Mindful meditation and how it relates to kamma

Let's take equanimity as an example.
It appears as if our definitions / understanding of the word differ.

If I were to guess both our definitions differ greatly from how the Buddha used and understood it.

In these days where every word the Buddha spoke is interpreted to mean almost anything really. I think it's important to look up and get a feel for how Gotama explained it. Then I think we can come to some sort of agreement of how in buddhism the word is to be understood.

Not that there is anything wrong with both our usages of the word. Only when we take our definition to be Gotama's understanding and exclaim them as such within a buddhist sub-forum is where things get awry for me..

With Love
Eelco

[Gem]

Originally Posted by naturesflow

I know how you come across. Its very clear to me. I hope you don't mind but I sent it to a friend to read. He shared it opened up a reminder from his yoga days doing something similar, but not in any great length back then.. So we are going to work with this and bring the awareness differently into the next meditation. As for what arises and deepens through this, is what each one will understand for their own process, I understand the inside process will be what it will be..

I think the information you offer, supports to notice things differently and it is a way to create and open up your normal practice into something different, just through noticing and changing things around..

Well, I can talk about how I approach it, which is something I refined over time, and because it is from the lived experience I am able to go into detail on it.

If people talk to me about their meditation, then I can talk about that specific in some depth in a way that is meaningful in the context of their life.

I'm glad the yoga instructor looked into it and seemingly found something in it... It is his/her critical discernment to see if it makes any sense, and seems to recognise the logic. I'm glad for this reason: I didn't say 'do this and do that' and someone took that to be right as if I have authority. I say 'it is done this way for xyz reasons' and they were like 'I see' as it made sense in themselves. I'm also glad it can be remembered from his past yoga practice and he already has that lived experience to give it meaning. I think it's very relevant to yoga because it's a deep way of mind/body connection - the 'know body' from the hard solid surface to the subtle dynamic flow.

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Eelco

Not asking you to quote anything.
Just asking you to check if your understanding matches with others who have walked the eight fold path. either from written sources or buddhist monks.

Not to invalidate you realizations, only to separate what you realize from what is commonly realized by "Buddhists" whatever that may be.

That way you can say I realized this and it is helpful in this or that matter instead of.
These buddhist terms mean this or that.

See the subtle difference between the two?

With Love
Eelco

The words will take on their nuances of meaning from the context they are used in, and other people will use the same words meaning different things in other contexts. Then I will understand their meaning and reply in that context as well.

When I was first outlining the words and the meanings, I said they are used in various ways, but I clarified the specific way I would use them, because I can't use the word 'sankara' in all the different ways it can be used at the same time.

Your quoted explanation confirmed the way I am using it is one of the ways it is used.

I speak primarily from my lived experience, so The Buddhist philosophy is relevant in that is meaningful according to my actual lived experience. I also often say that the Buddhist discourse is only meaningful through the insight that any individual has, and is hence understood by different people in different ways.

The subtle difference as I see it is, the religious approach is an attempt to discover the 'true meaning' (ie it must be the same meaning for eveyone), as opposed to the spiritual appoach of meditation and assigning meaning to the philosophy from real lived insight.

The latter isn't misguided, nor complete. It is unfixed, so approached in that way, the meanings of the philosophy deepen with real life deepening of understanding.

Hence there is no philosophy without meditation.

[sky]

Originally Posted by Eelco

Do you ever check your realization with people walking the same path?

It does occur that people have realizations that turn out to be mistakes.
thinking they are realized when in fact they are deluding themselves..

With Love
Eelco

Deluded myself many times Eelco but that's life and you do learn from your mistakes. Now I take more notice of Buddha's teachings as a guide book but not a rule book.
Climbing a mountain my way can be very dangerous I prefer to follow others who have walked the path safely and reached the top, but my footsteps are mine and mine alone.

[Gem]

I just want to go in the philosophical side of how meditation relates to kamma, and since kamma is based in volition, it only means meditation as the cessation of volition.

Volition is a fairly subltle as a concept because people may rightly say that undertaking to observe the breath, for example, is volitional, but to simply observe the breath doesn't include any will to make the breath other than it is. In contrast, if a person determines to breath deeply, then there is the awareness of breath + the action of controlling the breath. This acting upon 'what is' is what I call 'volition'. Whereas kamma can mean action, the action is driven by the intent to act, and also, an intent or a want to act and be countered by a contrary will to refrain from said act.

It's very common to want to act, but knowing such an act is socially unacceptable, refraining from it, so I'm not talking about Kamma as action, but as will, and the will to, and any contrary restraint, is all kamma, even though the act was not performed.

In this way kamma is the same as will, and no action has to be physically performed to generate kamma. Kamma has already moved the mind even though no physical motion was enacted. This means I allude to 'thought results' and not necessarily to physically manifest outcomes, but on a more subtle level, all thought manifests in physical sensation, so in a deeper sense, there is a still a physical effect even though the intended act itself was refrained from.

In the subtler sense kamma thus has instant effect, and meditation is primarily about awareness in this instant, so when we observe the breath as it is, without intending to alter it, its depth, rate and rhythm is the effect of the volition - ie. it is kamically influenced. Naturally, if the mind is very calm then the breath is shallow slow and even, but if the mind is agitated the the breath is faster and more erratic. This is to say, at least in our waking life, the breath is influenced according to the kamma which moves the mind which manifests sensationally in the body.