Buddho

[bodom]

When the citta slowly, step by step, goes into calm, the citta's habit of going out to the senses and their objects will slowly lessen until one will be aware as soon as it occurs. When one gets to this stage the word "Buddho", mentally recited, will disappear on it's own because the recitation word is a gross object and when the citta goes beyond this gross object stage it will abandon it. When the preparatory word has disappeared one need not recall it. Just keep the citta at the base constantly and notice the feelings and tendencies of the citta in that base.

Luang Pu Atulo

[bodom]

Remember that in being aware of (or fixing) the citta, one must have in mind the aim of developing the citta to the desired state. This aim is virtue (Sila). Reciting "Buddho" alone, without this purpose of virtue, will be of no use at all and will negate our efforts making meditation difficult in the future. If ones purpose is firm, however, ones development of the citta will, without doubt, bear fruit every time to varying degrees but always to the satisfaction of the practitioner. In using "Buddho", clear, fixed thought and consistency must be coupled with diligent effort. I have compared firm and consistent purpose to a man watching the sword blade of an enemy ready to strike. The man watches the sword blade thinking, "Whatever way it comes at me, I must counter it to be safe".

Luang Pu Atulo

[jcsuperstar]

While we meditate here on the word buddho, we have to make up our minds that we're going to stay right here with someone venerable, in the same way that we'd be a monk's attendant. We'll follow after him and watch out for him and not run off anywhere else. If we abandon our monk, he's going to abandon us, and we'll be put to all sorts of hardships.

ajaan lee
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/thai/lee/loyalty.html

[bodom]

When we start meditating buddho, buddho, buddho,as soon as we focus the mind on buddho,it won't stay there. It'll run out to think of whatever work we are about to start or have left undone. It thinks about doing this and doing that until it gets all worked up, afraid that the work won't come out well or won't succeed. The work we've been assigned by other people or that we're doing on our own will be a waste of time or will cause us to lose face if we don't do as we've been told...This is one of the distractions that prevent new meditators from attaining concentration. You have to pull your mind back to buddho, buddho, buddho,and tell yourself, "Thoughts of this sort aren't the path to peace; the true path to peace is to keep the mind with buddhoand nothing else" — and then keep on repeating buddho, buddho, buddho...

Ajaan Thate Desaransi

[bodom]

When you're meditating buddho, buddho, buddho,your defilements see that the situation is getting out of hand and that you'll escape from their control, so they look for things to tie you down even more tightly all the time. Never from the day of your birth have you ever practiced concentration at all. You've simply let the mind follow the moods of the defilements. Only now have you begun to practice, so when you repeat buddho, buddho, buddhoto get the mind to settle down with buddho,it's going to wriggle away in the same way that fish try to wriggle back into the water when they're tossed up on land. So you have to pull the mind back to buddho.Buddho is something cool and calm. It's the path for giving rise to peace and contentment — the only path that will release us from the suffering and stress in this world.

Ajaan Thate Desaransi

[bodom]

Once the mind has been fully trained by using mindfulness to keep it with buddhoas its only preoccupation, it won't go straying after different things, and instead will gather into oneness. The meditation word will disappear without your being aware of it, and you'll feel a sense of peace and ease that nothing else can equal. Those who have never experienced this ease before, when they first experience it, won't be able to describe it, because no one else in the world has ever experienced that kind of peace and ease. Even though other people haveexperienced it, it's not the same. For this reason, you find it hard to describe — although you can describe it to yourself. If you try to describe it to others, you have to use similes and analogies before they'll understand you. Things of this sort are personal: Only you can know them for yourself.

Ajaan Thate Desaransi

[bodom]

When you meditate on buddho, be patient. Don't be in a hurry.Be confident in your meditation word and use mindfulness to keep the mind with its buddho.Your confidence is what will make the mind firm and unwavering, able to let go of all its doubts and uncertainties. The mind will gather in on its meditation word, and mindfulness will keep it solely with buddhoat all times. Whether you sit, stand, walk, lie down, or whatever work you do, mindfulness will be alert to nothing but buddho.If your mindfulness is still weak, and your techniques still few, you have to hold on to buddhoas your foundation. Otherwise your meditation won't progress; or even if it does progress, it won't have any foundation.

Ajaan Thate Desaransi

[bodom]

For concentration to be strong, the mind has to be resolute.When mindfulness is strong and the mind resolute, you decide that this is what you want: "If I can't catch hold of buddho,or see buddhoin my heart, or get the mind to stay put solely with buddho,I won't get up from my meditation. Even if my life will end, I don't care." When you do this, the mind will gather into one faster than you realize it. The meditation word buddho,or whatever it is that may have been bothering or perplexing you, will vanish in the flash of an eye. Even your body, which you've been attached to for so long, won't appear to you. All that remains is the heart — simple awareness — cool, calm, and at ease.

Ajaan Thate Desaransi

[bodom]

If you're impatient, things get even more fouled up. You have to be very patient. Whether or not the mind is going to attain concentration, you've meditated on buddhoin the past, so you just keep meditating on buddho.Act as if you had never meditated on buddhobefore. Make the mind neutral and even, let the breath flow gently, and use mindfulness to focus the mind on buddhoand nothing else. When the time comes for the mind to enter concentration, it will do it on its own. You can't arrange the way it will happen. If it were something you could arrange, all the people in the world would have become arahants long ago.

In meditating on buddho, you have to get so that you're quick and adept.When a good or a bad mood strikes you, you have to be able to enter concentration immediately. Don't let the mind be affected by that mood. Whenever you think of buddho,the mind gathers immediately: When you can do this, your mind will be solid and able to rely on itself.

Ajaan Thate Desaransi

[bodom]

Keep meditating, even if you feel tired and exhausted. Let your mind dwell with the breath. Take a few deep breaths, and then establish the mind on the breath using the mantra "Buddho." Make this practice habitual. The more exhausted you feel, the more subtle and focused your concentration must be, so that you can cope with the painful sensations that arise. When you start to feel fatigued then bring all your thinking to a halt, let the mind gather itself together and then turn to knowing the breath. Just keep up the inner recitation: "Bud-dho, Bud-dho."

We have that clear wakefulness that is called "Buddho," the one who knows, the one who is awake, the radiant one. It is meeting and dwelling with the Buddha, with knowledge and clarity. For it was only the historical flesh-and-blood Buddha that entered parinibbana;the true Buddha, the Buddha that is clear radiant knowing, we can still experience and attain today, and when we do so the heart is one.

Ajahn Chah

[bodom]

When the mind has been trained like this it will constantly recollect Buddho, Buddho, Buddho . . . which is knowing. Knowing what? Knowing what is right and what is wrong at all times. Yes, this is possible. This is getting down to the real practice. That is, whether standing, walking, sitting or lying down there is continuous sati.

Ajahn Chah

[jcsuperstar]

We must all be determined from this point onwards to make our minds peaceful. We focus our awareness upon knowing the in-breath and the out-breath together with the mantra 'Buddho'. Developing these basic meditation themes of Buddhanussati (the recollection of the qualities of the Buddha) and anapanasati (mindfulness of breathing) are a way of cultivating sati, that is, 'mindful recollection'. We practise Dhamma in order to train ourselves, to further the development of our hearts and minds. We practise meditation for the purpose of elevating our hearts to loftier, nobler heights, making it more excellent and sublime.

Ajahn Anan Akincano

http://www.what-buddha-taught.net/Books5/Ajahn_Anand_Akincano_Seeking_Buddho.htm

[bodom]

The way to practice is to awaken the mind and make it “that which knows”, waiting and watching over itself. Whenever a visitor approaches, you must wave your hand to forbid them from coming in. Where could they sit, when the whole day long you occupy the only seat available, your awareness being right in the centre, receiving all the visitors who come? This is what “Buddho” means: a firm and unshakeable awareness. If you can sustain this awareness, it will guard the mind. You simply sit down and establish awareness on this one spot, because this is where all the visitors have come to, right from the time you were just a baby throughout you entire life until the present. So you must get to know them all and this is how. You simply sustain “Buddho”.

Ajahn Chah

[bodom]

We are taught to meditate, which is a step higher in refinement. This effort to train ourselves in meditation is a way of self-reliance that is steadily taken onto a firmer and more dependable level. We use a meditation-word as the means to direct and control the heart. For, as the mind is not yet able to sustain itself, we have to rely on the meditation-word as the object to soothe and bring peace and calm. The settling of the mind in "buddho buddho buddho..."is one example of this. It is an object for the heart to occupy itself with, which is correct and right and appropriate to finding refuge in Dhamma.

Ajahn Maha Boowa

[bodom]

Mindfulness can also be developed through walking meditation. We should walk with composure, the hands clasped lightly in front, right over left. The head should be neither raised too high nor hung too low. The eyes should be focused forward to an even distance and stray neither left nor right, neither behind nor too far ahead. While walking back and forth, we coordinate the movement of our feet with the mantra, 'Buddho'. As we step forward, leading with the right foot, we internally recite 'Bud -' and with the left foot, '- dho'.

Ajahn Akincano  

[bodom]

Luang Pu Chah taught that while walking in meditation, we must be aware of the beginning, middle and end of the path. While reciting 'Bud -' with the right foot and '- dho' with the left, we should also fix our mindfulness on knowing our movements in relation to these three points along the path, that is, as we begin, as we pass the middle and a we reach the end. Upon reaching the end of the path, we stop and establish mindfulness anew before turning around and walking back reciting, 'Bud - dho', 'Bud - dho', 'Bud - dho' as before.

Ajahn Akincano

[bodom]

When listening to others, we can also focus on reciting 'Buddho' in our heart while mindfully noting that we are listening. We should strive to be mindful whatever our activity, be it sitting, talking or listening. Luang Pu Chah greatly stressed the practice of mindfulness.

Ajahn Akincano

[bodom]

When we see how really serious and harmful the defilements are, we should make our minds forthright and our confidence solid and strong, telling ourselves that we've let ourselves be deceived into believing the defilements for many lifetimes; it's time now that we be willing to believe the Buddha's teachings and take buddho as our refuge. We then make mindfulness solid and fix the mind firmly in buddho. We give our lives to buddho and won't let our minds slip away from it. When we make this sort of commitment, the mind will drop straight into one-pointedness and enter concentration.

Ajahn Thate

[bodom]

"When we make up our mind to repeat 'Buddho,' the act of making up the mind is in itself the act of establishing mindfulness. When we keep thinking 'Buddho' and are not willing to let the mind slip away from 'Buddho,' our mindfulness and alertness are already healthy and strong, always watching over the mind to keep it with 'Buddho.' As soon as our attention slips away, so that we forget to think 'Buddho' and go thinking of something else, it's a sign that there's a lapse in our mindfulness. But if we can keep our mindfulness under control and can think 'Buddho, Buddho' continuously, with no gaps, our mindfulness is already strong, so there's no need to go 'establishing mindfulness' anywhere. To think of an object so that it is coupled with the mind is, in and of itself, the act of getting mindfulness established."

Phra Ajaan Sao

[bodom]

How did Phra Ajaan Sao teach? If it so happened that someone came to him, saying, "Ajaan, sir, I want to practice meditation. How should I go about it?" he would answer, "Meditate on the word 'Buddho.'"If the person asked, "What does 'Buddho' mean?" Ajaan Sao would answer, "Don't ask.""What will happen after I've meditated on 'Buddho'?""Don't ask. Your only duty is simply to repeat the word 'Buddho' over and over in your mind."That's how he taught: no long, drawn-out explanations.