Resolution 2025: Practice Meditation

I was once angry and full of ardor in India (Sharon on left), with Dipa, Dipa Ma, and Joseph G?

Mindfulness is attention, bare attention, but it's not just attention, which we advert to at will. Mindfulness (sati) is a dispassionate looking on without expectations or resistance but rather full of allowing and acceptance. That kind of looking and listening. People all over this country misuse the word "mindfulness" everyday, never realizing that when the Buddha used it, and he used it a lot, like about 14 times in the 37 Requisites of Enlightenment, he meant something that people understood from other things he had said. There's no sense in thinking that we know if we don't, as that will only frustrate us. Wrong mindfulness is a danger. Could make a person feel anxious or unpleasant or distressed. Real allowing, like Tara Brach talks about, is the immediate antidote to those kinds of temporary states.

Just some words of uplift from Wisdom Quarterly

I should probably practice the Path, right? - Ya think? Nah, let it practice you, doing through you, naturally. - What, by some kind word to a cashier? - No, just real being there, noticing without judging or evaluating, expecting or measuring, wanting anything to be any different than it actually is. Just presence. - Ugh. Sounds dreadful. - Yeah, Daria, y'know, we're alive anyway, what if we were to do the radical act of living it? We're there anyway, going through the motions.

By developing the practice of "mindfulness" (sati, satipatthana, "balanced effort," sthira-sukha, not too tight, not too lax, bare present moment awareness that is full of acceptance, gently abandoning resistance, internally letting go, nekkhkamma), it becomes effortless and habitual to stay in the present moment.

It is always the present moment, which is really all there is, as much as we miss the mark most of the time. We drag the past or future here to waste this moment with two infinite unrealities, going over the no-longer-existent or the not-yet-and-maybe-never-to-be-existent.

Rather than abandoning ourselves, let's be present with ourselves free of resistance. In this way we can open to our lives and realize our potential for the stages of enlightenment in this very life. Western lay practice is particularly suited to it; however, our mental habits of rushing, striving, objectifying, measuring, comparing, goal settling, muscling, striving, struggling, and forcing all get in the way. We have yang, okay.

The West has very much misunderstood one thing about the Path the Buddha pointed out. It does not need stronger and stronger determination, with the intensity to allow one's blood to dry up and bones become dust. This is sure to fail. This is exactly why the wandering ascetic Siddhartha kept failing to find what he was looking for. What he needed was balanced-effort which, therefore, meant balancing yang with yin, stiffness with softness, striving with allowing, contentment (santussita) over a sense of urgency (samvega). But ask around. It's as if no one has ever heard the oldest and most popular story in the world, the Allegory of the Buddha's Life or "Every Person's Quest"). It's not only about him and what he let go, overcame, saw for what it was, and awakened as a result, it is about us, too.

Let us now practice our powerful yin. Powerful? The Earth is very yin, wet and solid, sitting, observing without getting sucked in, sometimes immovable. It is not holding on with brute force or clinging as we might conclude. It is just allowing, and its nature is such.

We are not making up the Truth, memorizing it, but finding it and allowing it to reveal itself like a sitter at a still forest pool who need only sit still all ever so gentle breaths to come and go, and marveling at all the marvelous forest creatures who present themselves at the waterside to drink.

We are softly, vigilantly noticing, so much so that we may begin to notice what has been there to be found all along. It may reveal, it may not. Let it. Allow it either.

The Buddha did not create enlightenment (bodhi) or liberation (nirvana). They have always been, for they are unmade, unformed, unfabricated.

The path-of-practice to realize the liberating Truth, that he made known again finally allowing the jhanas and their purifying affects on his heart/mind then immediately undertaking systematic insight practices (fourfold sati-patthana). Mindfulness provides stability for the first by bringing back the wandering mind again and again, having noticed it is of a nature to wander off, then bringing laserlike attention on the Four Foundations of which one is mindful. (See the Maha Satipatthana Sutta for the details on this).

Now that it, the Truth, the Dhamma exists in the world and there are peaceful places to withdraw to and practice, now that we have peace, sufficient food, imperfect but sufficient health, and just the beginnings of clarity, let us determine to investigate. The Dhamma (Dharma) is inviting us to "come and see" for ourselves.

There is nothing to believe or accept ahead of time, just the willingness to persist to the culmination of serenity (samadhi, the jhanas) and insight (vipassana). The Kalama Sutta makes it all open and a great place to begin, not falling into misunderstanding by skimming but reading it to the end.

Sharon Salzberg is an amazing living teacher able to both explain and point from experience. - Wisdom Quarterly.

The place is? Mm, somewhere else? The time is? Ugh, some other time? If we never practice and make a persistent effort rather than waiting for a "perfect plan," we will wander aimlessly upcycling and downcycling without end.

Encouragement from the Buddha

Hey, where'd you come from, li'l guy?

Maybe this will be encouraging for the philosophical types, not that we Westerners suffer any of that tendency. No, not us. One time a conniving sophist came to the Buddha with a trick question, even though the Buddha could perfectly well see his heart and his motivation/intention. He innocently asked, something to the effect of:

"O, Great Aryan Guru-jii, those who practice your Path, will they all attain the goal, or half of them, or none of them, or how is it?" You'll never guess what the Buddha replied. Go on. Guess.

(Did he by any chance say 144,000? Because that would be quite a coincidence!) No, he didn't say that.

He remained silent. His attentive attendant monastic Ananda, one of the most beloved figures in all of Buddhism, became distressed. The Brahmin repeated his question a second and third time. Those times, too, the Buddha only replied passively with noble silence. The debater, insulted that his plan to engage the Buddha in some verbal wrangling and a debate he felt sure he was going to win, got up and left.

Fortunately for us, Ananda asked the Buddha why he had remained silent. He had tremendous psychic and intuitive powers beyond the scope of our understanding (an imponderable amount) and could discern the best answer to whatever was asked of him. Why not this innocent-enough question?

The Buddha explained that if he had said either all, some, or none, each answer would give rise to inaction, inactivity, not striving, not exerting, not letting go, and never mind that the Brahmin was more interested in eel-wriggling philosophical debater than real firsthand experience and understanding.

• (Hey, Ananda, why? Well, if we're all going to eventually make it, why bother? It'll happen anyway. If some of us are never going to make it no matter if we strive and strive, why bother. We're not going to make it. If, yeah, well, some of us who endeavor are yet others who endeavor are not, what's the fairness in that, Ziggy? Why bother? There is not right answer as all lead to inaction and not setting off and persisting on the Path. (Ah, I get it. That Buddha was wise.)
• Hey, but, psst, on the side, just between you and me, what is the correct answer? You know, just for historical purposes in case it ever comes up in real life. Yeah, right, the Buddha explains:

Then he answered humble Ananda to remove all his perplexity, and his answer was profound directly for us.

The Buddha answered by giving a simile of a marvelous and impenetrable fortress so well built that not even a very flexible cat could squeeze through its walls and ramparts to gain entrance. But there are four guarded and well-marked gates by which to freely enter.

Then he said: Ananda, just as a ruler, owner, or guard at the gate on duty is not interested in counting how many are inside now, or how many remain outside, or how many will eventually pass him coming in -- all of that he sets aside. But the one thing he does know with certainty is that if someone is inside, that person gained entrance by one of the four gates, alluding to the teachings he made known like, say, the Four Foundations of Mindfulness (AN 10.95).

Ananda was startled and in awe, at peace and rejoiced at the Buddha's words. So why do we do this to ourselves, piling up points of contention, fearfully "needing" to know everything in advance -- What will it take? How long will it take? If I fail, do I get all of my suffering back in full? -- a tangle of views and disputes, more clever questions than could possibly have ever been asked by any ancient before us. You know, they weren't as smart as us, those old seekers on their spiritual quest in millennia and aeons past?

Practice and see. It is of immediate benefit. If one is burdened by clinging, how long after letting go will I feel relief?

Immediate. Simultaneous. Just as soon as. It isn't the common, "Be good now, and be rewarded with a slice of heaven later" religious deal. It isn't, "Well, if I don't become a monastic and go all in, what's the point, Droopy Dog?"

• You know what the man should have asked, and thank goodness someone else did? "What does it take to conduct this path-of-practice? Who can succeed? Who is it for that you have taught for 45 human years what you taught?" That question, remarkably, he did answer. It's for the average person or deva (light being, lit. "shining one" of which there are many kinds but presumably those closer to human plane of existence, of average intelligence, the manyfolk. He didn't attain in a deva world and come down from on high to tell people what's up and give commands and threats. He in fact said the human plane is the easiest place to attain enlightenment. Why? It is because there are worse worlds, like the animals, ghosts, and those suffering worse than we suffer. And there are much better worlds, the many planes of the various kinds of devas, where they party and celebrate, cavort and conduct entertainments so much and so pleasing, who's got time to strive or just sit there? I need a cool dress for the cotillion! A corsage, a suit, a cape to really make an entrance, and so on and so forth. But the human plane, which is not just this Earth, is like the seashore beach where the waves are tumbling and being tossed about in torments and tempests. We get swept away, sure, but we can usually swim back to the sort of safety of the beach. Inland, where the parties endlessly roar, as well as celestial wars and more troubles than one would think the long-lived devas (deus, Olympic gods, asuras, gandhabbas) would have to endure given their good but far from perfect previous karmic merit. Here we experience enough pain to remember why we need and want to practice for freedom and complete liberation; yet, here, too, we experience enough pleasures that it's kind of nice and devic sometimes. That's why it's best to practice here and not delude ourselves, imagining, "Oh, yeah, later, when I'm in the mood."

If it were not so, we would not bother to say all of this. As peace grows, the heart gains confidence (saddha) which gently impels us forward.

Which way will you turn tomorrow on the way to the whatchamacallit thingy? Yeah, that's the way you usually go, but what if that path is blocked by the remains of a bonfire or crowds in the crosswalk or heavy bumper-to-bumper traffic? Since you don't know for sure, you shouldn't leave the house. Too risky. Play it extra-safe. Stay in bed. Sleep in. Bliss (piti) can wait. It's always been waiting. 💖

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• See Accomplished Theravada Buddhist meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg
• For more detailed advice as the stages begin, see also British teacher Beth Upton
• Other remarkable resources are Czech polymath and dual-ordained monk Ven. Dhammadipa (Ven. Xing-Kong), Tina Rasmussen, powerful Sayalay Dipankara, Stephen Snyder, Sayalay Susila, Jack Kornfield, Trudy Goodman, Melissa McKay, Pema Chodron...and many others
• Text by Teacher Seven for Wisdom Quarterly; animated video by Sharon Salzberg (sharonsalzberg.com, podcast, videos, all that jazz someone else has to manages), Ananda (Dharma Buddhist Meditation)