Not the formal sits — the quality of awareness carrying through daily activity: conversations, transitions, reactions, the texture of ordinary hours.
Right Effort (Sammā-vāyāma)
Definition & Guidance▾
Sammā-vāyāma — the four great efforts (cattāro sammappadhānā):
preventing unarisen unwholesome states from arising; abandoning arisen unwholesome states;
cultivating unarisen wholesome states; maintaining arisen wholesome states.
The operative word in all four is cetanā — intentional mental engagement with the quality of what is arising. Not willpower applied to behavior but attention applied to the mind's own movements.
Sammā-saṅkappa — three qualities of intention: nekkhamma (renunciation — toward release rather than acquisition); abyāpāda (non-ill-will — goodwill rather than aversion); avihiṃsā (harmlessness — compassion rather than cruelty).
These operate beneath action and speech as motivational ground. Wrong intention can accompany technically correct behavior. The question is not what you did but what was driving it.
Kāya — Embodied Awareness
The body as field of practice — outside formal sits.
Day Summary
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How present and non-reactive were you in ordinary life today — outside formal practice?
The Log Itself
This tool can become another object of clinging — the streak as identity, the quality scores as self-affirmation,
the logging as performance. Before saving, a moment of honesty.