Seeing That Frees: Meditations on Emptiness and Dependent Arising

The more insight we have access to, and the more we have cultivated beautiful qualities of the citta, the more malleable perception can be for us with practice.

If, at any point, I recognize that I have already been pulled in to a web, or even a tornado, of papañca, it is crucial to realize that all is not lost.

even as it is happening we know not to trust the web that is being spun.

What is more necessary is that they sustain relatively steadily for more than a few minutes. Then we can learn to sustain them for longer.

Too easily we can become caught up in measuring the ups and downs of our focus of mind and miss the bigger picture of what we are cultivating.

Oftentimes just remaining lightly, delicately open and sensitive to the whole body in this way begins to reveal a subtle pleasantness to the way the space of the body feels. It can be extremely helpful to learn to ‘tune into’ this, and to enjoy it.

trying with mindfulness to stay more at contact, we find that it is actually a delightful way of being. Lighter, more easeful, less burdened by the complexities of papañca, we also enjoy the vivid brightness of the present moment, the beauty of ‘nowness’, and the relative spaciousness of less self-building.

Thus it offers us the opportunity to learn, usually gradually, the two wise attitudes discussed above: not to take the hindrances personally, and not to believe their perspectives.

Emptiness teachings and ways of looking are only a smaller subset of the larger set of tools for freedom that is the whole of the Dharma.