Anapanasiti vipassana - the breath of life

Passed down from Buddha himself 2500 years ago, mindfullness with breathing takes us back into the essence of all living beings, the breath itself. For everyone serious about getting to know themselves, a silent retreat has the potential to reveal the basic components of how human nature is built up through the exploration of thoughts, projections, emotions, the ultimate truth, law of cause and effect, impermanence and the de-identification of self. The first step is to silence the ever chattering mind enough to actually be able to look inside. This is where most give up because of lack of patience and the mind's convincing self defensive nature, that will fight for it's right to dominate. It can result in people leaving the retreat early because the mind has concocted up a good reason to be somewhere else at the moment. The riches are vast for the ones that are able to unlock the secrets of the mind and patience is surely a virtue in this matter. With the development of single pointed concentration one will be able to access a sub level of the mind that has all the answers that we seek and also the answers to the questions we didn't even know we were asking.

The 16 steps of Anapanasiti is divided into 4 sections (tetrads)

First Tetrad, development of concentration (Samadhi)

1. Fully comprehend the long breath
2. Fully comprehend the short breath
3. Experiencing all bodies
4. Calming the breath

Second Tetrad, learn what conditions the mind.

5. Experience and contemplate Rapture/Joy (Piti)
6. Experience and contemplate Bliss/Happiness (Sukkha)
7. Fully comprehend the mind-conditioner
8. Calm the mind-conditioner

Third Tetrad, examine and contemplate the mind itself.

9. Contemplate the mind
10. Make the mind delighted
11. Make the mind concentrated
12. Liberate the mind

Fourth Tetrad, Contemplation and experience of impermanence and Dhamma

13. Contemplate and fully comprehend impermanence
14. Dissolving of attachments, dispassion
15. Letting go of all suffering (Dukkha)
16. Emanicipation, liberation, enlightenment.

When the four tetrads are fully contemplated, experienced and cultivated, the seven factors of enlightenment (bojjhanga) will arrive together. These seven factors are: mindfullness (sati), investigation of reality (dhamma-vicaya), energy (viriya), rapture (piti), tranquility (passaddhi), concentration (samadhi) and equanimity (upekkha). When these seven factors of enlightenment are perfected, then higher knowledge (vijja) and deliverance (vimutti) are also perfected.

The man who perfected buddhas teachings, the venerable Buddhadasa (slave of buddha) made the following statement about anapanasiti:

"You will discover something that everyone should find in order to not waste the opportunity of having been born."