The Complete Achievement of Shamata:
In the process of calm-awareness meditation, we have developed complete mindfulness of body, feelings, mind, and phenomena. We can speed this development of mindfulness by practicing mindfulness during our day-to-day activities as well. Through this mindfulness, we have achieved direct knowledge of our own mind-states and in the process have understood those mind-states that are harmful and those that are beneficial.
By beginning to abandon the harmful mind-states and strengthening the beneficial, and by stopping ourselves from dwelling on the past, fretting over the future, and clinging to the present, our sense of energy has increased. With increased energy comes a greater sense of well-being which leads to Joy. With increased Joy and a stronger and stronger sense of well-being comes tranquility of body and mind, which leads to a sense of Peace.
Having a peaceful mind means that the body and mind come more and more under our control and so our focus improves. All of these experiences gives us a tremendous flexibity and control of our body and mind and a strong sense of well being. We move back and forth between experiencing Joy, Peace, and Concentration, with each one becoming stronger and stronger, in a way, feeding off of each other.
This is the point that we are working on in these last stages. During these stages we are working at becoming comfortable and balanced with these sensations of joy, peace, and concentration including becoming comfortable regardless of their intensity. At first they seem extraordinary and amazing, which is where our current degree of attachment comes from.
In the previous level, the 9th, we were working on maintaining a balance between well-being, peace, and awareness as these qualities expanded. During this level, we are working towards becoming so familiar with this Joy, Peace, and Concentration, that they almost seem boring. At this level, that boredom tends to make us a little lax in our attention. Therefore we need to learn to insert the appropriate amount of energy or effort to maintain the balance of these qualities despite our familiarity with them.
For the qualities of Shamata to be really useful, these qualities need to become NORMAL but we still need to be active and not on auto-pilot. These qualities need to be thought of as an ordinary part of our being and not something special, because then we're subtly keeping them separate from ourselves. In that way, those qualities, and therefore our minds, are not fully integrated.
As long as we look at meditation as an activity, then we can end up thinking that the only way to have a sense of well-being, tranquility, and awareness is through meditation. This can work in the same way as some people with drugs, alcohol, or other addictions. We can end up with the belief that only through indulging in the addictive behaviour, in this case meditation, will we have that sense of well-being, tranquility, and awarenesss.
If we understand calm-awareness meditation properly, we will realize that it's not really an activity; it is not an end in itself. All we've been doing with calm-awareness meditation is taming and training our mind. We have developed an integrated, balanced, and focussed mind, and the qualities of this kind of mind are well-being, tranquility, and awareness. Once our mind is tamed and trained, then we will always have access to these qualities, regardless of our external situation.
At the same time, we need to still be alert to maintaining our technique. Its like tennis pros who no longer have to think about the technique of tennis, but still have to use the right skills at the right time to get the results that they want. Its like a driver who no longer needs to think about all of the things that need to be done in order to drive a car - they just do it. Or a jeweler who is so experienced they can put together a beautiful necklace or ring with ease.
The difficulty of this level is, like the very good driver, tennis pro, or the experienced jeweler, we can tend to get a little sloppy because we are so good at what we are doing. The right level of effort needs to be applied at the right time so that there is sustained effort with a flexible degree of effort. That way there is always the right amount of effort being applied even though everything is done so easily. Finding the right level of effort and becoming comfortable with it is the main work of this tenth and last level of Shamata meditation.
Once we recognize these states as normal, we may begin to notice that our focus determines our reality. Our response to situations depends on how we view them. Because of this sense of control and our addiction to it, we end up with a slight attachment to the meditative process. We need to recognize that these abilities are developed within meditation, but are designed to be used outside of meditation. We should begin to see the need to break down the division between meditation and non-meditation. That doesn't mean that its time to stop meditating, but it means that we are ready to work on learning how to incorporate the world outside of meditation into our integrated mind.
Full Shamata
At this level, maintaining well-being, peace of mind, and focus become "effortless". We have now fully developed Complete Acquaintance, or total familiarity with the work of meditation. As with the previous level, lack of equanimity is still the main problem. This is the result of a subtle grasping at the meditation process, the final portions of which need to be overcome at this final level. Once we have an experience of continuous and total physical & mental ecstasy & bliss during meditation, that is the sign of the full attainment of the path of Shamata.
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