Basically what we've explained as techniques, is that first we just note, and we come back, we note the distracting thoughts and mental states and we come back. Now if the thought is still very strong, we examine the body, we let go of the meditation subject we're doing and we examine the body, see if there's any stress, tightening of the body and so on. Run the attention through, note parts if you find anything, then go back to your meditation subject. If the same thoughts keep coming, that's when to switch over into Reflection, and generally we say start with Compassion and Lovingkindness unless you become very skilled and you know exactly which other one to use.
Start with Compassion and Lovingkindness towards every person and being that's in the thoughts. Do it for yourself, you have got a problem, do it for other meditators, they've probably got hindrance attacks going on at the moment. See if the mind can then let go of the attachment to the thoughts in that way. If the Compassion and Lovingkindness doesn't work, you go back the breathing and the thoughts keep coming again, change into one of the other Reflections, also into anything that we've been giving you new during the retreat.
We mentioned in the 10-day retreat things like: if you have got lots of future thoughts, to reflect on Death, if you're having a lot of negativities, you reflect on How Fortunate You Are, reflect on your good Kamma, other such things, so you change over into Reflection, trying to bend the energy. It's like you have got this energy of a negative mind state that's pulling you, wanting you to dwell on something; OK we're going to start with that energy but we're going to bend it into something else.
So when you're thinking of the future, in particular, go, "Wow! The future may never come! I may die today." We started with the word "future" in that first sentence, but then we moved into Death Reflection and we keep moving into Death Reflection until finally the wisdom is stronger and the hindrance attack passes by.
Now if nothing works at all, with all the Reflections and so on, it's good to remind yourself of the third Foundation of Mindfulness. When Rosemary explains it, it's just fairly brief because in the Sutta itself, it's fairly brief. But the Buddha says to become aware of your mind states whether they're angry and greedy and so on. And just to know that they're impermanent, to know that they have their own arising and to know they're going to have their own passing. In this particular section of knowing mind states and just being aware they're going to pass, they're going to pass, that in itself gives us a distance from being attached to a mind state.
If you ever look at the Satipattana Sutta, you will see that the third foundation kind of doesn't tell us what to do, whereas the fourth foundation says, ah, see where they came from, see how they go away, see how they won't come again in the future and so on. And for me, personally, it was confusing when I first memorized the Sutta, I wasn't really sure what the third foundation meant. But what it seems to be is a kind of a catch area, if you can't do the fourth foundation you move into the third, and you generally note "It's impermanent, it's impermanent," so that we're not going to react to it with more negativities. Yet generally all the other techniques should work fairly well.