Abandoning the Five Hindrances

Whoever has gained release from the world, is gaining release, or will gain release, all of them have done so by abandoning the five hindrances, the mental impurities that weaken wisdom, and by firmly establishing their minds in the four abidings of mindfulness, and by developing the seven factors of enlightenment as they really are.

This is how they have gained release from the world, are gaining release, or will gain release.

AN10.95

When one can consistently dwell “contemplating mind in mind, ardent, fully aware, and mindful, having put away covetousness and grief for the world,” the mind is stable and sensitive enough for the next stage in the Gradual Training: Abandoning the Five Hindrances by developing the Seven Factors of Enlightenment.

The practice of Abandoning the Five Hindrances is cleansing the mind of the mental impurities that weaken wisdom, the cleansing of habitual tendencies and defilements that prevent us from dwelling in Right Mindfulness, the Four Dwellings of Mindfulness and maintaining a concentrated and collected mind. This prevents us from discerning more and more subtle mind states, abiding in Jhana, and thus blocks further progress on the path to liberation.

Five Hindrances What are they?

There are Five Hindrances that block progress on the path to liberation; these are:

1. Sensual Desire: Craving sensual satisfaction and clinging to sensory experiences, such as pleasant sights, sounds, tastes, smells, and tactile sensations.

2. Ill-will: Feelings of hostility, anger, resentment, or aversion towards oneself, others, situations or states of being.

3. Sloth and Torpor: Sloth is mental lethargy, sluggishness, or dullness, while torpor refers to physical and mental inertia or drowsiness.

4. Restlessness and Worry: Restlessness is an agitated, unsettled mind characterized by worry, anxiety, or mental agitation. Worry refers to excessive concern about past or future events, leading to a scattered and distracted mind.

5. Doubt: Skepticism, indecision, or lack of conviction in the teachings, the practice, or one's own abilities. It undermines confidence and commitment to the path, hindering progress toward liberation.

At this stage of the Gradual Training, these hindrances should only manifest themselves in subtle forms. For example, sensual desire might manifest as clinging to perceptions of the body or in the expectation that experience should be predictable, satisfactory and under our control.

Ill-will might manifest as wanting to be free of more subtle bodily, mental or verbal fabrications.

What these Five hindrances have in common is that because of desire, aversion or delusion, one feels pressure to react to the current situation by either seeking pleasure, avoiding discomfort, or seeking a distraction from the current situation, which results in lack of mindfulness and loss of concentration.

Five Hindrances and the Gradual Training

Here a disciple frequents a secluded lodging: a forest, the root of a tree, a mountain, a ravine, a hillside cave, a charnel ground, a jungle grove...

He sits down cross-legged after his meal, having returned from his alms round, setting his body erect and establishing mindfulness on itself. He lives with a mind free from covetousness for the world, cleansing his mind of covetousness; free from ill-will and harm, compassionate for the welfare of all living beings, cleansing his mind of ill-will; free from sloth and torpor, alert and mindful, cleansing his mind of sloth and torpor; free from restlessness and remorse, calm in mind, cleansing his mind of restlessness and remorse; free from doubt, having crossed over doubt, confident in skillful qualities, cleansing his mind of doubt.

Just as a person would take a loan for a venture, and the venture succeeds, he would then repay his old debts and still have surplus for supporting his family, thinking, I took a loan for a venture, it succeeded, I repaid my debts and have surplus for my family, and he would be joyful and happy.

Similarly, a sick person, suffering and severely ill, unable to eat and lacking strength, later recovers, can eat and regains strength, thinking, I was sick, suffering, unable to eat, now I am recovered, can eat, and have regained strength, and he would be joyful and happy.

Just as a person imprisoned would later be released safely without loss of property, thinking, I was imprisoned, now I am released safely without loss of property, and he would be joyful and happy.

Just as a slave would later be freed, becoming independent and free to go where he wishes, thinking, I was a slave, now I am free and independent, and he would be joyful and happy.

Just as a wealthy person traveling through a dangerous road would emerge safely without loss of property, thinking, I traveled through a dangerous road and emerged safely without loss of property, and he would be joyful and happy.

In the same way a disciple sees these five hindrances un-abandoned in himself as debt, sickness, imprisonment, slavery, and a dangerous road. When these five hindrances are abandoned, he sees himself as debt-free, healthy, released from prison, freed from slavery, and in a safe place.

Having abandoned these five hindrances, impurities of the mind that weaken wisdom, secluded from sensual pleasures, secluded from unskillful qualities, he enters and remains in the first jhana, which is accompanied by applied and sustained thought, with rapture and pleasure born of seclusion...

MN39

First, let's consider that every stage in the Gradual Training has addressed the hindrances, from gross to more subtle afflictions:

The Practice of Sila: the letting go of desire, aversion, and attachment to interactions with others through the practice of Right Speech, Right Action, and Right Livelihood. This involves renouncing desires, expectations, assumptions, and the tendency to take for granted how others should behave. It also means releasing ill-will towards others and avoiding interactions that lead to remorse and long-term disturbances in the mind.

Guarding the Sense Doors: restraining oneself from getting entangled in the world by making contact with objects of the world in such a way that we do not grasp at their signs or features, if this contact might result in greed, aversion, or delusion.

Moderation in Eating: not getting lost or delighting in flavors, craving food.

The Practice of Wakefulness: The practice of keeping the mind unobstructed, not getting lost in unwholesome thoughts.

Right Mindfulness: Abiding in the Four Dwellings of Mindfulness, having subdued greed and aversion for the "world."

At this stage in the Gradual Training, the Five Hindrances should no longer manifest as actions, speech, or even coherent thoughts. Instead, they might manifest as karmic energy or residual forces.

Having reached this stage of the Gradual Training, the mind is now sensitive enough to see suffering closer to its source, the mind stream, the source of volitional formations and their propagation into suffering.

At this stage, disturbances might surface not as clear mental images or stories but felt as tension, energetic blocks, fog, agitation, heaviness, or dullness. However, it is crucial to continue and deepen all the previous practices so that the disturbances caused in daily life do not spill over into the practice of abiding in the Four Dwellings of Mindfulness. Eventually, as practice deepens, even the latent hindrances must be fully uprooted. These are not just active thoughts or energies, but dispositions stored in underlying tendencies.

Five Hindrances: The Stages of Liberation

Until one has reached one of the stages of liberation, the Five Hindrances can only be weakened and overcome temporarily so that one can abide in Jhana.

As one attains levels of liberation, some of the hindrances are permanently let go:

• Doubt is eliminated at the first stage of liberation, the path and fruition of stream entry.
• Sensual desire, ill-will, and remorse are eliminated at the third stage, the path and fruition of non-returner.
• Sloth, torpor, and restlessness are eradicated at Arahatship.

Therefore, every step taken in weakening these hindrances takes us nearer to the stages of liberation, where freedom from these hindrances becomes unshakable.

A person who has attained the destruction of the taints or mental intoxicants (asava): sensual desire, existence, views, and ignorance, has developed and well-developed the Seven Factors of Enlightenment. This person is called an arahant, a fully enlightened being.

Five Hindrances: The Cessation of Craving

It is the remainderless fading away and cessation of that same craving, the giving up and relinquishing of it, freedom from it, non-reliance on it.

SN 56.11

It's important to keep in mind that at its root, the Gradual Training is for the cessation of craving: craving sense satisfaction, craving for becoming, and for non-becoming.

This requires clear, penetrative insight into the impermanent, unsatisfactory, and non-self nature of our experience, the Five Aggregates. Only then can dispassion arise, which, when developed, leads to seeing the fading away, the cessation, and ultimately the release of all craving.

How does a disciple dwell contemplating the mind in the mind?

Here a disciple knows a mind with lust as a mind with lust, a mind without lust as a mind without lust, a mind with hatred as a mind with hatred, a mind without hatred as a mind without hatred, a mind with delusion as a mind with delusion, a mind without delusion as a mind without delusion, a contracted mind as a contracted mind, a distracted mind as a distracted mind, an exalted mind as an exalted mind, an unexalted mind as an unexalted mind, a surpassed mind as a surpassed mind, an unsurpassed mind as an unsurpassed mind, a concentrated mind as a concentrated mind, an unconcentrated mind as an unconcentrated mind, a liberated mind as a liberated mind, an unliberated mind as an unliberated mind.

DN22

In the above passage, the Tathagata teaches us that to purify the mind, we must first recognize the subtle mind states that manifest as volitional formations, mental energy, which propagate into unwholesome mind states.

The mind must be purified so that is clear, concentrated, unshakable, free from entanglement, imbued with the single-minded intention of destroying the taints. To create the causes and conditions for such a mind requires developing the Seven Factors of Enlightenment.

However, before we take a look at the Seven Factors of Enlightenment and how they can be used to Abandon the Five Hindrances, let's look at some basic concepts about the mind stream, what the Tathagata calls "Volitional Formations"

Five Hindrances: Kammic Energy

To understand the practice of Abandoning the Five Hindrances, it's useful to see the hindrances as kammic energy.

Kamma is mental energy, which has momentum or volition and is rooted in past desires, which manifest as intentions to fulfill those desires. This volitional mental energy is what drives our desire for existence and creates a sense of "being," leading to the desire to take on a birth in a body in order to seek satisfaction in the world through bodily, mental, and verbal actions. What the Tathagata calls bodily, mental, and verbal formations.

Since Kamma is rooted in greed, aversion and delusion, it manifests in the present as restless, scattered mental energy, constantly seeking satisfaction by "feeding" on objects of the "world", what we call obtaining sensual satisfaction. This continual seeking, restlessness results in a tainted, disturbed mind, clouded in ignorance, incapable of attaining liberation.

By progressing on the Gradual Training and developing the Eightfold Path, this scattering of mind energy is reduced, resulting in a more collected and settled mind, which is now solely intent on liberation.

However, even at this stage of the Gradual Training, restlessness remains, as a constant stream of ingrained karmic mental energy still seeking an outlet, as desire for existence, as clinging to the Five Aggregates. This unsettled mental energy is what the Tathagata refers to as "five impurities of the mind, which, when present in the mind, make it neither pliable, workable, nor radiant, and it does not properly attain concentration for the destruction of the taints."

To progress on the path to liberation, we must transform this impure, scattered mental energy by applying the Seven Factors of Enlightenment, to purify the mind into a pure stream of pliable, collected mental energy, which is single-mindedly intent on destruction of the taints.

Disciples, these five impurities of gold, which when present in gold, make it neither pliable, workable, nor radiant, and it does not properly come to fulfillment in any craftsmanship. What are the five?

Iron, copper, tin, lead, and silver, these, disciples, are the five impurities of gold, which when present in gold, make it neither pliable, workable, nor radiant, and it does not properly come to fulfillment in any craftsmanship.

But, disciples, when gold is freed from these five impurities, it becomes pliable, workable, and radiant; it is not brittle and properly comes to fulfillment in any craftsmanship. Whatever ornament one wishes to make from it, whether a ring, earrings, a necklace, or a golden chain, it serves that purpose.

Similarly, disciples, these are the five impurities of the mind, which when present in the mind, make it neither pliable, workable, nor radiant, and it does not properly attain concentration for the destruction of the taints. What are the five?

Sensual desire, ill will, sloth and torpor, restlessness and worry, and doubt, these, disciples, are the five impurities of the mind, which when present in the mind, make it neither pliable, workable, nor radiant, and it does not properly attain concentration for the destruction of the taints.

But, disciples, when the mind is freed from these five impurities, it becomes pliable, workable, and radiant; it is not brittle and properly attains concentration for the destruction of the taints.

AN5.23

Purifying the Mind by Purifying Kamma

To understand purification of the mind, it is essential to remember the Tathāgata’s teaching: The mind is the forerunner to all experience.

It is not the case that things exist, and the mind perceives them as they are. Instead, based on tainted karmic volitional intentions, the mind of an ordinary person is constantly seeking and selectively paying attention to objects of the world, with perceptions tainted by the craving to feed on satisfactory experiences or avoid unpleasant ones.

In other words, the mind, by its intentions, what it pays attention to, and how it perceives things, creates experience.

The physical things of the world exist as they are, but our perceptions of them being good or bad are shaped by our desires and intentions, which create mental, bodily, and verbal formations which shape the whole of our existence, influenced by greed, aversion, and delusion.

To understand this important point, first consider that intention is the "builder of kamma." As soon as the mind leans toward an action, even subtly, kamma is being formed. Depending on the amount of volition created, this will shape future actions when conditions are ripe.

Kamma does not only manifest in outward action. It is also the subtle intentional energy that shapes perception, choices, and identity, moment to moment. Even the most subtle perceptions, when rooted in craving, aversion, or delusion, are kammic energy.

At this stage of the Gradual Training, we purify the mind by replacing unwholesome states of mind, the Five Hindrances, with wholesome ones, the Seven Factors of Enlightment.

This requires further purifying our views (Right View), purifying our intentions (Right Intention), purifying our inner speech (Right Speech), purifying our actions (Right Action), purifying how we practice (Right Livelihood), purifying our effort (Right Effort), and how we pay attention to and perceive the "world." (Right Mindfulness), into a single collected stream of mind energy intent on destruction of the taints (Right Concentration).

Purifying Perception

Abandoning the Five Hindrances and cultivating the Seven Factors of Enlightenment requires a more subtle knowing, being able to see intention, attention, perception, and effort, which manifest as subtle movements of the mind.

Just as a goldsmith carefully applies intention, attention, and effort to separate impurities from gold, making it pliable for crafting ornaments, we must further develop Right Intention, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, and Right Investigation to purify our mind and it's perceptions, for the destruction of the taints.

It is the diversity of perceptions and clinging to them (objectification) that keeps us entangled in the "world." Clinging to perceptions prevents the mind from becoming collected, single-minded or concentrated, which obstructs clear seeing.

The perception of impermanence, the perception of non-self, and the many other perceptions taught by the Tathagata help purify our perceptions, freeing them from impurities that obscure wisdom, allowing perception to become sharp and penetrative.

Perception: What is it?

To understand the purification of perception, let us first look at perception itself, how kamma shapes perceptions, and how perceptions can be used for the purpose of liberation.

Perception is the function that recognizes and labels objects. For example, you see a shape and your mind identifies "tree," or you hear a sound and know "music." This is perception; it classifies and gives meaning.

In essence, all hindrances are clinging to feelings and perceptions. Feelings and perceptions, although they fall under two separate aggregates, the Feeling Aggregate and the Perception Aggregate, work together in tandem. Feelings influence our perceptions, and perceptions create feelings.

Since feelings and perceptions are created, shaped from past accumulated kammic volition, we can work with them just as a goldsmith works with gold to cleans ourselves of attachment to unwholesome perceptions, while at the same time developing wholesome ones, the Seven Factors of Enlightenment.

In regard to purifying kammic formations, there are two types of perceptions: passive perception: seeing a color or hearing a sound when the sense doors are open. These perceptions rise and pass away on their own without the mind attaching to them.

And intentional perception: directing the mind to investigate, sustain, or even fabricate perception, both wholesome and unwholesome.

Perceptions do not, by themselves, create kammic energy. Kammic energy is only created when there is intention, that is, when intention attaches to perceptions by clinging to them, acting on them, or by fabricating new ones.

If one intentionally directs the mind to perceive something with craving, aversion, or delusion, for example perceiving beauty with lust or perceiving threat with fear, then intention drives and makes that perception volitional, karmically potent, which leads to the propagation of wrong intentions and unwholesome thoughts.

On the other hand, if one intends to use specific perceptions, for example, the perception of emptiness, which is rooted in Right View, this creates wholesome kamma. The perception of emptiness purifies the mind stream, volitional formations of objectification.

For example, in MN 62, the Tathagata teaches his son Rāhula to practice the perception of impermanence, non-self, unattractiveness, and others for his development. These perceptions are not passive; they are intentional, cultivated with awareness.

It's important to understand that perceptions are not intellectual; they are experiential. For example, the perception of impermanence is attention directed to the constantly arising, changing, and passing away of feelings and perceptions, which manifest as bodily formations, mental formations, volitional formations, and verbal formations.

Instead of clinging to these phenomena existing or not existing, we set intention to see "there is passing away," “there is fading away.” Seeing that nowhere in this constantly changing and impermanent process is there anywhere or anything to cling to. It is the mind's craving for existence, clinging to perceptions and feelings either existing or not existing, that causes suffering. Seeing this repeatedly and fully applied to every aspect of our experience, dispassion, cessation, and letting go naturally follow.

We need to see for ourselves that any perceptions that are seen through the lens of the mind (hijacked by the mind), the mind will cling to them and make them impure, tainted with greed, aversion, and delusion.

This is why concentration, a collected mind, and abiding in Jhana are crucial, as they remove the unwholesome perceptions that the mind can get entangled with. With the mind and unwholesome volitional formations out of the way, perception becomes purified and can be used for the destruction of the taints.

So although it can be skillful to use imagination at first, perception is seeing what is actually occurring, a seeing that is trained by inclination, without the objectification created by the mind.

Those who perceive permanence in the impermanent, pleasure in suffering, self in the non-self, and purity in the impure are beings with wrong views, with scattered minds, and without understanding.

AN4.49

Perception Using Antidotes

Just as impurities in gold can be neutralized using chemical treatments that dissolve unwanted substances while preserving the precious metal, we can also purify our own perceptions by using antidotes.

Consider that since the mind fabricates the good and bad perceptions of the world and all the other dualities, this means that we can re-train or reprogram the mind by neutralizing perceptions which result in greed, aversion and delusion. We can cleanse the mind of its attachment to dualities by applying antidotes to these perceptions.

For example, just as we can neutralize acids with alkaline, stop a fire with water, cool heat with ice, or remove darkness with light. The mind can be purified of the Five Hindrances by using antidotes.

For example, using the perception of the unattractive to counter the attractive, the perception of energy to counter dullness, good-will to counter ill-will, and the many other practices and perceptions that the Tathagata recommends.

Purifying the Mind Purifying Attention

At a more fundamental level than perceptions, the mind can be purified by how and what it pays attention to. By not paying attention to unwholesome perceptions or states of mind, but instead paying attention to wholesome ones.

Attention is what directs the stream of consciousness. Attention is an intentional act directed toward perception, for example, the breath. It’s more fundamental than perception, for without attention, there is no perception. Perception requires contact, but before contact, attention directs the mind toward the field of attention.

Intention is the power or energy behind Volitional Formations, attention is how this energy is manifested.

Attention is how consciousness engages with experience, and depending on the type of attention or what it engages with, this has a bearing on the outcome of kammic energy.

Perception must be accompanied by wise attention (yoniso manasikāra) and clear seeing; only then does the kammic energy flow lead to destruction of the taints.

Attention can be wholesome and unwholesome. Wise attention is attention guided by Right View, leading to disenchantment, dispassion, and release. Unwise attention is attention that leads to proliferation, craving, views, and bondage.

What one pays attention to grows.

In regard to purifying the mind, two types of attention need to be developed:

• Vitakka, the initial application of attention. It is the turning of the mind toward an object. It is the act of bringing something into the mental field.

• Vicāra, sustained attention. It is the sustained application, keeping the mind engaged with it, investigating it.

vitakka and vicāra are pre-verbal or sub-verbal processes, otherwise known as proto-thoughts. They are attentional formations that are verbal in nature, but have not yet formed into inner speech.

We must train our mind to be sensitive to these proto-thoughts. For example, the mind might lean toward the breath, and then there is quiet monitoring of it, noticing and investigating experience without verbal labeling.

We use proto-thoughts, vitakka and vicāra to direct our attention and sustain it in such a way that it is established on wholesome perceptions, and grows there.

In this simile, the Tathagata shows us how vitakka and vicāra work subtly as proto-thoughts, not coarsely like inner speech but more like silent inner shaping, shaping a unified experience of joy and pleasure.

When you intentionally direct the mind (vitakka) and sustain it (vicāra) on a particular way of seeing, like: "this is impermanent," "this is empty of self," "this is unsatisfactory," you are forming proto-thoughts, a mental habit that turns your attention repeatedly toward the liberating characteristic of the experience.

This is a volitional perception, meaning it's intentionally formed and sustained through proto-thoughts that shape attention, which shapes perception and results in insight.

In other words, we need to become aware of our intentions, how and what we pay attention to, and how we perceive experience to create the causes and conditions for wisdom to arise.

The result is the opposite of scattered attention, it is the purification of the mind stream, which leads to concentration and insight.

Five Hinderances Proper Attention

Not understanding what things are fit for attention and what things are unfit for attention, he attends to things unfit for attention and does not attend to things fit for attention.

And what are the things unfit for attention that he attends to?

Whatever things, when attended to, lead to the arising of unarisen sensual desire, or to the increase of arisen sensual desire, to the arising of unarisen desire for existence, or to the increase of arisen desire for existence, to the arising of unarisen ignorance, or to the increase of arisen ignorance: these are the things unfit for attention that he attends to.

And what are the things fit for attention that he does not attend to?

Whatever things, when attended to, do not lead to the arising of unarisen sensual desire, or to the increase of arisen sensual desire, to the arising of unarisen desire for existence, or to the increase of arisen desire for existence, to the arising of unarisen ignorance, or to the increase of arisen ignorance: these are the things fit for attention that he does not attend to.

By attending to things unfit for attention and not attending to things fit for attention, unarisen defilements arise and arisen defilements increase....

He attends wisely to: This is suffering; This is the origin of suffering; This is the cessation of suffering; This is the path leading to the cessation of suffering.

By attending wisely in this way, three fetters are abandoned: identity view, doubt, and attachment to rites and rituals.

MN2

So what is the fire that burns away these karmic impurities?

In MN2, the Tathagata describes the seven methods for abandoning the taints: by seeing, restraining, using, enduring, avoiding, removing, and developing. The key point to understand is that only two of these methods lead to the Supramundane path and ultimate liberation.

Abandoning by seeing: Mindfulness and clear knowing always comes first; there can never be enough mindfulness. We must be able to completely see our mind states or hindrances before they can be addressed. Often, just seeing clearly and completely is enough to let go and abandon a hindrance. Through Right View, seeing a mind state as not-self, impermanent and suffering, we develop the insight necessary to let go of wrong views.

Abandoning by developing: By cultivating the factors of enlightenment, we directly weaken and destroy the hindrances. This is the active process of progressing on the Supramundane path.

The other five methods, restraining, using, enduring, avoiding, and removing, are effective for temporarily suppressing the hindrances but do not eradicate them. While they may be helpful in certain situations, they do not lead to the destruction of the hindrances and, therefore, do not result in liberation.

At this stage of the Gradual Training, generating wholesome states of mind is through the development of the Seven Factors of Enlightenment, by abiding in one of the Four Dwellings of Mindfulness.

As every individual is different, one will need to identify which hindrances affect them the most, understand how and when they arise, recognize their inner strengths to counter each hindrance, and actively cultivate relevant practices to overcome them.

And what are the defilements to be developed?

Here a disciple wisely develops the mindfulness enlightenment factor, which is based on seclusion, dispassion, cessation, and leads to relinquishment; he wisely develops the investigation of states enlightenment factor... the energy enlightenment factor... the joy enlightenment factor... the tranquility enlightenment factor... the concentration enlightenment factor... the equanimity enlightenment factor, which is based on seclusion, dispassion, cessation, and leads to relinquishment. If he does not develop them, defilements, distress, and fever arise in him.

MN2

Five Hinderances Right Effort

Just like every other part of the Gradual Training, Abandoning the Hindrances depends on Right Effort. The purification process requires using Right Effort, to incline the mind into skillfull perceptions.

Just as a goldsmith, working with raw and impure gold that is dull and unworkable, places it in the fire and carefully controls the heat, using his tools, tongs, crucible, and hammer, with skillful attention, removing impurities bit by bit until the gold becomes pure, bright, and malleable, ready to be shaped into an ornament.

In the same way, dwelling in Right Mindfulness, we use investigation of dhammas to examine hindrances in our perceptions, using Right Effort, we apply mindfulness, investigation, energy, joy, satisfaction, tranquility, concentration, and equanimity to purify the mind of its unwholesome states.

Using Right Effort to address the hindrances throughout the day, and not just during practice, is essential.

Right Effort Balancing Right Effort.

Now, let's look at how to apply Right Effort in a way that skillfully uses intention, attention, perception, mindfulness, and the Seven Factors of Enlightenment to purify the mind.

First, keep in mind that effort isn't about straining; it’s about building the right causes and conditions so that effort becomes effortless. Imagine a goldsmith at work. He’s not just hammering metal; he’s adjusting, refining, and bringing out impurities. The process has become effortless through practice. That’s how Right Effort should be developed and applied: a steady flow of intention and attention, with vigilance, gradually developing, strengthening, and balancing the factors of enlightenment.

Preventing Unwholesome States from Arising is keeping soot out of the gold crucible, protecting purity from the start. At the very beginning, we set the Right Intention to purify the mind of unwholesome states. We guide attention using gentle proto-thoughts: "subdue desire for the world," "let go of attachment to the senses," "soften attention," "develop an all-encompassing awareness," "keep vigilant for clinging."

Abandoning unwholesome states that have arisen is like when a goldsmith skims impurities from molten gold. We refine the mind by using investigation to identify what’s obstructing awareness or disrupting stillness, whether it’s clinging to perceptions, restlessness, dullness, or something else. Then we apply the right antidote: If there’s dullness, we arouse energy by seeing the need for urgency in our practice. If there’s restlessness, we soften attention and perception into tranquility.

If there is clinging to perceptions, we investigate: "Is this lasting?" "Is this mine?" "Is it stressful?"

We let the perception of impermanence dissolve attachment to perceptions. We let the perception of not-self see: this is not me, not mine, not myself. Furthermore, we let the perception of suffering reveal: this is not worth clinging to.

Arousing wholesome states that haven’t yet arisen is like applying the right amount of heat on gold so that our awareness begins to glow.

By nature, the awareness of an unliberated person contains a mixture of wholesome and unwholesome perceptions existing together in varying proportions. Wholesome perceptions are always present somewhere in awareness.

With full mindfulness, we investigate awareness and use attention to move and sustain our focus on wholesome perceptions.

Using Vitakka, the initial application of attention, we turn the mind toward a wholesome perception. Then, using Vicāra, sustained attention, we keep the mind engaged with it, investigating it. As we sustain our attention on it, it grows.

It is important to have proper attention, not to judge our effort or create a separate mind stream to evaluate the growth or increase in a wholesome mind state, as this scatters attention and weakens or destroys sustained attention. It splits attention between two streams, which destroys concentration. The results of the investigation will naturally be known; there is no need to make any effort.

By using proto-thoughts to incline the mind toward what is wholesome, we direct the mind to investigate the existence of already existing wholesome perceptions, like energy, joy, happiness, and tranquility. For example:

"There is joy," "let joy arise," "let joy grow." "Let attention dwell in satisfaction," "may stillness deepen."

Once the gold is forming, it needs shaping and cooling to become stable. We sustain and deepen arisen wholesome states by resting attention on wholesome perceptions.

When pīti (joy) arises, we don’t rush past it. We dwell in it. Let it fill the body. When concentration stabilizes, we let equanimity emerge on its own.

Even wholesome states must be released without clinging. We need to see that even joy is changing. It is not mine, not self. When joy is released, there is a deepening of wholesome states.

Instead of striving to increase wholesome states, we protect the stillness, keep it pure from ego, from craving to own the experience. We let go, through letting go we see that even holding on to joy is suffering and there is release.

Think of effort like the hands of a skilled goldsmith. He knows when to heat, cool, stir, or wait. Similarly, we adjust: Too dull? Add energy, light. Too agitated? Add tranquility, breath softness. Too attached to joy? See its fading nature. Too much trying? Let equanimity balance everything.

Effort becomes wisdom, it knows what to feed the mind to keep it balanced, steady, content and unwavering. Over time, balancing the Seven Factors of Enlightment becomes effortless, Right Effort flows naturally, refining itself.

We maintain this pure stream of collected, unwavering, yet pliable mental energy and make it suitable for the destruction of the taints.

Five Hinderances Seclusion

Being endowed with clear knowing, the Tathagata further instructs him: Come, disciple, frequent a secluded dwelling - a forest, the root of a tree, a mountain, a cave, a cemetery, a forest haunt, an open space, a heap of straw.

He frequents a secluded dwelling - a forest, the root of a tree, a mountain, a cave, a cemetery, a forest haunt, an open space, a heap of straw. After his meal, on returning from his alms round, he sits down, folding his legs crosswise, setting his body erect, and establishing mindfulness in the body.

He lives with a mind free from covetousness, cleansing his mind of covetousness; he lives with a mind free from ill-will, compassionate for the welfare of all living beings, cleansing his mind of ill-will; he lives free from sloth and torpor, perceiving light, mindful and fully aware, cleansing his mind of sloth and torpor; he lives free from restlessness and remorse, with an inner tranquility, cleansing his mind of restlessness and remorse; he lives free from doubt, having crossed over doubt, unperplexed about wholesome states, cleansing his mind of doubt.

MN107

Abandoning the Hindrances and the following stages of the Gradual Training depend on seclusion, both physical and mental, not just brief retreats, but extended periods of solitude. As part of the practice of Abandoning the Hindrances, we will need to find a quiet, natural setting such as a forest, hill, hut, cabin, or a silent room.

We will need to disconnect completely from human contact, phones, and all forms of reading except for Dhamma. Bring only the bare necessities: clothing, food, water, and shelter.

Remember that seclusion is primarily seclusion from the "world" the Five Senses. Right Mindfulness requires subduing greed and aversion for the "world".

Purifying the Mind The Seven Factors of Enlightenment

Now that we have looked at some basic concepts regarding perception, attention, and intention, we can now look at developing the Seven Factors of Enlightenment.

First, it's important to understand that the factors arise not randomly or through an act of will, but when the right conditions are present. Intention and perception play a key role and must be guided by wise attention.

Also, the factors are progressive unfolding; each factor nurtures the arising of the next:

Mindfulness, when developed and cultivated, fulfills investigation of Dhamma.

Investigation, when developed and cultivated, fulfills energy. Energy fulfills rapture.

Rapture fulfills tranquility. Tranquility fulfills concentration. Concentration fulfills equanimity.

SN46.3

Not only are the factors dependent on one another, but also their balance is vital. For example, too much energy leads to restlessness; too much calm leads to dullness. Mindfulness, the first factor, oversees the balance.

Each of the factors is a form of letting go, not holding on to perceptions, the lessening of stress and dissatisfaction.

Also, it's important to understand that there are many pathways for developing the Seven Factors of Enlightenment.

When a disciple is devoted to the development of the perception of impermanence, the seven factors of enlightenment go to fulfillment through development.

This shows that a particular kind of perception, namely, the perception of impermanence, is powerful enough to develop all seven factors. In the same way, Anapanasati, the Brahmaviaras, Developing Sila and many other practices (if not all) lead to the development of all seven factors.

Let us now look at each of the Seven Factors of Enlightenment.

when a disciple's mindfulness is established and not confused: the mindfulness enlightenment factor is aroused, he develops the mindfulness enlightenment factor, and the mindfulness enlightenment factor reaches fulfillment.

Dwelling thus mindful, he investigates, examines, and inquires into that state with wisdom. ...the investigation-of-states enlightenment factor is aroused at that time, he develops the investigation-of-states enlightenment factor, and the investigation-of-states enlightenment factor reaches fulfillment at that time.

As he investigates, examines, and inquires into that state with wisdom, energy that is not slack is aroused in him. At the time, Ānanda, when the disciple's energy that is not slack is aroused: the energy enlightenment factor is aroused at that time, he develops the energy enlightenment factor, and the energy enlightenment factor reaches fulfillment at that time.

When energy is aroused, joy that is free from sensuality arises. At the time, Ānanda, when joy that is free from sensuality arises in the disciple whose energy is aroused: the joy enlightenment factor is aroused at that time, he develops the joy enlightenment factor, and the joy enlightenment factor reaches fulfillment at that time.

When the mind is joyful, the body and mind become tranquil. At the time, Ānanda, when the disciple's body and mind become tranquil: the tranquility enlightenment factor is aroused at that time, he develops the tranquility enlightenment factor, and the tranquility enlightenment factor reaches fulfillment at that time.

When the body is tranquil and happy, the mind becomes concentrated. At the time, Ānanda, when the disciple's mind becomes concentrated: the concentration enlightenment factor is aroused at that time, he develops the concentration enlightenment factor, and the concentration enlightenment factor reaches fulfillment at that time.

Dwelling thus with a concentrated mind, he carefully observes with equanimity. At the time, Ānanda, when a disciple dwelling thus with a concentrated mind carefully observes with equanimity: the equanimity enlightenment factor is aroused at that time, he develops the equanimity enlightenment factor, and the equanimity enlightenment factor reaches fulfillment at that time. ...

Thus developed, Ānanda, the four foundations of mindfulness thus frequently practiced fulfill the seven factors of enlightenment.

SN54.13

And what is the nourishment for knowing and liberation?

It should be said: the seven factors of enlightenment...

And what is the nourishment for the seven factors of enlightenment?

It should be said: the four foundations of mindfulness...

And what is the nourishment for the four foundations of mindfulness?

It should be said: the three kinds of good conduct...

And what is the nourishment for the three kinds of good conduct?

It should be said: restraint of the senses...

And what is the nourishment for restraint of the senses?

It should be said: mindfulness and clear knowing...

And what is the nourishment for mindfulness and clear knowing?

It should be said: wise attention...

And what is the nourishment for wise attention?

It should be said: faith...

And what is the nourishment for faith?

It should be said: hearing the true teachings...

And what is the nourishment for hearing the true teachings?

It should be said: associating with good people...

Thus associating with good people fulfills the hearing of the true teachings, the hearing of the true teachings fulfills faith, faith fulfills wise attention, wise attention fulfills mindfulness and clear knowing, mindfulness and clear knowing fulfill restraint of the senses, restraint of the senses fulfills the three kinds of good conduct, the three kinds of good conduct fulfill the four foundations of mindfulness, the four foundations of mindfulness fulfill the seven factors of enlightenment, the seven factors of enlightenment fulfill knowing and liberation.

AN10.61

Seven Factors of Enlightment Mindfulness

Right Mindfulness, the first of the englightment factors has already been extensively covered in the previous stage of the Gradual Training. It serves as the foundation for developing the Seven Factors of Enlightenment. Right Mindfulness is the basis for all the other factors. The other factors cannot arise if we are not fully aware and mindful. Also, unlike the other factors, you can never have too much mindfulness.

In regard to developing the Seven Factors of Enlightenment, it fulfills the mental seclusion required before we can practice, as we must subdue desire and aversion for the "world" before the mind can be quiet and subtle enough to develop the other factors.

Mindfulness provides the real-time awareness needed to identify hindrances as soon as they start to appear, and provides the continuous attention required to purify them.

Seven Factors of Enlightment Investigation of States

We have also covered the investigation of mental states (Dhamma-vicaya), the exploration and discernment of mental processes and experiences. Through contemplation, appropriate attention, and seeing things as they really are.

Using the Four Noble Truths as the guide to investigation, we identify hindrances, their cause, their cessation, and the path to their cessation.

At this stage of the Gradual Training, we must refine the way we use our attention, Vitakka and vicāra.

Perceiving clearly the nature of things leads to curiosity and investigation: what is this? Is it lasting? (Proto-thoughts). Often, by investigating perceptions with full mindfulness, they dissolve, fade, and pass away.

Seven Factors of Enlightment Energy

And what is the faculty of energy?

Here a noble disciple lives with energy aroused for the abandoning of unwholesome states, for the attainment of wholesome states, being steadfast, strong in exertion, not shirking the responsibility for wholesome states.

He generates desire, makes an effort, arouses energy, exerts his mind, and strives for the non-arising of unarisen evil unwholesome states; for the abandoning of arisen evil unwholesome states; for the arising of unarisen wholesome states; for the maintenance, non-confusion, increase, expansion, and fulfillment by development of arisen wholesome states: this is called the faculty of energy.

SN48.10

Energy is the third of the Seven Factors of Enlightenment. It is also one of the Five Faculties, one of the Five Powers, and a component of the Eightfold Path (specifically, Right Effort).

This energy refers to the mental energy generated by volitional formations, or kamma. It can manifest as a scattered energy that quickly exhausts the mind, or as a pure and refined energy that arises from cultivating the Factors of Enlightenment or engaging in any wholesome practice.

Because kamma is energy, our past intentions shape how it appears in the present. However, what matters most is how we channel, shape, and use this energy.

Through Right Mindfulness and the Investigation of Mind States, clarity arises. This clarity lifts the burden and stress caused by either keeping perceptions scattered in awareness or suppressing them due to a lack of mindfulness. As a result, energy is freed, it becomes a purified, uplifting force rather than a tainted, tiring one.

The Tathagata offers many similes to illustrate how to develop mindfulness, investigation, and energy. Many of these examples relate to death or imminent danger, and for good reason.

When the mind is free of content, its natural tendency is to rest or shut down. To counteract this, we must increase our awareness and refine the subtlety of our investigation. Increased curiosity and mindfulness generate more energy.

Often this is not enough. We also need to cultivate ardency or urgency. Consider that if we are in a dangerous situation, our awareness and energy are far more heightened than when lying in bed in the dark.

In the Simile of the Beauty Queen, the Tathagata teaches that we must maintain the kind of awareness that senses danger in all directions, 360 degrees. This is because we tend to focus forward, often ignoring formations that arise in other parts of awareness, such as the back of the head or along the spine. Wherever mindfulness is lacking, mental fabrications can emerge or lay hidden.

When there is the perception of danger, the mind must release its clinging to existing perceptions and thoughts and become aware of any external threat. Contrary to popular belief, as long as one remains calm and collected, this letting go of existing perceptions allows awareness to become unobstructed. When awareness is free and alert, energy is released and can be refined for skillful use. This is the goal of the practice: to cultivate clean, pure energy that can penetrate the taints.

Ultimately, the true danger does not come from an external swordsman poised to strike at the slightest lapse in mindfulness. The real threat lies in the Five Aggregates, and the constant onslaught to fill our awareness with hindrances, with greed, aversion, delusion, and ignorance.

In short, we need a kind of mindfulness and investigation that remains alert to danger from every direction within our own experience.

Seven Factors of Enlightment Investigating Energy

When there is full mindfulness and investigation combined with ardency, it creates a positive feedback loop of motivation and effort that helps sustain energy.

Part of developing energy also involves investigating the absence of it. We can begin to explore what is hindering or blocking the free flow of energy within.

Although sloth and torpor is one of the Five Hindrances, in the context of investigating energy, we must look deeper into their causes. They are often rooted in clinging to something within awareness or in repressing certain experiences.

We feel dullness or sleepiness because we are holding on to some aspect of ourselves. For instance, if we cling to a fixed idea of what our practice should be and our current experience does not meet that ideal, a conflict arises. This internal friction drains our energy. This is how we can work with the so-called Hindrances. When we access and become more receptive to them, the energy that was previously used to suppress or deny them becomes available. In doing so, we release a source of energy.

On the other hand, when energy is not balanced by the other Factors of Enlightenment—especially the calming ones like tranquility, concentration, and equanimity, it can be mistaken as an end in itself rather than a means for progress. This imbalance may lead to restlessness, overexertion, or a distorted sense of purpose in practice.

Seven Factors of Enlightment Rapture

Just as a slave would later be freed, becoming independent and free to go where he wishes, thinking, I was a slave, now I am free and independent, and he would be joyful and happy.

MN39

It’s important to recognize clinging to the Five Aggregates as a form of slavery, or bondage. Our attachment to them limits our well-being and keeps us in bondage. Through practice, when we become, even temporarily, free from attachment to the five senses, the resulting seclusion brings a joy that can feel like being released from captivity.

Rapture (pīti) is the energetic release that arises when we let go of mental preoccupations and become fully present. It’s an exhilarating feeling, similar to experiences like skydiving, thrill rides, riding a motorcycle, or engaging in sports—moments when the mind completely lets go. People often pay a great deal for such experiences just to escape their own thoughts.

This rapture is born from letting go, from withdrawing from objectification. It arises when the mind stops trying to control everything and instead simply abides in what is.

As investigation deepens and understanding grows, joy arises. It is the natural result of release—a sign that defilements have temporarily fallen away and that stress has eased.

Unlike fleeting worldly pleasures, pīti arises from letting go and becoming temporarily free from attachment. It is born from seclusion, from stepping back from the constant objectification of sense contact. It offers a genuine taste of inner freedom and liberation.

To develop joy, we must use Right Effort, abandon unwholesome perceptions, and develop and fill our body and mind with the feeling and perception of joy.

As joy grows, all bodily, mental, and volitional formations are calmed.

Joy is also a step toward further purification of the mind. Rather than being scattered in the formations, the mind begins to settle and concentrate.

However, even joy is a coarse or impure energy. Excessive joy can become stressful. That’s why it needs to be balanced with tranquility so that it matures into calm happiness or satisfaction. As the mind continues to settle, it will naturally let go of the more intense aspects of joy, leading to deeper tranquility.

Since joy is born from letting go, it’s essential to approach practice with a sense of lightness, openness, and curiosity, not with rigid, goal-driven effort. This attitude enhances the experience of joy.

Like all conditioned phenomena, joy is volitionally fabricated, impermanent, non-self, and ultimately unsatisfactory. Allowing it to arise and pass naturally helps prevent attachment or disappointment.

Seven Factors of Enlightment Tranquility

Tranquility is the calming and settling of both body and mind. By calming the bodily, mental, volitional, and verbal formations, these perceptions have all been replaced with the feelings of joy. Joy, born from energy, is a type of exhilaration, which can be tiring. With the letting go of joy comes tranquility.

Tranquility naturally arises as the more active factors—investigation, energy, and joy—begin to settle internal agitation. It emerges gradually as the result of further letting go.

Tranquility in Practice

Tranquility can manifest in varying degrees, from subtle relaxation to profound stillness. Recognizing these levels helps determine if the current state is conducive to further practice.

When tranquility feels unreachable, investigate potential hindrances such as unwholesome habits, physical tension, or external distractions. Addressing these obstacles can create a clearer path for tranquility to emerge.

Relaxing physical tension through gentle movements or conscious body awareness fosters receptivity to mental stillness.

Rather than resisting mental disturbances, acknowledge their presence, investigate their nature, and allow them to arise and pass naturally. This process gradually leads to deeper tranquility.

Cultivating tranquility is essential for deepening insight and wisdom. As the mind settles and distractions fade, awareness sharpens, and the subtle workings of the mind become clearer. This refined clarity provides the stable foundation needed for the final factors of awakening—concentration, equanimity, and liberation.

Seven Factors of Enlightment Concentration

And what is the faculty of concentration?

Here a noble disciple, having made letting go the object, attains concentration, attains unification of mind.

He dwells secluded from sensual pleasures, secluded from unwholesome states, entering and remaining in the first jhāna, which includes directed thought and evaluation, as well as joy and pleasure born of seclusion.

SN48.10

Concentration (Samadhi) is a calm, stable state of mind that naturally arises through sustained mindfulness. Rather than being forced, it emerges when the mind lets go and fully settles into the present moment.

True concentration is a collectedness of mind, a deep stability that occurs when there is no urge to control or resist life's conditions. It is the peaceful unification of awareness.

As we continue to cultivate tranquility and contentment, the mind gently settles. It becomes still, unified, and free from the need to seek anything beyond this moment.

Seven Factors of Enlightment Equanimity

This is peaceful, this is excellent, namely, equanimity. For him, whatever arises as pleasant, unpleasant, or both pleasant and unpleasant ceases; equanimity remains. Just as, Ānanda, a strong man might easily spit out a lump of saliva gathered on the tip of his tongue; in the same way, Ānanda, for anyone, whatever arises as pleasant, unpleasant, or both pleasant and unpleasant ceases quickly, immediately, and effortlessly; equanimity remains, this is called, Ānanda, in the discipline of the noble ones, the unsurpassed development of faculties regarding tastes discernible by the tongue.

MN152

Equanimity (Upekkha) is a state of inner balance, an unshakable calm that remains steady despite external events or internal emotions. It embodies acceptance, non-reactivity, and mental stability.

This deep sense of balance allows the mind to remain undisturbed, no matter what happens. Rather than being tossed around by life's highs and lows, equanimity fosters a steady, peaceful perspective.

When we develop insight into the impermanence of perceptions, the mind naturally stabilizes. It stops being shaken by fleeting joys, satisfactions, or disappointments. In fact, what we once saw as pleasurable, such as contentment or excitement, can be understood as a form of stress.

By directing our attention wisely, especially toward perceptions of impermanence, danger, and detachment, we cultivate the conditions necessary for awakening. These insights lead to the development of the seven factors of enlightenment.

As the final and culminating factor of enlightenment, equanimity represents inner wisdom and freedom from emotional reactivity. To cultivate equanimity is to let go of attachment to pleasant experiences and resistance toward unpleasant ones. It is grounded in the realization that everything is impermanent and beyond personal control.

Equanimity is often mistaken for indifference or apathy. However, true equanimity is not about suppressing emotions; rather, it is an engaged and balanced response to life, free from being overly swayed by external circumstances. It arises from wisdom and an open-hearted embrace of every experience.

At the heart of equanimity is the understanding of impermanence. When we see that all things are in constant flux, our impulse to cling to or resist specific experiences diminishes. This shift in perspective allows us to navigate life's joys and challenges with greater ease.

Moments of equanimity often arise naturally, even without deliberate effort. By recognizing these instances, we can cultivate a deeper appreciation for equanimity and integrate it more fully into our daily lives.

Far from being passive resignation, equanimity is a dynamic quality that harmonizes insight with compassion. It empowers us to move through life's complexities with grace, freeing us from mental entanglement and emotional turmoil.

By nurturing equanimity, we cultivate openness, understanding, and inner peace in all situations. This balanced state of mind is not only the pinnacle of the path—it is also the foundation from which true liberation unfolds.

Just as this body is sustained by food, stands because of food, and does not stand without food; in the same way the seven factors of enlightenment are sustained by their respective nourishments, stand because of nourishment, and do not stand without nourishment.

And what is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen mindfulness enlightenment factor, or for the development and completion of arisen mindfulness enlightenment factor?

There are things that are the basis for the mindfulness enlightenment factor. In this, appropriate attention is frequently given: this is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen mindfulness enlightenment factor, or for the development and completion of arisen mindfulness enlightenment factor.

And what is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen investigation of dhamma enlightenment factor, or for the development and completion of arisen investigation of dhamma enlightenment factor?

There are wholesome and unwholesome dhammas, blameworthy and blameless dhammas, inferior and superior dhammas, and dhammas that are dark and bright with their counterparts.

In this, appropriate attention is frequently given: this is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen investigation of dhamma enlightenment factor, or for the development and completion of arisen investigation of dhamma enlightenment factor.

And what is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen energy enlightenment factor, or for the development and completion of arisen energy enlightenment factor?

There are the elements of initiative, exertion, and endeavor. In this, appropriate attention is frequently given: this is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen energy enlightenment factor, or for the development and completion of arisen energy enlightenment factor.

And what is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen joy enlightenment factor, or for the development and completion of arisen joy enlightenment factor?

There are things that are the basis for the joy enlightenment factor. In this, appropriate attention is frequently given: this is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen joy enlightenment factor, or for the development and completion of arisen joy enlightenment factor.

And what is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen tranquility enlightenment factor, or for the development and completion of arisen tranquility enlightenment factor?

There are tranquility of body and tranquility of mind. In this, appropriate attention is frequently given: this is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen tranquility enlightenment factor, or for the development and completion of arisen tranquility enlightenment factor.

And what is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen For the arising of the concentration enlightenment factor, or for the development and fulfillment of the arisen concentration enlightenment factor? Disciples, there is a sign of concentration, a sign of non-distraction.

Here, frequent wise attention: this is the nourishment for the arising of the not yet arisen concentration enlightenment factor, or for the development and fulfillment of the arisen concentration enlightenment factor.

And what is the nourishment for the arising of the not yet arisen equanimity enlightenment factor, or for the development and fulfillment of the arisen equanimity enlightenment factor?

Disciples, there are states conducive to the equanimity enlightenment factor. Here, frequent wise attention: this is the nourishment for the arising of the not yet arisen equanimity enlightenment factor, or for the development and fulfillment of the arisen equanimity enlightenment factor.

Just as this body is sustained by food, stands dependent on food, and does not stand without food; in the same way these seven factors of enlightenment are sustained by nourishment, stand dependent on nourishment, and do not stand without nourishment.

SN46.2

The Five Hindrances Sensual Desire

What is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen sensual desire or for the increase and expansion of arisen sensual desire?

There is, the sign of beauty. In this, frequent improper attention, this is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen sensual desire or for the increase and expansion of arisen sensual desire....

And what, is the non-nourishment for the arising of sensual desire that has not yet arisen, and for the increase, expansion, and full development of sensual desire that has arisen?

There is the perception of unattractiveness. In this regard, the frequent application of wise attention, this is the non-nourishment for the arising of sensual desire that has not yet arisen, and for the increase, expansion, and full development of sensual desire that has arisen.

SN46.51

So far in the Gradual Training, we have addressed sensual desire as an obstruction that has revealed itself clearly. Now we need to deal with sensual desire in forms that are more subtle in nature, in ways that we may not have considered before.

First, consider that desire is the fundamental energy that propels all of existence. We all have the desire to exist, to live, and to get satisfaction from life. Even at the most fundamental level of existence, feeding, for beings to survive, they must pay more attention to the attractive properties of worldly things like food and ignore their unattractive attributes.

If there was no ignorance of suffering, the unattractive properties of impermanence, unreliability, change, aging, decay, and death in all things of the "world," there would be no beings, as life itself would become unattractive. So by definition, desire is required for existence.

However, for those seeking liberation from this world and all other realms of being, we must break the bonds of attractiveness and let the attractive things of this world be as they are.

The main cause of the arising desire for sensual pleasures is inappropriate attention and ignorance.

To purify the mind, we must become aware of our desires and the mental energy behind these desires and see for ourselves how this unpure mental energy creates a scattered, foggy, confused, and stressed mind.

Then we need to find skillful ways to bring attention to the unattractive, unappealing side of our objects of desire. Develop an antidote that will neutralize and completely eradicate the unpure thoughts using the Tathagata's various teachings.

At this stage of the practice, when dwelling in one of the Four Dwellings of Mindfulness, sensual desire can manifest itself as lingering disturbances from one's daily activities, or it can manifest as desires and expectations in one's practice.

In other words, the expectation for the practice to be a certain way: to generate peaceful, good feelings, to reach new levels of insights, to be free of disturbances, or any expectations.

When there is a lack of mental stimulus, this manifests as stopping the practice early or the mind grasping other hindrances like Ill-will, sloth, and torpor to escape lack of sensual stimulation.

Countering any hindrance always starts with Right Mindfulness. Because of a lack of full, complete mindfulness, desire has not been completely subdued and is not satisfied resting, dwelling in mindfulness. We must expand our awareness so that we are aware of any scattered volitional mental energy that has not been subdued so that we can use one of the antidotes to calm the mental, bodily, or verbal fabrication.

This also requires activating the second factor of enlightenment, the investigation of the mental state. What are the causes and conditions that are creating this state? Where is the desire? How am I making this personal, permanent, and suffering?

By definition, if there is desire, then there is clinging to a mental state.

Joy arises from the relief of letting go of desire. The more we let go, the more release and relief there is, and this results in more and more subtle joy and happiness.

In other words, to counter sensual desire, we must let go, which results in joy.

By developing the joy factor of enlightenment and Jhana, we can generate happiness independent of the senses, independent of outside conditions.

Desires start to diminish once one realizes for oneself and experiences through direct experience that there is a pleasure greater than sensual pleasures and that the desire for sensual pleasures themselves is the cause of stress and unhappiness.

The Five Hindrances ILL-WILL

What, disciples, is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen ill-will or for the increase and expansion of arisen ill-will?

There is, disciples, the sign of repulsiveness.

In this, frequent improper attention, this is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen ill-will or for the increase and expansion of arisen ill-will....

And what, disciples, is the non-nourishment for the arising of ill will that has not yet arisen, and for the increase, expansion, and full development of ill will that has arisen?

There is, disciples, the liberation of mind by loving-kindness.

In this regard, the frequent application of wise attention, this is the non-nourishment for the arising of ill will that has not yet arisen, and for the increase, expansion, and full development of ill will that has arisen.

SN46.51

Ill-will or aversion is the ingrained behavioral pattern that causes one to react negatively to expectations not being met, or that anything or anyone should or should not be a certain way. Aversion manifests as irritation, frustration, anger, and resentment toward a person, situation, or state of being.

When working with aversion, one has to first realize that aversion itself is the problem, not the conditions of the world. We must realize that we haven't yet learned how to skillfully deal with circumstances and that it is the resistance itself that's causing the stress and unhappiness.

Thus above, below, and all around, everywhere and in every respect, he pervades the entire world with a mind imbued with goodwill, abundant, exalted, immeasurable, without hostility, and without ill will.

He pervades one direction with a mind imbued with compassion... with a mind imbued with empathetic joy... with a mind imbued with equanimity, likewise the second, likewise the third, likewise the fourth.

Thus above, below, and all around, everywhere and in every respect, he pervades the entire world with a mind imbued with equanimity, abundant, exalted, immeasurable, without hostility, and without ill will. This is called the boundless liberation of mind.

SN41.7

As the Tathagata says, goodwill is the remedy for the ingrained behavioral patterns that cause one to react negatively.

This is developing goodwill toward ourselves and others, based on the understanding that everyone is afflicted, everything in life is the result of causes and conditions, and there is no one to blame or anything to take personally.

Goodwill is not about feeling sorry or making judgments about ourselves or others. It is a practice to counter the ingrained negative behavioral patterns.

The Tathagata has said that even if you have a speck of ill-will left, you haven't perfected goodwill.

The Five Hindrances SLOTH AND TORPOR

What, disciples, is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen sloth and torpor or for the increase and expansion of arisen sloth and torpor?

There is, disciples, discontent, lethargy, drowsiness after meals, and mental sluggishness. In this, frequent improper attention, this is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen sloth and torpor or for the increase and expansion of arisen sloth and torpor....

And what, disciples, is the non-nourishment for the arising of sloth and torpor that has not yet arisen, and for the increase, expansion, and full development of sloth and torpor that has arisen?

There is, disciples, the element of initiative, the element of launching forward, the element of exertion.

In this regard, the frequent application of wise attention, this is the non-nourishment for the arising of sloth and torpor that has not yet arisen, and for the increase, expansion, and full development of sloth and torpor that has arisen.

SN46.51

Sloth and Torpor are states of mind where you feel mentally and physically sluggish, unmotivated, and tired. When the Tathagata says frequent improper attention to these states, what does he mean? First, remember that whatever one pays attention to, it grows.

So instead of addressing discontent, lethargy, drowsiness, and mental sluggishness, you let them linger. As a result, they grow and become an ingrained habit.

Instead, we must use Right Effort to abandon these unwholesome states and replace them with initiative, the element of launching forward, the element of exertion.

Overcoming Sloth and Torpor with the Factors of Enlightenment

Friends, when the mind is sluggish, which of the factors of enlightenment is it not the right time for cultivation, and during which is it the right time?

When, disciples, the mind is sluggish, it is not the right time for the cultivation of the tranquility factor of enlightenment, the concentration factor of enlightenment, or the equanimity factor of enlightenment.

Why is that? Because, disciples, a sluggish mind is difficult to arouse with these states.

However, disciples, when the mind is sluggish, it is the right time for the cultivation of the investigation of states factor of enlightenment, the energy factor of enlightenment, and the joy factor of enlightenment.

Why is that? Because, disciples, a sluggish mind is easily aroused with these states. And indeed, disciples, I say that mindfulness is useful in all things.

SN46.53

First, it's important to recognize that sloth and torpor, like all the other Five Hindrances, are the result of a lack of full mindfulness. Full mindfulness only results when the body is fully relaxed and the mind is centered, stable, and content, with few or no bodily, mental, or verbal fabrications obstructing awareness.

In other words, when the mind is not satisfied with the current state, this means there are underlying latent desires still present. Underlying desires cause stress and tension. To escape this underlying stress and tension, one of the ways that the mind responds is by shutting down.

Instead, we must re-establish Right Mindfulness by subduing greed and aversion for the world.

For example, by discerning the restless energy behind desire and aversion and applying Right Effort, for example, by using mindfulness of breathing to let go of desire and clinging, see the calming and passing away of bodily and mental phenomena, and instead using the breath to breathe in such a way to cultivate energy and joy.

With the investigation of mind states, there is or will be energy and joy present somewhere in awareness. By paying attention to this energy and joy, whatever we pay attention to grows.

The Five Hindrances RESTLESSNESS AND REMORSE

What, disciples, is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen restlessness and remorse or for the increase and expansion of arisen restlessness and remorse?

There is, disciples, non-quietude of the mind. In this, frequent improper attention, this is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen restlessness and remorse or for the increase and expansion of arisen restlessness and remorse...

And what, disciples, is the non-nourishment for the arising of restlessness and remorse that has not yet arisen, and for the increase, expansion, and full development of restlessness and remorse that has arisen?

There is, disciples, the calming of the mind. In this regard, the frequent application of wise attention, this is the non-nourishment for the arising of restlessness and remorse that has not yet arisen, and for the increase, expansion, and full development of restlessness and remorse that has arisen.

SN46.51

Overcoming Restlessness with the Factors of Enlightenment

And when the mind is restless, for which of the factors of enlightenment is it not the right time for cultivation, and for which is it the right time?

When, disciples, the mind is restless, it is not the right time for the cultivation of the investigation of states factor of enlightenment, the energy factor of enlightenment, and the joy factor of enlightenment.

Why is that? Because, disciples, a restless mind is difficult to calm with these states.

However, disciples, when the mind is restless, it is the right time for the cultivation of the tranquility factor of enlightenment, the concentration factor of enlightenment, and the equanimity factor of enlightenment.

Why is that? Because, disciples, a restless mind is well calmed by these factors. And indeed, disciples, I say that mindfulness is useful in all things.

SN46:53

The Five Hindrances DOUBT

What, disciples, is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen doubt or for the increase and expansion of arisen doubt?

There are, disciples, things that give rise to doubt. In this, frequent improper attention, this is the nourishment for the arising of unarisen doubt or for the increase and expansion of arisen doubt....

And what, disciples, is the non-nourishment for the arising of doubt that has not yet arisen, and for the increase, expansion, and full development of doubt that has arisen?

There are, disciples, wholesome and unwholesome states, blameworthy and blameless states, inferior and superior states, dark and bright states with their counterparts.

In this regard, the frequent application of wise attention, this is the non-nourishment for the arising of doubt that has not yet arisen, and for the increase, expansion, and full development of doubt that has arisen.

SN46.51

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The Battle Within

Upāsikā Kee Nanayon

Clear insight doesn’t come from thinking and speculating. It comes from investigating the mind while it’s gathered into an adequate level of calm and stability. You look deeply into every aspect of the mind when it’s neutral and calm, free from thought-fabrications or likes and dislikes for its preoccupations. You have to work at maintaining this state and at the same time probe deeply into it, because superficial knowledge isn’t true knowledge. As long as you haven’t probed deeply into the mind, you don’t really know anything. The mind is simply calm on an external level, and your reading of the aspects of the wanderings of the mind under the influence of defilement, craving, and attachment isn’t yet clear.

So you have to try to peer into yourself until you reach a level of awareness that can maintain its balance and let you contemplate your way to sharper understanding. If you don’t contemplate so as to give rise to true knowledge, your mindfulness will stay just on the surface.

The same principle holds with contemplating the body. You have to probe deeply into the ways in which the body is repulsive and composed of physical elements. This is what it means to read the body so as to understand it, so that you can explore yourself in all your activities. This way you prevent your mind from straying off the path and keep it focused on seeing how it can burn away the defilements as they arise, which is very delicate work.

Being uncomplacent, not letting yourself get distracted by outside things, is what will make the practice go smoothly. It will enable you to examine the defilements in the mind in a skillful way so that you can eliminate the subtlest ones: ignorance and delusion. Normally, we aren’t fully aware of even the blatant defilements, but now that the blatant ones are inactivated because of the mind’s solid focus, we can look into the more profound areas to catch sight of the deceits of craving and defilements in whatever way they move into action. We watch them, know them, and are in a position to abandon them as soon as they wander off in search of sights, sounds, smells, and delicious flavors. Whether they’re looking for good physical flavors, bodily pleasure, or good mental flavors, we have to know them from all sides, even though they’re not easy to know because of all the many desires we feel for physical pleasure. And on top of that, there are the desires for happiness imbued with pleasurable feelings, perceptions that carry pleasurable feelings, thought-fabrications that carry pleasurable feelings, and consciousness that carries pleasurable feelings. All of these are nothing but desires for illusions, for things that deceive us into getting engrossed and distracted. As a result, it isn’t easy for us to understand much of anything at all.

These are subtle matters and they all come under the term, “sensual craving”, the desire, lust, and love that provoke the mind into wandering out in search of the enjoyment it remembers from past sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and tactile sensations. Even though these things may have happened long ago, our perceptions bring them back to deceive us with ideas of their being good or bad. Once we latch onto them, they make the mind unsettled and defiled.

So it isn’t easy to examine and understand all the various defilements within the mind. The external things we’re able to know and let go of are only the minor players. The important ones have gathered together to take charge in the mind and won’t budge no matter how you try to chase them out. They’re stubborn and determined to stay in charge. If you take them on when your mindfulness and discernment aren’t equal to the fight, you’ll end up losing your inner calm.

So you have to make sure that you don’t push the practice too much, without at the same time letting it grow too slack. Find the Middle Way that’s just right. While you’re practicing in this way, you’ll be able to observe what the mind is like when it has mindfulness and discernment in charge, and then you make the effort to maintain that state and keep it constant. That’s when the mind will have the opportunity to stop and be still, to be stable and centered for long periods of time until it’s used to being that way.

Now, there are some areas where we have to force the mind and be strict with it. If we’re weak and lax, there’s no way we can succeed, for we’ve given in to our own wants for so long already. If we keep giving in to them, it will become even more of a habit. So you have to use force, the force of your will and the force of your mindfulness and discernment. Even if you get to the point where you have to put your life on the line, you’ve got to be willing. When the time comes for you really to be serious, you’ve got to hold out until you come out winning. If you don’t win, you don’t give up. Sometimes you have to make a vow as a way of forcing yourself to overcome your stubborn desires for physical pleasure that tempt you and lead you astray.

If you’re weak and settle for whatever pleasure comes in the immediate present, then when desire comes in the immediate present you fall right for it. If you give in to your wants often in this way, it’ll become habitual, for defilement is always looking for the chance to tempt you, to incite you. As when we try to give up an addiction to cigarettes, or meat: It’s hard to do because craving is always tempting us. “Take just a little,” it says. “Just a taste. It doesn’t matter.” Craving knows how to fool us, the way a fish is fooled into getting caught on a hook by the bait surrounding the hook, screwing up its courage enough to take just a little, and then a little more, and then a little more until it’s sure to get snagged. The demons of defilement have us surrounded on all sides. Once we fall for their delicious flavors, we’re sure to get snagged on the hook. No matter how much we struggle and squirm, we can’t get free.

You have to realize that gaining victory over your enemies, the cravings and defilements in the heart, is no small matter, no casual affair. You can’t let yourself be weak or lax, but you also have to gauge your strength, for you have to figure out how to apply your efforts at abandoning and destroying to weaken the defilements and cravings that have had the power of demons overwhelming the mind for so long. It’s not the case that you have to battle to the brink of death in every area. With some things, such as giving up addictions, you can mount a full-scale campaign and come out winning without killing yourself in the process. But with other things, more subtle and deep, you have to be more perceptive so as to figure out how to overcome them over the long haul, digging up their roots so that they gradually weaken to the point where your mindfulness and discernment can overwhelm them. If there are any areas where you’re still losing out, you have to take stock of your sensitivities to figure out why. Otherwise, you’ll keep losing out, for when the defilements really want something, they trample all over your mindfulness and discernment in their determination to get what they’re after: “That’s what I want. I don’t care what anyone says.” They really are that stubborn! So it’s no small matter, figuring out how to bring them under control. It’s like running into an enemy or a wild beast rushing in to devour us. What are we going to do?

When the defilements arise right before your eyes, you have to be wary. Suppose you’re perfectly aware, and all of a sudden they spring up and confront you: What kind of mindfulness and discernment are you going to use to disband them, to realize that, “These are the hordes of Mara, come to burn and eat me. How am I going to get rid of them?” In other words, how are you going to find a skillful way of contemplating them so as to destroy them right then and there?

We have to do this regardless of whether we’re being confronted with physical and mental pain or physical and mental pleasure. Actually, pleasure is more treacherous than pain because it’s hard to fathom and easy to fall for. As for pain, no one falls for it because it’s so uncomfortable. So how are we going to contemplate so as to let go of both the pleasure and the pain? This is the problem we’re faced with at every moment. It’s not the case that when we practice we accept only the pleasure and stop when we run into pain. That’s not the case at all. We have to learn how to read both sides, to see that the pain is inconstant and stressful, and that the pleasure is inconstant and stressful, too. We have to penetrate clear through these things. Otherwise, we’ll be deluded by the deceits of the cravings that want pleasure, whether it’s physical pleasure or whatever. Our every activity, sitting, standing, walking, lying down, is really for the sake of pleasure, isn’t it?

This is why there are so many, many ways in which we’re deluded with pleasure. Whatever we do, we do for the sake of pleasure without realizing how deeply we’ve mired ourselves in suffering and stress. When we contemplate inconstancy, stress, and not-selfness, we don’t get anywhere in our contemplation because we haven’t seen through pleasure. We still think that it’s a good thing. We have to probe into the fact that there’s no real ease to physical or mental pleasure. It’s all stress. When you can see it from this angle, that’s when you’ll come to understand inconstancy.

Then once the mind isn’t focused on wanting pleasure all the time, its stresses and pains will lighten. It will be able to see them as something common and normal, to see that if you try to change the pains to find ease, there’s no ease to be found. In this way, you won’t be overly concerned with trying to change the pains, for you’ll see that there’s no pleasure or ease to the aggregates, that they give nothing but stress and pain. As in the Buddha’s teachings that we chant every day: “Form is stressful, feeling, perception, thought-fabrications, and consciousness are all stressful.” The problem is that we haven’t investigated into the truth of our own form, feelings, perceptions, thought-fabrications, and consciousness. Our insight isn’t yet penetrating because we haven’t looked from the angle of true knowing. And so we get deluded here and lost there in our search for pleasure, finding nothing but pain and yet mistaking it for pleasure. This shows that we still haven’t opened our ears and eyes; we still don’t know the truth. Once we do know the truth, though, the mind will be more inclined to grow still and calm than to go wandering off. The reason it goes wandering off is because it’s looking for pleasure, but once it realizes there’s no real pleasure to be found in that way, it settles down and grows still.

All the cravings that provoke and unsettle the mind come down to nothing but the desire for pleasure. So we have to contemplate so as to see that the aggregates have no pleasure to offer, they they’re stressful by their very nature. They’re not us or ours. Take them apart and have a good look at them, starting with the body. Analyze the body down to its elements so that the mind won’t keep latching on to it as “me” or “mine.” You have to do this over and over again until you really understand.

It’s the same as when we chant the passage for Recollection while Using the Requisites, food, clothing, shelter, and medicine, every day. We do this so as to gain real understanding. If we don’t do this every day, we forget and get deluded into loving and worrying about the body as “my body,” “my self.” No matter how much we keep latching onto it over and over again, it’s not easy for us to realize what we’re doing, even though we have the Buddha’s teachings available, explaining these things in every way. Or we may have contemplated to some extent, but we haven’t seen things clearly. We’ve seen only in a vague blurry way and then flitted off oblivious without having probed in to see all the way through. This is because the mind isn’t firmly centered. It isn’t still. It keeps wandering off to find things to think about and get itself all agitated. This way it can’t really get to know anything at all. All it knows are a few little perceptions. This is the way it’s been for who knows how many years now. It’s as if our vision has been clouded by spots that we haven’t yet removed from our eyes.

Those who aren’t interested in exploring, who don’t make an effort to get to the facts, don’t wonder about anything at all. They’re free from doubt, all right, but it’s because their doubts have been smothered by delusion. If we start exploring and contemplating, we’ll have to wonder about the things we don’t yet know: “What’s this? What does it mean? How should I deal with it?” These are questions that lead us to explore. If we don’t explore, it’s because we don’t have any intelligence. Or we may gain a few little insights, but we let them pass so that we never explore deeply into the basic principles of the practice. What little we do know doesn’t go anywhere, doesn’t penetrate into the Noble Truths, because our mindfulness and discernment run out of strength. Our persistence isn’t resilient enough, isn’t brave enough. We don’t dare look deeply inside ourselves.

To go by our own estimates of how far is enough in the practice is to lie to ourselves. It keeps us from gaining release from suffering and stress. If you happen to come up with a few insights, don’t go bragging about them, or else you’ll end up deceiving yourself in countless ways. Those who really know, even when they have attained the various stages of insight, are heedful to keep on exploring. They don’t get stuck on this stage or that. Even when their insights are correct they don’t stop right there and start bragging, for that’s the way of a fool.

Intelligent people, even though they see things clearly, always keep an eye out for the enemies lying in wait for them on the deeper, more subtle levels ahead. They have to keep penetrating further and further in. They have no sense that this or that level is plenty enough, for how can it be enough? The defilements are still burning away, so how can you brag? Even though your knowledge may be true, how can you be complacent when your mind has yet to establish a foundation for itself?

As you investigate with mindfulness and discernment, complacency is the major problem. You have to be uncomplacent in the practice if you want to keep up with the fact that life is ebbing away, ebbing with every moment. And how should you live so that you can be said to be uncomplacent? This is an extremely important question, for if you’re not alive to it, then no matter how many days or months you practice meditation or restraint of the senses, it’s simply a temporary exercise. When you’re done, you get back to your same old turmoil as before.

And watch out for your mouth. You’ll have trouble not bragging, for the defilements will provoke you into speaking. They want to speak, they want to brag, they won’t let you stay silent.

If you force yourself in the practice without understanding its true aims, you end up deceiving yourself and go around telling people, “I practiced in silence for so many days, so many months.” This is deceiving yourself and others as well. The truth of the matter is that you’re still a slave to stupidity, obeying the many levels of defilement and craving within yourself without realizing the fact. If someone praises you, you really prick up your ears, wag your tail and, instead of explaining the harm of the defilements and craving you were able to find within yourself, you simply want to brag.

So the practice of the Dhamma isn’t something that you can just muddle your way through. It’s something you have to do with your intelligence fully alert, for when you contemplate in a circumspect way, you’ll see that there’s nothing worth getting engrossed in, that everything, both inside and out, is nothing but an illusion. It’s like being adrift, alone in the middle of the ocean with no island or shore in sight. Can you afford just to sit back and relax, to make a temporary effort and then brag about it? Of course not! As your investigation penetrates inwardly to ever more subtle levels of the mind, you’ll have to become more and more calm and reserved, in the same way that people become more and more circumspect as they grow from children to teenagers and into adults. Your mindfulness and discernment have to keep growing more and more mature in order to understand the right and wrong, the true and false, in whatever arises: That’s what will enable you to let go and gain release. And that’s what will make your life in the true practice of the Dhamma go smoothly. Otherwise, you’ll fool yourself into boasting of how many years you practiced meditation and will eventually find yourself worse off than before, with defilement flaring up in a big way. If this is the way you go, you’ll end up tumbling head over heels into fire, for when you raise your head in pride, you run into the flames already burning within yourself.

To practice means to use the fire of mindfulness and discernment as a counter-fire to put out the blaze of the defilements, because the heart and mind are aflame with defilement, and when we use the fire of mindfulness and discernment to put out the fire of defilement, the mind can cool down. Do this by being increasingly honest with yourself, without leaving an opening for defilement and craving to insinuate their way into control. You have to be alert. Circumspect. Wise to them. Don’t fall for them! If you fall for whatever rationale they come up with, it means that your mindfulness and discernment are still weak. They lead you away by the nose, burning you with their fire right before your very eyes, and yet you’re still able to open your mouth to brag!

So turn around and take stock of everything within yourself. Take stock of every aspect, because right and wrong, true and false, are all within you. You can’t go finding them outside. The damaging things people say about you are nothing compared to the damage caused inside you when defilement burns you, when your feeling of “me” and “mine” raises its head.

If you don’t honestly come to your senses, there’s no way your practice of the Dhamma can gain you release from the great mass of suffering and stress. You may be able to gain a little knowledge and let go of a few things, but the roots of the problem will still lie buried deep down. So you have to dig them out. You can’t relax after little bouts of emptiness and equanimity. That won’t accomplish anything. The defilements and mental effluents lie deep in the personality, so you have to use mindfulness and discernment to penetrate deep down to make a precise and thorough examination. Only then will you get results. Otherwise, if you stay only on the surface level, you can practice until your body lies rotting in its coffin but you won’t have changed any of your basic habits.

Those who are scrupulous by nature, who know how to contemplate their own flaws, will keep on the alert for any signs of pride within themselves. They’ll try to control and destroy conceit on every side and won’t allow it to swell. The methods we need to use in the practice for examining and destroying the defilements within the mind aren’t easy to master. For those who don’t contemplate themselves thoroughly, the practice may actually only increase their pride, their bragging, their desire to go teaching others. But if we turn within and discern the deceits and conceits of self, a profound feeling of disenchantment and dismay arises, causing us to pity ourselves for our own stupidity, for the amount to which we’ve deluded ourselves all along, and for how much effort we‘ll still need to put into the practice.

So however great the pain and anguish, however many tears bathe your cheeks, persevere! The practice isn’t simply a matter of looking for mental and physical pleasure. “Let tears bathe my cheeks, but I’ll keep on with my striving at the holy life as long as I live!” That’s the way it has to be! Don’t quit at the first small difficulty with the thought, “It’s a waste of time. I’d do better to follow my cravings and defilements.” You can’t think like that! You have to take the exact opposite stance: “When they tempt me to grab this, take a lot of that, I won’t! However fantastic the object may be, I won’t take the bait.” Make a firm declaration! This is the only way to get results. Otherwise, you’ll never work yourself free, for the defilements have all sorts of tricks up their sleeves. If you get wise to one trick, they simply change to another, and then another.

If we’re not observant to see how much we’ve been deceived by the defilements in all sorts of ways, we won’t come to know the truth within ourselves. Other people may fool us now and then, but the defilements fool us all of the time. We fall for them and follow them hook, line, and sinker. Our trust in the Lord Buddha is nothing compared to our trust in them. We’re disciples of the demons of craving, letting them lead us ever deeper into their jungle.

If we don’t contemplate to see this for ourselves, we’re lost in that jungle charnel ground where the demons keep roasting us to make us squirm with desires and every form of distress. Even though you have come to stay in a place with few disturbances, these demons still manage to tempt and draw you away. Just notice how the saliva flows when you come across anything delicious! So you have to decide to be either a warrior or a loser. The practice requires that you do battle with defilements and cravings. Always be on your guard, whatever the approach they take to seduce and deceive you. Other people can’t come in to lead you away, but these demons of your own defilements can because you’re willing to trust them, to be their slave. You have to contemplate yourself carefully so that you’re no longer enslaved to them and can reach total freedom within yourself. Make an effort to develop your mindfulness and discernment so as to gain clear insight and then let go until suffering and stress disband in every way!

Five Hindrances Purifying the Hindrances

So let us now go back to our purification of gold analogy,. It is useful to perceive working with subtle hindrances as intentional energies, in the same way one would refine gold.

Our intention to refine our karmic stream of volitional energy through:

The shaping of our proto-thoughts (vitakka/vicāra) as shaping energies.

The direction of attention (manasikāra) as the flame that brings awareness

Letting go is the fruit of insight.

The hindrances are impurities in the heart's gold.

Perception + Attention = The Flame That Reveals the Impurities

Just as a goldsmith watches carefully for the exact moment impurities bubble to the surface in the molten gold, we use perception and attention to notice the slightest resistance. For example, a ripple of liking or disliking, a subtle grasping at the pleasantness of stillness, a faint hesitation or doubt, a quiet buzzing of impatience, the heaviness or sinking in the body,

These are the proto-energies of hindrances not full-blown, but arising as intentional energies, subtle movements in awareness.

The act of perceiving impermanence or emptiness here allows us to name and release these energies before they take form.

We skillfully use proto-thoughts to refine the mind. For example, the mind may subtly form a proto-thought like: This is not self; this too is changing; no need to grasp this stillness.

These are not verbal dialogues, but shaping energies, verbal formations, that apply the Dhamma at the edge of awareness.

This is precisely how vitakka and vicāra, when informed by wisdom, function to support insight and samādhi, until they too fall away in higher jhāna.

We are using refined proto-intentions to purify refined hindrances.

How Letting Go Happens: The Dropping of What’s Seen as Impure

Just like a goldsmith scoops away the impurity that floats up, you don’t fight hindrances or suppress them. You perceive them skillfully, and they naturally fall away when seen clearly.

Five Hindrances The Hindrances & Their Antidotes

When a disciple develops and cultivates the awakening factors, the five hindrances are abandoned.

SN46.53

Purifying the mind is not about resisting hindrances, it is the balancing and transforming them through the Seven Factors of Enlightment, this is the subtle art of the middle way: not suppression, not indulgence, but harmonizing qualities of mind like an expert tuning a lute.

Let us see practically how each hindrance and its antidote in a specific awakening factor.

Picture yourself sitting. The mind is cloudy, heavy, wandering. Instead of wrestling with the hindrance, you:

Identify the hindrance, this is mindfulness working.

Gently incline toward the opposite factor, like feeding light to push back a shadow.

Sustain and nourish that factor, even as the hindrance still flickers.

For example:

Sloth appears? Smile gently, straighten posture, and arouse energy. Reflect on urgency.

Restlessness buzzing? Attend to tranquility of breath and soften the body.

Doubt creeping in? Return to the unity of concentration; even one mindful breath dissolves confusion.

Over time, the mind becomes like well-refined gold, pliable, luminous, and suitable for deep insight.

The seven factors don’t just counter hindrances, they counterbalance each other.

If the mind is sluggish, develop: Investigation, Energy, and Joy

If the mind is over-excited, develop: Tranquility, Concentration, and Equanimity

The Seven Factors are not passive results but living medicines. Each one is an intentional antidote, harmonizing the hindrances and refining the heart. As each hindrance is met with its counter-force, the mind becomes like well-refined gold, suitable for deep seeing and final letting go.

Factors of Enlightment How they flow

Mindfulness, when developed and cultivated, fulfills investigation of Dhamma.

Investigation, when developed and cultivated, fulfills energy. Energy fulfills rapture.

Rapture fulfills tranquility. Tranquility fulfills concentration. Concentration fulfills equanimity.

SN46.3

The Seven Factors of Enlightenment naturally unfold, once purified and stabilized, conditions the arising of the next, naturally, like refining stages, the purification of gold.

Mindfulness the like heating the gold ore, You begin by applying heat, steady awareness applied so that it grows. Just like the goldsmith begins by heating raw ore to bring impurities to the surface, you begin by establishing mindfulness to observe the raw mental ore. You observe so nothing is hidden from awareness. The fire of mindfulness prepares the ground. Without it, nothing refines.

Investigation is the detecting the impurities that obstruct the mind. With mindfulness stable, you begin to examine: “Is this greed? Is this restlessness? There is clinging” This is like using skilled tools to detect and isolate the impurities. The goldsmith tests the molten metal; the disciple investigates mental phenomena. Energy is like applying bellows to Intensify the Heat

Now the heat must rise. Upon seeing what must be removed, you apply effort and sustained energy, just as the goldsmith uses bellows to increase the fire, ensuring that the impurities start to separate. Without energy, nothing changes. The heat must reach transformation levels.

Joy arises as the mind becomes light and malleable. Now the gold begins to glow beautifully. The metal is not yet pure, but the process begins to bear fruit. Pīti arises, joy from seeing release, seeing purification in real time. Pīti is the shine that shows you’re on the right path. The fire is working.

The Molten Gold Settles. Now the bubbling calms, the liquid becomes smooth. As the fire does its work and impurities rise to the top, the gold becomes still and glossy. Likewise, the body and mind settle deeply into serenity. The heat remains, but it is no longer agitating. There is no feeling of rush, just a calm, luminous clarity.

The Gold Becomes Uniform, Now the gold reaches a uniform consistency, no bubbles, no turbulence. For the mind, this is samādhi, unshakable, steady, undistracted. It is pliable, just as the Tathagata described. The goldsmith can now mold the gold into whatever shape is needed.

The Gold is Pure and Unmoved. Now the fire may cease. At this final stage, the gold is completely purified. It is radiant, cool, and resistant to corruption. The mind reflects this with upekkhā, a stable, unshakable balance. No clinging, no resistance. Just presence and purity. No more adding or removing. The work is done. The mind is now ready to be applied to any task, for example removal of the taints.

The Purification Process as Dependent Arising of Wisdom

Each stage of the purification process supports the next, the hindrances are systematically removed at each level:

Craving and aversion are burned away through energy and investigation.

Restlessness and dullness fall away with rapture and tranquility.

Doubt dissolves in the clarity of samādhi and equanimity.

"Just as a goldsmith removes impurities with careful attention, heat, and tools, so too the desciple removes the five hindrances through the progressive cultivation of the Seven Factors of Enlightment."

This is not forced, each factor gives rise to the next naturally, as fire purifies metal, until the mind is pure, luminous, and fit for final release.

Factors of Enlightment Ānāpānasati

The Tathagata taught in MN 118 (Ānāpānasati Sutta) that mindfulness of breathing, when practiced thoroughly, naturally develops all Seven Factors of Enlightment, just like refining gold through stages. So let us integrate what we’ve explored: hindrances, perceptions, proto-thoughts, energy balancing, and the unfolding seven factors, all within the rhythm of the breath.

Foundation: Establishing the Crucible (Mindfulness)

Step 1: "Breathing in long... breathing out long."

You begin just observing, not altering, the breath. This is sati, placing the ore into the crucible. It warms the mind with presence.

Watch the breath like watching molten metal, not interfering, just observing.

Proto-thoughts like “Here now” or “Breathing in, breathing out” may gently arise, these help set the frame.

At this stage: You are simply applying heat: mindfulness as the base.

Encountering Subtle Hindrances (Detecting Impurities)

As you settle, subtle hindrances bubble up:

Restlessness: mind won't stay

Dullness: sleepiness, fog

Desire: craving for deeper state

Aversion: frustration with progress

Doubt: “Am I doing it right?”

What to do?

Name it, not out loud, but with clear perception. Apply the corresponding Enlightment factors as an antidote.

Cultivating the Factors via the 16 Steps of Ānāpānasati

Each group of four steps in Ānāpānasati corresponds to 4 foundations of mindfulness, and naturally unfolds the 7 bojjhaṅgā. Here's how:

First Tetrad – Body (Kāyānupassanā)

Breathing in/out long → Breathing in/out short → Experiencing the whole body → Calming bodily formation

You are calming the body’s fire, preparing the ore. Mindfulness, energy, and the first perception of calm develop. Subtle restlessness or dullness are soothed.

Second Tetrad – Feeling (Vedanānupassanā) Experiencing rapture (pīti) → Experiencing pleasure (sukha) → Experiencing mental formation (cittasaṅkhāra) → Calming mental formation

Now pīti glows like gold, this is the joy of purification. Tranquility follows naturally. Use perception to observe: “This joy is impermanent, not mine.” Subtle clinging to pīti may arise, use upekkhā and perception of fading.

Third Tetrad – Mind (Cittānupassanā)

Experiencing the mind → Gladdening the mind → Concentrating the mind → Liberating the mind

This is samādhi strengthening, the gold is now molten, ready. Doubts may fade here, but if they arise, perception of clarity, or proto-thought like “This mind is bright” helps. Let the energy factor (vīriya) adjust: too much = balance with tranquility, too little = balance with investigation.

Fourth Tetrad – Dhamma (Dhammānupassanā)

Contemplating impermanence (anicca) → Fading away (virāga) → Cessation (nirodha)→ Letting go (vossagga)

Here is where you use perception of impermanence with great clarity. Observe sensations, joy, even samādhi itself as passing phenomena. Proto-thoughts like “not lasting,” “not self,” arise spontaneously. The mind becomes balanced and unshakable, this is upekkhā fully developed.

From Gold to Release

By the end of this process, the hindrances are left behind, like slag separated from pure metal.

The factors of awakening are present, balanced, and flowing.

You do not fabricate peace, peace emerges as fabrication ends.

This is how ānāpānasati becomes satipaṭṭhāna, which fulfills the seven factors, which lead directly to knowledge and liberation.

"Just as a goldsmith refines gold by fire, blowing, and watching closely, so too the meditator refines the mind by mindfulness, investigation, energy, and perception. The breath is the fire, the hindrances are the slag, and the bojjhaṅgā are the instruments.”

Factors of Enlightment Clear Seeing

Clear seeing (Sampajañña) Is Not Separate From Consciousness or Wisdom

Wisdom (paññā), memory (sati), and discernment are not add-ons to consciousness, they are inherent when the mind is not clouded by greed, hatred, or delusion.

Awareness itself, when free from craving and aversion, knows rightly, it does not need an extra effort to “analyze” what it sees.

When awareness is embodied, present, and non-reactive, then sati + sampajañña + paññā function as a single, luminous quality.

Sampajañña is not something added to awareness, but the function of wisdom within awareness when it is unobstructed.

Rather than a “meta-cognitive module” watching mindfulness, we might say: Sampajañña is mindfulness when it is awake to the whole context, when it sees what is happening, how it is happening, and what it means for the path.

When the Tathagata says "He is mindful, clearly knowing, and aware."

This doesn’t necessarily mean that he toggles between three functions, rather, he’s describing qualities of the same luminous mind when not distorted.

The "clearly seeing" quality (sampajañña) is: Awareness that is undeluded (no self-making) Awareness that is intentional (knows its direction) Awareness that is informed by Dhamma (knows the nature of what is observed)

sampajañña as a function of pure awareness, not a separate task, but a natural luminous discernment of Dhamma, when the obscurations have settled.

Sati is presence. Sampajañña is presence that understands. Paññā is the luminous clarity that sees through. And all these are functions of the same undistracted, purified consciousness, viññāṇa freed from distortion.

When such awareness abides in the body, without greed or aversion, then there is no “add-on” needed, Dhamma reveals itself.

Right Effort Fabricating Perceptions.

Remember the all important teaching "What ever one pays attention to grows."

As part of Right Effort we want to abandon unwholesome states, and instead cultivate wholesomes ones like energy, joy, tranquility, satisfaction, concentration and equinimity.

So the question is, when we perceive a perception like, for example, joy, we are simply noticing joy that is already present, or are we fabricating joy by perceiving it?

The answer is both are skillful at different stages of the path.

Normally, if we have progressed on the Gradual Training, because of ethical living and letting go, joy will almost always be present somewhere in the mind or body. By directing attention there, Perception notices the uplifting quality, and it grows. Attention sustains and highlights it; this leads to its increase and deepening.

"When he sees that his mind has become glad, joy arises in him. When he is joyful, the body becomes tranquil. When the body is tranquil, he feels pleasure. When he feels pleasure, the mind becomes concentrated."

Joy arises naturally due to seeing gladness, and we perceive and sustain it with attention, which then supports concentration or collectedness.

In other cases, especially when the mind is dull, the Tathagata encourages actively generating perceptions of energy, light, joy, etc. These are not "fake" perceptions but rather a volitional, skillful fabrications that condition wholesome states.

Quite secluded from sensual pleasures... a disciple enters and abides in the first jhāna, which is accompanied by applied and sustained thought, with rapture and pleasure born of seclusion. He drenches, steeps, fills, and pervades this very body with the rapture and pleasure born of seclusion.

Another way to look at this process is the copying and pasting joy sensations from one part of the body to another until awareness is completely with joy. We intentionally cultivate joy as a factor of jhāna, using bodily awareness, breath, and subtle perception. We “pervade” the body with it, a kind of active fabrication.

So this joy is not “found” but generated through Right Intention, Right Effort and right perception. Once joy is present, whether naturally noticed or deliberately cultivated, attention plays a crucial role: If attention dwells on the joy, it sustains and strengthens it. If attention turns to agitation, doubt, or restlessness, joy fades.

So, attention is like watering a seed: whether the seed was already there (joy noticed) or planted (joy fabricated), it grows by attending to it.

Perception is not merely noticing what is already there. It is also a way of shaping the experience by highlighting, naming, and directing the mind’s relationship to what is seen.

This means we can use perception to recognize the actual characteristics of experience, for example, impermanence and also intentionally incline perception to cultivate dispassion, even before dispassion has fully matured.

For example the Tathagata teaches perceptions that help support the arising of release:

• Perception of impermanence
• Perception of dispassion
• Perception of cessation
• Perception of letting go

The ending of craving depends on dispassion, cessation and letting go. Because of our ingrained passion, our craving for sense satisfaction, they will not dissapear on their own, we need to cultivate antidotes for them to be neutralized, for them to not taint our perceptions.

These are all perceptions that are to be cultivated, which means they are fabricated at first, until they become directly seen and no longer need to be sustained. So the perception of dispassion is explicitly fabricated to lead to non-fabrication. It’s a skillful use of perception as a raft.

Fabricating dispassion

So how do we fabricate dispassion as a perception in practice?

We can consciously incline the mind to see things as not attractive, not owned, not worth holding on to, and thus cool down the fire of craving. For example, as a thought, sensation, memory or, emotion arises. We attend it with mindfulness: "This too is impermanent.", "This isn’t worth clinging to."

These are fabricated perceptions, proto-thoughts that shape our lens. They are not forced beliefs, they are intentional framings. When you see clearly and add this perception, the heart begins to unhook.

The perception may become bodily: a cooling, a softening, a withdrawal of interest. This is dispassion as a felt response, gradually cultivated through perception training.

For example, through clear seeing, we can clearly see:

The eye is burning… forms are burning… eye-consciousness is burning… with the fire of lust, hatred, and delusion.

SN35.28

As a result:

Seeing thus, the instructed noble disciple becomes disenchanted… through disenchantment, there is dispassion… through dispassion, there is liberation.

SN35.28

The perception of dispassion is used to incline the mind away from craving, to see experience as not worth clinging to, and to cool the fires of becoming. It is not suppression, but wisdom-inclined seeing. Furthermore, it is not imagination, but a reshaping of perception toward truth. It is fabrication leading to non-fabrication.

Purifying the Mind Putting it all together

When we bring together everything we've explored—kamma, intention, attention, perception, right effort, the seven factors of awakening, mindfulness of breathing (ānāpānasati), and the Tathagata’s metaphor for refining gold—we create a living alchemy for purifying kamma at its root.

Now, let us weave this understanding into the fabric of karmic purification.

Kamma is more than outward action; it is the subtle force of intention shaping perception, choices, and identity from moment to moment. Even proto-thoughts, when rooted in craving, aversion, or delusion, are expressions of kamma in motion. Purifying kamma means transforming intention—from reactivity and clinging to wisdom and release.

The Ānāpānasati Sutta (MN 118) serves as a powerful method for karmic purification. When followed to its culmination, this practice fulfills: - The Four Foundations of Mindfulness
- The Seven Factors of Enlightenment
- The realization of knowledge and liberation

Each breath becomes a moment of karmic work, either sustaining old kamma or dissolving it through wisdom.

Applying the gold refinement metaphor to karmic energy reveals a profound process of transformation:

Mindfulness (Sati) – Heating the Kamma Field
The fire of breath awareness brings latent karmic tendencies to the surface. As you observe the breath without judgment, restlessness, sorrow, and craving emerge. These are not obstacles but ripening kamma—an opportunity for purification.

Right Effort #1 – Preventing Unskillful Responses
Holding steady awareness prevents unskillful reactions to old kamma, allowing it to arise without reinforcing its cycle.

Investigation (Dhammavicaya) – Detecting Kamma Structures
You begin to recognize karmic patterns in perception: "This is clinging," "This is aversion." By perceiving impermanence, attachment loosens. Proto-thoughts such as "Not me, not mine" interrupt habitual reactivity.

Right Effort #2 – Dissolving Volitional Loops
The moment unwholesome tendencies are seen, they begin to dissolve.

Energy (Vīriya) – Stoking the Fire to Transform Habit
Without energy, old kamma persists. By bringing skillful intentionality into the breath—"Let me meet this moment with clarity"—new, wholesome kamma forms, burning away the old. This effort is transformative, shifting from reactivity to responsiveness.

Joy (Pīti) and Tranquility (Passaddhi) – Softening Kamma
As the weight of past karmic formations lightens, joy naturally arises—not as indulgence, but as the fruit of purification. The mind, once reactive and entangled, begins to rest in itself.

"When the hindrances are abandoned, joy arises. When joy arises, tranquility follows." — SN 46.3

This is karmic uplift—joy signals the falling away of burdens.

Concentration (Samādhi) – Unifying the Mind
Where kamma once scattered mental energy, collectedness now replaces fragmentation. The mind gathers inward, relaxed and undistracted by external stimuli. This is no longer just the avoidance of unwholesome kamma but the formation of samādhi—wholesome kamma leading to insight.

Equanimity (Upekkhā) – Transcending Reaction
At the deepest level, purification culminates in non-reactivity. Pleasant and unpleasant sensations arise and pass, yet the mind does not grasp or resist. Even joy and calm are seen as conditioned, and thus released. This is where kamma ceases in real time:

"With the cessation of craving, kamma ceases."

The gold is not just refined—it is pure, untouchable, luminous.

One perception developed and cultivated leads to complete disenchantment, dispassion, cessation, peace, direct knowledge, awakening, and Nibbāna. Which one? The perception of impermanence.

AN 10.1

When these five hindrances are abandoned in himself, he observes joy arising within, from joy comes delight, with a delighted mind the body becomes tranquil, with a tranquil body he feels pleasure, and with a pleasurable mind, the mind becomes concentrated.

DN9

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