The teachings of Ajahn Suchart.
28 February 2024
“You want to stop the mind from thinking aimlessly, to stop the mind from going to the past or to the future.”
Question: In terms of practising mindfulness to develop samādhi, is there a difference between mindfully aware of the body movement while doing cleaning activity and thinking Buddho while doing cleaning activity?
Than Ajahn: You can do whichever way you want. You just have to prevent your mind from thinking about other things. You want your mind to focus on one thing, on your cleaning activity or on the reciting of Buddho.
You want to stop the mind from thinking aimlessly, to stop the mind from going to the past or to the future. If you think about the past or the future, it can cause your mind to become irritated, agitated and restless. You want to calm and stabilise your mind, so you only want to focus on one thing, on a neutral object that doesn’t provoke any emotion.
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Question: In the practice of sati to develop samādhi, if one does a job like doing engineering project or studying and not thinking of anything else, is it equal to focusing in Buddho while doing a manual job like cleaning?
Than Ajahn: If you still have to use the thoughts to perform an activity then you are still thinking, you still have mental activity. If you are doing a manual job like cleaning or sweeping where you don’t use much mental activity or thinking, when you sit, you can have samādhi very quickly.
If you still have to think like an engineer where you have to think to solve problems, when you sit in meditation, your mind might still be thinking about the problems. Then it will be more difficult to sit and meditate if your work involves a lot of mental activity.
If your work does not involve a lot of mental activity like if you work as a janitor where all you have to do is just to clean up the place, when you sit and meditate, your mind can become calm easier.
By Ajaan Suchart Abhijāto
Youtube: Dhamma in English
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