section_path: Practice (paṭipatti)/Meditation/Forms
section_name: Forms
paragraph_text: Forms
  
  Theravāda Buddhist meditation practice varies considerably in technique and objects. Currently, there are also various traditions of Theravāda meditation practice, such as the Burmese Vipassana tradition, the Thai Forest Tradition, the esoteric Borān kammaṭṭhāna ('ancient practices'), the Burmese Weikza tradition, Dhammakaya meditation and the Western Insight Meditation movement.
  
  Theravāda Buddhist meditation practices or Bhavana (mental cultivation) are categorized into two broad categories: Samatha bhavana (calming), and Vipassanā bhavana (investigation, insight). Originally these referred to effects or qualities of meditation, but after the time of Buddhaghosa, they also referred to two distinct meditation types or paths (yāna).
  
  Samatha ("calm") consists of meditation techniques in which the mind is focused on a single object, thought, or gatha, leading to Samādhi '. In traditional Theravāda it is considered to be the base for vipassanā ("insight"). In the Theravāda-tradition, as early as the Pāli Nikayas, the four jhānas are regarded as a samatha -practice. The eighth and final step of the Eightfold Path, Right Samadhi, is often defined as the four jhanas. In the Pāli Nikayas, Jhānas are described as preceding the awakening insight of the Buddha, which turned him into an awakened being. Yet the interpretation of jhana as single-pointed concentration and calm may be a later re-interpretation in which the original aim of jhana was lost.
  
  Vipassana ("insight", "clear seeing") refers to practices that aim to develop an inner understanding or knowledge of the nature of phenomena (dhammas), especially the characteristics of dukkha, anatta and anicca, which are seen as being universally applicable to all constructed phenomena (sankhata-dhammas). Vipassana is also described as insight into dependent origination, the five aggregates, the sense spheres and the Four Noble Truths. It is the primary focus of the modernist Burmese Vipassana movement. In western countries it is complemented with the four divine abidings, the development of loving-kindness and compassion.
  
  Vipassana practice begins with the preparatory stage, the practice of sila, morality, giving up worldly thoughts and desires. The practitioner then engages in anapanasati, mindfulness of breathing, which is described in the Satipatthana Sutta as going into the forest and sitting beneath a tree and then simply to watch the breath. If the breath is long, to notice that the breath is long, if the breath is short, to notice that the breath is short. In the "New Burmese Method" the practitioner pays attention to any arising mental or physical phenomenon, engaging in vitaka, noting or naming physical and mental phenomena ("breathing, breathing"), without engaging the phenomenon with conceptual thinking. By noticing the arising of physical and mental phenomena the meditator becomes aware of how sense impressions arise from the contact between the senses and physical and mental phenomena, as described in the five skandhas and paṭiccasamuppāda. The practitioner also becomes aware of the perpetual changes involved in breathing, and the arising and passing away of mindfulness. This noticing is accompanied by reflections on causation and other Buddhist teachings, leading to insight into dukkha, anatta, and anicca. When the three characteristics have been comprehended, reflection subdues and the process of noticing accelerates, noting phenomena in general without necessarily naming them.
  
  According to Vajiranāṇa Mahathera, writing from a traditional and text-based point of view, in the Pāli Canon whether one begins the practice by way of samatha or by way of vipassanā is generally seen as depending on one's temperament. According to Vajiranāṇa Mahathera, it is generally held that there are two kinds of individuals. Those of a passionate disposition (or those who enter the path by faith) attain Arahatship through vipassanā preceded by samatha. Those of a skeptical disposition (or those who enter by way of wisdom or the intellect) achieve it through samatha preceded by vipassanā.