Stability and clarity are undermined by busyness and dullness. Busyness includes distraction, attention and energy being drawn into objects and excessive activity, or becoming obsessed and believing in the solidity of thoughts, feelings, or activities. Dullness includes sleepiness, dreamy states, torpor, laziness, and sinking into oblivion.
Don’t turn the cultivation of awareness into a withdrawal from the world. Sinking into oneself is as much a problem as attaching to sense-objects. When distracted, return to the body, here and now. When dull, open eyes and ears and reenter the world. The body does not stop at the skin. Sitting, standing, walking — awareness does not depend on posture. Don’t pose. Where do we meet the world? Explore the border, not dwelling anywhere.
Originally posted in 2010.