Guided Meditation: Available to the Present; Dharmette: Ready to Change (3 of 5) Unpreoccupied

This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Available to the Present; Ready to Change (3 of 5) Unpreoccupied. It likely contains inaccuracies, especially with speaker attribution if there are multiple speakers.

The following talk was given by Gil Fronsdal at Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, CA on December 28, 2022. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.

Guided Meditation: Available to the Present

Hello everyone, and welcome to this period of meditation.

One of the ways that meditation can unfold and develop over time is through appreciating some of the beneficial states, beneficial ways of being that come with meditation. Sometimes, in doing this appreciation, maybe keep the bar low. Keep it in micro-moments of beneficial states, because as we appreciate these beneficial states, that validates them. It makes room for them. It supports them to grow more, and they can last more than just a micro-moment; maybe they last three or four, or who knows, maybe even a second or two.

The idea is appreciating something, and one of the things to appreciate is the moments the mind is not preoccupied. I think meditators sooner or later will begin being sensitive and aware of how much thinking goes on in the mind, and how much our attention is pulled into that world. Sometimes people are swept away in their thoughts, or they have something they're really churning on or ruminating about. It just seems like the most natural thing in the world to be thinking about it. Even about the present moment, there's a continual commentary about it. It just seems like the most natural thing, but it's a kind of preoccupation of the mind.

The mind is occupied with thoughts, and some people—because they identify with their thinking—say, "Well, I have this idea, there's nothing wrong with thinking. This is who I am and I should be free to think whatever I want to think, it's important." And certainly, that's a fine attitude to have in and of itself, but it doesn't really support the deepening of meditation, the deeper beneficial ways that meditation can improve our lives, benefit us, and free us.

So it's important to begin being sensitive to the difference between being preoccupied and the mind being—I don't know if unoccupied is the right word—but the mind being ready, receptive, getting to be malleable and soft, being here. This transition in a period of meditation from being preoccupied to being here: "Now I'm present." And kind of being present in a way that doesn't require thoughts to tell us that. There's a knowing "I'm here" that's there before we have a thought, "Oh, I'm here."

So, appreciate having arrived. Appreciate an awareness that's here for a micro-moment without being preoccupied. Available to be aware, available to sense, to feel, to be present for what is actually here, now, in this moment. Sometimes this is called arriving. We finally arrive in the present moment with our attention, rather than attention being swept up in, directed to, or utilized by all kinds of concerns and preoccupations.

An unoccupied mind isn't a blank mind or a lazy mind. It's like a glass window which has finally been cleaned, and now we can see in. The preoccupations interfere with that seeing.

So, assuming a meditation posture, and if your eyes are still open, maybe lowering your gaze, and then gently closing your eyes. Gently paying careful attention to the body and what's happening in your body. Take a few long, slow, deep breaths. Maybe the deep inhale is kind of like saying, "Hello, body," connecting, being present.

And then letting the breathing return to normal and continue for a while. As you breathe in and breathe out, feel your whole body, the whole breath body. Relaxing as you exhale.

Noticing that while you're being present for the body breathing, is there also a pull into the world of thoughts, ideas, preoccupations? What's it like to have both an intention to be with your body breathing, and a mind that wants to be with concerns?

Underneath the mind's concerns and preoccupations, is there mental tension? A pressure to think? And if there is, as you exhale, relaxing the mind. Letting the mind spread out wide and still.

Taking a few moments to acknowledge any thoughts and concerns you have. By acknowledging them, maybe they can be put aside for now, so you can settle more into your meditation, more into an embodied^[1] connection to the present moment.

And even if it's the smallest degree of being present for here and now, see if you can appreciate the attention you have. Appreciate the micro-moments of unpreoccupied attention, to being here in your breathing, your body, and your experience.

If you give your awareness, intention, and attention over to breathing, your body, it's almost like giving it life, animating it, instead of animating and energizing the thinking, the preoccupation.

To be unpreoccupied is a matter of degrees; it's not all or nothing. Appreciate the degree to which your mind is less preoccupied, more here in your experience.

As we come to the end of the sitting, to turn our attention now out to the world: there's a difference between being available for others with our attention, our hearts, our care, versus advancing on people, asserting ourselves. Being available rather than asserting.

Being available is to be unpreoccupied, to be unbiased, not to meet with judgments and preconceived ideas. What we learn in meditation about being unpreoccupied but available, receptive, is invaluable for how to be with others. To be available not in some passive, withdrawn way, but available to respond kindly, generously, lovingly, delightfully, respectfully. To be available to wish people well rather than caught up in our reactions. We are coming from our goodwill.

On this day, may the people that I encounter or know about, may they be well, may they be happy.

On this day, the people who I will be encountering or knowing about, may they be safe.

On this day, the people that I'll have contact with or know about, may they be peaceful.

On this day, may the people who I think about or meet, may they be free.

And on this day, may I be available to have this goodwill, wishing for the people that I become aware of. May everyone we have encountered or think about or learn about today, may they be well.

Thank you.

Dharmette: Ready to Change (3 of 5) Unpreoccupied

Continuing with the theme of this week, which is to be ready for change, to be willing to change in a good way in the life that we live. The Dharma practice is walking on the path of being changed. Being changed for the better, being changed out of the ways that we live that are harmful for ourselves and harmful for others, into a way of living that is beneficial for ourselves and beneficial for others.

To prepare or to help the mind, the heart, or who we are be available for change and beneficial growth, there are these five different areas. The first is this readiness: to be ready for something new, ready and available to be receptive. The second, which we talked about yesterday, is to have a mind that's malleable, a mind which is workable. You're not holding onto ideas, opinions, and identities in such a way that things are stuck or hard. Not holding a stance where we're stubborn, resisting, or asserting. Instead, there's a softness, a malleability, a workability, where we are a work of art that we can work on ourselves.

Today, the topic of these five is being free of hindrances. The hindrances are major preoccupations that we have, that we get caught in. They're kind of like vacuum cleaners, where we get close to them and get sucked in, and we swirl around inside until somehow we find our way out. These are very powerful forces that keep us preoccupied, churning, ruminating, caught up, wanting, not wanting, clamped down, shut down, frozen, agitated, spinning all kinds of things.

There are five of them, but the shorthand is that they are preoccupations of the mind. The Pali word is nīvaraṇa^[2], translated as "hindrances," which also means "coverings." Sometimes I think of them like a wonderful greenhouse that, because it was going to be a freezing night, was covered with big blankets. But then the farmers forgot to take the blankets off, and it stays that way for months. The plants inside can't grow, the warmth of the sun can't really get in, and things shrivel, dry, get really thin, until they all fall over.

We have these coverings that cover something precious that we don't see when we're preoccupied. To let go of these preoccupations is like pulling the blanket off so that something deeper within—the seed beds and seeds—can begin growing. Something beautiful can begin to happen. We do have beauty within us: beautiful capacities, beautiful potential, beautiful attitudes, motivations, thoughts, and feelings. To be available is to be unpreoccupied, to allow something deeper to happen that can't happen when we're preoccupied.

One of the really important features of doing vipassanā^[3] practice—insight^[4] meditation practice, mindfulness practice—is to really become an expert on the hindrances. On sensual desire^[5], avariciousness, wanting, greed; ill will, hostility, resentment; and then what I call resistance, frozenness, and stiffness—it's usually called sloth and torpor, but these are more strategies of not being present that shut us down; and then agitation, resentments, and regrets; and finally, doubt.

There are Dharma talks about these five, there are essays on them, and I have a little book about the hindrances called Unhindered. It's important for people who do this practice to not be discouraged or turn away from these when they occur to us, but rather really take them on as a worthy area to study and understand. How does this work? Until we begin to see how the magic is done, we are no longer tricked by the magic into thinking that something is real there. We start seeing the sleight of hand of the hindrances, why we get caught in them, and why we think they're so important and valuable when they're just a trick of the mind to get us preoccupied and caught.

Finding ourselves without the hindrances is one of the great delights. Beginning to have an unpreoccupied mind is a pleasure. So, one of the ways to be prepared to change and to grow is to begin appreciating, valuing, enjoying, and being inspired by the degree to which we are unpreoccupied.

That's a hard thing to do because the preoccupation seems so important. Being unpreoccupied can seem like nothing, like, "That's not any good. What's good is doing things and thinking about things." But this unpreoccupied mind that's available, that's present for the fullness of this life, the fullness of our hearts and our minds, just here and present—appreciate it. Take the time to value it when it's there.

Rather than seeing it as all or nothing—either preoccupied or unpreoccupied—it's a matter of degree. Hopefully, we're tipping the balance towards being more unpreoccupied than preoccupied. Begin appreciating the degree to which you're unpreoccupied, the degree to which you're available and present.

That also allows you to have the same attitude of availability, receptivity, and softness around the ways in which we are preoccupied. It's not like setting up a battle between them. The more we have this availability of attention, we can hold all the ways that we are caught, attached, and involved. We hold it generally, generously, and non-assertively. I don't advance upon it to blow it away or fix it; I am available to know it fully in meditation. Maybe everything difficult within us is a door to a deeper understanding of life and of ourselves.

If you really want to change in a beneficial way, begin appreciating the unpreoccupied mind and make time for it. Begin to learn to recognize when you're preoccupied, when you're spinning out, when you're being carried away by trains of thought. Realize, "Oh, there it is again," and then step off the train. Take off the blanket. Let the thought bubbles kind of drift away. Let the tension, the pressure, and the need to solve, fix, judge, remember, and plan settle for a while so you can be here in a deeper and fuller way.

As you're available and receptive, you are maybe starting to become softer, in a place where creativity can occur, in a place where deeper wisdom and understanding can arise. It isn't like you lose your ability to take care of your life if you're no longer preoccupied with your concerns. You gain a new vantage point from which to take care of your life. When you're not preoccupied, it's possible for the important issues of your life to come into your mind to be thought about without it being a preoccupation. It's just something to think about in a light, open, and peaceful way. Have tea with your thoughts and think what needs to be thought about.

For today, the topic is to appreciate non-preoccupation. Appreciate when you're not caught up in your thoughts and appreciate the alternative. Appreciate what that's like to not be preoccupied and caught. Appreciate the openness, the subtleness, the availability, the receptivity. Appreciate maybe even the delight and the joy of not having lost yourself to your thoughts.

There is a way in which we lose ourselves when we get too preoccupied, and then we gain ourselves when the preoccupations part like clouds. The preoccupations part, and we're like, "Ah, we're here. We're back. Here I am." For the Buddha, the absence of hindrances, the absence of preoccupation, is a source of gladness, delight, and happiness.

What I'd like to suggest to you today is to notice the times that you're not preoccupied, where you're available rather than asserting yourself. See if you can taste or find the hints, or the big ways and small ways in which there is some gladness and happiness in this ability to be here in an available way. Think of it as micro-moments. Sometimes think of it as degrees. See if you can find the well-being, the delight, the gladness, the appreciation for not being caught up. "Wow, I'm not caught up. I'm just here for this second."

May you have lots of "wow" today. May you have lots of appreciation and joy. "Oh, here it is, I'm back. Life is back."

Thank you very much, and may this be a day sprinkled with joy. Thank you.