The Teachings of Ajahn Suchart.
10 April 2024
“Samādhi itself cannot get rid of the desire.”
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Monk: Is it necessary to sit for long period of time in meditation?
Than Ajahn: When you first start, you can only sit for as long as you can, but as you progress, you want to sit longer because samādhi is beneficial for your mind. It is like charging a battery. Whether you charge it briefly or charge it for a long time can give you different battery strength.
When you sit in samādhi, you are charging your mind to become very strong to be able to resist your desire. So, if you have strong samādhi then you can resist your desire. If you have weak samādhi, you cannot resist your desire. So, the goal is to have strong enough samādhi to be able to resist all forms of your desire. That’s why you want to sit for as long as possible and sit in many sessions in a day, not only in one session.
After you can no longer sit then you get up and walk to release your body tension and pain in the body.
After you have finished walking then you come back and sit again. Just keep on sitting for as much as possible until you have that strength to resist your desire.
Samādhi itself cannot get rid of the desire. The mind has to have paññā or wisdom to instruct it to resist the desire. Alternatively, if you have paññā but no samādhi and when you are told to resist your desire, you also cannot resist it.
For example, right now, you know that not eating in the evening can be quite painful for you, that’s because you have no samādhi.
When you start thinking about food, you become very hungry already. If you have samādhi and you know that you are not supposed to eat, you can stop that desire and you will not feel any pain from wanting to eat in the evening.
“Singapore via skype, Aug 9, 2015.”
By Ajahn Suchart Abhijāto
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