Thanissaro Bhikkhu on Refreshing Breathing

"When you meditate, you’ve got to put the mind in the right mood. Sometimes, focusing on the breath is the way to put it in the right mood. You take a couple of long, deep, in-and-out breaths, and it feels good. You can just feel the stress and the strain melting away. The patterns of tension you’ve been holding in your body begin to dissolve. There’s a sense of nourishment that comes from that. So you just drink it in. If, after a while, long breathing doesn’t feel good, you can try other rhythms: short in, long out; long in, short out; or shorter breathing, more shallow, lighter, heavier. You get to explore this area of what they call form: the way you feel the body from within. Sometimes that’s enough to get the mind to settle down." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "In the Mood"

"Even working on breath meditation is a form of goodwill [mettā] for yourself, as you look after the energies in your body. You begin to realize that you’ve been placing a lot of burdens on your mind, unnecessary burdens, by allowing these energies to get all out of whack. But if you work on them and gain a sense of being balanced here in the concentration, a lot of the burdens in the mind get lifted. And then you have more time for other people." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Spread Goodness Around" (Meditations9)

"Start with what you know. The breath is coming in. You know that? Yes, you know that. It’s going out. You know that? Yes, you do. Okay, know just that much. Don’t forget that. Is it comfortable or not? Well, you may not be sure. Could it be more comfortable? Experiment and see. Try to sensitize yourself to how the breathing feels. Without this level of sensitivity, the meditation becomes mechanical. When it’s mechanical, it becomes a chore. And when it’s a chore, the mind will rebel. So ask yourself: What really feels good when you’re breathing right now? If you can’t figure out what really feels good, hold your breath for a while until the mind comes to the point where it’s screaming at you: “Breathe! You’ve got to breathe!” Then, when you breathe, notice what feels really good as you breathe in. Take that as a guide." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Start Out Small" (Meditations2)

"So as a meditator you’ve got to learn how to remind yourself that what you’re doing here is a good thing. All you’re asked to do is to breathe, which you’re going to do anyhow. And then watch the breath, because right here you’re going to learn about your own mind. Isn’t that the most worthwhile thing to learn about? To watch the movements of your mind, to see how, given a particular situation, you can either create a lot of suffering out of it or you can create a lot of joy — the same situation, but you handle it differently: That should be a really fascinating process." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "New Eyes"

"The Buddha mentions that sometimes meditation can get dry, in which case it’s good to stop and think about themes that give a sense of refreshment and inspiration to the mind. You might want to think of all the people who have been good to you through your life. An attitude of gratitude can often give rise to a sense of ease and well-being. Then notice that the breath changes when you’re thinking thoughts that are good like this. Then let that same ease of breath continue as you drop the thought and return to the breath." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Technique & Attitudes"

"Regardless of what’s happening in the mind, you can still breathe calmly. In fact, this is an important way of retraining yourself. Even though scary thoughts or infuriating thoughts are coming through the mind, you can still breathe calmly. They don’t need to have such a total impact. So while we’re meditating here, it’s good to gain practice in being sensitive to what kind of breathing feels good." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Fear & Anger" (Meditations5)

"The ability to maintain your center and to breathe comfortably in any situation can be a genuine lifesaver, keeping the mind in a position where you can more easily think of the right thing to do, say, or think when your surroundings get tough. As a result, the people around you are no longer subjected to your greed, anger, and delusion. And as you maintain your inner balance in this way, it helps them maintain theirs. So make the whole world your meditation seat, and you’ll find that meditation both on the big seat and the little seat will get a lot stronger. At the same time, it’ll become a gift both to yourself and to the world around you." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu “Strength Training for the Mind”

"So keep that image of the acrobat in mind. The primary consideration is that you maintain your balance. This is why we’re meditating: to give rise to a sense of solidity inside. Once you’ve got that sense of solidity, the sense of ease and well-being that comes as you work with the breath and develop a good solid center inside, then in your relationships with other people you’re less grabbing. You’re not looking so much for what you can get out of the other person. You’ve got something to give." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "The Acrobat"

"Some people think that those of us who practice breath meditation would be really up the creek on days when it’s hard to breathe. That’s not the case at all. If you really get to know your breath energy in the body, you can find that that knowledge makes difficult breathing a lot easier." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Breath Meditation When It’s Hard to Breathe"

"The breath, the Buddha said, is the most refreshing form of meditation. He compared it to the first rain storm of the rainy season. If you’ve ever been in Asia during the hot season, you know what it’s like when the first rains come. There’s been dust in the air for months and months, along with the oppressiveness of the heat. All of a sudden the rain comes and washes everything, cools everything off. The air is suddenly clear like it hasn’t been for months. That’s the image the Buddha gives for breath meditation. When the breath is refreshing, it'll wash away all unskillful states." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Undirected Insight"

"Simply by sitting here breathing — the breath coming in, going out comfortably — you don’t require any sensual pleasures at all to make you happy. That’s what you learn when you meditate: You’ve got the resources inside that allow you to breathe in a way that feels really satisfying, and it’s all for free. It has nothing to do with sensual desires at all. That’s what renunciation means." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Five Precepts, Five Virtues"

"You stay with the body as much as you can. Try to make the sense of the breath as refreshing as you can. You don’t want to have just a sense of equanimity as you go through life. You want to have a sense of positive enjoyment in how it feels to have a body. One of the reasons you work with the breath is so that you feel comfortable inside your body. No matter what the world outside may say about your body, you’re perfectly fine with it inside. That way, you’ve got a friend inside. You’ve got a sense of well-being so that you’re not so hungry to go outside and look for something to snatch and grab and chew on outside. So as you’re meditating, realize that having a sense of fullness, having a sense of rapture, is a necessary part of the practice. Try to develop it as much as you can while you’re sitting. Then try to carry that through the day as your food. It’s like your lunch bag for the day. When you have the sense of feeling comfortable inside yourself, you’re less ...

"The reason the breath seems mechanical is because you’re not really sensitive to what you’re doing. You’re not giving it your full attention, your full sensitivity. Think of meditation as listening to a piece of music you’d like to hear, but it’s far away, so you have to make yourself really quiet and really sensitive. Learn how to be a real connoisseur of the breath." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Full Attention"

"Many people have trouble staying with the breath or getting in touch with the breath energies in the body because their conception of how their body works is determined by what they’re told about how it works: what other people can observe; what a doctor says or what a machine can measure about their breath from the outside. But when you’re meditating, you’re not looking at the body from outside. You’re experiencing it from within, and that means throwing out a lot of your old outside preconceptions, particularly the assumptions that draw on materialism: the idea that you’re primarily matter, and only secondarily conscious. If you function totally in a materialistic universe, it’s going to make you suffer. And yet when we come to meditation, even though part of us realizes that materialism is a miserable way of thinking, we still carry a lot of materialistic assumptions into the mind. So turn things around. Awareness comes first, the material world later. You’re exp...

"If you have trouble sleeping, then by all means meditate when you’re lying in bed, for meditation is a useful substitute for sleep. Often it can be more refreshing than sleep, for it can dissolve bodily and mental tensions better than sleeping can. It can also calm you down enough so that worries don’t sap your energy or keep you awake. But make sure that you also set aside another time of the day to meditate too, so that you don’t always associate meditation with sleep. You want to develop it as an exercise in staying alert." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "With Each & Every Breath: A Guide to Meditation"

"One of Ajaan Fuang’s students talked about the time when he was meditating in a bus — he wasn’t normally that good a meditator, but for some reason when he sat on a bus he found it very easy for the mind to settle down — and the breath felt delicious. Well, how do you make the breath delicious? How does that happen? In other words, try things out. Use your ingenuity. Use your imagination." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Beginner's Mind"

"So you want to be able to settle down right here, because after all, this is going to be your refuge. You look outside, and the world’s pretty dismaying. You look inside, and it’s also dismaying at times. But it doesn’t have to stay that way. You have the potential for refuge right here, the potential for pleasure, rapture. After all, those are steps in the breath meditation: breathing in, breathing out sensitive to pleasure; breathing in, breathing out sensitive to rapture. There are potentials there. Look for them, learn how to develop them, and that’s how you become your own refuge." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Potentials for Refuge"

"Learn how to develop an interest in the breath. After all, it is your  breath. It’s the force of life that keeps you with the body, keeps the mind and the body together. And if the breath is good, it’s nourishing. If the breath energies flowing through the nervous system and circulatory system are good, that’s going to have a good impact on the health of the body. When the body feels healthy and strong, the mind is going to find it easier to stay here. So take an interest in this and develop the ability to ask questions not only about your meditation, but also about the rest of your life." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Ask Yourself the Buddha's Question"

"You have to start here, creating this little corner and giving all your attention to this one spot where you’re focusing on the breath or whatever your meditation object is. The purpose is to create a little space, at least, where you can put aside the madness of the world — where you feel solid, secure, where there’s a sense of well-being. So you find a spot that’s relatively comfortable and you work to make it more comfortable." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Pleasure & Pain"

"Try to relax around the breath. Don’t make the meditation too much of a chore. Think of it as an opportunity to breathe easy. Each breath is another opportunity to breathe easy. When the mind can rest a bit, then it can look at itself more clearly. So whatever lessons you’ve learned on how to let the mind rest with the breath and let that sensation of resting spread out: Remember them." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Getting the Most Out of the Present"