In a previous post, I explored how the First Great Effort — to prevent unskillful states from arising — is not an all-or-nothing operation, but instead a progressive exercise in relative prevention. In this post, I’ll start to explore actual practice methods for making the first great effort.
First to quickly contextualize this: The First Great Effort is one of Four Great Efforts, which belong to Skillful Effort, which in turn belongs to the Eightfold Path.
The First Great Effort and Its Main Method
So the First Great Effort is to direct your effort toward preventing, at least in relative terms, the arising of unskillful states. According to Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, “maintaining unremitting mindfulness” is the primary tool for preventing unskillful states from arising. (In Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness)
That this is the main method is very interesting, and could probably be explored at great length. It’s also quite interesting that, as Gunaratana notes, “Mindfulness requires training, and training requires effort.” Making the first great effort is thus a clear point of interdependence between the two path-factors of Skillful Effort and Skillful Mindfulness.
Five Activities, Practices, or Techniques
Although I myself am not especially accomplished in either path-factor, I have found the following to be helpful:
1. noticing the unskillful state
2. recognizing it as unskillful
3. watching and exercising restraint as necessary to refrain from speaking or acting from it
4. recalling to mind what it means to be unskillful
5. recalling to mind the intentions to prevent and know unskillful states
Although I numbered those activities 1-5, they aren’t necessarily a sequence of steps. The activity numbered as (2), recognizing a state as unskillful, does probably need to be preceded by (1), noticing the state itself. Aside from that, any sequential ordering is, I think, pretty loose, nor do all five need to happen in any given case.
Exploring 1, 2, and 3
It might be that 1, 2, and 3 are key. It seems pretty necessary (1) to notice the state itself, even if you don’t at first recognize it as unskillful. It also seems needed, I think fairly obviously, (2) to recognize that the state is unskillful. This probably happens after noticing the state, or it might also happen simultaneously. Sometimes, in fact, recognizing the unskillfulness of a state doesn’t happen until quite a bit later. That can be discouraging, but it’s still important, especially in the bigger picture of training one’s capacity for awareness and recognition of the unskillful.
It also seems needed (3) to watch the state in question — to keep an eye on it, you might say — and to exercise restraint in order to refrain from speaking or acting from an unskillful state, as the speech and actions would themselves be unskillful. This watching and restraint, I think, can occur even without or even before clearly recognizing a state as unskillful, which is why I don’t insist that (3) always follows (1).
This is for at least two reasons, I think. First, we can train ourself to restrain speech and action when it is not yet clear whether an act would be skillful or unskillful. As a side note, Stoic philosophers even had a name for that particular form of restraint (in translation, “freedom from precipitancy”), and considered it a specific logical virtue. Additionally, we can habituate ourself not to act on unskillful impulses, and this habituation can stop us even before recognizing a state or impulse as skillful or unskillful.
It’s worth noting that the (3) watching and restraint don’t only apply to outward speech and actions, but also to how we “feed” or restrain our inward thoughts, feelings, intentions.
That’s already a threefold practice to apply, rooted in mindful awareness.
Exploring 4 and 5
Activities 4 and 5 might be called supportive of 1-3. Recalling (4) to mind what is unskillful, or what it means that something is unskillful, is very potent. I think it develops that skillful understanding which alters the form and inclinations of one’s will. Very roughly, being unskillful implies that a state or impulse (etc.) tends to cause or lead to harm, suffering, and unfreedom for oneself and for others. Recalling this to mind gives a clearer picture of the nature of an unskillful state, and begins, one way or another, to weaken it and the habit of mind it represents. This is especially the case if you can see how the specific unskillful state, present at that moment, may lead to particular unwanted results.
This recalling can be done when you’re in the midst of observing, recognizing, or restraining an unskillful state. It can also be done ahead of time, as a preventive meditation before heading into an activity, place, etc. which you know causes unskillful states to arise in you. Or it can be done simply as a reflective meditation.
Practice (5), recalling to mind the intentions to prevent and know unskillful states, can also be called “setting an intention,” or committing to an intention and effort. One remembers the intention, recalls one’s previous commitments to it, and commits or re-commits again. Besides this “setting your will,” you’re also setting the intention to remember the intention, or remember the commitment. Like (4), this can be done in the midst of observing, recognizing, and/or restraining a state or impulse, or it can be done in anticipation of some activity, or again simply as a reflective exercise.
Closing Remarks
Those five practices or activities are what first came to mind when thinking about what helps me to attempt the first great effort through the application and development of mindfulness. Again, I am not particularly accomplished at this, but maybe that means what helps me may help others as well. These things are in some ways simple, but they are not necessarily easy.
They also, I find, will tend to open up an ever more complex domain of experience or experiential awareness — in terms of the details and depth of which one begins to become aware. But that itself can be difficult and present challenges. It doesn’t necessarily immediately feel good, especially when you become aware of unskillful states in their unskillfulness, yet the philosophers make a strong case that the gradual training in wisdom is worth it.
I’ll attempt to pursue this practical topic further in subsequent posts, perhaps drawing more directly from Gunaratana’s discussion of the matter.
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