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The Breath That Can Save Your Life (16 Exercises on Mindful Breathing)
There is a film company in Vietnam called Sena Film making “The Sixteen Exercises of Breathing” this summer in Plum Village, based on Thầy Pháp Niệm’s Vietnamese translation of The Path of Emancipation, which records a twenty-one-day retreat “The Sixteen Exercises on Mindful Breathing.” Today we revise the first eight exercises before moving on to the ninth and beyond.
- Identify – breathe in knowing “this is my in-breath,” breathe out knowing “this is my out-breath.”
- Follow – follow the in-breath all the way through and enjoy the fact of being alive.
- Awareness of body – “Breathing in, I am aware of my whole body,” uniting mind and body.
- Relax body – notice tension or pain and allow the body to release it.
- Bring joy – discover joy in the present moment (“Breathing in, I know spring is there…”).
- Bring happiness – deeper calm than joy, savoring like sipping cool water.
- Recognize painful feeling – “My dear little painful feeling, I know you are there.”
- Release tension in feelings – embrace pain with tenderness, like a mother with her child.
Exercises 9–12 concern the mind (third foundation, “contemplation of the mind in the mind”):
- Identify mental formations – recognize any of the fifty-one mental formations.
- Gladden mind – invite sleeping seeds of compassion, joy, love to manifest.
- Concentrate mind – cultivate a samādhi (e.g., impermanence, no-self, emptiness).
- Liberate mind – breathe so as to be free from afflictions, embracing and releasing what binds you.
