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Guided Meditation: Beautiful Mind

A warm hello from Redwood City, here at the IMC^[1], and welcome to our morning meditation here and at other times around the world. Thank you to the people who are greeting on chat; it's lovely to see your names, see your locations, and receive the greetings.

When I was practicing in Burma, I practiced with a teacher named U Pandita^[2]. A series of his talks were translated and published in English in a book titled The State of Mind Called Beautiful. Of course, we can be in many different states of mind, but the idea that we can also have a state of mind that's beautiful, I think, is quite inspiring. In fact, this is what anapanasati^[3] is working towards, and Buddhist practice in general is for us to discover or cultivate a state of mind which is quite luminous, beautiful, and inspiring in and of itself.

I've been fortunate to see many beautiful places in the world—inspiring sunsets over the sea and all kinds of things. The thing that has been the most beautiful thing for me to see is the beautiful mind. Why that's incomparable with the beauty of nature or other kinds of beauty, I can't quite explain. Maybe it's because it's so subjective or so intimate, while at the same time not being personal—something quite wondrous.

So, with the ninth step of anapanasati, the direction is to experience the mind. It's kind of like shifting from "what" to "how."

If I go to the supermarket and I really need something quickly—maybe we're having a big family dinner and everything's dependent upon having salt, and there's no salt at home. We need to get salt, so I'm sent to the store to get salt. I've never bought salt in the store. I've bought many things, but somehow I can't remember ever having bought salt. But I'm in a hurry, guests are coming, and all I'm focused on is getting the salt. I'm searching the aisles, searching the names of things on the aisles to see where they have the salt. I don't notice anything else in the store but looking for the salt. And then when I finally get the salt, I just focus on getting to the checkout counter and the shortest line. My mind is completely consumed with the thing that I want. I don't really notice too much of anything else because it's so important to get that salt. So it's all about the what the mind has.

But maybe at the end of the day, after all this busyness, I sit down and then I realize how I am. I realize that I'm tired and maybe tense from searching for salt, and the residue is still in me. So I can feel a little bit how I am. But the initial "how I am" has to do with why I feel kind of tight in my shoulders and my belly. I'm weary in my face, and I feel a little bit discouraged that I made such a big thing^[4], that I got caught up in salt. So it's still about a what, even though I'm conventionally feeling how I am.

But as I settle in and step back, I notice something that's very different. As I notice how I am, how the mind is—how the mind is that's processing all this, how the mind is that knows. How the mind is as it knows it's searching for salt, how the mind is when it knows how it knows I'm tired and weary. It's kind of like the mind is the container or the reference point for receiving experience. It's the state of mind; it's not a thing, but it's still a state that we can feel. And that is where the beauty begins to show itself.

There is something very special about that shift to the how rather than the whats of our experience. The how—which is how we're aware, how the mind is as it operates.

With that, we'll do a meditation, and we'll maybe at some point shift more to this how.

Guided Meditation

Assuming a meditative posture. Of course, how you are can begin right away. How are you in this body? How are you in your posture?

To answer that question, the mind is involved in a what—the particular sensations of the body, the position of the body.

And then, how is your breathing? How are you with noticing your breathing? Do you have a reaction to how you're breathing, a response? Is there a "for" and "against" something, or wishing it to be different, or wanting to make it different?

What happens if you simply just know you're breathing? Know how you're breathing.

Closing your eyes. And if it makes sense, go inward into your body and feel the places where there might be tension and holding.

Perhaps you can relax the shoulders, release the shoulders. Relax, release the belly.

If there's some way to relax or adjust your hands so they're more relaxed, release your hands. Adjust your hands so there's no tightness in your hands.

And can there be a softening in the face? An easing up of all that we hold in the face—around the eyes, the forehead, the cheeks. Perhaps imagining there's lots of space in front of the face, behind the face, for the muscles of the face to release, to relax. For the face to rest.

Then, how is your mental activity? Do you feel there is a lot of energy and thinking, or is the mind sluggish? Is there any tension, pressure?

And if there is tension or pressure, can you release the mind? Release, relax the thinking mind, quieting your thinking.

And how is your mind? How is it? What's your mental state, or the state of your heart-mind? Which is very closely related to how you are aware, how you are receiving experience.

Oftentimes, what the mind is focused on is the objects of our desires, the objects of our aversions, or the vague objects of our confusions^[5].

Can you feel the part of the mind that is free of desire? That is not leaning forward or stretching forward, focused on having or getting. The mind that is free of desire. Maybe it's a back corner of the mind, or a deeper layer of the mind, or something at the center. Maybe it's something that doesn't have a lot of distinguishing characteristics—a feeling of absence.

Is there a part of the mind which is free of aversion? A part of the mind that is not about something, not focusing on something that's not liked. A place where there is no aversion, and because of that, maybe the mind is not so concerned with what. A place where the mind can rest in a peaceful place.

And can you become aware of a place where there is no confusion? Even if there is confusion as well, someplace where there is no confusion, because the mind is not focused, fixated on a subject, something it wants or doesn't want, something it is trying to understand. The part of the mind that can be at rest with itself.

And then becoming aware now of your overall state of mind. The state of mind within which everything you know is known, but a state which is always more than what is known. So it's not something that we know as much as something we feel. A wide-open, expansive feeling of the state of mind.

And so that you don't get too involved in this state of mind—looking for it, wanting it, fixating on it—as you feel your state of mind, also be aware of yourself breathing in and breathing out. Maybe as if breathing in and out, you're breathing through the state of mind, or breathing at the very center of the state of mind. With a state of mind so wide and broad that it includes breathing within it.

Breathing in, experiencing the mind. Breathing out, experiencing the mind.

And perhaps as you shift from focusing on what you're thinking about to experiencing the mind, experiencing being aware, that this mind, this awareness, maybe begins to have no sharp boundaries, no edges. Somehow it's related to the spaciousness around you. To space. Not the same, but it has qualities of clarity like space, or spaciousness like space. Perhaps stillness, like space around you.

Breathing in, experiencing this... the mind. Breathing out, experiencing the mind.

As you exhale, letting go of all the things you're thinking about, all the whats of life, all the objects of thought. And then on the inhale, experience your overall state of mind. The overall state^[6] within which thinking occurs, but a state that's broader than our thoughts and ideas, the whats.

Exhaling, letting go of whatever you're thinking, all the whats. Inhaling, and feeling the broadness, the peacefulness of the state of mind that contains all things within it. Like a room contains all things within the room.

And then as we come to the end of this sitting, bring to mind some person with whom you have a relatively uncomplicated relationship. Bring them to mind so there's some image of them, or sense of them, idea of them. But rather than your thoughts and memories and desires, concerns about the person, allow the person to just... to sense the idea, the image of the person. Whatever sense you have, to just rest in the openness of mind within this general state of how you are. There's nothing you have to do about the person, but just let them be included in your state of mind through your image, your idea, your sense of them.

So you're not actively relating to them, rather just being with them in your mind, with your mind. If we're relating to them with our desires and our concerns, then we're involved with what. But if we just allow them to be included in the how we are, resting there, not actively relating or wanting or not wanting. Just allowing the person to be in the peacefulness of the state of mind.

And now, maybe with some tenderness or care, can you now evoke a mood of goodwill, of kindness for this person, of generosity? Maybe wishing them well is almost too much, but imagining them well. Feeling the goodness of their well-being.

Gently keeping them in your open, spacious attention. Now wish them well:

May you be happy. May you be safe. May you be peaceful. May you be free.

And is there some way that you can learn from how to include someone in your state of mind in this kind of way? It is in fact a way to be close to your goodwill for others. Rather than rushing into the whats and the shoulds and the doings as you meet people today in your life, take your time to let them be known. To receive and listen and sense them in a generous state of mind.

And then perhaps other things can happen, and those other things might be related to your goodwill. May this practice of ours support us to meet the people of the world with our goodwill. May all beings be happy.