Video
Original in Hungarian
Description
We put our hands together in front of the chest and arouse the intention that through practice we wish the obstacles to clarity would be removed and that we would achieve a state of relaxed presence.
Then we assume the posture of meditation. This can be a cross-legged posture, any posture where the knees are bent. It’s important to keep the back straight, to stabilize the posture, you can also take the meditation hand posture, either here in front of the navel, or you can put your hands on both knees like this, or you can put your hands on both knees facing down. Find the posture that suits you. It is important to feel that you are pressing the ground with your knees and body.
And our back is straight.
The shoulder open is like being pulled upwards by the top of the head, as if a perfectly vertical symmetrical line, symmetrical to the line of our two sides, is the essence of our postures, of our presence, our axis.
We can move subtly to find a balanced state, so we have a hold, we are in balance.
And that when we reach a state of balance, we release the tensions first at the level of the body.
At the forehead.
At the heels.
Shoulders at the navel and at the hip level.
We pay attention to the toes, the fingertips.
And anytime there would be tension in these areas we also raise the intention to notice, notice and relax these points.
This also maintains a relaxed state of balance.
A relaxed unmovable state of equilibrium.
Whenever we feel out of balance, or tension has arisen, or we no longer have the posture, we correct the posture.
Posture, balance, relaxation.
And posture is like a vessel. The mind is like the nectar that fills the vessel.
We move on to consciousness. We close our eyes and look inward.
We observe the bodily sensations from head to toe.
Try to feel the whole body together, so not in a band, but as if we were observing the space from head to toe that our body is cutting out of the outer space.
We direct our attention from the centre of our body towards the navel.
And there we observe the tiny movements of the breath, the movement of the breath.
The body is completely released.
As we do it well, the body becomes light. It can even disappear, we have a sense of bodily sensation.
We are in balance.
We relax the five acting points including forehead.
Chin shoulder navel and hips.
We are intimately present with our own breathing.
And at the navel we notice that on the inhale there is a rising expanding sensation and on the exhale a sinking contracting sensation. It
is as if we were also watching our breathing with our eyes in the direction of the navel.
We also direct our inner vision there and focus on the navel and watch the movement of the breath at the navel.
The thoughts come no problem.
We don’t dismiss them, we simply return to the breath.
We notice if we are scattered.
And we return to the primary object of the breath, the navel.
We continue to relax, not only letting go of the breath in the body. We let the body breathe on its own, so we don’t try to influence it with our mind, but the mind breathes, but we let the body breathe, we let go of the breath.
Now the mind is just following, not dictating.
It is simply following the process of breathing.
The very act of navel-gazing, of watching the breath, has a calming effect. At the brow, we observe the drowsiness and eliminate it, and at the navel it calms us.
The little soldiers of our vigilance are there at the points.
Forehead.
Jaw shoulders.
Navel.
Hips and whenever tension appears at these points, they send a signal and relax these areas.
Our mind follows our breathing. Also
by recognizing and telling us what is happening. So we associate our inner thinking with the breath.
Exhaling we say exhaling.
Let the breath continue to be in control so that the mind doesn’t dictate the breath to inhale, exhale, but when we inhale we recognize it.
And saying inhale impersonally is simply naming what is happening.
And when we exhale, we exhale. It
can also
help if we try to say it quietly, so we don’t say it out loud without dictating it inside, but for the subtle sensation of inhaling, very quietly, just whispering it in our minds almost, inhaling.
And exhale.
If we try to let go of all thoughts, there is nothing else to do now.
Just so much.
To keep our bodies in balance.
Our breathing attention at the navel and inhaling we say inhale, exhale, exhale.
We are present relaxed all the time.
When scattered thoughts
come, we recognize them.
And we return to the navel for the breath and the words inhale exhale.
And strange bodily sensations come, we observe those too and relax into them.
We maintain a state of balance.
The goal is to become simpler.
To become more purely relaxed and do nothing else than what the practice is, the right posture.
We focus on the navel.
And there in the process of breathing in, let’s say inhaling to exhaling to exhaling.
All other things are just diffusers.
We notice them.
And we go back to the practice.
The difficult thing about this type of meditation is that they are too simple.
The mind wants to entertain itself.
It produces bodily sensations.
It’s okay.
We observe them, relax into them and return to this very simple mindwork of focusing on the navel.
We are present in the process of breathing.
And we say inhale exhale.
Next step is to engage the distractors from our state of meditative presence into our practice.
This looks like if any kind of strong bodily sensation appears at the knees at the hips at the thighs anywhere.
Then we take our attention there.
We observe the state.
For body sensation, we say feeling feeling feeling, we name it, we relax into it, and then we let it go and go back to breathing.
You don’t have to do it very often, so you don’t have to go out very often. We decide what is the bodily sensation that is already so strong that it is drawing our attention, then we make the enemies part of our practice. We make it part of the practice.
There is a sensation at the hips, we go out, we let go of the breath.
We observe the feeling.
Pain or tension.
We call it a feeling.
Feeling.
Feeling.
We relax into it and then return to breathing.
Breathing in.
Breathing out.
We listen to our breathing at the navel.
You don’t have to be perfectly still for this exercise.
We follow the sensations. You cannot make very subtle, continuous small movements. This helps to avoid numbness in the legs and pain in the body.
But still, when we feel that something is becoming very unbearable, we let go of our breathing. We go outside observe, name relaxing in it.
And that if it doesn’t go away then we either rub it or we move something about our body position.
Not taking the pain to extremes is not the goal, as we can make progress in the middle ground.
The exercise is not about tolerating pain, it is about developing awareness of presence.
It is about making friends with the tendency to be distracted. We are now also bringing the
scattering of consciousness into the practice.
Whatever verbal or even visual thought arises in us, we equally let go of the breath, give space to the thoughts and say thinking, thinking, thinking.
We relax into the state then return to the breath and continue to observe the breath at the navel inhaling inhaling saying inhaling exhaling, exhaling.
If we want to be present in the breath two things can move us out bodily sensations as well as thoughts, so now we include both in the practice, if some strong bodily sensation appears we go out feeling, feeling feeling feeling strong thought we go out thinking, thinking, thinking and then we return to the breath. Because there are always thoughts, there are always feelings, so we have to make a choice. It’s already related to intelligence in meditation, when to go out and when not to go out, but it’s better to go out as less as possible. We move our attention towards feelings towards sensations.
We observe them, we name them, we let them go. In the same way, with stronger thoughts, we should move our attention towards thoughts towards thinking.
We notice, name, let go and stay with the primary support of presence, the breath.
One aspect of attention is mindfulness.
Here in this practice it is the navel, the navel is the focal point.
Another aspect of continuity in this practice is this breath.
We are aware of the breath all the time, or if we are not aware of the breath then we are aware of the feelings or the thinking.
And there is also a teres aspect of consciousness.
So we let go of the conceptual naming.
And we are simply present in the breath.
We also
feel the bodily sensations.
And we also sense the thoughts.
We are present in the space of the body breath and the conscious processes.
We are clearly, relaxed, simply present in space all the time. In
Satipatthana’s text, we find that we are present in the space of body, feeling and consciousness in a state of alert relaxed enthusiasm.
Transcending regret and any aspiration for worldly things.
We are simply present.
In the same way, whenever there is tension within us, we notice it.
We loosen it, if our hold is out of balance, we restore balance.
We relax the body with the breath and the mind.
We can have thoughts. In the meantime we sense the breath.
Meanwhile we sense in the body and sensations.
And still the focus is
on the navel.
We feel our breath, the expansion and contraction.
We let go of the exercise.
We let go of the focus, the attention.
Let what you want to appear appear
naturally.
And we reflect back on that half hour, what we practiced, even recall the steps.
Hold, balance, relaxation.
Turning inward by closing the eyes. Observing the sensation of
body position.
Accentuating breathing at the navel.
Then adding inhaling exhaling, then adding feeling feeling feeling.
Then thinking, thinking, thinking and then expanding at the end.
All 3 areas body breathing and also the space of consciousness beyond concepts without concepts.
Time spent in pure continuous focused released space presence. Recalling the difficulties we encountered in the practice.
These will be the points that will help us
later, the recognition of obstacles.
And then we thank ourselves for the whole exercise. We fold our hands in front of the chest and bow the head in front of the heart.
And thank you very much. I’ll also do the exercise after half an hour of practice it’s worth moving the members around a bit, we can even massage ourselves. Bye.