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Hi Lal, First of all, let me introduce myself. I am from Indonesia; my background is that I don’t speak English, so I read your writings via Google Translate.
Even though the meaning is not very clear to me, I understand it well enough.
Maybe my good karma vipaka was bearing fruit until I found your website. I studied Theravada for several years from the videos of Bhante’s lectures in my country, everything went very well, I meditated quite easily to achieve calm even though it was only 5-15 minutes of meditation duration.. In the last few months, I have felt something unexplainable in my heart; I can’t explain it; it’s like upekkha but not upekkha. It’s like being unconditioned, like calm water with no ripples, no joy/sorrow… After I found your writings about Anapanasati. , tilakkhana, sotapanna, make it more intense. .. I have almost awakened my sila, my panna may also be developing, only my formal meditation is less than optimal. I rely on understanding/panna to maintain sila, because I know that doing bad deeds is useless.
This is my purpose in registering on this forum: to ask directly about my feelings.. 🙏
So the essence of my question is, is the object of Nibbana accessed through the heart or mind?
Because I think Nibbana cannot be thought of, it can only be felt, is that true?
And one more question: Does formal Samatha meditation pay attention to the breath? Does it function to strengthen the sati muscle so that we can maintain mental and physical behavior when bad thoughts come so we can avoid them?
Is this useless?
Or is this just an illusion of my feelings? There is something strange in my heart. Sorry if my question is strange.
Your answer may help to clarify my situation.
Warm greetings, Thanks 😊🙏
2 users thanked author for this post.
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Hello Waisaka. Welcome to the forum!
Your English is good enough for me to understand. I revised some of your sentences to make them a bit more clear. I hope I did not change the meanings you wanted to express.
It seems that you were a meditator in your recent lives. That could be why calming your mind and entering Samadhi is easier.
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You wrote: “In the last few months, I have felt something unexplainable in my heart; I can’t explain it; it’s like upekkha but not upekkha. It’s like being unconditioned, like calm water with no ripples, no joy/sorrow…”
- That is very impressive. You are experiencing “niramisa sukha,” which is very different from “joyful experiences” due to mundane pleasures. See “Three Kinds of Happiness – What is Nirāmisa Sukha?“
- It is more like the relief you experience when a bad headache goes away. You feel a sense of calm.
________
You wrote: “So the essence of my question is, is the object of Nibbana accessed through the heart or mind?
Because I think Nibbana cannot be thought of, it can only be felt, is that true?”
- Yes. You are right. As you wrote, “Nibbana cannot be thought of, it can only be felt.”
- It is felt as a relief! It calms the mind.
______
I think you will be able to make significant progress.
- If you can learn English a bit more, reading the posts on this website will become easier. If you can spend part of your time reading simple English novels or even newspapers, that could help you learn English.
- While Google Translate is generally good, I don’t think it can correctly translate the Pali words written with English letters.
- To learn pronunciation, the following could be helpful:
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Welcome to the forum, Waisaka! 😁🙏🏿
If you have difficulty writing in English, I recommend an application called Grammarly. When I first started on the forum, I also had difficulty writing in English. Grammarly corrects the majority of your mistakes and can also make suggestions regarding the meaning of your text. I always use this application to write on the forum. I recommend using Google Translate, copying and pasting the text into Grammarly so that it corrects the mistakes and suggests a better text. It’s free and can be installed on phones and computers. The full name is Grammarly AI Writing Assistant. It can be found on the Google Store or other platforms.
May the triple Gem bless you and may you attain the Supreme bliss of Nibbāna. 🙏🏿🙏🏿🙏🏿☸️
1 user thanked author for this post.
-
Hello Waisaka. Welcome to the forum!
Your English is good enough for me to understand. I revised some of your sentences to make them a bit more clear. I hope I did not change the meanings you wanted to express.
It seems that you were a meditator in your recent lives. That could be why calming your mind and entering Samadhi is easier.
_____
You wrote: “In the last few months, I have felt something unexplainable in my heart; I can’t explain it; it’s like upekkha but not upekkha. It’s like being unconditioned, like calm water with no ripples, no joy/sorrow…”
- That is very impressive. You are experiencing “niramisa sukha,” which is very different from “joyful experiences” due to mundane pleasures. See “Three Kinds of Happiness – What is Nirāmisa Sukha?“
- It is more like the relief you experience when a bad headache goes away. You feel a sense of calm.
________
You wrote: “So the essence of my question is, is the object of Nibbana accessed through the heart or mind?
Because I think Nibbana cannot be thought of, it can only be felt, is that true?”
- Yes. You are right. As you wrote, “Nibbana cannot be thought of, it can only be felt.”
- It is felt as a relief! It calms the mind.
______
I think you will be able to make significant progress.
- If you can learn English a bit more, reading the posts on this website will become easier. If you can spend part of your time reading simple English novels or even newspapers, that could help you learn English.
- While Google Translate is generally good, I don’t think it can correctly translate the Pali words written with English letters.
- To learn pronunciation, the following could be helpful:
Thank you very much lal, your answer really helped me.. Thank you also for your explanation of the dhamma on the website, making my progress regarding sakkayaditthi faster.. I will read more of your writings on this website, and thank you for the advice, sorry if my english is bad.. ☺️🙏
1 user thanked author for this post.
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Welcome to the forum, Waisaka! 😁🙏🏿
If you have difficulty writing in English, I recommend an application called Grammarly. When I first started on the forum, I also had difficulty writing in English. Grammarly corrects the majority of your mistakes and can also make suggestions regarding the meaning of your text. I always use this application to write on the forum. I recommend using Google Translate, copying and pasting the text into Grammarly so that it corrects the mistakes and suggests a better text. It’s free and can be installed on phones and computers. The full name is Grammarly AI Writing Assistant. It can be found on the Google Store or other platforms.
May the triple Gem bless you and may you attain the Supreme bliss of Nibbāna. 🙏🏿🙏🏿🙏🏿☸️
Hi jitananto, nice to meet you too☺️.. Thank you very much for your advice.. Hopefully you will also grow in dhamma☸️.. Sadhu Sadhu sadhu🙏🙏🙏
2 users thanked author for this post.
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