Clinical Handbook of Mindfulness (16 page)

in the enterprise of unifying and concentrating the mind such that it can

remain steadily upon a single object over multiple mind moments.

Buddhist psychology identifies five primary obstacles to meditation,

known appropriately as the five hindrances. The first of these is
sense desire
,

or the impulse of the senses to seek out their objects. It is as if the eye wants

to see forms, the ear is eager to hear sounds, and so on for the other senses,

including the mind liking to think the thoughts that please it in one way or

another. We are so used to having our senses connect with their correspond-

ing object that a considerable habit energy is present in any given moment

inclining the mind to “lean toward” or be attracted to their habitual forms

of stimulation. This pull of the senses, including mind as the sixth sense, is

subtle but can be viscerally discerned as the mind gets more sensitive. The

second hindrance is
ill-will
, a corresponding propensity to shy away or with-

draw from those objects of experience that do not please us or are painful

in some way. These first two hindrances act as a matched pair of polar oppo-

sites, pulling and pushing the mind and senses from one object to another in

ways that make it difficult to settle down. The third and fourth hindrances

also work together as an opposed pair,
restlessness
and
sluggishness
. Rest-

lessness is a matter of too much energy, driving the mind relentlessly from

one object to another, while sluggishness is too little energy, bogging the

mind down in slothful, sleepy, or lazy states. The antidote for restlessness

is to relax and tranquilize the mind, while the remedy for sluggishness is to

arouse greater interest and enthusiasm. Paradoxically, the goal is to reach a

state that is simultaneously tranquil and alert. The mind should be calm with-

out being sluggish and alert without being restless. The final hindrance is

40

Andrew Olendzki

doubt
, often manifest as recurring thoughts of self-doubt, doubt about mak-

ing progress, or doubt about the entire enterprise of learning such a daunting

thing as meditation. As long as any of these five states or factors is arising in

the mind, it will be difficult or impossible to focus the mind and hold it steady

upon a particular object. But they can, with patient practice, be temporar-

ily put aside or abandoned. They are likened to wind-blown waves on the

surface of water, and when they quiet down, the mind, like water, becomes

limpid and clear.

Deepening Meditation

Although at first the attention has an almost irresistible propensity to be

drawn to sounds, physical sensations, or stray thoughts—wherever the

action is—it eventually gets less and less diverted by random stimuli. At some

point the momentum shifts, and it becomes more compelling to remain with

the primary object than to pursue the shallow stimulation of some novel

input. It is not that the object itself is of particular interest, but rather the

quality of mind with which the object is cognized becomes more intriguing

as it gains in power, depth, and lucidity. Under the scrutiny of a concen-

trated mind, everything becomes fascinating. If this process of steadying the

mind on a single object is allowed to mature, it will eventually reach a stage

called
absorption
, or
jh¯

ana
in Pali (the same word is rendered
dhy¯

ana
in

Sanskrit,
ch’an
in Chinese, and
zen
in Japanese). In this state the mind is

so thoroughly attending to a particular object that it is no longer aware of

other objects that might present themselves at a sense door. A bird might

sing and the sound waves will reach the ear and may even be processed by

subliminal sensory systems, but it will not enter conscious awareness since

“the line is busy” as it is absorbed by the primary object of awareness. This

is a state most resembling a trance to the outside observer and is the target

of considerable caricature of meditation in popular culture. But while the

mind may appear non-functioning from the outside, it has reached a state

of remarkable capability when regarded from the practitioner’s subjective

standpoint.

The classical meditation literature of the Buddhist tradition describes a

systematic (and repeatable) four-stage process by which the mind becomes

gradually purified of its distractions as it becomes increasingly focused and

potent. Nothing significant happens until the mind has at least temporarily

abandoned the five hindrances mentioned above, and any progress is immedi-

ately canceled if any sort of harmful or unethical impulse arises in the stream

of consciousness. Again, this is not so much a proscription as it is a descrip-

tion of the natural qualities of the mind, which can only achieve an advanced

state of concentration if its thoughts and intentions remain ethically whole-

some. The first stage of absorption meditation is accompanied by intense

physical pleasure and mental joy, more a state of deep well-being permeat-

ing the body than of sensory titillation. This stage also involves the normal

conceptual or discursive functions of the mind. One can feel very focused

while retaining the ability to verbalize and direct thought at will. In the sec-

ond stage these discursive functions cease, while the joy that comes naturally

with concentration persists. It is not that the mind has stopped functioning,

rather certain functions of the mind, those that direct and sustain deliberative

Chapter 2 Mindfulness and Meditation

41

conceptual thought, come to rest. In Buddhist understanding the more pro-

found levels of mind, characterized by a strong inner clarity, are only reached

when the chatter of verbalization and symbol manipulation ceases. The third

stage of absorption sees the diminishing of the intensive joy permeating the

first two stages into a more subtle sense of happiness and well-being. With

the fourth and final stage, all pleasure is replaced with equanimity, a deep

evenness of mind that regards phenomena with compete objectivity. The

usual attraction toward what is pleasing and avoidance of what is displeasing,

both attitudes of mind that prevent us from seeing clearly, are surmounted by

equanimity. At this point the concentrated mind is said to be purified, bright,

and steady. Moreover, like gold purified in a crucible, it becomes malleable

and can be turned with great effect to a number of non-ordinary modes of

functioning.

The civilization into which the Buddha was born had been adept at the

contemplative arts for centuries. The world he inhabited was filled with a

marvelous diversity of spiritual teachers and teachings, and he learned many

meditation practices from others. The
yogis
of his day, those disciplined

practitioners of the meditative arts, were influenced considerably by ancient

shamanic practices and used deep mental training in the service of universal

religious pursuits such as gaining magical powers, traveling to other dimen-

sions of reality, and interacting with non-human beings. Many operated in

traditional Hindu contexts, employing meditative practices in the mystical

pursuit of realizing and uniting with god in various ways. The Buddha seemed

to have a very different set of interests, however, and both discouraged the

development of magical abilities and repudiated the theistic assumptions of

his day. He fully embraced the science of purifying and training the mind,

but directed it to the goal of understanding the nature of human experi-

ence. In particular, he was interested in investigating the moment-to-moment

functioning of mind and body, the synthetic construction of experience, and

the specific ways in which both suffering and well-being are conditioned by

interdependent factors. He saw humanity as being in an existentially chal-

lenging situation, given the ubiquity of change and the inevitability of aging,

sickness, and death. He also saw that human beings have deep instincts for

personal survival, which manifest as a whole array of afflictive emotional

responses rooted in greed, hatred, and delusion. The bulk of our difficulties,

he discerned, come not from the existential challenges themselves, but from

internally generated maladaptive responses activated by the relentless and

unreflective pursuit of pleasure and avoidance of pain. Through the exam-

ple of his own awakening and a subsequent life devoted to training others,

the Buddha demonstrated that these internal causes of suffering can be seen,

understood, and healed. His approach is basically psychological, his methods

are mostly empirical, and his goal is ultimately therapeutic, which is why his

teachings are of growing interest to modern psychologists.

Mindfulness Meditation

The primary tool for bringing about the radical transformation from reflexive

suffering to profound well-being is meditation, but the one-pointed concen-

tration meditations described so far are of only limited usefulness. The dis-

cipline and focus they bring to the mind are indispensible, but insight into

42

Andrew Olendzki

the workings of the complex mind requires a more agile meditative tool.

That tool is
mindfulness
. Called
sati
in Pali, mindfulness derives from a root

√

(
sm
r¸
t
) meaning memory or recollection and refers to the cultivation of a

certain presence of mind that remembers to attend with persistent clarity

to the objects of present experience. Like meditation in general, it involves

placing attention deliberately upon an object and sustaining it over time,

but unlike one-pointedness and absorption, mindfulness tends to open to a

broader range of phenomena rather than restricting the focus to a singular

object. Like a floodlight rather than a spotlight, mindfulness illuminates a

more fluid phenomenological field of ever-changing experience rather than

isolating a particular object for intensive scrutiny. This alternative mode of

observation is necessary because mindfulness practice is more about investi-

gating a
process
than about examining an object. All mindfulness meditation

requires a certain degree of concentration in order to gather and focus the

powers of the mind, but the concentrated mind is then directed to a moving

target—the flowing stream of consciousness—rather than being allowed to

stabilize on a single point. Whereas concentration practice involves returning

the mind again and again to the primary object of meditation, mindfulness

practice allows the mind to follow whatever is arising in experience. There

is less a sense of controlling
what
the awareness is resting upon and more

care given to
how
awareness is manifesting.

In classical Buddhist psychology, mindfulness is regarded as a mental state,

one of the 52 functions of the mind that can arise in various combinations

to assist the cognizing of an object by consciousness. These mental factors

are similar to what are often called intentions, attitudes, or qualities of mind.

Among the mental states are found certain functions that are universal to

all mind moments, such as perception, feeling, volition, and attention, some

that may or may not arise in any given mind moment, such as decisiveness,

energy, or joy, and some that occur only in unwholesome states of mind such

as conceit, envy, or avarice. Mindfulness is among a list of factors that are

considered wholesome, and these serve as antidotes and alternatives to the

unwholesome factors. Mindfulness is always accompanied by such comple-

mentary mental factors as trust, equanimity, and kindness, along with factors

that contribute to the mind’s tranquility, malleability, and proficiency. This

system thus maps out a rather precise definition of mindfulness, which says

as much about what it is not as what it is. Mindfulness is not mere atten-

tiveness to experience; nor is it the deliberate turning of the mind toward

a particular object and the sustaining of attention upon that object; nor

can mindfulness ever co-arise with restlessness or any of the mental states

rooted in greed, hatred, or delusion. Mindfulness consists of a quality of

attention that is at once confident, benevolent, generous, and equanimous.

It is a manner of being aware, an attitude of mind toward experience, and a

mode of awareness that is paradoxically both intimately close and objectively

removed (Olendzki, 2008).

One more classical word for meditation that should be considered in this

context is
bh¯

avana
. It is based on the causative construction of the verb “to

be” and is thus literally “causing to be”; it is generally translated as
develop-

ment
. One of the important functions of meditation is the development of

those qualities of mind that are beneficial to a path of transformation. There