How to check your breath meditation: "Is This the Breath?"

 It's exciting that I've found a way to check my breath meditation that works for me, and that I think works for you. But, I had a lot of failed attempts.

What Works

It's simple. I just keep asking, "Is this the breath?" And I limit myself to two answers. "This is the breath." or "This is not the breath." And I keep repeating this.

What doesn't work

I've tried many things, and they don't work, at least not consistently. Unfortunately, the things that don't work don't fail 100% of the time. They work sometimes. And, in a measurement tool, a ruler that works sometimes is not a good ruler. Here are some things that I've found don't work.

1. Try to stop thinking: This is a common instruction. For example, "close your eyes and empty your mind." The problem that I've found is that my mind doesn't like to be empty. It needs some work to do. And, staying with the breath is the task. In my tradition, it is celebrated to exert effort to stay with the breath. For example, if there is an itch or your mind wanders. You actively try to stay. And that effort is thinking. So, do I stop trying? Or do I stop thinking about trying?
   Sometimes, it works. When it works, I notice the thinking and to try to drop a specific thought. Or to set the intention to drop thinking in general. But, if this approach doesn't work and thoughts keep coming up, I'll stop trying to force it after 5 minutes.
   Instead, I go back to a specific thought: "Is this the breath?" And, if I have any other thought, all I need to do is remember, go back to the thought, "Is this the breath?"
2. Counting. Bhante G is the person who I think has given the largest set of options around counting. One can count in breaths and out breaths. (1-in, 2-out, 3-in, 4-out) which allows some distinction, or count sub breaths (1-in, 2-in, 3-in, 4-in, 5-in, 6-in, 1-out, 2-out, 3-out, 4-out, 5-out, 6-out) which allows subtle distinctions in the breath process, or just whole breaths (1-in, out; 2-in, out;...) which just keeps us loosely on task. And there are suggestions of how high to count, counting 1-10, or 1-4, or just counting 1 each time (which I heard a Zen teacher talk about).
   All of these are excellent ways of staying on the task of breathing and also investigating and getting interested in breathing. It works when one's interest and "listening" to the breath gets very close and attuned. When it works, it is great.
   But, it fails for me in two ways. One is that I have distracting thoughts that are stronger than the counting. So, I may be counting, but I get lost or just go through the motion of the counting. Getting lost a little is normal. But, in developing breath meditation, if I'm getting lost every minute, I may want to develop another tactic, to develop concentration. (If I'm developing acceptance, then I just keep failing and getting back up, restarting the counting. But acceptance practice is different from concentration practice.)
   The second way I fail is that I multi-task. One thread is with the counting. The other thread is following my windy mind. I stay just enough with the counting that I can honestly say, "I'm with the breath" and counting. But, it's more like the counting is the background process, and the foreground process is the windy mind. My thoughts about dinner, work, my body, the past, the future.
    BUT! (my sneaky mind exclaims) part of my mind is with the counting. And the counting is proof, indisputable, that I am with the breath.
   However, when I'm honest, I can clearly look and see that although the background is mildly with the breath, the foreground is not. The honest and helpful/skillful thing to notice is "This is not the breath." In this case, the scattering is the thing that is not with the breath. And this is just the level of reminder to get me back to trying to see if I can be more with my breath.
   So, counting is something I use often, but now, I always marry it with "Is this the breath?"
3. Stay. I start most of my meditations with a little intention setting: "Stay with the breath." I take some deep breaths, focusing on their physical feeling, and I try to actively get myself to stay. That's okay.
   Where it goes wrong is if my whole meditation is focused on the dictate, "Stay". Because then, I build up a lot of tension. And that tension is not part of the breath. That tension is not helpful. Even if the tension keeps me with the breath, all I'm learning is to stay with the breath when I have tension. This is maybe okay occasionally or for a minute. But the dictator approach is not something to fill up a whole 10-30 minute meditation.
   So, it might work sorta, but similar to #2, the staying with the breath becomes the background. And the foreground ends up being my (subtly) gritted teeth and the identification that "I must stay".
   Applying my inquiry method, when I ask, "Is this the breath?", I can say, "The background is the breath, but the foreground is not the breath." So, I begin to be able to notice and disentangle many things; that sometimes I am split with being with the breath and running away. This is akin to hearing the different voices of the committee of the mind (Thanissaro).
   So, Stay is something I use as part of the process. But at some point, I need to let go of Stay and just look and see, "Is this the breath?"
   (NOTE: See SEPI for a technique which uses Stay along with some other techniques that balances it out.)
   
4. Just watching thoughts and passively letting go. In this technique, one lets the mind wander, but one doesn't attach to the thoughts. The hope, and there is some truth to it, is that the spinning/stirring will run out of fuel and the mind will naturally settle on its own.
   Again, this technique can do useful things, especially in training in equanimity. But, I've found it is usually too passive. Like, if a thought about a past grudge comes up, I habitually will "go there" and start that snowball of justifications, re-analysis, etc. And, when I catch it, one option is to simply let it go, without much comment. Letting go is a good instead when the alternative is fixating and further feeding it. But, there are other insteads. One can look carefully at the allure. One can look carefully at the process of getting pulled away. One can look at the urge to feed on the grudge.
   A neat thing of asking "Is this the breath?" is that it forces me to be very observant about what the "this is". Sometimes, I just notice that it's not the breath, I don't categorize, and I just say "This is not the breath". But, when memory and perception have attached to it, when I've fallen into the "hole" and become one with that thought, sucked in, the "This" in "This is not the breath" isn't neutral. So, I can notice that the feeding is not the breath. The allure is not the breath. The re-analysis is not the breath. And, I nudge myself back to just the breath. I notice the shift. The shift is from "This is not the breath" to "This is the breath."
   Almost always, the grudge (or other thought) comes back, but armed with "Is this the breath?", I learn to catch it earlier. Not perfect, but earlier. And, sometimes I can watch it, not in terms of the narrative and plotline, but instead in the emotional-stickiness and how it develops.
   So it might be, "This is the breath. This is the breath. Breath. Breath. <increasing stickiness> Not breath. <More stickiness> Not breath. <Huge stickiness> (my observer says WOW), This really is not the breath." And so I'm flexing my observing muscles and my discernment muscles. And, I am learning the skill of staying indirectly; not by forcing myself to stay, but by being very very carefully watchful.
   Sometimes it helps to name the "this". I'll say "Grandiosity is not the breath." And this ties into seeing the origination and the passing away. I'll keep saying "Grandiosity is not the breath" until the grandiosity is gone. As a small, wholesome celebration, I will sometimes say, "This is now the breath, and not grandiosity." or "Grandiosity not here, just breath".
   Ajahn Geoff relates a story (Of either Ajahn Lee or Ajahn Fuang, I think), where he distinguishes between two types of letting go. Letting go like a pauper, and letting go when there are stakes. Like, when a rich person has a Mercedes Benz and then lets it go. It actually means something, has some bite. But, if a poor person says, "I don't need a Mercedes Benz", it doesn't mean that much. Because they don't actually have a Benz.
   So the "just watching thoughts and passively letting go" is like that of a pauper. One may have zero discernment and ability to observe. And one can then close ones eyes and say, "I'm letting go". It is TRUE and helpful that they aren't grabbing onto that thought, feeding it actively. That is a skill with some benefit. But the stronger way to let go is to watch, carefully, to learn about the intricacies of the feeding/clinging. And to let go with the understanding of what it is that we are letting go of. It's allure and drawbacks. And how many times we've grabbed onto it before.
   This latter way of letting go and staying with the breath is a more durable letting go.
   The passive letting go is useful for mildly tempting things. But I often fail on the bigger addictions or the subtle identity views.
   The active letting go, at its heart, is a very deep letting go of sticky things. In a sense, when I say, "This is not the breath", it carries the deeper subtext that I've looked deeply at what "this" is, so that I can notice it and see it's many forms, both small and large. And that I can see that they are still not the breath. And, this is related to appropriate attention. The thought may look innocuous, but sometimes the subtlest kilesas are the most damaging overall. Like a vine in a crack... not a big deal, but it will slowly rip up the concrete to shreds.

These are some of the situations I've had to deal with when I am doing breath meditation. And the choices I make in how to stay with the breath. Overall, I've found the simple question, "Is this the breath?" a good fit for me. Active but not too active. Discerning, but not too active. Able to deal with the obviously sticky thoughts as well as the subtle ones. As I get more sensitive, I can notice smaller things that are and are not the breath.

I do use the 4 tetrads of Anapanasati and the descriptions of jhana as roadmaps. The question of "Is this the breath?" is directed thought and evaluation (jhana description) and it is "sensitive" (steps 3, 7, 9 of the tetrads). If I'm having an especially noisy mind, I'll adapt and just ask, "Is this a long or not long breath? (step 1 of the tetrads). Which gets me away rom the distracting thoughts with a clearer evaluation of long vs not long. And, when I'm sensitive enough, I can look at calming or dispassion. But I am finding great fruit focusing and developing the sensitivity with "Is this the breath?"

Hope you try it out if you are feeling stuck. May it be helpful and of benefit to you.

UUDR.