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Contemplating the Three Trainings
The four conscious breaths related to feelings focus primarily on sensation, including:
- Joyful feeling: breathing in–out and experiencing a joyful feeling
- Happy feeling: breathing in–out and feeling happiness
- Awareness of feeling: being fully aware of the feeling in the present moment, whether it is pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral
- Calming feeling: breathing in–out and calming the feeling
According to the Vimuttimagga, mental formations are explained as feeling and perception, but in these four breaths, the main focus is on taking care of feelings. Feelings can arise from the body (for example, a toothache) or from perception (for example, sad news, fear of snakes). In the five skandhas, feeling lies between form and perception; feeling manifests as a mental formation, and deeply, as a seed in consciousness. Mindfulness needs to embrace, make contact with, and transform feelings, without separating the subject and object of contemplation.
Shaking Off Attachments and Practicing in the Original Tradition