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Talk: 19880716-Larry_Rosenberg-UNK-questions_and_answers-1554 Leandra Tejedor Start_time: 01:17:06 Display_question: Will you speak a bit more about the moment of coming back to the breath process that you call crucial and essential? Keyword_search: breath, samadhi, attention, mindfulness, joyful effort, beneficial, faith, kilesas, self-punitive, blame, hatred, blame Question_content: Questioner: Will you speak a bit more about the moment of coming back to the breath proces,s that you call crucial, and essential? Larry: The coming back, I understand coming back, yes. It’s very… Questioner: More often than not. Quite often when I realize that I've been off, I'm already back to the breath, and I don't know if I missed a step, that… Larry: Yeah, no, it's okay. As you start doing this, that happens, you automatically come back, and that's a step in the direction of being able to stick with the breath more frequently, and also not being getting lost when you leave the breath, not getting lost in that which has taken you away, for as long a period of time. Questioner: Is there… Larry: There is a split second, some time has elapsed, if you've been somewhere else. But now the mind, let's say, see, as the mind starts to, fully appreciate the value of, let's say the Samadhi practice, or the value of attention, the value of mindfulness. This is why it's sometimes called, joyful effort. It's not joyful effort for most of us, at the beginning, it's hardly, but it can blossom and ripen into joyful effort, because even if you're working on some sticky things, the practice is you're working on behalf of something that's beneficial. And you know it. You know that this is a wonderful way to spend your life. You really know it. It's not even faith. It's beyond faith, because it's been demonstrated to you, at some degree of depth, time, and time again. So that, the coming back, is like a reflex, and there's still a gap, because if you've been taken away, there is that slight, maybe it's a split second, and then it comes back. Even when you land on the breath, mindfulness can show you the following things. Have any of you seen this? Break_line: Let's say you're with a breath. Let's say it's just an in breath, breathing in, just an in breath. When you look carefully, sometimes you'll see that the mind is on the breath, at the beginning, and then it slips off, and then it comes back, at the end. You've seen that. Okay? And then when you see that, just the seeing of it, can often be very helpful. And eventually you learn how to stick to the breath, during the entire duration of a breath. So these are the kinds of things that happen. Now, the other aspect of the coming back, has to do with what Craig was asking. Because if you're really trying to get somewhere, and ambitious, or if you're very self-punitive, there's a lot of self… not liking yourself too much for reasons in our biography. In some way, we leave the breath. And then there's a stubborn part of ourselves that says that's bad, you have weak concentration, you're a rotten yogi, and get back there fast. And so you whip it back. Well, what's wrong with it is that whole it's usually a sign of something like that. And so in the easing back, what we're trying to do is, develop this gliding back, easing back without blame. Break_line: Now, despite no matter how hard we all try, blame comes up, because the self will claim it, and the self doesn't care what I've said. The kilesas have a rich feel there… of hatred. Only the hatred now, is towards ourselves. And you can see that, even in a breath. And that's wisdom at work, wisdom then can chip away at that. And now suddenly we're not as preoccupied with, how awful we are, or how everything we touch turns to something not so good. What is the heart of your question? Is that getting at it? Or if not, let's try again. Questioner: I'm not sure if there should be some moment or instant of recognition and an opportunity to develop this gentle... Larry: Oh, I see. No don't worry, that’s… if you were to get really too… make it… it's simpler than that, that's thinking. Just come back, and I'm saying that to just ease that process, and if you find yourself back great, so much the better. End_time: 01:21:28
