This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Wholeness in Silence; Samadhi (52) Immersed in Silence of Third Jhana. 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 from Spirit Rock. I’ll be here one more day tomorrow. It’s a delightful, comfortably cool, foggy, cloudy weather. The clouds, the fog should burn off today, and we’ll have a beautiful blue sky. I’m here for a meditation retreat, so maybe a little bit more than usual, I am, I don’t know, maybe I could say in love with what it’s like to be alive when I’m living close to the world of this unified, harmonious, collected movement in meditation.
I’ve been reminded here because of one of the co-teachers, Kaira Jewel Lingo, who was a nun in the Thich Nhat Hanh1 tradition for 15 years, and before that lived in spiritual communities, about growing up in Italy and having just enough contact with Catholic monasteries there to feel the same kind of unification, coziness, warmth, kind of centered in my body in those monasteries as she has felt and as I feel here.
When we come to this third jhāna2, one characteristic that’s important to keep in mind is that there’s no discursive thinking. Many of us understand our life, make sense of our life, through the thinking mind, through having conversations, explaining things to ourselves, understanding connections between things. It’s inconceivable that we could have a rich, valuable, safe life without negotiating it through thinking a lot.
As we come into the third jhāna, the thinking mind kind of goes offline. However, it’s not going into a trance; there’s actually a greater clarity. It’s kind of like without the discursive thinking mind, the conversational mind, the commentarial mind, going quiet and becoming peaceful, there’s actually a greater sense of clarity, a greater sense of clear knowing, a greater sense of a certain kind of healthy intelligence that the mind is capable of, even though there’s very little content.
One of the ways to appreciate this jhāna, whether you go into it or not, is the goodness of nonverbal thinking. Most of the knowing, most of the conceiving that we have through the day is not done verbally or in images. There’s a deeper capacity that humans and probably animals have to know that does not require a lot of thinking. I suspect that some of you saw the turkeys going by a little while ago. There’s an intelligence in them, but I suspect they’re not thinking about all kinds of things. I don’t even know how much there’s a past and future, probably some, but so many of the kind of thoughts that you have would be inconceivable for a turkey, but the turkey knows, sees, and knows enough to stay alive.
I’m not saying that you be like a turkey, but I’m saying that it’s kind of built into us that we have a nonverbal knowing, a non-discursive, non-conversational knowing that is called clear recognition, saññā3. And even sati4, mindfulness or awareness, is a kind of silent awareness more than it is labeling or verbally recognizing what’s happening. It’s a silent recognition. So this idea of a noble silence is part of moving into the jhāna, this beautiful clarity and intelligence. For this sitting, perhaps you can kind of attune yourself to how there is a nonverbal clarity, a nonverbal awareness of experience that is a doorway for a deeper intimacy.
So, assuming a meditation posture, maybe rocking back and forth a little bit, swaying back and forth, kind of feeling into your posture to feel how to align it, center it, have the chest a little bit more open. Maybe adjust the head a little bit so there’s a lifting at the very back of the head, tipping the head forward slightly and creating a little bit more stretching at the back of the neck. A good part of the feeling into your posture and adjusting it is probably happening with a nonverbal knowing, or a very rudimentary verbal knowing, very simple, that’s coming from a different place inside than discursive thinking about stories and events and what should happen.
And then in your posture, let there be a few deeper inhales and, in a relaxed way, extended exhales.
Relaxing as you exhale, allowing for relaxation as you exhale. And so there’s a knowing, a nonverbal knowing, maybe a kind of feeling of subtle places in your body that release, relax, soften. You don’t have to think about them; it’s enough just that they’re known without any comments.
Allowing your breathing to return to normal, and on the exhale, continue to allow the body to relax. No commentary needed. And see if there can be a silent awareness of your body, of the tensions in your body, of the softening in your body.
And then centering yourself on your breathing. Maybe if it’s possible, center yourself on the grounding place, the settling place deep at the beginning of the inhale and at the end of the exhale. Let there be a nonverbal, silent awareness at the end of every exhale of that settling place, grounding place deep within.
And as the inhale begins, allowing the inhale to arise, spread through your body, where the sense of allowing is silent. No words, images needed. Receiving the sensations of breathing in, allowing the exhale. And allowing, which is also silent, it’s almost like an opening up the door, a window, to allow the sensations of exhale, allowing the exhale to unfold.
And maybe without discursive thinking, there’s no right and wrong with however way you’re breathing. There’s no project. It’s simply a quiet, silent knowing of breath, knowing of breathing from some deep place inside that is content to rest in a silent knowing, silent awareness.
A silent awareness that is a bit like being surrounded by refreshing water, a pool of water, floating. And thoughts are let go like bubbles floating to the surface, resting in the body, in the body’s silent awareness.
If there is thinking, maybe you can feel how the thinking has tension in it, or pressure. Maybe you can understand that here and now, the thinking is not needed. There’s a better alternative: to trust the meditation, to trust the silent awareness, maybe arising out of the body.
And if there is anything that’s pleasant, delightful about resting here and now in the body, allowing, receiving whatever is happening into this nonverbal, silent awareness that can include everything—no thinking needed.
A silent awareness, the non-discursive, nonverbal way of knowing, is a way to leave ourselves alone, to not be a project, to not be something to judge. It’s phenomenally generous and kind to hold ourselves in awareness without anything extra, as if we’re our best friend who’s silently accompanying us, not commenting or judging or trying to fix us. Just we know we’re not alone. So to sit with this silent awareness of ourselves is being our own friend here.
And then learning how to be a friend for all people, the value of accompanying the world without discursive thinking, without making anything into a project, without judging. A silent awareness that has an intimacy, a friendliness, a care that allows so much to be communicated, more than words could ever do. To trust the love, the kindness, the friendliness that can be there with silence, silent accompaniment with clear companionship.
And as we end this sitting, to let the silent awareness spread our goodwill out into the world.
May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free.
And may others feel, recognize that we’re showing up with a simple friendliness, care, and kindness for them and for all beings, whether we agree with them or not. May all beings experience profound well-being.
So thank you very much. And again, there’s no bell. I will bow in appreciation. Thanks. Thank you.
So good morning and welcome to this next talk on samādhi5. This week we’re exploring the third jhāna that is, basically, the second and third are recognized as a form of noble silence. And silence, of course, in our society, there could be a dictionary of silence—all the different meanings, what’s conveyed in silence, many of which are not kind and sometimes are off-putting. But this is called a particular kind of silence called noble silence, a silent treasure, a treasure silence. And that where it feels cozy, it feels wonderful, it feels like nothing is needed.
There’s a remarkable thing that happens when discursive thinking stops, conversational thinking stops, rumination stops. Not just a few times; often for many people, rumination, obsessing about things with the mind, storytelling, telling ourselves stories, repeating the same idea over and over again, commentating, judging, having thoughts which are mean or thoughts which are scary or thoughts which are filled with desires—all these limit us. All these narrow the window, narrow the wholeness. They divide us, they keep us not really deeply in touch in a holistic way with ourselves from the inside out. In fact, even though thinking can be quite pleasant at times or quite compelling, seemingly very important, it involves a tremendous sacrifice, a tremendous loss.
Oddly enough, sometimes the people who are most worried about the Buddhist teachings of renunciation, letting go—which these jhānas have a lot to do with, letting go in the meditation—the people who are most worried about it, most troubled by it, are the ones who are most involved in their thinking mind, their discursive mind. And there’s good reason for that, because that’s the mind that tells us stories about all the things we need and should have or don’t have, and all the ways that we’ve been offended or hurt. And of course, thinking is valuable. Of course, some of the things we think about are true enough, but it’s unfortunate if it disconnects us from the wholeness of who we are and some of the deeper capacities of knowing and intelligence that we have that are waiting for us, that are there kind of below the level of discursive thinking, below the level of conversational thinking.
And so going into this third jhāna, it can feel very silent in there, but it’s not a silence that is being silenced, being ignored. It’s not a silence of being disconnected. There’s a feeling of, almost a feeling of, to be alive is enough. Someone on this retreat that I’m teaching asked me very, very sincerely in a question, “What’s the meaning of life?” And sometimes if someone asks that question, it’s not really asking for an answer, or it may be too philosophical or something, but there was such a sincerity that this was really important for the person, so I was careful about how I responded. So there was an example I was using, a kind of discursive thinking conversation to think about that, but it arose from that silent place inside. It wasn’t arising from fear or ambition; it was more kind of the place where creativity or intuition arises, maybe.
So I thought about it for a while, and I lived with it for a while, and the answer I came back with is that the meaning of life is to discover the expression of life. What is it that wants to be expressed? What is it that’s flowing and growing and knowing from deep inside that you can never know if you answer the question, “What is the meaning of life?” with a philosophical answer, with an answer that even is logical or somehow rational or somehow conceptual? It’s like asking someone who is involved in some wonderful playing of music or doing a dance or maybe just going for a walk with a friend in a delightful walk, “What’s the meaning of friendship? What’s the meaning of playing music? What’s the meaning of dance?” While you’re doing it, it’s not needed. In fact, to assign meaning to it during the activity takes you out of the activity. And so to drop in and let the expression of the music, the music-making, of the dance, of the friendship—the expression of it, that is the meaning of life.
So in these deeper jhānas, it can feel that way. There’s no need for meaning. We’re so fully alive, so fully here, so fully quieted the discursive, ruminating mind that tells us otherwise. It’s part of the delight for it. And it’s also very satisfying to go through this process of feeling a lot of joy and happiness in the first and second jhāna, and then having the joy quiet down, and then inviting this very deeper happiness. This deeper embodied happiness, again, is not verbal. It doesn’t have a verbal source. It doesn’t have a source from ideas. Many people’s emotions and sense of happiness and sadness is so dependent on the thinking mind, and whatever direction thoughts go, that’s the way we feel. And here, there’s a whole different source for happiness, for joy, that wells up from deep inside and that exists deep inside, that just feels satisfying, feels like this is being alive.
So, I want to read the metaphor or the simile for the third jhāna. And it uses, in this metaphor, a pool of cool water. You have to appreciate that, maybe imagine that it’s one of the warmest, hottest days you’ve ever been in, because these metaphors were created in India, in the hot climate of India. It was, in the Buddha’s enlightenment, I think I was there in June, it was the hot season, it was the hottest season. Boy, there was no one else there, it was so hot. And the Buddha didn’t get enlightened in the peak of the hot season, but he was getting close to it when he was sitting under the Bodhi tree there. And in the context of a very hot day, it’s just a delight to go into and soothing and satisfying to go into a cool pool of water. And so it’s in that context you’ll see that coolness is used as part of the metaphor, and lotus flowers are used. And lotus flowers can be quite beautiful, and so it’s a metaphor for something that’s quite beautiful in ourselves, in our experience.
So the third jhāna is like a pool filled with blue lotuses or red lotuses or white lotuses, where some of the blue, red, and white lotuses would be born in the water, would grow in the water, would be nourished by the water without ever rising up above the water, above the surface. The cool water would fill, pervade, saturate, and permeate those lotuses from their tips to their roots, so no part of the blue, red, or white lotuses would not be touched with cool water.
So the practitioner pervades and saturates and permeates this body with happiness freed of joy, so that no part of the body is not touched.
A couple of things about this simile. I just find it delightful, this expression. This body is permeated with happiness freed of joy. Have you ever heard of such a thing? Why would you want to free yourself from joy? Because there’s a happiness which is better, a pure happiness in a very deep, embodied, satisfying way, that lacks the excitement, the thrill of joy. And of course, that thrill and excitement is quite wonderful at first, but if it goes on and on and on, it’s exhausting, it’s tiring. And so to be able to drop into this deeper state of happiness…
And the metaphor is one of being immersed in the water, cool, refreshing water. When I was young, we lived by the seashore, and I spent a lot of time in the summer not only in the water but under the water. I had snorkels and a mask, and I would dive under the water, maybe to about six feet or so, five or six feet, and flip myself over on my back and try to stay down there as long as I could. And there were gentle waves coming in, in the sea that I was at, and I’d be underneath looking up at the waves coming into the shore. And it was so delightful to be down there. There was this wonderful silence, there was this wonderful being kind of enveloped, hugged. It was kind of like being all cozy in a nest, perhaps, or cozy in a nice comforter-filled bed or something. And the world had disappeared down there—the world of expectations, the world of needs, the world of comparing myself to others and wanting things to be different. The world was so still and quiet down there, so satisfying. And I felt more alive on my back under the water looking up than I did almost any other time. No part of my body was not touched by this wonderful environment of the water.
So as we go into these deep absorptive states, many people will actually use the simile of dipping underwater briefly or for a while when they’re in these deep absorptions. And then if they come out, it feels like they’re surfacing out of it. There was a time in my practice where I would go into these deep states, and I needed to, felt like I needed to just kind of make sure everything was okay, that I wasn’t straining or that I knew the time, I knew my environment. And I would surface out of the water and check out what was going on, make sure everything was good, and then I would dip down back in.
And then in this state, everything we experience, all the sensations, whatever goes on, any feeling that goes on, is seen as beautiful, is seen as kind of wonderful, like lotuses. Each thing is distinct, each thing is its own thing floating in this water. So you might feel sensations of breathing, and it’s just delightful, like it’s its own lotus floating in the water. You might even feel some happiness, sensations of happiness in different parts of the body, anything. And there’s a silent knowing, a silent, nonverbal awareness of all this. There’s tremendous clarity, and now you’re not thinking about it, but you know it. You come out of it, you might think about it some, but not in this state.
So I hope that this metaphor and these words give you a feel, a sense, maybe through your imagination, of what it’s like. And if the idea of being in a pool of water is not welcoming for you, maybe there’s some other way, another metaphor that you have that can be comparable. One of the first times I experienced this kind of thing was going into a thousand-year-old chapel in France. And it was on top of a little hill, and being in that chapel, I was enveloped by a kind of goodness, a kind of peace that was new to me.
So, the third jhāna, thank you. I hope that you somehow go through the day exploring, considering, feeling into the ways in which you can have nonverbal knowing, the ways that awareness, mindfulness, can be silent, and that you find that very satisfying. So thank you very much.
Thich Nhat Hanh: A Vietnamese Thiền Buddhist monk, peace activist, and founder of the Plum Village Tradition. ↩
Jhāna: A state of deep meditative absorption. There are traditionally eight jhānas, each representing a progressively deeper state of concentration. ↩
Saññā: A Pali word that translates to “perception,” “recognition,” or “cognition.” In this context, it refers to a direct, non-verbal knowing. ↩
Sati: The Pali word for “mindfulness” or “awareness.” It is the faculty of remembering to pay attention to the present moment. ↩
Samādhi: A Pali word for a state of meditative concentration or “unification of mind.” It is a key component of the Buddhist path. ↩