How to Start Meditating

Ananda, Dhr. Seven, Crystal Quintero, Wisdom Quarterly

First, relax. Calm down. Take a deep breath. Sit up. Now don't just do something, sit there.

You can't "meditate." No one can. Meditation happens to a person who cultivates the "factors of absorption."

"Absorption," or jhana/zen (Pali/Japanese) from the older Sanskrit and Chinese words dhyana/ch'an, happens as the mind is pulled into a single meditation subject/object.

Mind is amazing when it blossoms.

The thing being given single-pointed attention draws, pulls in, "absorbs" consciousness. One is conscious -- not in "trance" or hypnosis -- but one is conscious only of that single object/subject, the theme one used.

 

The Buddha spoke of at least 40 traditional meditation subjects or objects. Not all of them lead to all of the eight (nine according to the Abhidharma's reckoning because there are various ways to parse these levels of absorption). Of the ones that do, meditation/absorption/ch'an and zen will happen.

Zazen (sitting) for zen (meditation)

By analogy, you can't grow things. No one can. Growth happens for a person (say a gardener or farmer) who cultivates the factors of growth.

"Growth" (which can be called "bringing into being," a synonym for Buddhist "meditation"/bhavana) happens as the seed is given all of the "factors of growth" it needs and all of the impediments/obstacles to growth are removed.

It's as easy as that!

I didn't know that seed would do that!

The mind/seed will grow -- or actualize -- into what it can be if and when it has the factors it depends on for growth. (This is a simple form of understanding the Buddhist principle of Dependent Origination, the knowledge that everything that comes into being does so depending on conditions and not without them).

How to Start Meditating

Siddhartha under the bodhi tree

BREATH The body is already breathing, so put and hold attention there. Ignore everything else; let it go, abandon it, exhale. There is no need to breathe, to do breath. It is already happening.

Simply remain aware of it at the nostril, like a lumberjack holding a two-handled saw. Whether pulling or releasing (so that the other lumberjack can pull that side of the two-handled saw), attention remains fully at the point of cutting.

Just so with the breath, whether it is going in or out, the mind remains fixed and fascinated with just the point of entry (the nostril) and the point of exit (same nostril), inhalation (the nostril), exhalation (same nostril).

The mind will revolt. It will not be limited to one source of stimuli. It wants what it's used to, constant diversity, entertainment, stimulation to the point of exhaustion then sleep for more dream-stimulation. Train the mind, tame the mind, hold the mind to one subject/object until it calms and blossoms.