Mindfulness (2020) 11:2857–2859
https://doi.org/10.1007/s12671-020-01482-8
MINDFULNESS IN PRACTICE
A Busy Mind Need Not Be a Problem
Ajahn Amaro 1
Published online: 18 August 2020
# Amaravati Publications 2020
At the beginning of the day, we set our intention; we direct our
attention towards the Triple Gem and express our respect. We
reaffirm our commitment to use these qualities as our guiding
principles.
When recollecting these essential teachings, I often consid-
er that all the information which we as human beings need to
be completely liberated is contained in the morning chanting.
All that is required is to know, understand, digest, practice,
and embody this; through the Triple Gem, the Buddha
Dhamma Sangha, liberation will be realized. This is all we
need to know. Not much, simply what is here in this small
package; but it needs to be fully internalized, fully actualized,
made real, brought to life through our practice during the
course of the day. Here, in this moment.
Recollect these observations: dukkha, anattā, anicca, all
conditioned phenomena are unsatisfactory, not-self, and con-
stantly changing.
When we look more closely at anicca, change, we see it
everywhere, in both the physical world and the mental world.
The body is impermanent. This is expressed in the Pali words
rūpaṃ aniccaṃ. Rūpa includes all physical form, internal or
external, whether it is our own body, a building, a tree, or a
planet; rūpa, physical form, is changing. Then, there is vedanā
aniccā. Vedanā is the Pali word for sensations, pleasant, pain-
ful, neutral sensations. Saññā means “perception”; it is what
we see, hear, smell, taste, and touch, our sense impressions.
These too are changing. Saṅkhārā refers to our mental con-
structions: thoughts, memories, intentions, plans, imagination,
moods, emotions. All are transient, uncertain, unstable, emp-
ty. And finally, there is viññāṇa, discriminative conscious-
ness, the fundamental capacity to cognize objects, internal or
Excerpted from The Breakthrough by Ajahn Amaro, Amaravati
Publications, 2016.
* Ajahn Amaro
ajahn.amaro@gmail.com
1
Amaravati Buddhist Monastery, Hemel Hempstead,
Hertfordshire HP1 3BZ, UK
external, and to discern the differences between them. This too
is changing. The objects of attention and the consciousness of
them are all constantly transforming, moment by moment.
These are not just principles to be believed in, but ways of
examining our experience, ways of looking at how our mind
represents the world. Our experience, moment by moment, is
of how our mind constructs the world. Sight, sound, smell,
taste, and touch are the faculties through which our mind
fabricates an image of the world. Thus, we do not experience
the world itself; we experience our mind’s representation of it,
built out of body-consciousness, feeling-consciousness, per-
ception, thinking, and concepts. That which is known moment
by moment is our mind’s representation of the world. What
we experience is a fabricated image of the world, and that
image is constantly changing and empty in and of itself.
These qualities of anicca, dukkha, anattā—change and
uncertainty, unsatisfactoriness, the inherent emptiness of a
self and what belongs to a self—we are not trying to make
ourselves believe they are true. They are not articles of
faith; rather, they are tools with which to explore our ex-
perience. “Is this permanent or is it not? Is it changing or is
it not? Is this memory, this idea completely satisfactory?”
Even a sweet memory of a beautiful occasion—you might
experience a perfect day and think, “How could that be
dukkha? That was the most sublime, unique, perfect of
occasions. How could it be dukkha?” But when we explore
and reflect, we can see how even the sweetest of occasions,
the most glorious of moments is unsatisfactory. Its unsat-
isfactoriness lies in the fact that it cannot make us
completely and permanently happy. The sheer act of
experiencing a sweet, glorious moment can make us feel
that other moments are inferior, not up to the same quality
of delight. They can never quite match that wonderful day,
that wonderful moment, that perfect holiday—even when
you are in the midst of enjoying that perfect place, you can
be worrying about how you are going to make a booking
for next year and guarantee that you are going to get the
same perfect rooms... Right there is the cause for dissatis-
faction, the cause of dukkha.
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Again, we are not trying to make ourselves believe this, but
seeing how it works. Take something that we prize as being
beautiful, most precious and delightful, absolutely pure and
good—we can see it as a cause for dukkha when someone
comes along and insults it, says that it is ugly and foolish,
not beautiful, not pure, that it is inferior. We love the
Buddha and admire his teachings above all things. Then,
someone says the Buddha was a fool, the Buddha was wrong.
Even hearing those words—“How can he say that?”—this is
dukkha.
These principles, anicca, dukkha, and anattā, are means of
exploring our experience. They are tools for examining our
habits of identification and attachment, our habitual views.
They are employed to look at what we take to be self, at the
things which appear to belong to us— “my” memories, “my”
ideas, “my” body, “my” experience, “my” practice, “my” in-
sights, “my” defilements. The principle of anattā, not-self, is
not a belief. We are not trying to make ourselves believe that
we have no self; rather, this teaching is a lens through which to
explore that feeling of “I-ness,” “me-ness,” “my-ness.” What
is it that feels as if there is a “me” who is reading these words?
What is it that owns these sensations in the body? Is there an
owner? How does any being really own anything in a substan-
tial, absolute, and real way? How can any “thing” be truly
owned? And what would it be that does the owning, the
possessing?
These qualities of anicca, dukkha, and anattā are tools with
which to examine our habitual relationship to the mind, the
body, and the world: to look and see. They are the supports for
looking inward—for vipassanā, seeing inwardly.
When we explore and examine experience in this way, we
ask ourselves a question: “What is it here that is the owner of
this feeling in my leg. What is that? Is there truly an owner?”
That active looking and exploring is the method of vipassanā.
And then there is the change of heart that is the insight itself;
that opening, that realization, that expansion of vision when
there is the clear seeing of “How could there be an owner?
How could there be a ‘me’—a separate individual who is the
possessor of an object? How could that be? Of course, there
isn’t. Aha.” That is the change of heart. That is the genuine
quality of insight—the clear seeing of reality itself. And this
change of heart, change of vision—seeing our lives, seeing the
world in a radically different way—is the purpose of this kind
of practice.
Now, it is easy to fall into the habit of judging how our
practice is going—“good meditation” versus “bad medita-
tion,” “good sitting” versus “bad sitting.” For example, you
might think that your walking meditation is going well but the
sitting is going badly, or vice versa. You may think to your-
self, “During the formal practice I’ve really got it together, but
outside the formal periods my mind is all over the place, it is
really bad.” Be aware of the mind judging experience in this
way for this is a false division.
Mindfulness (2020) 11:2857–2859
In this practice, the intention is to learn from everything:
wished for and not wished for, expected and unexpected,
pleasant and painful. Ajahn Chah often used to say that liking
and disliking are of equal value (“Chorp, my chorp, tau tau
gan”) in Thai [ชอบไม่ชอบเท่าเท่ากัน]). Whether we like it or we
do not like it is not the point. Liking and disliking are of equal
value as a source of insight, a source of wisdom. Certainly, we
recognize that when the mind is in a concentrated, peaceful
state, filled with wholesome qualities and generating insights,
this is beneficial. But if we attach to it and identify with it, that
grasping of insight and clarity can become a cause of suffer-
ing. Insight is a wholesome quality, a beautiful quality, but
that is not the only point. The main point is to learn from it.
When the mind is confused and busy, caught up in prolif-
erations, wrapped up in old anxieties and doubts, regrets, re-
sentments, filled with aversion and restlessness, you might
think, “Well, this is really bad. My practice is falling apart.”
But the mind which can recognize these unwholesome states
is not unwholesome. That which recognizes entanglement is
not entangled. Right there, there is mindfulness. There is
wisdom.
When there is a recognition that the mind is all over the
place, or that it is agitated or busy, right there is the establish-
ment of mindfulness. Even though the object is agitated or
busy, that which knows it is not caught up in it. That which
is fully aware of the agitated state is the pathway of release
from it. So do not be caught in these judgments of “things
going well” or “things going badly.” This is just the experi-
ence of different patterns of mood and feeling. Moods change
during the course of a day, during the course of a sitting, just
like the weather. Feelings change. Things ripen at different
times.
You may find that after practicing for some time, you settle
into awareness and then long-standing attachments and preoc-
cupations rise to the surface. It is not that anything has gone
wrong with your practice, it is just that these old habitual
attachments are finally being looked at; they have a bit of
room to come to the surface at last. Thus it was not that things
were “going well” because you were peaceful, and now they
are “going badly” because an intense state has arisen and there
is agitation. It is just that different things have different causes,
and because of that they arise and appear at different times.
The precise causes for everything that we experience are
not knowable. They are incalculably complex. The precise
causes and results of karma are considered to be one of the
four “imponderables” or acinteyya—aspects of reality too
complex to work out, possessing too many dimensions or with
too many factors playing into the equation for them to be
understood by the thinking mind. But we do not need to cal-
culate or figure out why a particular feeling has manifested at
this moment. And equally, we do not need to figure out why at
a particular moment all obstructions fall away and the mind
becomes bright and clear, open and blissful. Or how, when
Mindfulness (2020) 11:2857–2859
everything was just fine a moment ago, suddenly there is
raging irritation or lurid fantasy, an agonizing memory or
ferocious agitation in the body.
Sometimes things just seem to come out of nowhere.
You cannot say exactly what is causing them but what
you can know is that they can be met with the heart of
wisdom—sati-paññā, mindfulness conjoined with
wisdom. Wisdom knows that this is changing, this is un-
satisfactory, this is not-self. And therefore you reflect,
“What can I learn from this beautiful feeling? This terrible
feeling? This mundane feeling? Is it changing? Is it satis-
factory? Can it please me permanently? Does it have an
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owner? Is it who and what I am? What can be learned
from the presence of this thing? What is it teaching me?”
I guarantee that we can always relate to every experience in
this way if we take the trouble to try. Thus, it is always im-
portant and helpful to bear in mind that liking and disliking are
of equal value. Things come together. Things fall apart.
Coming together and falling apart are of equal value.
Everything will teach us if we let it.
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