Liberation Through Non-Clinging Across Buddhist Traditions

How approaches from different Buddhist traditions can complement and support each other on the path to awakening
By Joseph Goldstein

Part 3 of 3

Mindfulness

The question then becomes: How to proceed? How do we practice stabilizing our glimpses of selfless awareness? We begin by strengthening the quality of mindfulness. Unless we have trained ourselves to observe our minds and what happens within them, we may not realize just how prevalent the continuous streams of thought are throughout the day. The effect of these unnoticed thoughts on the mind can be compared to a movie soundtrack. Often, we are hardly aware of it, being totally engrossed in the storyline. Yet the soundtrack is designed to manipulate our feelings in various ways—happy, tense, frightened, amused—all conditioned by a process we hardly notice.

Through practice, particularly in sessions of formal meditation, we may become somewhat adept at recognizing dramatic thoughts, those with a particular emotional charge. But much more frequently there are light thoughts that are brief and hardly leave a trace. While doing walking meditation on one recent retreat, I began to pay particular attention to these light and quickly passing thoughts. I was surprised to realize how often they arose and how many of them referenced a sense of self: a memory, a plan, a comment, or a judgment. It became clear that each time I was lost in one of these ephemeral thoughts, I was reinforcing a felt sense of self.

Dudjom Rinpoche, one of the most highly revered Dzogchen masters of the 20th century, wrote in A Heart-Jewel for the Fortunate:

When you are meditating, it is easy to identify your coarse thoughts when they arise suddenly. But until a few of your subtle thoughts have arisen and are recognized, you do not know that they are there. These are called “undercurrents of thought.” They are the sneaky thieves of meditation, and for that reason it is very important to post the guard of mindfulness.

All traditions teach the importance of cultivating and strengthening mindfulness. The Pali canon underscores the critical role of mindfulness in the well-known opening of the Satipatthana Sutta:

Bhikkhus, this is the direct path for the purification of beings, for the surmounting of sorrow and lamentation, for the disappearance of pain and grief, for the attainment of the true way, for the realization of nibbana—namely, the four foundations of mindfulness.

Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche likewise highlights the importance of cultivating mindfulness in his commentary on The Lamp that Dispels Darkness:

Let the mind remain in a relaxed and open state. . . . Just as a young child cannot be left on its own but needs the constant attention of his parents so he won’t get lost, mindfulness is necessary so that the mind does not get lost in distraction. Mindfulness is not something that is acquired right away; perseverance is needed. It is necessary to be mindful not only while resting in the state of meditative evenness, but that mindfulness needs to be kept in any circumstances. While eating, while walking, etc., it is important to be constantly alert and vigilant in watching the condition of the mind.

Rinpoche continues:

So do not be satisfied by a mere glimpse of awareness but allow it to become unchangingly present. This is achieved through mindfulness and vigilance. At the beginning, vigilance means to pay constant attention to one’s state of mind, examining whether the mind is distracted or not from the recognition of awareness. This is a somewhat fabricated or contrived mindfulness. Mindfulness will develop gradually. . . . When the point is reached where a thought of desire or aversion arises, awareness is there at the same time, without having to purposefully arouse it. That is uncontrived, absolute mindfulness. At this stage, all thoughts will be liberated as they arise.