Being Still - The quieter you are, the more you see

Notice just now when we finished chanting, the sound of the crickets was suddenly a lot louder. It's not that the crickets suddenly sang louder, but for us it seemed louder because we were quieter.

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This is an important principle in training the mind: The quieter you are, the more you see. We talk often about how there's a doing, there's a karma in every present moment. There are choices you make with every present moment, and sometimes the emphasis may seem too much on the doing. But remember that being quiet is also a form of doing, and sometimes it's the most skillful doing, the most skillful thing you can do.

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Try to keep the mind as quiet as possible, as still as possible, as if you're listening to music far, far away and you want to try to make out the tones, make out the melody. You have to make yourself very quiet. And in the same way if you want to see things in the mind, see things in the breath, you have to make yourself very quiet. The quieter the mind is the more it sees.

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So, when the breath comes in, the breath goes out, the mind doesn't have to come in and out with the breath. You choose a spot in the body where you want to stay, and you stay right there. Ajaan Lee gives the image of a post at the edge of the sea. The tide comes in, the tide goes out, waves come in, waves go out, but the post doesn't come in and out with the tide or the waves. It stays right where it was, where it's been all along, and because it stays put you can tell exactly how high and low the tides are, how far the waves come in.

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The more still you are the more you have something to measure things against. It's like those measuring things they have next to the - I don't know what they call them - to tell what the flood level is. Those things have to stay in place. If they don't stay in place they're totally useless....So it is with the mind. When the mind is moving around like that you can't really see things for what they are. You simply go along with the flow, but how fast or how slow the flow is, you don't know.

So, when we sit here and meditate try to find a spot that's comfortable and then just stay right there. You don't have to do a lot of things. Just do one thing consistently. And this way you have some way of measuring the breath, the ins and outs of the breath, you have a way of also measuring the movements of the mind.

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Once you have that reference point then even the most subtle movements become clear. But if you move around a lot you have no idea whether other things are still or moving around as well. So find a nice quiet spot to stay and then just stay there as comfortably and still as possible. And watch. Keep your mindfulness alert..."

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu