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Guided Meditation: Calm Thinking; Dharmette: Introduction to Mindfulness Pt 2 (4 of 5) Thinking Well - Gil Fronsdal

The following talk was given by Gil Fronsdal at Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, CA on December 18, 2025. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.

Guided Meditation: Calm Thinking

Hello and welcome to this series of introductory instructions for mindfulness meditation. Today's topic for the guided meditation is mindfulness of thinking.

Sometimes meditation is associated with not thinking—with the thinking mind becoming quiet and still, with there being no thoughts. Sometimes it is associated with the challenge of distracted thoughts that pull us away into their worlds. We get swept off our feet, out of our minds, and into the world of thinking.

I want to offer you an idea that is not so common about Buddhist practice and thinking: we are not trying to stop thinking, but we are trying to learn to think better. We are learning to think in a healthy, supportive, and liberating way. To learn to think in a different way than we usually do is the art of what we are learning through meditation.

One of the important things to be mindful of is not simply that we are distracted or caught and swept up in our thoughts, but that thinking is a composite made up of different parts. Part of what contributes to distraction is the pressure and tension that goes into thinking. There is a pull, a pushing, an involvement, and an investment that we make in our thoughts. We get engaged in them. They seem important. There is a desire to be thinking, to be concerned, to be worried, to be involved. That desire sometimes comes out of fear, sometimes out of greed, and sometimes out of inspiration and delight.

There is a pressure, a contraction, to think. Sometimes you can feel it like the glue between us and our thoughts—we can't really separate—or like a yoke. One thing to become mindful of is not the thinking itself, but the physical, somatic¹ experience of thinking. We can feel that pressure, that tension, that contraction that goes along with thinking. Gently, that becomes the object of mindfulness. Mindfulness of thinking can be a mindfulness of physical tension.

Sometimes that physical tension comes with a sense of narrowing. Our world becomes very small—some people say kind of dark—when we are involved in thinking. It feels like there is nothing outside the thoughts that is of any interest. As we begin relaxing deeply, the tension of thinking relaxes, and thinking becomes lighter. Thinking becomes softer. There is not the attachment to thinking, nor the preoccupation with thoughts.

The thoughts become lighter, softer, and less prioritized. We are less centered on what we are thinking. This lightness, softness, and ease of thinking is described by the metaphor of a small cloud drifting in an empty sky.

Now we are beginning to come into the capacity, the ability, of unattached thinking—unpressured thinking. As we enter the Dharma and get deeper and more settled in our body, here in the present moment, this can give birth to wise ways of thinking about the present. Wise ways, light ways, soft ways, and non-demanding ways. These are "no expectation" ways of just swimming, navigating, and floating in this world of meditation with thoughts that support us to go deeper, to become more present, connected, quieter, stiller, focused, and happy.

Assume a meditation posture. This posture of meditation is actually quite important, as I emphasized, because it is beginning to create a context for being present that involves more than just the mind. To slump in a couch and have the body be as relaxed as possible might end up prioritizing the mind. But to have a posture that involves some modicum of intentionality brings a sense of presence through the posture.

Within that posture, feel the body. Let the attention roam around and inside of the body. Feel the places of warmth and coolness. Feel the places of solidity and strength. Feel where there is muscular tension and where the muscles are relaxed.

Then, within this body, take a few deeper, fuller breaths, relaxing the body as you exhale. Breathe normally, in a gentle but intentional, purposeful way. Center yourself in the breathing body, as if the rhythm of breathing is a gentle massage of the body from the inside. Relax as you exhale.

Then, feel on the inhale your thinking mind. Not what you are thinking, but the somatic feeling of thinking. Notice any tension, pressure, pushing forward, pulling back, tightness, or somatic feelings of agitation and activation of energy. As you breathe in, feel that. And as you exhale, relax the thinking mind.

If you feel any tension or pressure to think—the way you invest or lean into it—can you find precisely where those sensations are in your body? What size are they? Are they like the head of a pin, the size of a marble, or a tennis ball? How big is this area?

As you follow the rhythm of breathing, gently have attention enter into the tension of thinking and relax it. Soften as you exhale. Is any of the pressure to think associated with any emotion? If it is, for three or five breaths, breathe with that emotion. Allow it to be there. Just know it and feel it, welcoming it and inviting it to relax, too.

Then shift your focus to riding along with your breathing. Breathing in and breathing out. Allowing thinking, the pressure, and the emotions to recede into the background. No longer offering them much attention, let them fade away on their own. Let them remain on the edges of things and stay here with your breathing. Steady yourself on the breathing.

Again, on the inhale, feel any pressure that remains—tension, interest, or glue that you have in relationship to thinking. What you are thinking about is not important. It is the way that you are relating to it, the way that it is being held or pushed. On the exhale, let that relax. Even if it is an infinitesimal softening.

Maybe on the inhale feel how much energy is being funneled into thinking. Is it strong, medium, or light? The energy of thinking. Let the thinking that you are aware of be, but look beyond the edges of it. See if outside of this way of thinking, there might be a quieter, almost effortless thinking about the present moment that has no pressure.

See if you can feel the lightest, effortless way that thinking thinks itself, outside of the usual way of thinking. Maybe thoughts that float by. Maybe thoughts that float up from deep within the body. Maybe thoughts that are kind of in the background.

Take these effortless ways of thinking and think thoughts about being mindful of breathing. Gentle encouragement, instructions, and explorations just to be here with breathing itself. Gentle thoughts of discovery—discovering what is here with the breathing. Discovering where the calm is.

Part of the tension of ordinary thinking is identifying ourselves with thinking, as if you are your thoughts. Can you feel or sense an alternative to that? Letting the thoughts alone. Maybe identifying more with a calm, quiet awareness. Being centered here in the body, being aware more than being centered in thinking. Use gentle, effortless thoughts of staying connected here to the present moment.

As we come to the end of the meditation, see if you can identify within you the quietest, effortless ways of thinking. The kind of gentle, quiet thoughts that have no force behind them. They float up in the lightest, softest way.

Reflect on the value of Metta². The importance of kindness and friendliness, and how kindness and friendliness are related to the softest, gentlest, effortless way of thinking.

In that way of thinking, spend a few moments here with thoughts of goodwill for the people in your life, the people you will encounter, and the wider world of your communities. Wishing them well.

May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free.

And may each of you be well, be peaceful, and be happy by learning to think without any pressure. Learning to think from this deep, quiet, effortless place within that wants the best for you.

Thank you.

Dharmette: Introduction to Mindfulness Pt 2 (4 of 5) Thinking Well

Welcome to this fourth talk in a five-part series. This is part two of the introduction to mindfulness meditation. Building on part one, today is the day where we talk about thinking—the instructions on thinking.

The very basic idea of how to practice mindfulness meditation is to have a grounding place, a place of settling in the body that is the default—the home base for practice. It could be many places. I encourage people who can to use the belly: the movements of the belly, the centeredness, the steadiness, and the weight of the belly. As the belly moves with the breathing, just rest there and come back to that; center yourself there. It could also be with the air going in and out through the nostrils, or the movement of the chest, or different places.

If something else becomes stronger, where there is a pull to be aware of something else because it is loud, then let go of the breathing—or bring the breathing with you—to attend to this stronger thing. Bringing the breathing with you means to breathe with it or through it. Make this new thing the subject of mindfulness. Take it in and learn how to be present for it in a non-reactive way. Then, after a while, go back to your breathing.

This can be done with thinking. If we don't have a clear, full acknowledgment that we are thinking, thinking might just have a life of its own and keep taking over, pulling us into it so we get lost. Part of mindfulness is that if you find yourself thinking a lot, maybe let go of the breathing for a few moments and really acknowledge that you are thinking. It is kind of like looking thinking right in the eye and saying, "I see you. I know that this is thought." Maybe stay with it for three, four, or five breaths. Just know and recognize it without being pulled into it or caught in it. After three, four, or five breaths, come back to the breathing again.

Sometimes thinking is so strong that it needs to become the primary subject of mindfulness—the primary thing we take in, receive, and recognize. One of the things that is invaluable to know about thinking is that there is more to thinking than the content. If we focus on the content of what we are thinking about, it is all too easy to be caught in it, react to it, and build on it. Instead of the content, be aware of the wider experience of what thinking feels like: the physicality of it, the somatic nature of it.

Sometimes that is not so easy to feel, especially if thoughts are very quiet. But if thinking is strong, the muscles in our body get activated. Sometimes you see a furrow in between the eyebrows, a scrunching up of the face, or the jaw gets tight. Sometimes it is a little marble of pressure, tension, or contraction behind the forehead or in the middle of the head. There might be a sense of pressure pushing or leaning forward to think. There might be an activation of energy that is swirling—an activated, restless energy.

Feel the energy of it. Feel the physicality of the tension of it. That is one of the things that keeps thinking going. Without acknowledging and feeling that tension, you can let go of thoughts forever, but the tension is going to keep pumping out new thoughts. What really needs attention is the tension, the pressure, the investment we give to thinking, the leaning into it, and the sense of urgency that is there. If we know that and are mindful of that, something quiets and settles. We don't get pulled in so strongly.

We can also be aware of the emotions that are connected to thinking. Those are often the fuel that gives power to thoughts. If there is fear or anxiety, that gives thinking power. We are invested; it feels important. We lean into it, thinking we have to engage and solve something. If there is strong desire, strong aversion, or a lot of doubt and confusion present, that fuels it too. Sometimes we need to step back and just feel the emotion, the attitude that is connected to thinking. If that is recognized and acknowledged, then there is less fuel for the thinking.

The thing I want to introduce today is the idea that we are not trying to stop all thinking and not think at all. But by reducing the tension, the pressure to think, the urgency to think, the fascination with the thoughts, and the leaning into and identifying with thinking, things quiet down. As that quiets down, it gives us the opportunity to recognize that we can have dual-track thinking.

There are different layers of the mind that think in different ways. As the ordinary discursive thinking quiets down, we might begin to recognize that there is a deeper, quieter, almost effortless way of thinking. It is kind of in the background, or in the periphery, or deep below everything. It might be almost nonverbal thinking, or maybe it is very lightly verbal, or just light images. It is very light, very soft, and gentle.

It might be operating in the background as a gentle recognition of what is happening, a gentle exploration: "What is this? Let me feel this. Let me be here for it." The idea is to feel this effortless, deeper, quieter way of thinking that is not so interested in stories, not so interested in the future and the past. It is really attending to and caring for what is here right now. Encourage that side of it. Take refuge in that gentle thinking about the present moment and have it help you become more centered in the practice. Have it help you to explore and be mindful.

It can be as simple as recognizing, "Oh, there is a little bit of tension at the top of the inhale. I feel a little bit held in the chest. What is that? Let me feel that. Let me be with that. It's okay. Let me be with it." It is a kind of gentle exploration, a gentle saying, "Stay there." It is not any more complicated. It is not asking, "Well, why did this happen? And why did my second-grade teacher do that?" It is just, "Oh, this is how it is now. Let me be with it. Now I've been with it for a while. Let me settle. Let's see if it can relax. Return to the grounding place of breathing."

So there is this idea that there are different tracks of thinking. Part of what mindfulness can begin showing us is a track of thinking which doesn't have that strong somatic association. There is no pressure or tension behind it. We don't identify with it, thinking "this is who I am." It is not necessarily caught in the mood of different emotions. It is a kind of quiet, supportive thinking that leads us to the end of thinking—to the thinking becoming even quieter, stiller, slower, wiser, and kinder.

If you are just letting go of thought and coming back to the breathing, you are not learning anything. You are not learning to understand and deepen your wisdom about what this thinking is. From time to time, it is good to take the process of thinking into account and to be mindful of it. What does that process feel like? Not the content, but the process, the activity of thinking.

You start seeing how much we identify with it, how much glue there is, how wedded we are to it, and how much investment we put into thinking ("They're so important, these thoughts I have," even though I've had these same thoughts a thousand times). We start feeling the tension, the pressure, the pull, the justification, and the strong interest. Maybe something begins somatically to relax and soften.

That quiets the thinking down enough that you can begin recognizing a kind of effortless way of thinking. A thinking that is very light. It kind of floats like a cloud drifting in an endless sky. It has no solidity, no substance, no weight, no hardness. It is almost like a hologram in terms of its substantiality.

Begin appreciating that there can be a way of thinking without pressure, without expectation, without demand, without self, without a complicated story. Just simple being present here in the present moment experience. That effortless, light, quiet way of thinking maybe connects mindfulness to kindness, to goodness, to warmth and compassion, because it is a thinking that comes maybe from the heart—or from deeper than the heart even.

Mindfulness of thinking can lead us to thinking in better ways. Because we have to think—that is an ordinary part of life—can we think better? Can we think in ways that are nourishing for us rather than debilitating? Can we think in ways that are healthy, enlivening, and nice rather than stressful? That is the opportunity of mindfulness of thinking.

I would encourage you today to periodically, as much as you can through the day, stop and notice the attitude, tension, physicality, and somatic nature of how you are involved with thinking. See if it is possible to relax the thinking mind and begin seeing: is there in fact a substrata, a second thought track, that maybe is more healthy for you than the loud thought track that you usually live with? And what is it like if you start attuning yourself, aligning yourself, with this second thought track that is maybe healthier?

I hope this becomes a fascinating and useful discovery for you. May your thinking bring you much joy.

Thank you.