samatha
Buddhist concentration practice
Samatha is a Buddhist meditation practice aimed at developing calm and concentration.
The practitioner focuses attention on a single object—often the breath—to quiet mental agitation and cultivate tranquility.
Samatha is typically paired with vipassana (insight meditation): samatha steadies the mind, vipassana investigates its nature.
She began her practice with samatha before moving to insight work.
Clear-seeing contemplative practice
- tranquilityUndisturbed peacefulness
- concentrationSustained single-minded attention
- stillnessComplete lack of motion
- absorptionProcess of taking in
serenity · mindfulness · focus · equanimity · collectedness · settling · stabilization · centering
Air taken in
- objectTangible entity or aim
- mantraRepeated focus phrase
- visualizationForming mental or graphical images
- countingDetermining quantity sequentially
anchoring · fixation · gazing · candle · loving-kindness · recollection · foulness · charnel
Process of taking in
- tranceSemiconscious, unresponsive condition
- accessRight to enter
- neighborhoodResidential area nearby
- thresholdPoint of beginning
formless · cessation · mastery · emergence · reviewing · bases · nothingness · supernatural
Buddhism of the elders
- PaliBuddhist scriptural language
- suttaBuddhist doctrinal discourse
- BuddhaghosaTheravada's foremost commentator
- raptureOverwhelming ecstatic feeling
hindrances · sloth · torpor · restlessness · doubt
vipassana
Clear-seeing contemplative practice
- tranquilityUndisturbed peacefulness
- concentrationSustained single-minded attention
- stillnessComplete lack of motion
absorption · serenity · mindfulness · focus · equanimity · collectedness · settling · stabilization · centering · unification
breath
Air taken in
- objectTangible entity or aim
- mantraRepeated focus phrase
- visualizationForming mental or graphical images
counting · anchoring · fixation · gazing · candle · loving-kindness · recollection · foulness · charnel · cemetery
absorption
Process of taking in
- tranceSemiconscious, unresponsive condition
- accessRight to enter
- neighborhoodResidential area nearby
threshold · formless · cessation · mastery · emergence · reviewing · bases · nothingness · supernatural
Theravada
Buddhism of the elders
- PaliBuddhist scriptural language
- suttaBuddhist doctrinal discourse
- BuddhaghosaTheravada's foremost commentator
rapture · hindrances · sloth · torpor · restlessness · doubt
- meditationbreathing meditation, breath, breath meditation, mantra, breathing
- BuddhismBuddha, dharma wheel, Four Noble Truths, nirvana, dharma
- Pali Buddhismsutta, vinaya, sangha, buddha, samsara
- Buddhist Mindmind, mental states, mental state, cognition, attention
- Buddhist practicespuja, prostrations, incense offering, meditation retreat, temple worship
- Buddhist teachingssutta, sutra, discourse, teachings, teaching
samathaagitation
Disturbed, restless state
restlessness · distraction · anxiety · discursiveness · turbulence