How I Meditate
And an attempt at why
It’s a very drowsy afternoon, warm, a little muggy, and calm with thunderstorms in the forecast. A good day for a snooze in a hammock some place quiet. But I’m in an urban place and quiet is at a premium here. Fortunately the Rochester Zen Center is around the corner and they have a Japanese garden in back that is a little oasis.
It’s my meditation spot when the weather is accommodating. I probably have several dozen books on Buddhism and many of them deal with its central practice of just sitting. A lot of words for something that has little to do with words.
I’m not a joiner these days and I don’t belong to a Buddhist group or organization. As I used to say to friends, I see Buddhism not as a religion but as a training regimen, though not in the military meaning of the term. What we train for is cultivating compassion, something lacking in our divided times.
But how do you do that, train for compassion? For me it comes down to patience, the ability to let things unfold at their own speed. It’s something I have always struggled with. But a great way to find patience is just sitting. And this is the way I do it.
It starts with the three Refuges; Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Awakening, truth, and community. Sitting, back straight, eyes open but cast downward, you take a breath and silently say ‘I take refuge in the Buddha’, breath, ‘I take refuge in the dharma’. Breath. ‘I take refuge in the sangha’.
I repeat that sequence three times followed by my vow, which is ‘This practice is for the awakening of all beings’. Three sequences of that. Then I sit and count breaths, not trying to get anywhere, just breathing and letting thoughts go where they may.
Fifteen or twenty minutes of the breathing and then I repeat the refuges and vows. Usually by then my mind has settled and I can just watch the world for a few minutes. In the Zen Garden there are innumerable things to watch. Today it was the breeze in the feathery Japanese maples, bumblebees in the purple vinca blossoms, the pattern in the river rocks scattered within the brick walkways.
There is rarely anyone there but today there was a man tending to the gardens up by the Victorian mansion where the Zen Center is located. It’s a remarkably beautiful brick building of brick with Gothic ornamentation that was donated to the Zen Center when it was founded in the 1960s by roshi Phillip Kapleau, after he spent years studying in Japan.
The donor was the founder of Xerox Corp who was fascinated by Zen.
The Zen Center style is a little too disciplined for me and they tend to attract very competitive minds, or at least they used to. But no one ever bothers me when I’m there except to say hello now and then. I’m very grateful for their presence.
A note about mindfulness: mindfulness as a concept and way of life is having a moment right now, but I recently watched an entire documentary dedicated to it, made by a leading mindfulness institute, and it never actually defined what it is.
Meditation is often used interchangeably with mindfulness as a tool for changing consciousness. But they are not the same thing, in my experience. I always go back to the monk and Zen teacher Thich Nhat Han and his admonition that when you wash dishes, just wash dishes. That is being mindful, to be in the here and now and not thinking ahead or behind or about anything but what you are doing.
Mindfulness is an outcome of meditation, which is not emptying your mind. If you try to empty your mind you’ll find yourself in the elephant quandary; if you are told, don’t think of an elephant, you will first have to imagine an elephant. It’s just the way we think.
So telling yourself not to think is probably just going to unleash a torrent of thoughts rather than clear your head. Instead you dwell in the moment, the breath, the space around you, and just enjoy it.
Why do I do the refuges and vows? It’s not a religious thing. Buddha was very clear that he was not a god to be worshiped, he was a man who had an awakening. For me the refuges and the vows are a way of telling my mind that I am entering a process, a program. They trigger a state of mind that helps me move into a meditative state.
I certainly can’t claim that always works, but I sincerely make those inner statements and they give form to my little meditation sequence. And they help me quiet the thoughtstorm that plagues anyone starting meditation.
Patience or the lack thereof is one of the things that led me to alcohol and may be the principal factor in walking away from it. I suffered from what Lawrence Durrell called the journalist's curse, the sense that something is happening somewhere and I’m missing it. In his masterpiece fiction series, the Alexandrian Quartet, he describes a minor character, a reporter, who simply cannot sit still out of fear of missing a story.
A part of me was that person, although I am not a journalist. I’d like to think that has faded as I get older. Meditation helps.
Martin
~ I write The Grasshopper, a letter for creatives, The Witness Chronicles, a place for my articles on politics and climate, and The Remarkable, a recovery letter, about my addiction and reentry experience. All are weekly and free, however this is how I live and I strongly believe all writers and creatives should get paid, if we provide value. Your upgrade to a paid subscription helps make that happen.
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