Know and calm the mental formations
Notice how feeling and perception are colouring this moment, and let that activity settle while you breathe.
Pourquoi ça marche
Steps seven and eight ask the meditator to breathe “experiencing the mental process” and then “stilling the mental process” (citta-saṅkhāra). MN 44 defines the mental process as perception and feeling — the way experience is recognised and the pleasant-or-unpleasant tone it carries. Knowing these as activities, rather than as the plain truth of what is happening, turns attention to how the mind is shaping the moment; calming them lets that shaping quieten, which the tradition treats as a bridge from feeling to mind.
Comment faire
- Breathing in and out, notice the feeling tone of this moment: pleasant, unpleasant or neither.
- Notice, too, how you are perceiving the moment — labels, impressions, the sense of “this is how it is.”
- Know these as things the mind is doing, while the breath continues.
- With each out-breath, let that activity ease, the way the body eased in the earlier steps.
Données probantes
Both steps are in MN 118, and MN 44 gives the definition of the mental process as perception and feeling. Ṭhānissaro’s notes to MN 118 draw the same connection. The support is textual; the step has not been studied. (anecdotal)
This is one of the less intuitive steps, and interpretations vary; there is no research on it as a distinct practice.
Sources
- Sujato, B. (trans.). Mindfulness of Breathing (Ānāpānassatisutta, Majjhima Nikāya 118). SuttaCentral.
- Sujato, B. (trans.). The Shorter Elaboration (Cūḷavedallasutta, Majjhima Nikāya 44). SuttaCentral.
- Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu (trans.). Mindfulness of Breathing (Ānāpānasati Sutta, MN 118), with notes. dhammatalks.org.
Erreur fréquente
Treating the step as an instruction to stop thinking — it asks you to know and calm perception and feeling, which is quieter and subtler than suppressing thoughts.
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Plus de pratiques pour Ānāpānasati: The Sixteen Steps of Mindfulness of Breathing
- Know each breath as long or short
Begin by simply knowing whether this in-breath and this out-breath are long or short, without making them any particular way.
- Experience the whole body and let the breath calm it
Widen attention from the breath alone to the whole body breathing, and let the bodily activity of breathing settle on its own.
- Breathe experiencing joy and happiness
Let the pleasant feelings that arise in a settled sitting become part of what you know with each breath, rather than a distraction from it.
- Experience, gladden, steady and free the mind
With the breath still present, know the state of the mind, brighten it when it is dull, steady it when it scatters, and release it when it is caught.
- Breathe contemplating impermanence and letting go
Let each breath show you that experience is changing, and let that seeing turn into fading interest, ending and release.
- Move through the sixteen steps as one practice
Let a single sitting travel through body, feeling, mind and letting go, taking each group of four only as far as it is actually alive.
- Notice how breath practice builds the factors of awakening
Recognise mindfulness, investigation, energy, joy, tranquillity, concentration and equanimity as they develop out of the practice.
- Know what to do when focusing on the breath feels wrong
Recognise that breath attention can make some people more tense or uneasy — and adjust the practice rather than forcing it.
Concepts associés
- Satipaṭṭhāna: The Four Foundations of Mindfulness
The discourse that modern mindfulness grew from, practised the way the text lays it out
- La méditation vipassana, rendue pratique
Intuition, équanimité et l'approche du scan corporel pour se libérer de la réactivité
- Shamatha : la pratique bouddhiste du calme mental
Entraîner l'esprit à se poser : les neuf étapes et leurs parallèles neurologiques modernes
- La méditation par comptage des respirations
Le comptage, le redémarrage, et pourquoi la simplicité est une fonctionnalité, pas une limitation