Concentration practice, kasinas, and the jhannas

I noticed a couple of threads recently mentioning concentration practice and I am thinking there is something here that would be good to discuss.

In my own recent attempts at exploring of the jhannas, I've found that making any attempt to "do" a concentration practice leads me to feeling stuck and sluggish, with a headache. Which I believe means I'm not doing the practice correctly. I think perhaps this comes from repeated schoolroom admonitions to "concentrate!" on my work, as well as all the sci-fi movies where people with psychic powers kind of screw up the eyebrows and look intently at something in order to move it around.

This is the kind of concentration I'm used to, but all I seem to end up with is a furrowed brow and a pain in the head. On the other hand, Kenneth's instructions on this are to lightly hold the concentration object as you would a peanut shell floating on the water, to simply maintain contact with it.

When following these instructions, I find that there is still a small "effort" being made by the mind, trying to make sure it "holds onto" the image. I'm thinking this is probably wrong, and that true concentration is completely effortless, just a resting of the mind in the object of concentration and only making any effort when the mind strays from the image. But this seems to negate the "subtle effort" aspect of the first jhanna.

So in the end, I feel I'm kind of on the right track but that some clarification would be helpful. I was hoping some people could offer their own descriptions of what exactly they are "doing" with their mind when sitting down to do some concentration practice. I figure if we get enough fingers pointing, we might be able to pin down the kasina moon pretty good....

There is an older topic somewhere here on which we discussed this very thing. The word "concentration" is not very accurate in describing these states or the skills required to access them. Let me look for the thing right now and link to it right..... here:

kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/thread/34...+Thing+Concentration ...

Have at it.

The subject of right effort is so important that Snyder and Rasmussen devote an entire chapter to discussing it. Furrowed brow and headache definitely sounds like the result of too much. The vitakka and vicara referred to in the texts have different interpretations, but a common one is that vitakka is directing attention toward the object and vicara is holding it there. It's true that less and less effort is required as time passes, but even in the beginning any effort made should be gentle. I often think that, for Westerners, the advice to make an effort should be replaced by advice to be patient, as we've all been far too enculturated by the idea that life requires ferocious degrees of effort.

Nice, thanks Chris! Jake's description of "relaxed stability of attention" makes sense to me. If we can stabilize the attention in a relaxed way, then "concentration" kind of builds builds on its own, so long as stability of focus is maintained.

Owen's and your comments on Mike's thread about Metta practice are quite helpful as well.

Derek, gentle effort in directing the attention and gentle effort in keeping it there. Two different efforts.... I like that, thank you. Which book are you referring to (by Snyder and Rasmussen)?

The book is just called Practicing the Jhānas.

Another way to avoid excessive effort is to think of it as a process of inquiry rather than as concentration. "How is the breath right now? What's happening at the ānāpāna spot?" (Without the words, of course!)

In my own experience it felt like the biggest breakthroughs in concentration came when I switched my focus to simply letting go. For me this letting go happened in multiple levels:

1. Letting go of the desire for attainments or experience - I had finally given up on ever getting jhana or any strong experience of rapture outside of retreat.

2. After listening to a talk by Ajahn Brahm about getting out of the way of the meditation I switched from trying to keep my attention on the breath to simply letting go of any distractions (experientially: thoughts arise, attention is diverted, "let go," sensations arise, "let go," analysis of sensations arises, "let go"). Eventually the body and mind become more still and the mind seems to just settle on the breath as the only thing happening.

3. At a recent retreat after experiencing a lot of pain due to too much effort I've learned that there is always room for less, lighter, kinder effort. Even after I've decided that there is no way I can effort any less, there was still room to let go more and to effort less. This completely transformed my experience from constant pain with periods of unbearable pain to occasional pain and more natural, sustainable practice.

Edit:

The talk by Ajahn Brahm I was referring to is not available online at the moment but this page seems to summarize it pretty well: www.buddhanet.net/budsas/ebud/ebmed099.htm I like his way of translating Samadhi as Stillness. I think it really points at the nature of the experience. Also, the parable of the water glass is very helpful.

The ability to enter and abide in samatha jhana is a skill. There is no particular trick to it, any more than there is a trick to playing piano well; you just have to practice it until you are good at it, after which time it is effortless. It is human nature to look for a short cut, or just the right instruction that will help you figure it out. But you don't figure out jhana any more than you figure out piano; you master it over a period of years and decades. Seen in this light, it frankly isn't so important which method you use or how you frame it conceptually. Mastering jhana just takes a lot of practice.

Whenever a yogi makes a breakthrough in practice, suddenly discovering the ability to access some hitherto unknown place in the mind, there is a tendency to attribute the breakthrough to whatever practice tweak they were experimenting with that day. This too is human nature. In reality, though, the "sudden" breakthrough is almost always resting on a very solid base of practice over a longer period of time.

See if you can take the longer view of samatha jhana. Just as you would not be too upset if after a year or two of casual piano practice you were not yet ready to play at Carnegie Hall, don't be surprised if jhana does not come quickly or easily. Keep cultivating your concentration each day, using whatever tried and true technique appeals to you and someday you will notice that you can access and abide in samatha jhanas at will. And all along the way you will have the wonderful but occasional flashes that are previews of things to come. There's no free lunch on jhana street. But persistence and diligence pay off in the long run.

For those who would like to be able to abide in samatha jhana, I recommend first attaining the 1st and 2nd Paths of enlightenment. This builds a firm foundation for jhana and opens up some pathways that were not previously available.

"For those who would like to be able to abide in samatha jhana, I recommend first attaining the 1st and 2nd Paths of enlightenment. This builds a firm foundation for jhana and opens up some pathways that were not previously available.

"

Thanks everyone.

So, practice practice practice it is (in a lighter, kinder, relaxed and stable way) as far as increasing concentration goes, and I think I will be leaving aside any abiding jhanic interests for now.