Category: A Natural Mindfulness

On The Dao Bums forum site, someone wrote:

 First jhana is concentration on the sensation of piti. There is still thought. I don’t think it is possible that thought and one-pointedness co-exist.

Gautama equated “right concentration” with “one-pointedness of mind”:

And what… is the (noble) right concentration with the causal associations, with the accompaniments?  It is right view, right purpose, right speech, right action, right mode of livelihood, right endeavor, right mindfulness.  Whatever one-pointedness of mind is accompanied by these seven components, this… is called the (noble) right concentration with the causal associations and the accompaniments.  (1)

That implies that “one-pointedness of mind” is present in any “right concentration”, including the first.

There are also sermons where Gautama spoke of “one-pointedness” in conjunction with the first concentration:

Herein… the (noble) disciple, making self-surrender the object of (their) thought, lays hold of concentration, lays hold of one-pointedness.  (The disciple), aloof from sensuality, aloof from evil conditions, enters on the first trance, which is accompanied by thought initial and sustained, which is born of solitude, easeful and zestful, and abides therein. (2)

I would say that one-pointedness depends in part on the sense of gravity, and that along with a sense of gravity comes a feeling of momentum.  That feeling of momentum can underlie a train of thought, so that one-pointedness can in effect be rejoined as the thoughts conclude, rather than re-initiated.

If Gautama is to be believed, thoughts don’t cease in concentration, even with the final concentration (3). What does cease is volition in thinking, beginning in the first concentration with volition in the formulation of speech, and ending in the final concentration with volition in the actions of feeling and perceiving.

As might be expected with the cessation of volition in speech, thought in the first concentration comes out of a particular necessity:

… the thought comes out of necessity in the free placement of attention in the movement of breath. When a presence of mind is retained as the placement of attention shifts, then the natural tendency toward the free placement of attention draws out thoughts initial and sustained, and brings on the stages of concentration… (4)

Gautama described the feeling of the first concentration with a metaphor about a “bath-ball”:

… just as a handy bathman or attendant might strew bath-powder in some copper basin and, gradually sprinkling water, knead it together so that the bath-ball gathered up the moisture, became enveloped in moisture and saturated both in and out, but did not ooze moisture; even so, (a person) steeps, drenches, fills, and suffuses this body with zest and ease, born of solitude, so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded by this lone-born zest and ease. (5)

  I’ve written about the “bath-ball” (6):

If I were kneading soap powder into a ball in a copper vessel, I would have one hand kneading soap and one hand on the vessel. The press of the hand kneading soap would find something of an opposite pressure from the hand holding the vessel, even if the bottom of the vessel were resting on the ground.

More particularly:

… the exercise becomes in part the distinction of the direction of turn that I’m feeling at the location of awareness… that distinction allows the appropriate counter from everything that surrounds the place of awareness.

I would say that gravity and handedness (I’m right-handed) are the source of my feeling of outward force at the location of awareness, and the activity of the muscles of posture in response to the stretch of ligaments is the source of the counter.

Omori Sogen, a Rinzai Zen teacher, spoke about centrifugal and centripetal forces connected with seated meditation:

Thus, by means of the equilibrium of the centrifugal and the centripetal force, the whole body is brought to a state of zero and spiritual power will pervade the whole body intensely. (7)

I’ve also written about Gautama’s choice of words in the second half of his “bath-ball” metaphor:

Words like “steeps” and “drenches” convey a sense of gravity, while the phrase “not one particle of the body that is not pervaded” speaks to the “one-pointedness” of attention, even as the body is suffused. (6)

My experience of “zest and ease” (Pali “piti” and “sukha”) depends on my experience of the senses connected with balance, particularly the sense of gravity:

If I can find a way to experience gravity in the placement of attention as the source of activity in my posture, and particular ligaments as the source of the reciprocity in that activity, then I have an ease.

The feeling of ease I get is accompanied by a feeling of clarity, a clarity that has a certain energy. I would guess that energy is Gautama’s “zest”. (8)

Gautama said:

… a good (person] reflects thus: “Lack of desire even for the attainment of the first meditation has been spoken of by [me]; for whatever (one) imagines it to be, it is otherwise” [Similarly for the second, third, and fourth initial meditative states, and for the attainments of the first four further meditative states]. (9)

The “Dao Bums” member continued:

I’d still love a plain English version of what you are suggesting here. I might try it, but I’d need some clarity about what you mean.

The pattern of thought Gautama identified as his way of living seems natural enough to me. Here are the highlights:

1) Relax the activity of the body in inhalation and exhalation;

2) Find a feeling of ease and calm the senses connected with balance, in inhalation and exhalation;

3) Appreciate and detach from thought, in inhalation and exhalation;

4) Look to the free location of consciousness for the automatic activity of inhalation and exhalation.

Regarding “calm the senses connected with balance”—the Pali can be translated as “calm the mental factors” (10), but no applicable explanation of “mental factors” is given in the sermons.

Regarding “look to the free location of consciousness for the automatic activity of inhalation and exhalation”—the Pali can be translated as “I will breathe in observing stopping, I will breathe out observing stopping” (11), where “stopping” is the cessation of the exercise of volition. Ceasing the exercise of volition while mindful of inhalation and exhalation only occurs when the activity of inhalation and exhalation is solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness.  I’ll have more to say about that later.

Thought “initial and sustained” ceases in the second concentration, though in my experience thought as in the four points above can recur. Gautama provided another metaphor:

… imagine a pool with a spring, but no water-inlet on the east side or the west side or on the north or on the south, and suppose the (rain-) deva supply not proper rains from time to time–cool waters would still well up from that pool, and that pool would be steeped, drenched, filled and suffused with the cold water so that not a drop but would be pervaded by the cold water; in just the same way… (one) steeps (their) body with zest and ease… (5)

Sogen wrote:

… It may be the least trouble to say as a general precaution that strength should be allowed to come to fullness naturally as one becomes proficient in sitting.  We should sit so that our energy increases of itself and brims over… (12)

Omori quoted one Hida Haramitsu:

We should balance the power of the hara (area below the navel) and the koshi (area at the rear of the pelvis) and maintain equilibrium of the seated body by bringing the center of the body’s weight in line with the center of the triangular base of the seated body. (13)

The equilibrium that Haramitsu described can follow a necessity of breath that places consciousness in the lower abdomen, given a feeling of ease at the point of consciousness and the experience of gravity as the source of activity and stretch.

I’m partial to Yuanwu’s “turning to the left, turning to the right, following up behind” (14). If I relax the muscles of the lower abdomen and the muscles behind the pelvis, and calm the stretch of ligaments between the pelvis and the sacrum, gravity can yield a “turning to the left, turning to the right”.

“Following up behind” I believe refers to support engaged behind the sacrum and spine:

There is… a possible mechanism of support for the spine from the displacement of the fascia behind the spine, a displacement that may depend on a push on the fascia behind the sacrum by the bulk of the extensor muscles, as they contract. (15)

There’s a frailty in the structure of the lower spine, and the movement of breath can place the point of awareness in such a fashion as to engage a mechanism of support for the spine, often in stages. (4)

That brings us to the third concentration. Gautama described the third concentration as like “water-lilies” of three different colors in a pond, lilies that never break the surface of the water:

… free from the fervor of zest, (one) enters and abides in the third musing; (one) steeps and drenches and fills and suffuses this body with a zestless ease so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded by this zestless ease. … just as in a pond of blue, white, and red water-lilies, the plants are born in water, grow in water, come not out of the water, but, sunk in the depths, find nourishment, and from tip to root are steeped, drenched, filled and suffused with cold water so that not a part of them is not pervaded by cold water; even so, (one) steeps (one’s) body in zestless ease. (5)

The water-lilies I believe represent the influence of the legs, the arms, and the head on activity in the abdominals, and consequently on stretch in the ligaments of the spine. The feeling of a combined influence of the extremities in the abdomen could be said to be like lilies of three colors floating under the surface of some body of water.  The exact influence of each extremity remains unclear (zest ceases), yet with a sense of gravity and a stretch in particular ligaments, I can arrive at an ease.

Gautama declared that the sages abide in the third concentration. I remind myself that the activity of the body in inhalation and exhalation tends toward coordination by the free placement of consciousness, and look for ease.

Things can shift from activity of the body coordinated by the free placement of consciousness, to activity that takes place solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness.  Here’s Gautama’s description of the fourth concentration:

Again, a (person), putting away ease… enters and abides in the fourth musing; seated, (one) suffuses (one’s) body with purity by the pureness of (one’s) mind so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded with purity by the pureness of (one’s) mind. … just as a (person) might sit with (their) head swathed in a clean cloth; even so (one) sits suffusing (their) body with purity… (5)

The transition to activity solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness can involve a leap of faith, as Dogen pointed out:

Suppose that you have climbed to the top of a hundred-foot pole, and are told to let go and advance one step further without holding bodily life dear. In such a situation, if you say that you can practice the Buddha-Way only when you are alive, you are not really following your teacher. Consider this carefully. (16)

Complete relinquishment of volitive activity in the body involves letting go of the activity of breath while yet conscious of the need to inhale and exhale.  That can feel like letting go of life itself.

The location of consciousness in the third concentration is the place from which to “advance one step further”. That location may shift and move, yet that is the place where automatic activity in the movement of breath can be engendered solely by virtue of the location of consciousness.

In some sermons, Gautama offered a variation on his metaphor for the fourth concentration:

… it is as if (a person) might be sitting down who had clothed (themselves) including (their) head with a white cloth; there would be no part of (their) whole body that was not covered by the white cloth. (17)

In the fourth concentration, ease in the nerve exits between vertebrae along the sacrum and spine provides an ability to feel right to the surface of the skin all over the body, such that “there is not one particle of the body” that cannot receive the placement of consciousness.

Gautama spoke of four initial concentrations. After his description of the fourth concentration, he would often outline what he called “the fifth limb” of concentration, “the survey-sign”:

Again, the survey-sign is rightly grasped by (a person), rightly held by the attention, rightly reflected upon, rightly penetrated by insight. … just as someone might survey another, standing might survey another sitting, or sitting might survey another lying down; even so the survey-sign is rightly grasped by (a person), rightly held by the attention, rightly reflected upon, rightly penetrated by insight. (5)

The survey-sign is a feeling for the body as a whole, to be arrived at after the attainment of the fourth concentration.  Such a feeling allows for a return to activity of inhalation and exhalation solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness, as appropriate.

I sit down first thing in the morning and last thing at night, and I look to experience the activity of the body solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness. As a matter of daily life, just to touch on such experience as occasion demands—for me, that’s enough. (18)

Let me know if there’s anything I can clarify.

☞ A Natural Mindfulness–PDF