This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Onward Leading Thoughts; Samadhi (39) The Pull 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.
Good morning, everyone. Before I start, some of you have contacted us about a hum in the recordings. I’m using a different mic; the issue might have been related to the mic that we had. So, I don’t know if those of you who noticed this want to say something at the end of the session, that would be nice.
So welcome everyone to our morning’s meditation. One of the invaluable areas to care for, be careful with, and caring has to do with our thinking during meditation. Some people are at war with their thoughts. Some people are enamored with their thoughts. Some people are 100% committed to their thoughts. Some people are subservient to the authority of their thoughts; every thought is true or something. But in meditation, the idea is to start learning how to think and what to think about that supports samadhi.1
At this approach stage of samadhi, there can still be thoughts, but the difference is that now the thinking comes from a deeper level, a deeper source within us than anxious thoughts, desirous thoughts, thoughts that have a lot of clinging involved or force behind them, or a lot of ego or self around them. The thoughts that come into play are quieter, softer, lighter, more like they float through. They don’t have any force behind them, or there’s no tension connected to them. They are thoughts that have to do with the meditation itself, very simple thoughts about, “Yes, this is good,” “Yes, here is where the attention should be,” “What happens if I come a little closer into the sensations of breathing?” “What happens if I open up more widely to the sensations of breathing?” “Can I just stay longer with the sensations of breathing?”
These are very simple. Sometimes they’re a little bit like giving ourselves instructions, sometimes a little bit like exploring the situation, just trying very subtly different ways of being with the experience. It’s very small adjustments, very small things. The thoughts would be almost as light, almost not there, as it would be driving down the freeway and the subtle ways in which you’re constantly adjusting the steering wheel to stay going straight. It’s done almost probably without any conscious thinking, but there is a conscious engagement that’s there.
So that light way of thinking can be akin to love, can be akin to being gentle, non-assertive. A kind of thinking that is not going to be judging, not going to be reactive or alarmed, but just like, “Oh, here, my friend, let’s try this. Let’s be here.” Like you’re with a friend who’s maybe troubled with something, and “Here, let me put my hand on your shoulder,” or “Here, would you like to link arms as we’re walking through the park?” “Here, I’m here with you.”
So there are no kinds of thoughts that are making opinions up or stories up or reacting or projecting ideas. It’s very simple, instructional about the experience. And sometimes they’re very subtle thoughts that, just to yourself, are kind of very simple, doing field notes, describing the situation. You know you’re doing this thinking appropriately if it doesn’t distract you. It keeps you on track, keeps you right here in a nice way. You feel the support of it. It’s like a friend who puts their hand gently on your back shoulder saying, “It’s okay, it’s okay. You can do this.”
And part of that is to begin to recognize, “Oh, here, this is the onward-leading nature, this pleasure, this well-being. This is good. Yes, this can help me stay with this, stay with what’s happening.” This is the onward-leading, this is where I adhere. And the onward-leading nature of samadhi at some point can feel like a gentle thread, a gentle cord which is pulling you along. Maybe like you’re on a sled and you can feel that your friend in front of you, or maybe it’s a horse or something, is pulling you along. You can feel the pull, you can feel the direction, or you can feel the slide. “Yes, here.” And maybe that’s the thoughts, the very subtle, “Here, yes.” Now, so feel the pull, the pull of samadhi.
Assuming a meditation posture. And as you’re sitting here, without anything else, just recognize in the broadest possible way how you are. How are you now? How would you answer that question, even in very simple ways? Feeling how that is for you to be this way. And then taking a gentle but full breath, and on the exhale, settle into the very middle of how you are, where the edges can relax.
Closing your eyes and feeling how you are in your body. What’s the global, general feeling, sense of being in your body? And then in the middle of that, taking a few long, full breaths, and as you exhale, to settle into the middle of all that, allowing the edges to relax.
And in a more general way, what’s the global experience of breathing? And then breathing a little deeper than usual. On the exhale, settling into the middle of your breathing with the edges relaxing. Taking two or three more deeper breaths, and on the exhale, letting your thinking mind settle, relax. Letting your breathing return to normal.
And feeling the rhythm of breathing in and breathing out.
At the end of the exhale, having a pause that’s just long enough that the urge to breathe in can be accompanied by a little thought, a subtle, quiet, loving thought: “Yes, yes to breathing in,” as you allow the inhale.
At the beginning of the exhale, maybe experiment with a very subtle, quiet thought that simply says, instructs, “Let go,” with no demand, no expectation, just a reminder to be with the letting go of the exhale.
And very calmly, gently, recognize, maybe with little thoughts, recognize any signs you have of becoming settled, becoming calm, becoming intimate with the cycle of breathing in and breathing out.
The quiet thinking, sometimes a nonverbal thinking, the nonverbal knowing thing that keeps you connected to the process of settling, concentrating, entering into an immersive experience of samadhi with your breathing.
And might there be some place deep inside, deep inside the center of your settledness or calm, where there’s a gentle pull that says, “Here, come along. Here, settle here, focus here.” Or perhaps more profoundly, you can feel the gravitational pull that has the message, “Let go. Here, let go into here, this place, this spot.”
And if it feels right, let there be a subtle, quiet thinking about your meditation experience that helps quiet the thinking mind, that reassures the thinking mind it’s okay to be quiet, to be here, to simply engage in dipping into the samadhi.
And as we come to the end of the sitting, to see if from the quietest place where you can think, or maybe the deepest place, the place that is most settled and calm, content, have thoughts of goodwill, thoughts of generosity, of respectful care for the people you might encounter today. Strangers, people in stores, places of work, neighbors, people on the road, friends.
And from the deepest place available for you, the deepest place of well-being or memory of a deep sense of peace, well-being, wish this for others. Almost as if you can offer what you have to others. Wish it, offer it.
May all of you be happy, calm, content. May all of you be safe, breathing breaths that are reassuring. May all of you be peaceful, free of agitation. May all of you be free of suffering, clinging. And may we share together, may we mirror for each other our deep human capacity for feeling happy, safe, peaceful, and free. May this be something we see in each other and support in each other.
Thank you.
Hello and welcome to this next part of the series on samadhi. We’re in this approach stage of samadhi, sometimes called access concentration. And as we get more and more settled into meditation—more settled, more absorbed, more intimate, more immersed in our experience—this is what samadhi is. Sometimes samadhi is felt to be any situation, not just meditation, where we are absorbed in what we are doing, immersed in what we’re doing. Some people will describe this as becoming one with what we’re doing. Some people describe it as being deeply intimate. Some people describe it as being one-pointed, gathered together, just here, just with this.
Some people describe samadhi more as a state, a broad, wide, expansive state that is centered fully here with one thing right now, at this moment. Sometimes it’s called momentary samadhi, where we’re very established in the present moment, but the awareness is fully there for one moment of experience, then something very different another moment, and it freely takes in the range of things that come in through the different sense doors. So it doesn’t necessarily have a single object, which going into deeper samadhi really usually uses simplifying into a primary kind of object, and a lot of the different sense doors start receding from awareness. So in deeper samadhi, a person might not be hearing sounds so much, not conscious of them. They’re still capable of it, but the attention is so absorbed in, like, the breathing that we don’t necessarily hear very much, or smell. So in the whole world of samadhi, things begin to shift and change, and it is a state shift. There’s a radical changing from business as usual with how we go through our lives.
One of the ways that this takes shape is that our thinking begins to change. As we start getting into this approach stage, thinking more and more tends to be wholesome. There’s less and less unwholesome thinking. There might be still some desires, aversions, doubt that come up—the hindrances might still be there, but they’re fairly weak now. So people who come into samadhi should really understand the hindrances well, have studied them a lot and be familiar with them, so that the subtle pull of them no longer grabs us. We’re able to say, “No, not now, stay here.”
There’s kind of an overriding movement towards a healthy way of thinking, a meditative way, a supportive way of thinking. Thinking about just here, just now, being here, stay here, continue here, relax here, don’t cling, don’t push, don’t pull back, stay, persist. But that thinking feels healthy, it feels wholesome. To some degree, we can come to this juncture with the approach stage where either it happens naturally, this kind of more healthy way of thinking about the meditation itself, about the present moment experience, or it’s easy to make the shift. And it is a shift where we’re no longer involved in the usual way of thinking, which maybe for many people is not so healthy, not so productive of calm, stability, peace, even well-being.
So, to begin to appreciate we’re actually shifting out of business as usual. It’s not a rejection of it, it’s not from aversion to it, but it’s important to really appreciate that if you want to go for a nice swim in a pool, generally you go and change into a bathing suit. So you’re shifting into a state, into a way of being that makes more sense, that’s more appropriate for a nice swim. There is a kind of recognition, “Oh, we’re going into a different mode here.” Otherwise, many of us are so committed to the usual mode of thinking, the usual mode of being, the usual preoccupations. But at least in principle, to understand this is a shift we’re taking, and we’re going into the pond, we’re going into the lake for a swim, in a sense. And yes, it’s appropriate to take off my regular street clothes to have my bathing suit. And so yes, it’s appropriate to put down our preoccupations about work and family and thoughts and desires and all kinds of things, resentments that we have. It’s appropriate for this time because we’re now entering into this kind of a new world, a new way of being.
This transition really begins to take hold in this approach stage. It’s a little bit wobbly still; the mind wanders off and we come back. “Be here.” This is where it’s really helpful to have this quiet, peaceful way of thinking that says, “Yes, here, stay here. It’s okay. You don’t have to go off. Not now, not now. Stay here.”
As we’re staying here with the present and the approach begins to happen, some of that approach feels like an onward leading, like there’s momentum, like we’re on a slide and we just kind of need to let go to let the slide carry us. The onward-leading nature might have different ways it’s experienced by people. Sometimes it can be feeling like… you know, I very much follow my breathing in my belly, the movements in my belly, and sometimes it’s almost like there’s a little thread in there that’s pulling me along. “Come here, follow that thread, stay right here where there’s a little bit of pressure, a little pulling.” It’s almost like… it’s not exactly that, but it feels like, “Oh yes, here is where I’m being absorbed in, here’s where I’m really connected.”
I don’t know if this metaphor works for you, but I’ve found it helpful for me. Sometimes I’m kind of like a kite that’s in the sky, floating nicely, but there’s a nice little thread, a cord that goes down to the ground. And that thread, that rope holding the kite in the air, it needs to be constantly taut. You don’t want it to be slack, and you don’t want it to be too tight. If it’s too tight, the string might break. If it’s too loose, the kite will fall. And so the job of the person who’s with the kite is to keep just the right tautness there so that it flies well. And so, just the right tautness there, “Just you here, stay there, feel that pull.” Don’t pull too hard, don’t lean into it. Relax. It’s always a relaxing, always a letting go, a releasing into, releasing into the onward-leading nature, releasing into the immersion, releasing into the lake, into the pond, releasing it down the slide.
When my kids were growing up, we went to a lake nearby that had a water slide, and it was fun. You could go fast and splash. In the slide of samadhi, there’s not really a splash. It’s very peaceful, but sometimes it can be a sudden shift, like, “Oh, I’m here, I’m in the lake.” Or sometimes it can be a slide that has no bottom, and you just find yourself in this peaceful space.
So, subtle, quiet, soft thinking. Not too much, not too little. A different kind of thinking than ordinary, but a thinking that’s about the meditation itself. Thinking that’s without greed, without trying too hard, without criticizing anything. Just simple, just the facts, just the field notes, just a little exploratory, aware. So that subtle thinking is part of this gathering together, unification, that all of us is participating, cooperating in just gathering together into this immersive experience of samadhi. And then feeling the pull, feeling the little bit of onward-leading nature, and not to get excited, not to push it more, but to always remember to feel and relax, let go. Almost like letting go into the experience is the way to be with it more fully.
So I hope that this makes sense. Just as I was saying this, in the back of my mind, I wanted to refer to it as “the poetry of samadhi.” I don’t think I’ve been speaking poetically, but maybe there’s something about the aesthetics, the sensibility of poetry when it really moves us in a deep way that comes into play, that supports this onward-leading nature, this subtle thinking, where the poetry of samadhi, the poetry of beauty here, poetry of sweetness here, “Yes, this is good.”
So thank you very much. If some of you would like to meditate more, a daylong, it’s not quite on this topic of samadhi, but certainly hopefully supportive, tomorrow I have a daylong retreat on Friday on mindfulness of emotions. And that will be through the Insight Retreat Center. On their menu, you’ll see online retreats. There’s also a note about it in the “What’s New” section of IMC’s website. I think it’s from 9 to 4 California time. It’s online. So thank you very much, and we’ll do another day tomorrow on approach.
Samadhi: A Pali word for a state of meditative concentration or absorption, where the mind becomes still, unified, and focused on a single object. It is a key component of the Buddhist path. ↩