Use what strategies you can to make the breath interesting, comfortable, a pleasant place to stay, an interesting place to stay. If it were really comfortable, you wouldn’t go wandering off.

"Use what strategies you can to make the breath interesting, comfortable, a pleasant place to stay, an interesting place to stay. Learn to think of the breath not as the air coming in and out of the lungs but as the movement of energy through the body. Then you can explore how the movement of the energy is going right now in different parts of the body. You can wander around the body for a while to see which part of the body seems easiest to focus on or when you focus on it has the most beneficial effect on the breath. Take your time to choose your main focal point.

You’re not just clamping down someplace. You’re actually exploring and choosing which kind of breathing feels best, which part of the body seems to be the best place to stay focused. You may settle at a place for a while and then decide that you don’t like it after all. Well, you can move again. This way, the meditation is not an exercise in clamping down on the mind. It’s an exercise in exploration, seeing what way of relating to the breath seems most fruitful.

If you find the mind wandering away from that, bring it back and then ask yourself, “What way of breathing would be more comfortable?” Maybe it’s not comfortable enough yet. If it were really comfortable, you wouldn’t go wandering off. It would feel very gratifying just to say, “Breathe in. Breathe out. Allow the breath to nourish every little cell in the body.” So if you’re not feeling nourished by the breath, ask yourself, “What would be more nourishing?” Explore. Experiment."

~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "The Quest for Inner Happiness"

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