Try This to Clear Your Mind
1 Video View·Sep 22, 2024
In today’s fast-paced world, our minds are often filled with noise, worries, and endless thoughts. This video invites you to pause and experience a simple practice that can help bring clarity, calm, and inner peace.
Recorded at Mahamevnawa Bodhignana Monastery in Hewagama, Kaduwela, Sri Lanka, this teaching offers a gentle reminder that a clear mind does not come from forcing thoughts away, but from observing them with awareness and letting them naturally settle.
Through mindfulness and meditation, we can learn to step back from mental clutter and reconnect with a deeper sense of peace within ourselves.
Take a few moments with this practice and allow your mind to slow down, breathe, and rest.
📍 Location: Mahamevnawa Bodhignana Monastery, Hewagama, Kaduwela, Sri Lanka
If this message resonates with you, consider sharing it with someone who may also benefit from a moment of calm.
Namo Buddhaya. Welcome to another video. In today's video we are going to discuss about
how can we clear our mind. Now so many of you complain when I'm meditating, when I'm studying,
there are so many thoughts popping inside our mind. I cannot stop it. I'm worried. What can I do?
Well, the reason for this problem is we are looking at the meditation
and we are looking at our mind in the wrong way. Always remember meditation is not about
emptying your mind. Okay. You can meditate while having thoughts inside your mind.
That is the most wonderful thing about meditation. You should not, you don't want to empty your mind.
You should not, you don't want to close the mind and let not other thoughts come in. No. Okay.
Just try this to yourself. If you try to stop thoughts, what will happen? The nature of your
mind is it will generate more thoughts again and again. Okay. That is the nature of your mind
because we don't know that trying to stop thoughts is also a thought. Okay. So remember meditation is
not about stopping thoughts. It is about being aware of your thoughts. There is one practice
in Buddha's teachings. It is called Chittanupasana. In Chittanupasana, Buddha introduced us to a
wonderful meditation of being aware of what comes into your mind. Okay. Let the thoughts come into
your mind, but be aware of it because most of the time we are not aware of what is going inside our
mind. That is the problem. That is why we get caught to these unwholesome thoughts like
greediness, craving, anger, hatred and a lot of things. Okay. Because we don't know what is going inside
our mind. The Buddha teaches us that Buddha introduced us this meditation to be aware of
what is coming into your mind. Let's say a lustful thought came to your mind. Okay. It's okay.
Everyone feels lust. Everyone feels this craving and desire inside their mind.
But the problem with most people is they don't know that their mind is under desire,
under lust. Okay. But if you can be mindful, okay, if you can detect when the lust arises,
ah, this is a lustful thought that is popping inside my mind. If you can detect it, if you can
identify it, then the nature of your mind is once you identify your thoughts, once you are aware
of that thought, it will start to be silent. Okay. It is something like a little baby. Look at your
mind like a little baby. Okay. Now when we are not aware of the babies, what they are doing?
They are doing a lot of nasty things. Okay. They are doing a lot of naughty things. Why? Because
we are not aware of them. But once we pay our attention, they try to behave. Okay. Because
they know that my parents or these elders are being aware of me. Okay. So they try to be
disciplined. And also, you know, the nature of kids and the nature of little kids is they are
very curious. So does the mind. Mind is very curious. It likes to cling into certain things
and like to search certain things. So what we can do to quiet our mind or to make silence inside
our mind is just to pay attention to what comes into your mind. Don't try to stop it. Okay. The
more you try to stop it, the more it will come. So what we have to do? Just be aware of it.
When you become aware of what is going inside your mind, you bring your mind to this present moment.
Because these thoughts and everything that goes inside your mind happening in this present moment.
If you can see the appearance of the thoughts and if you can see the passing away or fading away of
the thoughts, it will start to get quieter. Okay. So when your mind is busy in the next time, try this.
When your mind is busy, when a lot of thoughts come into your mind, just try to identify
one thought. Look at your mind like you're looking at an external thing. Okay. And try to identify
one thought. When it arises, you can identify, okay, it is arising now. When it fades away, okay,
you're knowing and you are understanding that this thought is fading away. Once you do that,
it is very amazing that your mind gets silent and quieter even more. So this is how we can
clear and quiet our mind to when we do meditations or when we are doing certain
things in our life. So keep this advice in your life and practice it. Namo Buddhaya.