2022-02-18 Satipaṭṭhāna (33) Corpse Contemplation

Insight Meditation Center10min

Gil Fronsdal

00:02

Contemplation of the corpse. In Theravadan Buddhism, sometimes it is understood that one of the best practices, at the time of dying, is the four foundations for awareness, for attention. It is the one most conducive towards liberation, freedom. The time of dying is one of the best times, better late than never, to become free.

Gil Fronsdal

00:30

Sometimes this text we are studying is read at people's bedside when they are dying. Sometimes in Pali – they do not understand it – but somehow it is meant to be beneficial. Sometimes it is read after people die. So this text has a connection to death and dying. Here at the center of it is the contemplation of a corpse.

Gil Fronsdal

01:00

There was offered a small guided meditation with this as a reference point. I do not know if I set it up well enough in the short amount of time we had. I would love to see some comments in the Chat. Brief comments – what it was like, if you were able to follow along with the dissolution of the body meditation. I'd like to know how this was received – what you learned from it – what benefit came from it. Take a couple of minutes here, and I will say a few words until they start appearing. I think here in the West, many people will emphasize the importance of the value of mindfulness of death and dying.

Gil Fronsdal

01:56

[Reads comments from the Chat] Here we go: "Daunting." "Freeing." "Got a sense of no-self." "Very powerful." "Got to the point of the big question, 'Who am I?'" "Made me smile." "Freeing." "Love preparing for my death." "Freeing." "We are not the body." "I found it profoundly freeing." "I noticed the dissolving of attachment." "Very beneficial but do it again." "Very powerful." "Tangible perspective." (They are going very fast now.) "The process helped with reducing fear of death." "Calming." "I pictured myself decaying in a field of flowers." "Felt like a deep knowing of our mortality." "The rising of deep compassion." "I thought I'd be afraid, but ended up in a puddle." "Beautiful." "Spacious." "Onward leading." "First revisiting then very peaceful." "Freeing." "An insight into true reality." "Very spacious." "Hard to come back into my thinking mind." "I felt like I was in outer space." "Reassuring." "Connection to nature and the universe is powerful and comforting." "Body is not myself." "Connected," "Was very light, nonattached, free." "Powerful." "Helpful." "New and different." "Dissolving into space." "Was able to follow." "Peaceful." "I want to go back and listen to the whole series – thank you." "Will have green burial." "Just following breath, pouring in teaching but I was not so ready to take this to my heart." "I wasn't into it." "My body was blown into the wind; identification with a self disappeared." "Spacious." "Really good work." "The sense of increasing space awareness was quite profound." "Each layer became more and more spacious." "Very calm." "Body just a vessel." "Experience of emptiness." "Relieving."

Gil Fronsdal

04:10

Great. Thank you for those who wrote that. I know that this was not going to work for everyone. For those of you who might have found it not so peaceful or nice, hopefully you can just put aside this part of the Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta. We will leave this behind, when we move to the second foundation next week. Before I go on, I just want to mention that I will not be here Monday so we will not have the 7am sitting this coming Monday. We will start again on Tuesday.

Gil Fronsdal

04:51

That is when we start with the feeling tones, the second foundation for awareness, for mindfulness. This is often considered the pivotal part of the Satipaṭṭhāna. I will talk about how structurally, and in different ways, it is pivotal to a huge transition that is going to happen in the practice as we go from the body to the mind.

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