RE: A General, All Purpose Jhana Thread

Answer 10/26/10 2:17 AM as a reply to Ian And. How Others Have Experienced Absorption — Part One



What follows in this section are a few of the alternative descriptions of the process of absorption that I have personally found helpful. They are by no means the only descriptions available, just a few that I have come across in my own struggle to better understand these processes. They reflect common experiences and ways of understanding the process of absorption with which I am able to confirm from my own experience.



This first excerpt I found posted in a Buddhist forum. I've left in the poster's comments at the top and the middle of the post as they seem relevant and instructive to the tone of the post and the everyday language used by Ajahns Chah and Dhammadaro Lee. Both Ajahn Chah and Ajahn Lee were beloved Thai meditation masters and Dhamma teachers. Among other things, it seems to say: "If simple village women can attain jhana, then so can you." The person who posted this, a friend of mine, is a bhikkhu in the Thai Forest Tradition.

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I also like the way some teachers explain meditation on an experiential level that even simple people can relate to. Some of the best meditators in Ajahn Chah's monastery who had jhana were simple village women (they could sit there for hours while the monks were in agony...). So Ajahn Chah used simple language to explain the basics of practice to them. This is a relevant passage:



The trick is to have sati (mindfulness) taking control and supervising the mind. Once the mind is unified with sati a new kind of awareness will emerge. The mind that has developed calm is held in check by that calm, just like a chicken held in a coop ... the chicken is unable to wander outside, but it can still move around within the coop. Its walking to and fro doesn’t get it into trouble because it is restrained by the coop. Likewise the awareness that takes place when the mind has sati and is calm does not cause trouble. None of the thinking or sensations that take place within the calm mind cause harm or disturbance.



Some people don’t want to experience any thoughts or feelings at all, but this is going too far. Feelings arise within the state of calm. The mind is both experiencing feelings and calm at the same time, without being disturbed. When there is calm like this there are no harmful consequences. Problems occur when the ‘chicken’ gets out of the ‘coop’. For instance, you may be watching the breath entering and leaving and then forget yourself, allowing the mind to wander away from the breath back home, off to the shops or to any number of different places. Maybe even half an hour may pass before you suddenly realize you’re supposed to be practicing meditation and reprimand yourself for your lack of sati. This is where you have to be really careful, because this is where the chicken gets out of the coop - the mind leaves its base of calm.



You must take care to maintain the awareness with sati and try to pull the mind back. Although I use the words ‘pull the mind back’, in fact the mind doesn’t really go anywhere, only the object of awareness has changed. You must make the mind stay right here and now. As long as there is sati there will be presence of mind. It seems like you are pulling the mind back but really it hasn’t gone anywhere; it has simply changed a little. It seems that the mind goes here and there, but in fact the change occurs right at the one spot. When sati is regained, in a flash you are back with the mind without it having to be brought from anywhere.



This is how he explained vitakka (directed thought) and vicara (evaluation), which are the basic 'tools' in meditation practice. Notice that he doesn't say we have to completely stop using the mind in this way, because actually these are also ways of developing pannya (wisdom) by contemplating the ways in which the mind reacts. He didn't make a sharp distinction between samatha and vipassana. For him it was just two aspects of the same practice. Here are some more details from Ajahn Chah:



There may be different phenomena contacting the senses, or thoughts arising. This is called initial thought (vitakka). It brings up some idea, be it about the nature of compounded phenomena (sankhara), about the world, or whatever. Once the mind has brought it up, the mind will want to get involved and merge with it. If it’s an object that is wholesome, then let the mind take it up. If it is something unwholesome, stop it immediately. If it is something wholesome, then let the mind contemplate on it, and gladness, satisfaction, and happiness will come about. The mind will be bright and clear as the breath goes in and out, these initial thoughts appear, and the mind takes them up. Then it becomes discursive thought (vicara). The mind develops familiarity with the object, exerting itself and merging with it. At this point, there is no sleepiness.



After an appropriate period of this, take your attention back to the breath. Then as you continue on, there will be the initial thought and discursive thought, initial thought and discursive thought. If you are contemplating skillfully on an object such as the nature of sankhara, then the mind will experience deeper tranquility, and rapture is born. There is the vitakka and vicara, and that leads to happiness of mind. At this time, there won’t be any dullness or drowsiness. The mind won’t be dark if we practice like this. It will be gladdened and enraptured.



This rapture will start to diminish and disappear after a while, so you can take up the initial thought again. The mind will become firm and certain with it, undistracted. Then you go on to discursive thought again, the mind becoming one with it. When you are practicing a meditation that suits your temperament and doing it well, then whenever you take up the object, rapture will come about, the hairs of the body standing on end, the mind enraptured and satiated.



When it’s like this, there can’t be any dullness or drowsiness. You won’t have any doubts. Back and forth between initial and discursive thought, initial and discursive thought, over and over again, and rapture comes. Then there is bliss (sukha). ...



Q: Are vitakka and vicara the same?



A.Chah: You’re sitting and suddenly the thought of someone pops into your head-that’s vitakka, the initial thought. Then you take that idea of the person and start thinking about them (in detail). Vitakka is picking it up, vicara is investigating it. For example, we pick up the idea of death, and then we start considering it: “I will die, others will die, every living being will die, when they die where will they go…? “ Then, stop! Stop and bring it up again. When it gets running like that, stop it again, then go back to mindfulness of the breath. Sometimes the discursive thought will wander off and not come back, so you have to stop it. Keep at it until the mind is bright and clear.



If you practice vicara with an object that you are suited to, you may experience the hairs of your body standing on end, tears pouring from your eyes, a state of extreme delight, many different things as rapture comes.



Q: Can this happen with any kind of thinking, or is it in a state of tranquility that it happens?



A.Chah: It’s when the mind is tranquil. It’s not ordinary mental proliferation. You sit with a calm mind and then the initial thought comes. For example, I think of my brother who just passed away. Or I might think of some other relatives. This is when the mind is tranquil - the tranquility isn’t something certain, but for the moment the mind is tranquil. After this initial thought comes, then I go into discursive thought. If it’s a line of thinking that’s skillful and wholesome, it leads to ease of mind and happiness, and then there is rapture, with its attendant experiences. This rapture came from the initial and discursive thinking that took place in a state of calmness. We don’t have to give it names such as first jhana, second jhana, and so forth. We just call it tranquility.



The next factor is bliss (sukha). Eventually, we drop the initial and discursive thinking as tranquility deepens. Why is that? The state of mind is becoming more refined and subtle. Vitakka and vicara are relatively coarse, and they will vanish. There will remain just the rapture, accompanied by bliss and one-pointedness of mind. And when it reaches full measure, there won’t be anything - (there is equanimity, and) the mind is empty. That’s absorption concentration (appana samadhi).



We don’t need to fixate or dwell on any of these experiences. They will naturally progress from one to the next. At first there are initial and discursive thought, rapture, bliss, and one-pointedness. Then initial and discursive thinking are thrown off, leaving rapture, bliss, and one-pointedness. Rapture is thrown off (note: scriptures usually say, “with the fading of rapture…”), then bliss, and finally only one-pointedness and equanimity remain. It means the mind is becoming more and more tranquil, and its objects are steadily decreasing, until there is nothing but one-pointedness and equanimity. (From 'Everything is Teaching Us')



It's true that in some Suttas the Buddha mentions an intermediate state called "avitakka vicaramatta" (without directed thought and a little bit of evaluation). I would see that as staying with the theme of meditation, not wandering elsewhere, but there still being the need to move the attention around the theme, back and forth ("becoming familiar with it"). It's a kind of rippling of the mind, it's not perfectly still. That comes only later, when the preliminary work has been done, and it's a natural result of that.



Ajahn Lee has a nice description of this process:



Directed thought (vitakka) - focusing on the breath without getting distracted - is like planting a tree. Evaluation (vicara) is like loosening the soil around the roots, giving it fertilizer, and watering it from the roots to the topmost branches. The body, which can be compared to the soil, will soften, allowing the fertilizer and water to penetrate down to the roots. Rapture is like the tree's being fresh and green and bursting into bloom. (There are five kinds of rapture: (1) an unusual sense of heaviness or lightness in the body; (2) a sense of the body floating; (3) a sense of coolness or heat; (4) a sense of thrill passing over the surface of the body; (5) the body beginning to sway.) Pleasure means stillness of body and mind, free from Hindrances. Singleness of preoccupation means being neutral toward other things, perfectly still in a single preoccupation. This is what the Buddha was referring to when he said that concentration matured with virtue is of great benefit, great rewards.



The factors of jhana -- directed thought, evaluation, rapture, and pleasure -- all have to be gathered at the breath if you want to reach singleness of preoccupation. Directed thought is like laying claim to a piece of land. Evaluation is like planting it with seed. When the seed bears fruit, that's rapture and pleasure.



Keeping awareness with the breath is directed thought. Knowing the characteristics of the breath is evaluation. Spreading the breath so that it permeates and fills the entire body is rapture. The sense of serenity and well-being in body and mind is pleasure. When the mind is freed from the Hindrances so that it's one with the breath, that's singleness of preoccupation. All of these factors of jhana turn mindfulness into a factor of Awakening.



Spreading the breath, letting all the breath sensations spread throughout all the elements and parts of the body -- the blood vessels, the tendons, etc. -- is like cutting a system of connecting roads through the wilderness. Any country with a good system of roads is bound to develop, because communication is easy.



Gavesako