The following talk was given at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California.

Please visit our website at audioderma.org. Hello and welcome to this second day on instructions of mindfulness of thinking.

And one of the invaluable ways of getting a handle on thinking so that it doesn't pull us,

would not get swept away in the currents of thought and the river of thoughts.

The train... of thoughts, the train cars of thoughts, the image that's sometimes given of thinking

is that we're standing at a train crossing watching a whole bunch of trains go by and

at some point we find ourselves on the train and we've been on it for a long time

and didn't know it. So these thoughts will

come and the idea is just let them go. Let them come and go. Don't get on the train. Don't get involved in the train.

And one of the ways that can support this

while still clearly knowing that the trains are coming and going without getting on is to feel the body,

to be well connected to your body.

The body is always in the present moment and the body is itself not exactly a thought.

However, the body is influenced by the thought. However, the body is influenced by the thoughts that we have. If the

thoughts are very mild and soft and wispy, maybe we don't feel any connection to the body too much or at all. But at that point, we don't

really need to because it's easy to let go of the thoughts. It's easy to stay with the breathing as we breathe, stay in the present moment. But if it's

hard to stay in the present, if it's hard to stay writing in breath and out breath over time because we get swept away in the trains

of thought.

Then we need some help in practice.

And one of the principles of mindfulness practice is everything is food for mindfulness.

Everything is something that we use. turn to and be aware of.

And so we want to learn how to be mindful of thinking so that we're kind of standing on the on the ground watching the train go by

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