”You should go back and forth between samādhi and paññā”

Sometimes your mind is too slow so you have to push it, and sometimes it goes too fast and you have to pull it back. The Buddha said you have to stay in the middle path, just like the string of a lute. If you tighten it too much, it can break, but if you don't string it tight enough, you cannot play it to make a sound.

So, you always have to watch your mind, to always be in equanimity. Try to be in the neutral position. Try to calm your mind, so it remains calm and mindful. Don't let your thoughts fool you sometimes. At times, you may think too much and want to do what your thoughts tell you to do. But you have to accept reality that you are not in that position to do that yet. You have to go step by step.

So fundamentally, you have to maintain mindfulness and be aware of what you are thinking. Better still is to not let your mind think at all. If you want to think, bring it back to Buddho, or investigate the body by going through the 32 parts of the body. Try not to let your mind wander in discursive thinking, thinking about this or that and so forth. If you want to think, then think about the Dhamma, think about the 32 parts and repulsiveness of the body. Otherwise, let it be blank and not think about anything.

That will be good. Concentrate on your breathing or what you are doing. Be mindful of the movement of your body. Try to be strict with yourself. For instance, if you know you have to do a certain thing at a particular time, then do it. Suppose at this particular time you have to sit, then sit, and if you have to walk, then walk. Do not give in to excuses for not doing it because it will become a habit.

You will then keep on excusing yourself and do something else instead. As soon as you move away from your practice, you are regressing. You are going backward and not forward. Sometimes your kilesas tell you that you are doing puññā or making merit by helping other people, but it is not enough for your mind. Your mind does not need that kind of puññā. Your mind right now needs peace, samādhi and paññā (wisdom).

So, you should spend most of your time in these two particular areas: samādhi and paññā. You have to do both alternatively. First of all, you have to calm your mind. Once it becomes calm and rested, let it stay rested for as long as possible. After it withdraws from that rested state, bring the mind to think about impermanence and the 32 parts of the body.

Keep on doing this again and again until it becomes second nature to your mind so that every time you look at the body you will not only look at the skin, but through it as well. This is to see other parts of the body that are hidden under the skin. The only way to be able to do this is to continually keep thinking about it all the time. When you are tired from the contemplation and the mind is becoming restless, you should stop thinking and return to samādhi.

Concentrate your mind and rest your mind. When your thinking starts wandering to other subjects, you should know that you are not with the Dhamma, which means your mind needs to rest. So you should stop all your thinking and instead practise samādhi. Calm your mind and let it rest. After it has rested and is coming out of calm, you will be ready to be taught again, to think in the ways of Dhamma.

This is what you have to do back and forth, back and forth, until you eventually understand the nature of the body. It's impermanent, repulsive and not beautiful. Until you have no desire for this body or any other bodies. Then you will know that the problems with your body are over, and you won't have to worry about the body anymore.

You then have to move up to the next stage. You have to study feelings, such as painful feelings, to understand that they are natural and part of nature. They come and go like the rain and wind. You cannot force them to go away when they happen to be there. All you can do is to understand them for what they are and leave them alone.

If you can do that, you will move higher and higher, but this has to be done alternately between samādhi and investigation (paññā). You cannot just do samādhi alone because you will not gain any insight or vipassanā. However, if you only do investigation, then your investigation will not turn into insight because your mind is agitated.

You will think too much — not in accordance with the truth — but in accordance with your imagination. So, when you know that the mind starts to become agitated and to think outside the boundary of the mind, you should know that it is time to rest your mind.

Therefore, you should go back and forth between samādhi and paññā.

By Ajaan Suchart Abhijāto