Do I get more merits if I give more? What is considered a reasonable donation? Please give some examples.

Kay so I have pretty strong OCD which manifests as just this constant stress. Under therapists advice ive been meditating for several hours a day for a month. I've made basically no progress. I also tried doing this several times over the past few years. Same thing. I've tried different objects (vedana, breath etc) and nothing really changes. However interestingly I've had these short moments of bliss that do occasionally happen. Not every session but its happened several times. What causes that. So I'm already expecting answers that are basically like "you have to be patient" but it's been a 2 months (and practicing mindfulness throughout the day) and nothing has changed at all. I dont think im like "treatment resistant" because like i said there are those short moments of bliss. But the thing is i dont even know what im supposed to do during meditation. Like what am i doing. Is samatha the one where im supposed to be really concentrated? Is that whats causing the bliss?

Upon asking about over-watching Youtube, I wondered if this activity was detrimental because it was merely sensory without much cognition. Buddhism usually promotes seemingly either attention (mindfulness), action (compassion), or even contemplation (analytical meditation). Therefore, I am wondering whether Buddhism considers that activities relying solely on the senses and the body cause detriment? **Do only activities with a cognitive or mindful component bring benefit?** Also, I feel vipassana is divided between bodily observations as the body itself and feeling, and mental observations as mind and dhammas. **Is this seemingly complementary approach linked explicitly with integration of body-mind?** Thank you

...as per the title. In the Theravada literature, the Buddha is seen as someone who found an end to suffering and taught that for all his life, urging his disciples to apply themselves to it, to not waste the opportunity and regret later. While there are many interpretations of what exactly is Nirvana in this tradition (and what is/is-not a tathagata after death etc), it's perhaps universally accepted by it's adherents that embarking on this doctrine culminates in the permanent cessation of suffering. Some may speculate or say more about Nirvana, but others might be silent and not add anything that the texts don't say. But what about Mahayana's Nirvana? * Is it the same same? Or is it more elaborated, like a realm where beings (Buddhas?) actually live? * Does it have the same requirements as the Theravada nirvana (e.g. elimination of the ten fetters, realization of four noble truths & dependent origination)?

How can I be completely aware in each and every moment, even working, walking, or talking? Is "continuous breath awareness" is an answer?

I have had experience in meditation, I want to have experience of living and learning with Buddhist monks. Where in Asia can I experience this for 8 to 10 weeks to start?

many times, I stumbled to start to dig something towards teaching of Buddha and at some point want to make focus on Buddhism. During my journey of looking bird eye of view, I passed through Vipassana, Therevada, Zen, Dalai Lama, Tibet, Nepal and Mynmar. Last read bit about Buddhism in Sri Lanka? How Arthur Schopenhauer inspired himself with Budda? Who guided him or how he came to know about terms like enlightenment.?

I have the intuition, from what I've heard within Buddhism, that formal meditation is rarely ever "wrong", and provides benefit if even slight form is held. Nevertheless, I am struggling to create a regular schedule. It has been years that I know of meditation, have investigated the techniques, and *still* I seem to avoid practising formally. Despite contemplation and walking meditation, I fail to progress to a formal routine. I wonder: 1. Is there really any remedy to this types of procrastination and laziness? I feel it may be pointless to try and seek advice on this topic, that my capacity is absent despite my present desire. 2. If they exist, what are the remedies to such a basic and pervasive laziness? Perhaps I should specify that the reasons I often tell myself against meditating (or other things) are: 1. Lack of obvious suffering. 2. Lack of ultimate goal. 3. Aversion to the effort.

It echoes in my mind that space time is not fundamental. I thought I read this in some psychics experiments, saw it in YouTube videos and/or read it in a book related to Buddhism. But I far from recall the details. I searched for space time not being fundamental on the topic of Buddhism but I am not really finding much about it. With space time not being fundamental I mean to say that it is a construct of the mind. One can understand it is a mental construct, but still experience space time. I am asking about the Buddhist view on space time, and the implications of that view. I am asking because of the following experience I had. Recently I experienced some different perception during meditation. It was like my perception of the room I was sitting in vanished and there was no perception anymore of me having a body, sitting in a room. But I would not say I changed, I was still present. And I had my eyes closed all along. This experience of no longer having a body happened to me a couple of times during meditation now. More recent I was doing a mental exercise to get the difference more clear about experience coming from sensory perception, and experience coming from the mind. I did so by focusing on my body, and then on some memory of how something felt tactically, and then switch focus back on my body, and so forth. I was switching like this continuously. Every time that I switched I mentally called out the difference (using my inner voice, so not out loud): > Experience from sensory perception and > Experience from mental perception At some point the distinction became more clear. At that moment it was clear to me the experience of space time arises because of a mental process. At that moment I could solely focus on sensory perception, and the awareness of space time was gone. And I could go back as well to experience space time again. I then experienced having a body again, sitting in the car, on a parking lot in front of the office. And I could go back again, focusing solely on sensory perception, where there was no experience anymore of me having a body. It was like space contracted to be dimensionless and I had no awareness of my body anymore, nor the car I was sitting in. Or maybe I should say that there was nothing more but the experience of the body. The bodily awareness was different. All encompassing vs being part of something else. I am having difficulties to describe my experience. I could still think of my body and the car though, but the experience of having a body and sitting in a car stayed away. It stayed away for as long as I kept this focus on sensory perception. It was like I was withholding my mind from creating the spatial awareness or something. I'm so curious to explore this more. Also how it relates to the self-awareness and experience of space time in dreaming (so a lucid dream). And I am really curious if there is some perspective from Buddhism on this kind of experience.

My goal with meditating was related to improving my concentration for academic reasons. At first I came across a method of meditating where I count out my breadth and avoid thinking of idle thoughts. I had a lot of success with this method and was able to focus much more but at a later point I grew curious on what happened if I didn't count at all or didn't pay attention to my breadth at all. So I repeated this process which was now easier just without any counting or attention. I again had success but my mind was very much blank at all times, it gave me some fright, I wasn't sure if it was going to be something harmful since I usually pick up on tiny details that relate to whatever I am doing but now my mind was just blank, so I stopped practising meditation as a whole for a while. I have recently discovered that a lot of things I have been attempting already exist so I am wondering if: - There are any better ways then what I have been doing to achieve higher levels of sustained concentration? - What end results I will face if I venture back into completely clearing my mind rather than improving its ability to focus through breadth counting? - If there are other components that seem useful to my goal that certain kinds of meditation can improve? - I also don't have much of an opinion on the forehead sensation that is commonly called a third eye but I can control it at will, I would also be wondering if there is anything particularly special about increasing the sensation or not? Any help is kindly appreciated. I have also been gradually resuming my breadth counting meditation with success. --- (edited to add:) I am happy and my mind is calm but it is filled with songs and memories that I like but are not related to the task I am working on and as a result get me distracted from it. As such I wanted to make my thoughts silent at will so I can keep focusing on tasks which make me less happy than my thoughts do.

Is continuity just causation? When a fire is caused by a spark, is that the same kind of continuity as there is in the dependent origination of the skandhas, just with different causes and effects?

Although one can cultivate sati (recollection/mindfulness) through meditation & good conduct (silā), & one can learn wisdom via book knowledge as well as via direct seeing (for example rising & passing away of phenomena), **how does one know (exactly) what to do/think about in every day life situations?**

I've read in other posts (such as [this one](https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/questions/18799/right-way-to-teaching-dhamma)) about the right way to teach the Dhamma. But is there a way to know about the "when", i.e. when to reach out someone else to teach the Dhamma? In specific, I'd like to know if one should teach only when asked for it, or if one should make assumptions about the other's needs or degree of knowledge when trying to help him/her (regardless if that person asked for that helped or not). If you could provide information about suttas where this is talked about, I'd really appreaciate it. I'd even be grateful if personal experiences are given. Thanks for your time and patience!

Are there parallel texts between Pali Canon Jhana Suttas, and Mahayana equivalent? Dhyana Sutras? I now that the theme is picked up again in Tiantai texts, but I'm thinking of between the Pali canon and the Tiantai? Does Asanga touch on this topic or skip over it? Kumarajiva?

MN 38 has the following two different or opposite verses on the arising of suffering & the ceasing of suffering: > *On seeing a form with the eye, he lusts after it if it is pleasing; he dislikes it if it is unpleasing. He abides with mindfulness of the > body unestablished, with a limited mind, and he does not understand as > it actually is the deliverance of mind and deliverance by wisdom > wherein those evil unwholesome states cease without remainder. Engaged > as he is in favouring and opposing, whatever feeling he feels—whether > pleasant or painful or neither-painful-nor-pleasant—he delights in > that feeling, welcomes it, and remains holding to it. As he does so, > delight arises in him. Now delight in feelings is clinging. With his > clinging as condition, being comes to be; with being as condition, > birth; with birth as condition, ageing and death, sorrow, lamentation, > pain, grief, and despair come to be. Such is **the origin** of this whole > mass of suffering.* > > *On seeing a form with the eye, he does not lust after it if it is pleasing; he does not dislike it if it is unpleasing. He abides with > mindfulness of the body established, with an immeasurable mind, and he > understands as it actually is the deliverance of mind and deliverance > by wisdom wherein those evil unwholesome states cease without > remainder. Having thus abandoned favouring and opposing, whatever > feeling he feels, whether pleasant or painful or > neither-painful-nor-pleasant, he does not delight in that feeling, > welcome it, or remain holding to it. As he does not do so, delight in > feelings ceases in him. With the cessation of his delight comes > cessation of clinging; with the cessation of clinging, cessation of > being; with the cessation of being, cessation of birth; with the > cessation of birth, ageing and death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, > grief, and despair cease. Such is **the cessation** of this whole mass of > suffering.* Although these two verses are different, what is common to both verses is the event of: "*on seeing a form with the eye*". How do aging-&-death cease when the eye sees a form?

Are life's issues and other practical problems appropriate as a meditation subject? Any buddhist school, that focus on this type of meditation?

Wikipedia lists schools in this section ... > [Schools of Buddhism (Theravāda subschools)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools_of_Buddhism#Therav%C4%81da_subschools) ... but, those pages which describe each school focus on **doctrine or philosophical aspects** (and don't always emphasise the differences with other subschools). I am interested in aspects that have more to do with **practice and disciplines**, e.g.: - What are the main differences in how monastic life is led in each of these subschools? - What does meditation practice focus on and how does that change from one school to the other? For instance: I know that in the teaching of Mahasi Sayadaw there is an emphasis on verbalising whatever is taking place in the present moment; whereas Ajahn Chah focuses on "opening the heart". I expect other subschools to neglect walking meditation of discourage verbalisation, others not to allow nuns, etc. --- Edit -- an answer mentioned that Wikipedia also has another page ... > Theravada (Monastic orders within Theravāda) ... which discusses *nikayas* rather than *subschools* and so which is more pertinent to my question. Unfortunately, those pages too don't discuss, detail, nor compare, the discipline and meditation practice.

I follow the notion that when the false view of an independent, permanent "self" is annihilated for the first time this is Stream Entry. The Dharma no long is merely a question mark, and it's not dependent on rituals, or merely following rules. These first three fetters can't continue in the face of such an experience. But how is the practice after Stream Entry different that before? --- > "In Buddhism, a sotāpanna (Pali), śrotāpanna (Sanskrit; Chinese: 入流; pinyin: rùliú, Tibetan: རྒྱུན་ཞུགས་, Wylie: rgyun zhugs), "stream-winner", or "stream-entrant" is a person who has seen the Dharma and consequently, has dropped the first three fetters (saŋyojana) that bind a being to rebirth, namely self-view (sakkāya-ditthi), clinging to rites and rituals (sīlabbata-parāmāsa), and skeptical indecision (Vicikitsa). > > The word sotāpanna literally means "one who entered (āpanna) the stream (sota)", after a metaphor which calls the noble eightfold path a stream which leads to nibbāna. Entering the stream (sotāpatti) is the first of the four stages of enlightenment." > > -- [Sotāpanna (wikipedia)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sot%C4%81panna) Also see [Agataphala Mahānāma Sutta (A 6.10) -- The Discourse on Mahānāma (on the fruition-attainer) ](http://www.themindingcentre.org/dharmafarer/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/15.3-Agataphala-Mahanama-S-a6.10-piya.pdf)

When I first started *metta bhavana*, everything went very well and I generated a strong feeling. Ironically, I am now anxious in doing this meditation (i.e. I skip some) because I feel I might not recreate the same quality as before. I feel this is definitely the wrong way of seeing, but I can almost not help it. **Are there any suggestions towards this type of anxiety/perfectionism?**

I have a friend from Sri Lanka who is a Theravada Buddhist monk. He is 36 (soon 37) years old and have been a monk for 19 years. He resides in SL and has just finished an english language course and have asked me if I could help find a Buddhist monastery, where he could stay for 2-3 years. His goal is to practice and improve his language skills to eventually be able to give a full Dhamma talk in english. It must a non-Sri Lankan monastery. Bhante would like to work with all Buddhist traditions. If you want to know more about him he has a *FB profile.* He has also written a short description of himself (this description is part of an email that Bhante himself has sent to monasteries - I have taken the self-description-part and put here): >"Dear Venerable sir/madam > >My name is Venerable Buttala Samithawansha and I am 36 years old. I currently reside in a monastery in Colombo Sri Lanka. I am a fully ordained Buddhist monk. > >I grew up as a poor farmer's son and was not able to get my formal education particularly English, however I managed to join the British Council where I completed pre intermediate levels 1, 2 and 3, intermediate levels 1, 2 and 3 and upper intermediate levels 1 and 2. > >I stopped school at 17 years old and was ordained at 18 years old. > >I would be very grateful if you know of any scholarships or funding to facilitate people who are in my situation.I am keen to improve my English skills under guidance on the native English speakers. I would like to share Buddhist teachings in English language in the future. > >My most humble gratitude . > >Yours faithfully, >Reverend Samithawansha" Does anyone know of a Buddhist monastery, where that would be possible? Thank you.