Looking for Sutta reference for Mindfulness Meditation

There isn't an definitive explanation of mindfulness, or how to do it. It is something you have to feel into yourself. All we can really do is talk or write around it.

In any case, I wasn’t able to find my book, which is somewhere on a pen drive. However, the rudiments of the book followed the principle scheme of developing a familiarity with the body and its context such that insight into cause and effect is seen. This too is known or discerned in the same way as the body placement to which disenchantment follows. Please understand that disenchantment isn’t disgust; it simply means one’s mind is no longer enchanted by form. This particular method is mentioned here in the Satipatthana Sutta:

“he remains focused internally on the body in & of itself, or externally on the body in & of itself, or both internally & externally on the body in & of itself.”

"Furthermore, when walking, the monk discerns, 'I am walking.' When standing, he discerns, 'I am standing.' When sitting, he discerns, 'I am sitting.' When lying down, he discerns, 'I am lying down.' Or however his body is disposed, that is how he discerns it.

If one is astute and well versed in the other satipathanas, which might involve memorizing the sutta, then those satipatthanas will naturally come into play as the world around you changes, thus it becomes an intuitive interplay of insights and knowledges instead of a systematized and methodical-based set of tasks. This is critical, because the play of phenomena isn’t bound by rules, although it can be expressed in such a way, of which I’m persistently reminded of by my local council!

The key point is to feel into what is meant by know or discern. It is this ‘knowing’ or ‘discernment’ that one begins to tune into. One becomes familiar with what that sense of knowing is like for them. It is a knowing that is absent of thought and intellect, although some teachers will give a concession to the mind by using a labeling method – it keeps the mind busy, but these are just training wheels. In any case, when that knowing is firmly understood it becomes a type of concentration.

This is not the kind of concentration that you were taught by society. Society teaches an intensely focused concentration brought about by straining the mind and is usually coupled with longing, wanting and striving. That has its uses, but it is not helpful here. We are looking for a relaxed and open concentration, as if you were holding your attention very gently. Nothing is projected outward and nothing is grasped tightly inwards, but there is a non-intellectual understanding of both inner and outer, which later becomes ‘just this’.

The effort to know should be like balancing a stick vertically in your hand. If the stick were to fall away from you - which represents the projection of attention or strenuous effort - then you readjust your hand such that the effort to balance the stick is almost zero. Conversely, if the stick falls towards you - where too much attention has gone inwards - you readjust the effort until the effort is almost zero.

Zen Master Dogen’s interpretation might be that one takes a backward step from the incessant need to know on a cognitive level:

“You should therefore cease from practice based on intellectual understanding, pursuing words and following after speech, and learn the backward step that turns your light inwardly to illuminate your self. Body and mind of themselves will drop away, and your original face will be manifest. If you want to attain suchness you should practice suchness without delay.”

In the Theravada tradition, one might understand this type of discernment or knowing as not giving your attention to the signs and features of your perceptions. It is barely a ‘doing’ of any sort, and that is how one ‘knows’ the placement of the body in its context. It’s so easily overlooked by many practitioners because it’s very boring to the mind, but if you can sit, walk, stand and lay down through this bordem, very interesting things will happen!

In this way, and with regular investigation, there will arise a sense of having both an inward and outward awareness at the very same time. The visual field may widen, giving a sense of spaciousness. One then knows the body and its context. Likewise, one does the same for standing, walking and lying down and in various situations in life.

After some time, a portion of your awareness will always be with the body and a portion with the context, because it has always been like that. In reality, it is not two things, or one thing, but it is ‘just this’. Having the attention placed like this, one then begins to notice how sensations arise in unison with the changing situations of the world. Your receptivity to the body and its environment becomes more sensitive.

It is that sensitivity that gives rise to an advanced form of mindfulness, hence… knowledge of cause and effect through situational awareness arising from knowing the body in its context. Thoughts and feelings are seen to occur in particular situations. This knowledge can dissolve certain cause and effect behaviours, for once you understand how you’re creating your world – and thus your suffering – you become disenchanted by your actions and certain behaviours can cease.

To condense all of that, we don’t have direct awareness. It is an indirect awareness concerned only with the world of the senses; eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body and mind, which animate our internal perceptions giving solidity or form to their appearances. One only moves through these various perceptions of the mind, experiencing a substandard version of reality. Satipatthana widens this perspective such that we can see the bigger picture.

The Mahasatipathana Sutta treats this at a superficial level as do a number of others, but if you want an incredibly thorough dive into traditional mindfulness practice, Ven. Analyo's Satipatthana - The Direct Path to Realization is indispensable. It covers both the sutta and commentarial references to the practice in almost exhaustive detail.