Knowing how to free your mind from the thoughts and feelings that plague it is a valuable skill. Nothing is as wonderful and liberating as the ability to clear your mind and acknowledge the invalidity of all your excuses, pitched for the purpose of letting yourself be dominated by unhappiness. The path to freedom involves developing a range of skills, including letting go and working towards our happiness.
This article shows a direct way to develop them, taken from the Noble eightfold thought of Buddhism. The Buddha was the source of such teachings, which, however, are not exclusive and can be practiced by anyone to benefit from them, thanks to their universal relevance.
Steps
Step 1. Be prepared for it to be a continuing business
Freeing the mind is a truly continuous action that requires righteous understanding, righteous thoughts, righteous words, righteous actions, righteous effort, righteous subsistence, right mindfulness, and right concentration. This is known as the noble eightfold path and the term "right" is used to denote ability or effectiveness. Read the list below and consider how you can put it into practice in your life, think about which cases of your own experience are applicable.
- It is almost similar to a recipe, with the right ingredients you get the desired result, but when the mixture is incorrect or lacking something important, the goal is not achieved. Many of the ingredients support and interact with each other in order to arrive at the goal.
- Another important point to consider is that the existence of a righteous effort implies that of an improper effort. This simply means that effort, mindset, concentration, etc., are not enough in themselves. The Buddha's biography shows that over time he practiced the 8 components in different forms, combinations and styles, but that only when the practice was correct did they interact effectively to lead to a solution.
Step 2. Consider the first of 8 and how to apply it - "Right Understanding"
This means exploring and fully understanding the 4 Noble Truths of Buddhism, but at its core a righteous understanding is being aware that all things change. Because they change without our consent we cannot depend on them, expect them to be perfect or entrust them with our happiness.
Proper understanding also includes the importance of being a virtuous person, pursuing mental development and developing wisdom, as these three aspects not only make up the eightfold path, they enhance and support each other
Step 3. Start applying "righteous thoughts" whenever possible
Proper thinking encourages thoughts of goodwill, understanding, and generosity, while ignoring those of greed, hatred, judgment, beliefs, and delusions. Righteous thoughts need right understanding, because in its absence it is not possible to distinguish the positive chains of thoughts from the negative ones.
In a practical sense, the four "divine mansions": loving kindness, compassion, shared joy, and equanimity are helpful in balancing the mind. It might seem that knowledge of the four noble truths makes life barren, sterile, and unhappy, while truly the support of virtue and the practice of divine abodes will not only counteract feelings of unhappiness, it will also create joy and well-being. Basically, in the presence of desire, commit to appreciating what you already have, and when you feel miserable, reflect on compassion. It is the use of opposites that determines its effectiveness. Consider this simple analogy: in math, (-1) + (1) = 0, in this sense, when practiced sincerely, a negative emotion can be balanced by a positive one in order to restore well-being
Step 4. Practice "Straight Words"
In fact, the dialogue follows the thoughts, when the thoughts are severe, the dialogue is severe, but when the severe thoughts are abandoned, the severe dialogue disappears because it lacks such mental intention. Consequently, in the presence of a positive mental state, a person can converse in a more capable and positive way within a discussion.
In a practical sense, we can include occasions when discussing certain issues may prove inappropriate. Right dialogue, in addition to being virtuous, takes this into account
Step 5. The third analysis focuses on "Right Actions"
They too follow suitable thoughts to the extent that, if we had angry thoughts, our actions would be equally so. Righteous actions and dialogue should be harmless and capable of releasing stress.
The interesting thing to note is that acting righteous also means letting go of everything that is causing our mental stress. Appropriate actions carry out and support appropriate thoughts and dialogue, as it is not enough to think about letting go of something harmful or saying something positive, it is necessary to act. This is another point where the components interact and develop with each other
Step 6. Think carefully about "Right Effort"
Applying the right effort simply means making a commitment to be aware and to take those actions that we do not consider simple. It is not an excessive effort that forces the mind to destroy some of its own aspects (useless attempt), but rather the absence of any effort. It is in fact a balanced effort, the intention of which is not to cause any harm.
In practice, righteous effort applies to all other components of the path. Effortlessly one is not inclined to perform expert actions, as it is much easier to do nothing and let the mind wander freely. But the effort requires right understanding, as it is very easy to apply it incorrectly or unbalanced
Step 7. Examine "Right Livelihood" and compare it to your experiences and occupations
A righteous subsistence causes us not to dedicate ourselves to something that forces us to be harsh or brutal towards people and other beings, living or not, and that can compromise our virtue, our mental abilities or our wisdom. This is not always possible and not everyone is lucky enough to do harmless jobs and choose which career to pursue.
In a practical sense, a righteous subsistence does not "own" you and causes you to have no desire to own it. If you have a pleasant job, righteous thinking comes into play when you value what you have by considering that slavery still exists in some parts of the world. If your job isn't quite as desirable, but at the end of the day you can go home and leave your worries at the office and then commit to releasing the stress it causes, the effort you will have to put in will be minimal. Right effort and righteous actions are also relevant to a righteous subsistence, as a virtuous employee earns his or her salary, does not get involved in office politics, and does not shirk his duties
Step 8. Carefully analyze the "Right Mental Presence" as well
Mindfulness is the awareness of daily activities and of what happens and feels in the biological body and in the mind in carrying them out. Mindfulness is an uninterrupted activity that can mean making mental notes or more simply being alert and observing. Ideally it includes righteous actions and understanding, so that when you see something, you know what to do and do it. Simply noticing or observing a problem does not solve it.
If you are not aware of what is happening, it is almost impossible to act righteously in order to abandon stressful thoughts and bad intentions. Thanks to mindfulness you can also recognize and learn to distinguish stress (which develops internally) and potentially harmful thoughts and intentions. Mindfulness, however, requires understanding and effort, and is therefore also dependent on the practice of these components
Step 9. "Right Concentration" means developing the mind in order to support mindfulness and attention span
It can occur during meditation or carrying out daily activities. Without concentration, there is no effort or mindfulness. It can be developed with time and with right understanding, but also with right effort, without which concentration and mindfulness fail.
- In some contexts, concentration is directly related or limited to meditative absorption, known as Jhana or Dhyana. Being able to enter a state of meditative absorption is excellent, but remember that it is not enough. It also involves possible complications, such as addiction to a state of stillness, a larger number of delusions and even the anxiety that the state of stillness does not last or that it is not attainable except with a lot of practice. Most people will never be able to experience it.
- The Jhanas can be used as a magnifying mirror to effectively see the mind, although such introspection can also be performed outside of meditative absorption, but only by dedicating a lot of time and effort to the practice, observing the mind day after day. Among their other virtues, the Jhanas calm the mind deeply and for long periods, which is impossible outside of a state of meditative absorption, and why vipassanā meditation is often referred to as arid, as it does not guarantee a sense of deep and lasting peace. Jhanas can also lead to higher mental growth, further benefit based on right understanding. It is good to remember that many have reached a state of meditative absorption without feeling free from their problems, therefore it is a skill that is good to develop, but which remains a component. Right effort, right understanding, and right mindfulness remain necessary.
- Curiously, Buddha taught those who reached the Jhanas to praise and respect those who could not, as they needed strength, discipline, commitment and a very deep understanding to be able to let go of their burden. Those who did not attain the Jhanas were taught to respect and praise those who were capable of it being a very complex skill and not something attainable by anyone.
Step 10. Take note of these components and note how each section is not only related to the others, but can be practiced for your well-being
Many refer to logic and common sense, but as always it is the facts and not the words that count. The important thing to remember is that in general we always come to the conclusion that a right understanding is the key, on which all the other components depend which in its absence would not be as effective.
Step 11. Start incorporating them into your daily experiences and note the results
The greatest benefits come when you begin to compare present experiences to past ones, noting any differences. In doing so you will not only increase the speed at which they work, you will be able to simplify them because you will understand the benefits, right understanding again.
- It is worth noting that there is no "righteous culture" or "righteous traditions, rites and rituals" which are really the "wallpaper" of life. They add color and interest, but as well as not being essential, they can be harmful if treated unwisely. The main reason many miss the mark is that they remain attached to their culture, identity, teachings, lineages and interpretations of things, without having the will to let them go or really examine them to see if they are truly capable of leading to freedom. mental.
- The Buddha put it in a simple analogy, after people have crossed the river, they don't take the boat with them. Basically, if after crossing the river you stick to the boat on the other bank, you have no way to take a single further step along your journey. The components analyzed may take you far, but if you remain stationary on the boat you will not move one step. By using mindfulness to recognize and understand things you will no longer be fooled by experiences and you will be able to let go of the worthless ones, thus freeing your mind.
Advice
- Get to know yourself, don't be a foreigner in your own home.
- Understand the situations where you get obsessed with something and move on. Obsession does not solve the problem in any way and must be addressed. The more you let go of your thoughts and emotions, the easier it will be to be free, in order to get to the point where doing so will have become a habit and the inner dialogue will simply disappear.
- Be kind to yourself. Often we are unhappy just because we are not well disposed towards ourselves. Trying to destroy certain aspects of the mind will force it to protect itself, this is a defensive skill that the mind uses when it feels under attack.
- It's easy to hold onto the feelings of joy and happy times, but these things come and go, you can't fix your mind on those standards in the hope that they will remain. Since there is no way to lock the mind, which constantly changes and reacts to impulses, it uses those feelings as a point of reference, in order to allow it to evolve and calm down.
