Have you ever read or heard something that, the next day, you forgot about despite finding it intriguing, eye-opening, and possibly life-changing?
Despite your best efforts, you forgot about that information as you went about your regular routines, falling back into old habits. The three wisdom skills of listening, contemplation, and meditation are Buddhism's answer.
Among all the lessons we could acquire in this life, the most crucial one is the ability to free ourselves from misery. But if not digested thoughtfully, even Buddhist insight can be swallowed whole.
To make the most of the teachings, we might employ the three wisdoms of mindful listening, contemplation, and meditation.
We can reduce distractions and maintain our attention on the material at hand by practicing mindful listening. We then thoughtfully consider and internalize what we have just heard. One way to think of meditation is as a way to process what we have learned. Information leaves the cognitive mind and enters the heart through this three-step process, where it becomes an embodied experience that we will never forget.
We are surrounded by an endless amount of information, most of which is vying for our attention. Even when we are able to identify what needs our attention, maintaining focus is not always simple.
The first step in listening with meditation, mindfulness, attention, and intention is realizing that what we are hearing is important.
This infuses our listening with feelings of delight, desire, and urgency, which keeps us interested in what we're hearing, reading, or learning. Even while contemplative listening is somewhat directed outward, our participation starts the process of internalizing the lessons. Contemplation and attentive listening are related. After listening intently and with great interest, we inevitably move on to reflection.
The Buddha famously advised us to experience the teachings for ourselves to see whether they really lead to happiness, rather than accepting them just because he taught them or because they make sense. Between conceptual and inexpressible cognition, contemplation acts as a link.
We start to absorb the lessons by thinking about or reflecting on them. We probe, doubt, try things on, and sample. I was not in complete sync with what I was hearing during the listening phase. We start to bridge this gap during the pondering phase.
By utilizing analytical or awareness meditation to go further into a contemplative practice, we are able to transcend the conceptual, thinking mind and directly experience the teachings. Meditation enables us to settle into that experience and get even closer to it once awareness arrives.Meditation goes hand in hand with Buddhist contemplation. We're encouraged to let go of our thoughts and simply relax into the spaciousness of an Ah-ha moment when it occurs.
In meditation, we simply allow ourselves to be enveloped in the embodied experience of truth, transcending the cognitive and logical realm.
My perception of what I heard and my thoughts are now inseparable from one another. There is mere awareness. The highest form of wisdom, called prana, is this non-dualistic experience of knowing.
It's possible that we briefly experienced this wise experience while practicing mindfulness meditation. The experience of this kind of insight, however, is transient; it ends when the meditation ceases. Here, the goal of meditation is realization rather than experiencing. Realization confers everlasting wisdom.
Methods for Developing Wisdom Participating in mindfulness meditation is a prerequisite for practicing any of the three wisdoms: listening, contemplating, and meditating. It will be challenging for us to listen without being sidetracked if we don't first achieve a degree of mental stability and tranquility. Moreover, it will be nearly impossible for us to think or practice awareness meditation without the foundation of mindfulness meditation.
How to Gain Knowledge The practice of mindfulness meditation is a prerequisite for all three of the wisdoms: listening, contemplating, and meditating. It will be difficult for us to listen without being sidetracked if we don't initially achieve a somewhat stable and tranquil state of mind.It will also be very impossible for us to think or perform awareness meditation without the foundation of mindfulness meditation.
While cultivating wisdom may appear like a sophisticated skill, it all starts with awareness and relaxation. By promoting non-judgmental awareness of the current moment, we can develop a steady, roomy, and calm mind.
By doing this, you'll improve your listening skills and acquire the capacity to integrate information that is important to remember. The knowledge that results from practicing mindfulness brings us to the concept of self-compassion, which is the ease and satisfaction that is always present within.
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Aspiration For Bodhichitta
For those in whom the precious Bodhichitta has not arisenMay it arise and not decrease.But increase further and further.
Dedication of Merit
By this merit, may we then obtain omniscience then.
Having defeated the enemies wrongdoing. May we liberate migratory from the ocean of existence.With its stormy waves of birth, old age, sickness, and death.
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