the diffuse, broad feeling of being here in your body. Maybe the way that calm or pleasure might not be localized to a particular place, but more spread quietly throughout the body. Easy to overlook, but which is support for steadying the mind here and now with the breathing at the middle.
And then as we come to the end of this sitting, to take a few moments to feel in whatever way you can a pervasive sense of the body, that the body has three dimensions. It has width and depth into which there can be a glowing feeling of calm or subtleness or quiet, even in the middle of noise.
And at your own inclination, to feel the body widely, almost as if there is a glow of attention that goes beyond the body. And may it be that your glow of care, glow of love or kindness, goodwill, travels like a radiance, like a gentle light or a soft warmth with no specific focus, but except to gently touch all things as it glows and flows outward into the world, touching the world with kindness, with kind attention, the warmth of kindness.
And imagine that light of kindness, the glow, the warmth, spreads far and wide, carrying with it goodwill for all beings. May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free. And may these wishes spread outwards in all the ways possible, so that other people know they’re not alone, to know that there are people who care and are kind. Let us be forces of kindness in this world. May we be friends with everyone.
Thank you.
So hello and welcome to this fifth Friday, the Friday, the fifth day of looking at the pleasure of Samadhi. To enter into Samadhi is really deeply supported by being attuned to pleasure—the pleasure that comes with meditation. Not the pleasure that we can get by having really wonderfully soft clothes to meditate in or the most perfect, sensuous cushion to sit on, but rather the kind of pleasure that begins to radiate or flow from the inside out.
As we start being sensitive and attuned to the pleasure, the simple, very simple pleasure of maybe being calmer—and it might be relative, in that we’re a little bit calmer than we were—we feel pleasure and the hope that it provides. It might be that we feel a little bit more at ease in ourselves, at ease with what is difficult, and that sense of a little bit more ease is pleasant. It might be that there’s a calm that begins spreading through the body, or a feeling of being stable after being agitated, feeling like we’re not going anywhere, we’re settling down more and more into ourselves. There could be that there begins to be some joy or delight. There could be some feeling of ease in the breathing.
I think one of the great experiences that was very meaningful for me when I was quite young and beginning to meditate was to discover a breath that was free, that had its own ease. Breathing was breathing itself. And sitting quietly in meditation or having tea or something and just feeling this complete freedom in the breath to breathe itself. Before that, I would never have imagined. I thought my breathing was relatively free, that I wasn’t involved in it, but there were so many ways in which my mental and emotional life was somehow involved with the breathing. And to have all that settle down enough so that the physical breathing was just breathing itself felt like such a great pleasure. So there’s many kinds of pleasures that can come with meditation.
And some of them really feel like they’re healthy, like they’re beneficial, that they’re supportive because they feel wholesome. They feel like they’re good for us to feel. And so we don’t tighten up or we don’t bore down on it. We don’t try to pump it up. We don’t try to be selective about it, to be like, “Okay, this is the one, this is the pleasure to really focus on and build up.” But rather, we kind of trust it. We absorb it. We let it register in our system.
In particular, I find very useful is the kind of very subtle pleasure or maybe joy that can feel like it’s pervasive through the body. And becoming more and more embodied, more and more present in our whole body is phenomenally useful for Samadhi. When people try to get concentrated only as a mental exercise, they often can get a certain kind of concentration and a certain kind of satisfaction from it, but in the bigger picture, it’s not so useful because it’s not part of a movement towards becoming more peaceful, more settled, more free. There’s something about opening up and settling into the full body and feeling the goodness of that and the pleasure of that.
There’s pleasure in breathing, so there’s all kinds of pleasures, and so each person is going to find their own. But there’s something about the mind that it’s more interested in being present if it’s enjoying it, if there’s pleasure. And certainly, we can develop a lot of mindfulness, strong mindfulness, being in the present moment with things that are unpleasant, and that’s valuable when we have to. But it just makes it easier and nicer for the mind to want to be there, to become partners with the body, partners with the meditation, so that the mind begins to gather. The mind begins being really interested, “Yes, this is good, this is where I want to be.”
Some people might complain that this is hedonistic, and it can be if the purpose is to only really just savor or indulge in the pleasures of meditation. But it’s not meant to be that. It’s meant to be able to dip into, drop into a state of health, a state of well-being, a state of harmony. The kind of pleasure that comes when we’re at ease in a deep, peaceful way, when we’re not in conflict and not agitated, not chasing things or running away from things, and not judging and making commentary about everything happening. But the whole psychophysical system begins to come into a very healthy place. I think of Samadhi as health, and it feels good, it feels pleasant.
And it’s leading us in the direction of becoming good people, leading us in the direction to become kind, more compassionate, more caring, more intelligent, more attuned people—attuned to the world, attuned to ourselves, attuned to others. Samadhi provides a tremendous amount of benefit for how we’re going to walk into the world if we kind of shift the whole way in our stance or attitude. In Buddhism, Samadhi is the means for liberation, to become free. And to become free of suffering is one of the great purposes, goals of a human life. And it’s a great goal for supporting other people, a great goal of compassion.
And so to know and discover for oneself how thoroughly and fully we can become free of suffering makes it possible for us to be attuned or attentive to how that’s a possibility for other people. And so we’re not overly influenced by their behavior or their quirkiness, but we see them with a different eye. We see them with this deep love and care, knowing what’s possible in them, and knowing that there is goodness and beauty within them that can be grown and become full. We feel a kind of kinship with people, a deep kinship with Samadhi, because the strong lines of separation that we have become softer.
So it’s not hedonistic, but it is going along, supporting, and with pleasure. So this is a piece of the puzzle that’s needed to be understood to really begin finding a way to settle in and getting concentrated in the Samadhi-type way. And so we’ll keep building as we go along here, and hopefully this week on pleasure will support us as we go further. At some point, that pleasure becomes a pervasive feeling of joy and a pervasive feeling of very deep, peaceful happiness. So the pleasure shifts and changes as we go along.
And for now, the next step in this, which we’ll talk about next week, is the preparatory, final preparation for dipping into what most clearly is called Samadhi in the teachings of the Buddha, to really get absorbed into this. And for that, there’s something that’s sometimes called access concentration. And so this pleasure supports a kind of attention, a kind of awareness that now begins to become in the groove of the present moment. So that’ll be the topic for next week.
So thank you very much. And as the week comes to an end, one more time here for our YouTube community, I want to evoke or remind that we have this fundraising drive that I’m so grateful for all of you who’ve made donations. It’s quite inspiring that so many people come together, and we’ve raised, you know, maybe close to, I don’t know, two-thirds or something of what we’re hoping to raise. We’re trying to match what we raised three years ago when we did a fundraising drive for Save the Children then, and maybe even surpass it. And so, I think for given the challenges of our world these days, it’s particularly significant to support these kinds of nonprofits that are trying to do good in the world. And I think everyone benefits, that the benefit spreads widely through the world for this kind of offering, this support for Save the Children. So thank you, and you can find information about it on the IMC website. Just go to IMC’s website, and there’s a red banner on the top of the website, and there’s a little discussion about it in the bottom right where there’s the “what’s new” section.
So thank you, and I look forward to coming here on Monday to continue.
Samadhi: A Pali word that refers to a state of deep concentration or meditative absorption, where the mind becomes still, unified, and focused. It is a key component of the Buddhist path. ↩