To calm the mind means to find the right balance. If you try to force your mind too much it goes too far; if you don’t try enough doesn’t get there, it misses the point of balance.
Normally the mind isn’t still, it’s moving all the time, it lacks strength. Making the mind strong and making the body strong are not the same. To make the body strong we have to exercise it, to push it. in order to make it strong. But to make the mind strong means to make it peaceful, not to go thinking of this and that. Fr most of us the mind has never been peaceful, it has never had the energy of samadhi, so we establish it within a boundary. We sit in meditation, staying with the One who knows.
If we force our breath to be too long or too short we’re not balanced, the mind won’t become peaceful. It’s like when we first start to use a pedal sewing machine. At first we just practice pedaling the machine to get out coordination right, before we actually sew anything, Following the breath is similar. We don’t get concerned over how long or short, weak or strong it is, we just note it. We simply let it be, following the natural breathing.
When it’s balanced, we tale the breathing as our meditation object. when we breathe in, the beginning of the breath is at the nose tip, the middle of the breath at the abdomen. This is the path of the breath. When we breath out, the beginning of the breath out, the beginning f the breath is at the abdomen, the middle at the chest and the end at the nose tip. we simply take note of this path of the breath at the nose tip, the chest and the abdomen, then at the abdomen, the chest and the tip of nose. We tale note of these three points on order to make the mind firm, to limit mental activity so that mindfulness and self awareness can easily arise.
When we are adept at noting these three points we can let them go and note the in and out breathing, concentrating solely at the nose-tip or the upper lip where the air passes on its in and out passage. §we don;t have to follow the breath, just establish mindfulness in front of us at the nose tip, and note the breath at this one point-entering, leaving, entering leaving. There;s no need to thin of anything special, just concentrate on this simple task for now, having continuous presence of mind. There;s nothing more to do, just breathing in and out.
Soon the mind becomes peaceful, the breath refined. The mind and body become light. This is the right state for the work of meditation.
This passage is written by Ajahn Chah.
