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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Mar 30, 2015 - 05:34am PT
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He said: The problem with doing your own thing is you only do what you like and you don't do what you don't like so it becomes a ego oriented practice which ends up having the opposite intention of buddhist meditation ie. Vipassana or zen or tibetan; and consequently has very limited value in creating a space where true insight can happen.
He replied: That sounds a bit dogmatic to me, although that is certainly one way to look at it.
This is a great thread and I don't want to introject any bad mojo, but greasing this squeaky wheel is worth a few words.
As mentioned, meditation is NOT philosophical. The "What is Mind?" thread is. So IMO it's good to leave that stuff over there.
That much said, meditation, however one practices (I don't say, "however you practice it," because most of the time the practice chooses you), must be one of the most slippery adventures a human can ever experience. The reasons there are many various types of practice is that it is not one-size-fits-all, though as someone mentioned, the secular practices like that taught by John Zinn ("The Full Catastrophe" is a must-read) reach across all types.
Point is, the most suitable practice for a given person depends on your nature and learning style and physical makeup. In my experience, a super ascetic, no frills practice like Renzai Zen is far too stark and gnarly for most people. For others, Eastern-centric approaches will have too many cultural accretions to feel right. You need to experiment and see what is possible. Vapassana is a great practice for many.
One of the chief challenges is to avoid the trap - and no one can completely - of letting your ego direct the practice with ideas about "doing it my way," what they call "cowboying" the practice. This come from the particularly American notion that "I don't need no stinking teacher," and that since (in this view) it is all subjective anyhow, "one way to look at it" (as I quoted above) is always the equal of any other way. So don't tell me I need to do it this way or that way because you don't know.
We easily can see how stubborn and self/ego reliant this is. Most likely the fear is that the only way to do it differently is to abandon ones autonomy and hand it over to some guru. This is largely untrue, though there are many pitfalls with any practice - for example, Zen has a high rate of drunkenness and profligate behavior.
No one who has been around meditation for long will deny that there many objective truths per the practice. For example, without training, our attention will glom onto whatever idea, feeling, memory, impulse etc. that has the greatest and most immediate charge. Or the fact that the mind follows the body and that good breathing is a proven way to get the mind to settle - ergo the need to keep your spine straight so your diaphragm is not compressed making breathing difficult. These and many other little instructional tools are helpful and are common stuff taught by competent teachers - along with loads of other things, none of which require beliefs.
What's more, as Sasaki Roshi once told me, it's easier to get a bonfire with many logs. We have all experienced this, how it's easier by and large to work out in a gym with people or practice yoga with a group, just to get the juices flowing. Private practice, in total solitude, is invaluable, and part of the whole deal, but it's not the whole deal. We all need course correction most of the way, as well as expert instruction, as is the case in any viable field of study, perhaps moreso with a subject so slippery and open to distortions as our meditation adventures.
So we can say without question that seeing instruction and working in a group - at least some of the time - is not merely "one way to look at it," but is the shortest road to Rome. The only people who ever insist differently are those who have never done the intense group retreats, which have and will always be an essential part of serious practice, providing crucial material not open to the "cowboy."
Lastly, the idea that a dedicated meditation practice is some kind of fu-fu hot tub New Agey fluff jive we do in our down time is not something that squares with our experience. At all. A serious meditation retreat is a challenging physical and psychological adventure and is likely the most intense thing you will experience for a good long time. None of this is easy, that's why we normally seek all the help we can get, including sound teachers and fellow adventurers to walk the path together.
JL
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L
climber
California dreamin' on the farside of the world..
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Mar 30, 2015 - 07:45am PT
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Just found this very short video by Alan Watts, one of the key people in bringing meditation to the west.
I worked with some of his meditation practices in the early '90s with phenomenal results.
[Click to View YouTube Video]
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Mar 30, 2015 - 08:06am PT
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JL,
For now I shall continue the simple breathing and counting meditation that was suggested to me here because it is having the desired effect of quieting the mind and calming the body which is what I set out to do in the first place.
As per yours and others suggestions I don't have a response, except to say point taken, and that I will try to be open minded about the options available to me as I try to learn what the sieve of my rebellious character would let through for me to contemplate. But then you obviously know about that little flaw.
-bushman
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Mar 30, 2015 - 11:09am PT
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'On Foolishness'
The time has come to put to rest,
My foolish ways,
I think it best,
Notwithstanding wastefulness,
Regretting all distastefulness,
Habitually intuitively,
I'll put the willful pen to rest,
To clear the mind of useless clutter,
And words unwise my lips to utter.
-bushman
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Mar 30, 2015 - 11:39am PT
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You meditators have a nice thread here. I enjoy reading the posts. Good to see Largo joining in.
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NutAgain!
Trad climber
South Pasadena, CA
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Mar 30, 2015 - 02:58pm PT
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Lots of good material here so far.
Largo came closest to articulating the biggest question for me in relation to this thread: What is the objective or intention associated with pursuing meditation?
People approach the topic from such different experiences, with different unmet needs, with different ideals and values and preferences, and different hopes/expectations, that a preliminary discussion ends up with a soup of interesting material, a sort of "brain storm" of notes, waiting to be organized or synthesized into a larger framework that encompasses the variety of perspectives.
Here's an initial stab in that organizational direction (not sure how to make hierarchical bullets here):
Why Meditate?
* What needs does it satisfy
** Acceptance - when coupled with a peer group or authority figure that values meditation
** Mental/Emotional issues
*** Anxiety, Fear
*** Unquiet mind, inability to let go of the past or future and focus on the present
** Relief from pain
*** Momentary distraction
*** Awareness, identifying sources of pain to enable long-term resolution
** Pleasure
*** Beauty of breathing, the flow of blood through our veins, and perceiving the small miracles of life
*** Beauty of micro and macro objects and concepts and ideas around us
** Spiritual connection and perception
*** Part of a greater whole
*** Awareness of ideas, concepts, and objects beyond our mundane conception
What is Meditation?
* Perceptions/experiences while in a meditative state
** Emotional
** Intellectual
** Physical
** Spiritual
* Meditation vs. Numbing and Distraction
** Direction/focus of observation and perception
*** No Focus
Absence/vacuous nihilist existence
Passive observation of external stimuli, and passive observation of our emotional/spiritual/physical/intellectual reactions to those external stimuli
*** Inward - awareness of signals from the physical, emotional, spiritual, and intellectual portions of ourselves, guided by probing questions and directed thought
*** Outward - awareness of the myriad sights/sounds/smells/textures and other sensory input we receive in the present moment; awareness of our being in relation to our friends and family, our community, our world, our universe
** Awareness and Signals
*** Fixation on signals that generate pain, reducing presence and awareness
*** Can't process all signals... prioritize!
*** "Reducing the volume" of loud external signals
Activities/situations that demand full focus, blocking other painful signals (which is liberating), but leaving no room for meditation
Activities/situations that create space for contemplation
Methods/Practices of Meditation
* Common themes/components of meditative practices
** Remove distractions (reduce "loud" external and internal signals, enabling quieter signals to be heard)
*** isolation from communication with others
*** isolation from work and family responsibilities, TV, games, etc.
** Increase perception of "quiet" external and internal signals
* Rituals - perceptual anchors to achieve a desired mental state
** sights
*** fire
*** fixed images
** sounds
*** bells, chimes
*** om/aum
** smells
*** incense
** tactile
*** clay/pottery
*** gardening
*** walking barefoot at the beach
** repetitive actions
*** breathing exercises, yoga
*** tai chi, martial arts
*** running, walking, hiking, swimming, biking
** contemplative motions: while body in rest between periods of intensely focused activity (rock/ice climbing - belaying; surfing - waiting)
** Specific practices designed to reconcile internal conflicts between intellect, emotions, and body
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PSP also PP
Trad climber
Berkeley
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Mar 30, 2015 - 04:26pm PT
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NutJob: it doesn't need to be that complicated. But you illustrate a point that many people really have no actual experience with meditation but for some reason think they can lead them selves in a meditation practice.
In 2015 there are many very good resources out there and vipassana centers has exploded (imo due to it's removing alot of the asian cultural trimmings).
So rather than creating an organizational treatise on how and why to take up fishing just go find a good fishing teacher and group.
Probably a better question would be how do you know they are a good teacher when you know almost nothing of the subject?
Luckily with the internet you can get access to dharma talks and know most of the gossip about almost any teacher or group.
You do have to be careful of bad teachers ; self appointed teachers , teachers that are abusive etc.. One of the biggest problems teachers have is people put them on pedestals and become attached to the teacher and the practice forms rather than just using them to help them live a more compassionate life.
Buddhist meditation practice is based with compassion.
Typically first time practitioners start with what is in it for me and if you practice diligently with proper guidance it will grow to where you only practice for others.
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Mar 30, 2015 - 06:25pm PT
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That was straight up informative, PSP.
I'm glad to know the end game for some is more the we would want for just ourselves.
Typically first time practitioners start with what is in it for me and if you practice diligently with proper guidance it will grow to where you only practice for others.
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EP
Trad climber
Way Out There
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Mar 31, 2015 - 08:38am PT
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You going to see Dark Star Orchestra April 12th?
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L
climber
California dreamin' on the farside of the world..
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Mar 31, 2015 - 12:53pm PT
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What is the objective or intention associated with pursuing meditation?
An interesting question which many minds (like your own) have no doubt pondered over the millennia.
The funny thing is, I have a strange sense that it isn't a person's "mind" that chooses to pursue meditation. It's something deeper within their being.
My own experience was this:
1. Hearing about meditation and all the "good" things it was supposed to do for me
2. Thinking about meditation as the flavor of the month for stress/anxiety relief
3. Attempting to "meditate" by sitting cross-legged on the floor and thinking about things
4. Lying down and attempting to "meditate" by thinking about things...and falling asleep
5. Giving up after 3 days out of sheer boredom and lack of anything but a sore derrière.
Two months later I was at a retreat called The Excellerated Business School for Entrepreneurs in Hawai'i. We began the program with a group meditation, lead by a man who'd worked closely with Alan Watts, one of the guys famous for bringing mediation to the west.
The mediation he had us do was something Alan had been taught by the Aboriginals of Australia, and a method of meditating totally foreign to me. We stood across from a partner with our eyes closed holding hands, and basically imagined sending positive energy out into the room.
It was the silliest, most idiotic thing I'd ever done.
After about 5 minutes of going along with this lunacy, I decided to open my eyes and look around. But before I could lift an eyelid, I was hit by a wave of such intense energy, I think I would've fallen over if my partner Wallace hadn't been holding my hands.
I have never experienced anything like this before or since. Although my eyes were tightly closed, my inner vision was filled with radiating blue light...the color you see around dolphins twenty feet beneath the surface of the ocean. Beautiful beyond words, iridescent, shimmering blue.
And I was filled with euphoria. Unspeakable euphoria. Only there wasn't an "I" any more. I was everywhere and everything. I wasn't standing in a conference room on the Big Island of Hawai'i holding my friend's hand...I was the air that filled the room and the island that held the Kona Surf Resort and I was my friend, too. And all the other people in the room, and the ocean outside the door.
And I was in love with all of it. And all of it was in love with me.
Only there really wasn't a "me", just an awareness experiencing the whole thing.
I came back from this "awareness" to find the entire group of 23 meditators standing in a circle staring at me. The leader of the meditation wanted to know what just happened. I didn't know what just happened, all I knew was that my shirt was wet from tears of ecstasy, and my partner Wallace had tears running down his face and onto his shirt, too. He'd "gotten it" vicariously from me, he said.
I didn't know what happened, but I was high from it for three days. I understood the ocean and the Earth and life itself in ways I can't explain. It was all so good, and everything was as it was meant to be, this I knew.
And then the beatific feeling began to fade, as did the intense knowingness, and three days later I was just me again, a participant at a business retreat in Hawai'i.
Not long after that experience, I heard about the 10-day Vipassana meditation course in North Fork, California. I had no idea what it entailed, but I signed up for the very next one.
The Vipassana course taught me to actually meditate, and though I haven't found the Blue Light again, I've experienced some pretty profound states of being on my meditation cushion. As far as an objective or intention where meditation is concerned, I feel my mind is only the travel agent that gets my airfare and rental car booked. My mind is not the "awareness" that has decided it's time to go on the trip.
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TWP
Trad climber
Mancos, CO & Bend, OR
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Mar 31, 2015 - 01:14pm PT
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L just took a stab at answering this question:
"What is the objective or intention associated with pursuing meditation?"
Here is my answer.
In 1969 at age 18 I read Phillip Kapleau's "Three Pillars of Zen" which described the objective of Zen mediation as reaching "satori" or "enlightenment." The Buddha achieved "enlightenment" and then shared his experience and knowledge with the word. Eureka, the birth of Buddhism itself.
Reading this book awakened in me the possibility that human beings were capable of reaching enlightenment by practice of meditation.
I did not know if this was true or not; however, I decided I wanted to achieve enlightenment if that was possible for me. The message was that mediation was the path to enlightenment; ergo I decided I wanted to spend this lifetime meditating regularly until I either died trying to obtain enlightenment or in fact obtained same. I viewed this as a worthy pursuit and my life's work.
It's now 2015 and my views have developed. Meditation has been integral to my life and evolution of my world view. I no longer believe I will ever be one wit more enlightened than I am today; yet I happily and gladly will continue my meditation until the day I die.
You can purchase this book at Amazon for $2.64. It's the only Zen book you will ever need to read.
http://www.amazon.com/Three-Pillars-Anniversary-Updated-Revised/dp/B0076LTS22/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1427832926&sr=1-2&keywords=three+pillars+of+zen
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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I second the thought per the "Three Pillars."
My first zen instructor, who only spoke Japanese, said he only knew the Heart Sutra, and never read any other Zen lit. Many modern practitioners are doing the practice with NO texts at all, just feedback from the teacher and peers, and the practice.
Wonderful story, L.
JL
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MikeL
Social climber
Seattle, WA
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NutAgain!: What is the objective or intention associated with pursuing meditation?
My friend, most words in your question points to issues that can liberate you. My response to each and every one would be “Mu.”
The best thing about your statement is that it is a question. Allow that to blossom, and follow where it takes you. I would not try to answer the question, if I were your advisor, for that will only give rise to conceptualizations (your post lists many). Instead, use the question as an energy source, as an impetus. If you aren’t looking specifically for answers, then you are likely to be open and sensitive to what you will stumble across.
In business and the social sciences, we call this kind of approach “action learning,” “action research,” or “action science.” The notion is different than typical research methods, which tend to plan everything out for every step and then execute the steps until completed. Action research, on the other hand, is systematic mucking around. One first has a question, then there is some data collection, but data collection and analysis usually suggests new questions, which entail different data collection and analysis, and so on. Visualize peeling an onion, but at every layer, one comes to see a different issue that calls for a new formulated question. It’s not the kind of research that can be readily published in the journals (too messy), but it tends to be social, participative, and some argue more relevant and pragmatic. It is also very empirical because theories tend to be subordinated and de-emphasized when compared to pure findings. Last it relies heavily on self-reflection because the real research instrument is YOU, the recognition of which is changing with every iteration. Now you’re into a negative feedback loop, one that is centrifugal rather than centripetal: instead of zeroing in on a final answer or some final essence, it increasingly throws you out farther and farther away from what you think you know and can pin down.
With all that said, I’ll make some loose predictions of your experiences. First of all, I think you will find no final answers. Second, you become aware of NOT fewer and fewer questions, but more and more questions. There are zillions of questions, none of which can finally be answered. (Certainly not certainly.) From this, questioning will become less and less burning. Conceptually, you come to find that you don’t really need to have questions, much less answers. You begin to see situations as simply complex sets of causes and conditions.
There are no end states that you finally get to. There is no achievement. It’s not about doing anything. This thing about meditation is about being . . . just being. Action may be character (said F. Scott Fitzgerald), but I think you’ll find at the end of the day that action and achievement are just running around in circles.
In Satsangs, when no one has a question for a teacher, a teacher will either feel that there is something that needs to be said, or most often he or she will say nothing at all, and long periods of silence will ensue. I have come to find those the very best times with my teacher and my peers. It’s delicious. The silence is deafening, the moment of here-and-now is pregnant with infinite openness, and there is sense of immediacy floating all around me. And, if you will, Nothing is going on.
I am so surprised that most people can’t stand to be still or quiet with one another. They appear to lack reserve, aplomb, dignity, calm, confidence, ease, savoir faire, grace, repose, insouciance, nonchalance.
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MikeL
Social climber
Seattle, WA
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Do not trust words. Trust emotions or instincts. They self-validate in stronger ways. It’s difficult to doubt an emotion or an instinct. The same can’t be said for words or thinking.
Meditation is like that.
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feralfae
Boulder climber
in the midst of a metaphysical mystery
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If someone is starting meditation, and wishes a fairly culture-neutral perspective on the practice, one might try Jon Kabat-Zinn or Tara Brach on meditation. There is quite a bit of information available on YouTube.
I began meditating at 13. The difference between meditation and Quaker silent worship varies only in intention, and not much at all in practice, as near as I have been able to tell over the years. Anything which quiets the mind and body, allows for a more intimate relationship with our own awareness, and expands our sense of being a part of one connected reality, seems worthy of investing some time.
It is also a very good way to get to know self better. It is nice to have found this thread.
Thank you.
feralfae
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TWP
Trad climber
Mancos, CO & Bend, OR
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"The difference between meditation and Quaker silent worship varies only in intention, and not much at all in practice, …"
Yes and no to the above statement.
I grew up a Quaker so attended many "silent meetings." Quakers are sitting in silence with the intention to speak to the group if so moved by the "inner light." The sitting thus is quite self-conscious and intentional. The messages thereby delivered tend to have a heavy dose of politics and self-righteous sermonizing along the line of: "Isn't it a traverse that …. this" or "We really should do … that." I never heard a single Quaker message that sounded like a mirror image of Buddhism's the Four Noble Truths or the path to enlightenment.
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feralfae
Boulder climber
in the midst of a metaphysical mystery
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Hmmm ...
Who told you to sit in silence waiting for inspiration to speak to the group? I never, ever learned or heard of that. But there are stranger things that I have not yet learned, so I am sure some meetings have this premise. I am thinking about this.
I sit in silence to connect with the inner voice, the inner Light, and seldom hear anything worth sharing, as far as I can tell. And we don't get a lot of commenting. I remember commenting once in the last several years. That was to share a short poem which came to me about sitting in silent awareness. But we have one 90-year old woman who routinely shares songs with us during meeting. When I was a child, there was a man (who was around 90 as well), who used to share during meeting, but usually about the need to abandon war and find other ways to settle disputes. I think our meeting might get politicized if some had their way, but they seldom speak either. Mostly, we sit, quietly.
Thinking . . . I have been to other meetings, however, where you are right: speaking seems to become an opportunity to advance personal political agendas, although I have always thought that was rather intrusive into what I thought was to be as pure a process of inner dialogue as possible. Since I meditate daily, I suppose that habit causes me to carry that practice into meeting. I have not closely inquired of others about their practices during silence, however. There are a couple publications (Pendle Hill) on Zen and being Quaker, which you may have read.
I'm usually too lost in inner exploration to be self-conscious in the way I think you may mean. Feeling that there would be an expectation to speak would totally turn me off to the practice, and make it into something I would not find very helpful, I think. But YMMV. :)
Thank you
feralfae
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NutAgain!
Trad climber
South Pasadena, CA
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One of my patterns, and peeling back the onion:
I need to know, need to be right
Earn approval, earn acceptance,
I'm not enough, I'm not ok
I don't deserve to be happy
I don't deserve to be
It's an old and deeply embedded one, which in day-to-day life does not hold so much influence over me as it once did, but it is still firmly in place. Ironically, sharing this is both an effort to rewrite this pattern and a way to repeat it, a slippery seeking of approval by acknowledging my need to seek approval. It came to my attention when I noticed my reaction to some other posts on this thread.
I started this reply with the intention to share some of my experiences that intersect with meditation (i.e. my defense), and I noticed each of my thoughts began with the word I. I kept hearing in my head "there is no I" and erased what I started with. And yet I still use I.
I guess one of the roses for me to stop and smell these days, to revisit and breath deeply again from my present perspective, is learning to not need to prove I'm the smartest. As a kid that was a form of defense, a buttress behind which I could hide from the sea of "I'm not ok". But as an adult, it's just a big block that makes my world smaller and darker.
I've embraced this in the past, but perhaps too much in the form of rebelling against the fruits of my intellect or receiving acknowledgement for it, rather than simply embracing my basic goodness and simply letting love in. Until I let these obstacles slip away, it will limit how much love and compassion I radiate.
Edit: That sounds like another excuse... This dangerous thread has made me pay more attention to my spirit which I have been neglecting for a while, and there are a backlog of messages queued up!
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