Audio (TCP7, Day 11): Nine Stages, Stage Seven (Praśamayati), Balance, Hindrances and Antidotes

A talk on the seventh stage of śamatha (calm abiding), praśamayati (“thoroughly pacifying”), and the seven factors of awakening (bojjhaṅga) — mindfulness, investigation, energy, joy, tranquility, concentration, and equanimity — as antidotes to sinking and agitation, followed by a self-guided silent sit.

Sakya tradition · IBA Kathmandu · The Complete Path (TCP) 2026 · English · Talk + silent sit

For the full Sanskrit/Pali/Tibetan glossary and nine-stages reference table, see the Glossary and Summary for Morning Meditations.

Transcript

So good morning, dear friends, welcome. Slowly, we are moving towards a conclusion of our series of morning sessions, Śamatha Vipaśyanā here at IBA Kathmandu, part of TCP 2026.

We have been combining our survey of the nine stages approach to Śamatha Vipaśyanā with an introduction also to Mettā Bhāvanā, the cultivation of loving-kindness, one of the four immeasurable minds, a dimension of bodhicitta itself.

We have also been finding windows through this northern perspective on Śamatha Vipaśyanā, these nine stages, windows into the southern school approach, the teachings of the Buddha as preserved in the Pali Canon with reference to Satipaṭṭhāna and Anapana Sati Sutas, the sutras on the four establishments of mindfulness and full awareness of breathing.

We have discovered how in this understanding, based in the northern schools, Śamatha and Vipaśyanā are combined, yoked together. I mentioned an example in the text of a teaching of the Buddha in which he encouraged an understanding that we can begin with Śamatha and move into Vipaśyanā. We can begin with Vipaśyanā and move into Śamatha and we can yoke the two together.

In some sense, whether we begin or end with Vipaśyanā or Śamatha, there is an understanding that by themselves neither will be sufficient, that they need this joining. Why? Because in order to be sharp and clear enough to discern the true nature of phenomena, the mind needs to be very calm. This quality of Śamatha, of calm abiding, is important.

But simply abiding in calm is also not enough by itself. That we need also to apply that calmness, perhaps that we have cultivated by paying attention to the breath, we need to apply that calmness to understanding what it is that is going on here.

And the content of that understanding, as we learn in Satipaṭṭhāna, for those who are familiar, also it is present in the culmination of the Ānāpānasati Sutta. And the Buddha himself has highlighted this fact in his teachings because we learn that actually he cultivated, he studied, Śamatha with a variety of other meditation masters before he sat beneath the bodhi tree.

We understand that he had already mastered the jhānas, already mastered Śamatha, before he began that deep concentration and awareness, turning that mind honed in Śamatha towards an investigation of phenomena, Dhamma-vicaya, under the bodhi tree.

Rather than remaining in samādhi as a way to experience the cessation of the defilements temporarily, turning that mind towards experience in a way that cut to the root of those defilements and removed them permanently. Combining Śamatha and Vipaśyanā, not contented simply to rest in peace and calmness, tranquility, but actually applying that mind to what? To liberation.

And we have met already the obstacles that we encounter to that process in the form of the hindrances. But we also meet the antidotes in the form of these factors of awakening, of liberation. And we have a guide to seven in particular, the bojjhaṅgas, for those who are familiar. The first of these is none other than mindfulness, smriti, sati.

Next is none other than this investigation, Dhamma-vicaya.

So we have already, nyan, drej [Chinese: 念覺支 niàn juézhī, “mindfulness awakening-factor” — confirmed against the Chinese-translator recording for this session, which independently names all three terms below], and then Dhamma-vicaya, dru, fa, drej [擇法覺支 zéfǎ juézhī, “dharma-investigation awakening-factor”], the next we have already met in its effortful sense, a kind of energy, vīrya, chin chintresha [精進覺支 jīngjìn juézhī, “energy/effort awakening-factor”].

In vīrya there is kind of an echo also of almost a heroic effort. Vir has this implication of heroism, and sometimes in our practice it can feel like the effort needs almost to be heroic to get us out of bed and onto the cushion. Sometimes it takes that kind of determination. But if we do so, then a very interesting reward is offered.

We are invited to consider that it is actually possible to experience a kind of bliss through this practice, pīti in Pali, prīti in Sanskrit. This is not only a factor of awakening, this is also a factor of absorption.

It is present from the stage of the first jhāna, a kind of bodily pleasure even, more subtle than the type of pleasure we get from indulging in pleasures of the senses, but nonetheless one that is anchored in the body. It is possible even to experience this as almost excessive, pleasant sensation in the body.

Some may have experienced this in their practice already, waves of sensation as the mind and body become very calm and still the subtle channels begin to open and we experience perhaps even strange and distracting pleasant sensation in the body.

There are actually many grades of pīti we can say from subtle to extreme which can even result in involuntary movement, phenomena familiar to yoga practitioners since antiquity. So it has this kind of energizing aspect as well.

And we will come back to this because we have met already the categorizing of hindrances into those that cause or tend towards sinking and those that tend towards rising and agitation. And here we find that this factor of awakening is indeed one that is energizing, this bliss, this pleasant sensation in the body.

And I think it is also possible for us to see how that heroic effort, an investigative mind, that curiosity, vīrya and dhamma-vicaya are also energizing factors.

These are the ones that help us to dispel drowsiness, dullness, to dispel doubt, making the effort to return the mind to the object when it wanders away, giving rise to curiosity about the object, familiarizing ourselves with subtle sensation even and paying attention to the aliveness, if you like, of the body. Activation, sitting alertly, aware of the whole body.

If we are not aware of the body in some kind of general background sense, it is very easy for the posture to collapse. It is almost as though we relax too much and the body is no longer a stable and upright container for the cultivation. But we can also activate too much so that it becomes almost a distraction, that intense, pleasant sensation.

And we learn from the progress through the chanas in the Southern schools that actually, in order to move beyond the first stage, this pīti, this strong, pleasant sensation also needs to be able to subside, to let go, to not cling even to this aspect of the experience also.

And if we are able to maintain awareness, mindfulness, perhaps combining mindfulness with that clear understanding of what is arising, that samprajanya, then from pīti, from that pleasant sensation, can also emerge a deeper relaxation, this clarity and relaxation combined. Praśrabdhi in Sanskrit, passaddhi in Pali, qīng’ān [輕安 qīng’ān, “pliancy” — Chinese gloss], docilidad [Spanish].

We found a beautiful word in Spanish for this, passaddhi. Docility, pliancy is also there, flexibility of body and mind. And it is this constellation of qualities. I apologize, I have not put constellation in the glossary in Chinese. The image is like of the stars in the sky, like a grouping of qualities that makes together a pattern that is helpful.

It is this constellation of qualities that allows the emergence of the next factor of awakening, none other than samādhi itself. Concentration, we translate loosely in English, yeah? Same in Spanish and in concentration.

But the implication here leans more towards actually exactly the quality that is being slowly brought into being through the nine stages, this quality of balanced placement, some being correct or complete, perfected, appropriate, samādhāna, this sense of placement, even like a gathering together of the factors.

And this is why not only is concentration maybe too sharp or pointy a term, too kind of restricted. But it’s also why even meditation is maybe better substituted for cultivation in the sense that we are bringing a constellation of factors into balance in order to give rise to a quality or qualities of mind that are conducive to insight. The image on the skillful gardener, yeah?

We’ve met this term bhāvanā, cultivation, already. Gardener, jardinero, Portuguese at least, jardinero, gardener, él cultiva las plantas, sí, preparando el suelo, you see. The sense of rather than being able to extract the qualities directly, we need simply to create the conditions to allow them to emerge from their own side.

And these factors of awakening can read as a kind of a gardener’s handbook for the cultivation of śamatha, the qualities that we need to bring into our practice. And the last of these is none other than maybe we lead with the Chinese letting go, upekṣā, upekṣā.

But in the sense of letting go, she [捨 shě, “to relinquish, let go” — Chinese gloss, confirmed against the CH translator recording for this session], I believe she, the traditional character implies kind of a dropping, yeah? So it’s equanimity in the sense of impartiality.

But this Chinese character is a very beautiful dimension of upekṣā and it relates directly to the last, not only of the factors of awakening, but also the last of the 16 exercises in the Ānāpānasati Sutta.

After recognizing, contemplating, impermanence, the subsiding of desire, cessation, there is paṭinissaggānupassanā [contemplation of relinquishment, the 16th exercise], contemplating, letting go. And it’s there already in the satipaṭṭhāna attitude we have met, yeah? Ātāpī, energy, diligence, related to vīrya, this heroic effort.

Samprajanya clearly knowing, investigating, becoming curious, discerning also, mindfulness, keeping things in balance. It is this mindfulness that helps us, combined with awareness, Samprajanya, to correctly apply the antidotes if we are sinking into dullness, applying energizing antidotes, investigation, effort, awareness of pleasant sensation, activation in the body.

And if we are rising into distraction, agitation, into grasping, applying calming antidotes, the downward tendency, clarity and relaxation, passaddhi, dosilidad, concentration, samādhi, and equanimity. Letting go. Ātāpī, samprajanya, satimā, mindful, and viharati abhijjhā-domanassaṃ, dwelling without grasping or pushing away.

Letting go. If we are able to bring this constellation of factors into our practice, then by and by the mind becomes thoroughly pacified. This is stage 7, praśamayati [thoroughly pacifying], que está completa, we have in Spanish here.

So, zuiji jijing [最極寂靜 zuìjí jìjìng, “utterly tranquil” — Chinese gloss for stage seven, per the course planning notes], this repetition is like really, really, really pacified. Let’s do it. I think we have silent sit this morning, is that correct? It feels like that would be appropriate anyway.

Establishing our posture, active sitting, allowing awareness to permeate the body, discovering in doing so that we can at the same time relax and in a way even more deeply than the type of relaxation that we might get in sleep or complete distraction in which awareness leaves the body, if you like.

Because here, not only are we able to be aware of the parts of the body that are relaxed already, but we can detect when tension creeps back in, from habit perhaps, from patterns of movement and encourage those tensions to melt away again. Identifying also our motivation, watering that seed in the heart mind, bodhicitta, open heart. This practice is not just for my own benefit.

Clarifying our intention for this session also, whether we wish to focus on simply familiarizing ourselves with the breath, perhaps cultivating greater and greater continuity using counting, patching up our attention when it wanders. Perhaps we wish to cultivate mettā, loving kindness at the beginning or even at the end of our session.

Perhaps there is a hindrance in particular, a tendency towards sinking. Perhaps that we are working with by applying antidotes that encourage rising, energizing or perhaps the inverse.

We are working with distraction, agitation and bringing calming factors into our practice, finding what is appropriate for us in each session, in each breath even, relaxing the whole body, letting go of tensions, distractions.

Reviewing our practice, perhaps noting tendencies towards rising agitation or dullness sinking, perhaps noticing an antidote that has been effective, energy or investigation, an activation in the body, perhaps a tranquility, concentration, a letting go that has helped with agitation, perhaps noticing a strengthening of mindfulness that is aware of what is appropriate in this moment, which antidote applies.

And we can take a moment if there are any questions, reflections and experience that may benefit from clarification. It seems everything is clear, which is wonderful. So let us continue in mindfulness this cultivation of balance, of inclusivity, bringing all aspects of our experience onto the path, both the pleasant and the difficult. Lovely day.

Thank you all for your energy, your attention to our translators, for your efforts and see you tomorrow.