Category: A Natural Mindfulness

Gautama’s teaching revolved around action, around one specific kind of action:

…I say that determinate thought is action. When one determines, one acts by deed, word, or thought.  (1)

“When one determines”—when a person exercises volition, or choice, action of “deed, word, or thought” follows.

Gautama also spoke of “the activities”.  The activities are the actions that take place as a consequence of the exercise of volition:

And what are the activities?  These are the three activities:–those of deed, speech and mind.  These are activities.  (2)

Gautama claimed that a ceasing of “action” is possible:

And what… is the ceasing of action? That ceasing of action by body, speech, and mind, by which one contacts freedom,–that is called ‘the ceasing of action’.  (3)

He spoke in detail about how “the activities” come to cease:

…I have seen that the ceasing of the activities is gradual. When one has attained the first trance, speech has ceased. When one has attained the second trance, thought initial and sustained has ceased. When one has attained the third trance, zest has ceased. When one has attained the fourth trance, inbreathing and outbreathing have ceased… Both perception and feeling have ceased when one has attained the cessation of perception and feeling.  (4)  

Gautama spoke of the “activity” of deed, but when he spoke of the ceasing of the activities, he spoke of the ceasing of “inbreathing and outbreathing”.  Even when “determinate thought” is not directly involved in the movement of the diaphragm, actions in the body that are occasioned by “determinate thought” affect the movement of breath, and can leave a residue of habit that further affects the movement of breath.  If “activity” in inbreathing and outbreathing has really ceased, then the “determinate thought” that gives rise to “activity” in the body of any kind must likewise have ceased.

“The cessation of inbreathing and outbreathing” is not an actual stoppage of breath. Gautama only spoke about the stoppage of breath once, in a description of the practices he undertook as an ascetic:

So I, Aggivessana, stopped breathing in and breathing out through the mouth and through the nose and through the ears.  When I, Aggivessana, had stopped breathing in and breathing out through the mouth and through the nose and through the ears, I came to have very bad headaches… very strong winds cut through my stomach… there came a fierce heat in my body.  Although, Aggivessana, unsluggish energy came to be stirred up in me, unmuddled mindfulness set up, yet my body was turbulent, not calmed, because I was harassed in striving by striving against that very pain.  But yet, Aggivesana, that painful feeling, arising in me, persisted without impinging on my mind…  (5)

Stopping the breath in and the breath out did not satisfy Gautama’s quest to “bring to a close the (holy)-faring”. Only after he had abandoned such ascetic practices did he enter the states of concentration, and attain the insight that caused him to say, “done is what was to be done”.

Just as he pointed to the “activity” of inhalation and exhalation instead of the “activity” of deed, Gautama pointed to the “activity” of perception and feeling instead of the “activity” of mind.  Apparently in Gautama’s experience, when the “determinate thought” that gives rise to perception and feeling has ceased, the “determinate thought” that gives rise to “activity” in the mind can also be said to have ceased. 

Gautama said that after he lectured, he returned to concentrating his mind:

And I… at the close of (instructional discourse), steady, calm, make one-pointed and concentrate my mind subjectively in that first characteristic of concentration in which I ever constantly abide.  (6)

“That first characteristic of concentration” is “one-pointedness of mind”, as here in Gautama’s description of “right concentration” (“right concentration”, part of “the eight-fold path” that leads to the end of suffering):

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.  (7)

Gautama spoke of laying hold of “one-pointedness” in the induction of the first “trance”:

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 directed and sustained, which is born of solitude, easeful and zestful, and abides therein.  (8)

I have described the experience of “one-pointedness of mind” as something that can occur in the movement of breath:

The presence of mind can utilize the location of attention to maintain the balance of the body and coordinate activity in the movement of breath, without a particularly conscious effort to do so. There can also come a moment when the movement of breath necessitates the placement of attention at a certain location in the body, or at a series of locations, with the ability to remain awake as the location of attention shifts retained through the exercise of presence.

In my experience, the “placement of attention” by the movement of breath is only completely free in what Gautama described as “the fourth musing”:

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.  (9)

The “pureness of mind” refers to the absence of any intention to act. Suffusing the body with “purity by the pureness of (one’s) mind” is widening awareness so that there is “not one particle of the body” that cannot become the location where attention is placed. 

The classic literature of Tai Chi appears to identify the ligaments of the body as a source of activity.  The literature describes three levels in the development of “ch’i”, a word that literally translates as “breath” but in practice is taken to refer to a fundamental energy of the body, and each of the three levels has three stages.

The stages of the first level are:

“… relaxing the ligaments from the shoulder to the wrist”; “from the hip joint to the heel”; “from the sacrum to the headtop”.   (10)

Unlike the contraction and relaxation of muscles, the stretch and resile of ligaments can’t be voluntarily controlled.  The muscles across the joints can, however, be relaxed in such a way as to allow the natural stretch and resile of ligaments–that would seem to be the meaning of the advice to “relax the ligaments”. 

The stages of the second level are:

“sinking ch’i to the tan t’ien” (a point below and behind the navel); “the ch’i reaches the arms and legs”; “the ch’i moves through the sacrum (wei lu) to the top of the head (ni wan)”.  (10)

Tai Ch’i master Cheng Man Ch’ing advised that the ch’i will collect at the tan-t’ien until it overflows into the tailbone and transits to the top of the head, but he warned against any attempt to force the flow.

Omori Sogen cautioned similarly:

… 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 instead of putting physical pressure on the lower abdomen by force.   (11)

I would posit that the patterns in the development of ch’i reflect involuntary activity of the body generated in the stretch of ligaments. There is, in addition, a possible mechanism of support for the spine from the displacement of the fascia behind the spine, a displacement that can be effected by pressure generated in the abdominal cavity and that may quite possibly depend on a push on the fascia behind the sacrum by the bulk of the extensor muscles, as they contract. 

The final level in the development of ch’i concerns “chin”.  According to the classics, “chin comes from the ligaments” (10). 

The three stages of the final level are:

“t’ing chin, listening to or feeling strength”; “comprehension of chin”; “omnipotence”.   (10)

Another translator rendered the last stage above as “perfect clarity” (12). In my estimation, “perfect clarity” is “the pureness of (one’s) mind” that Gautama associated with “the cessation of inbreathing and outbreathing” in the fourth concentration.

The Tai Chi classics emphasize relaxation. For me, calm is also required with regard to the stretch of ligaments, if “automatic movement” is to be realized.  The stretch of a ligament prior to strain is small (6%), and I would say that automatic movement is only initiated at the edge of the range. 

Cheng Man Ch’ing mentioned a Chinese description of seated meditation, “straighten the chest and sit precariously”–I think that also speaks to the necessity of calm (13).

In my experience, “automatic” activity in the movement of breath can at times depend on the relaxation of particular muscle groups and the exercise of calm with regard to the stretch of particular ligaments.  I believe that a pattern in the circulation of “automatic” activity can develop, especially when a bent-knee posture or carriage is maintained over a period of time.

I’ve written about my approach:

I begin with making the surrender of volition in activity related to the movement of breath the object of thought.  For me, that necessitates thought applied and sustained with regard to relaxation of the activity of the body, with regard to the exercise of calm in the stretch of ligaments, with regard to the detachment of mind, and with regard to the presence of mind.  I find that a presence of mind from one breath to the next can precipitate “one-pointedness of mind”, but laying hold of “one-pointedness of mind” requires a surrender of willful activity in the body much like falling asleep.  (14)

Many people in the Buddhist community take enlightenment to be the goal of Buddhist practice.  I would say that when a person consciously experiences automatic movement in the activity of the body in inhalation and exhalation, finding a way of life that allows for such experience in the natural course of things becomes the more pressing concern.  Gautama taught such a way of living, although I don’t believe that such a way of living is unique to Buddhism.

☞ A Natural Mindfulness–PDF