Tag Archives: Meditation

“Meditation is awareness”

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I have some bad habits and a couple of good ones. Perhaps my best habit is daily mindfulness meditation. I sit on a cushion for 30 minutes (sometimes as long as an hour) and concentrate on my breathing. That’s it. That’s my meditation practice. It’s the best half hour of my day.

And I haven’t missed a day for the last 271 days, tying previous record. My longest streak is 371 days. I’ve been practicing meditation for years but didn’t start keeping track of my sessions until November, 2014, when I started using an app called Equanimity. It times my session and keeps a simple log.

That first streak (371 days) was broken due to a bout with pneumonia. I started over and made it 271 days before I missed while out of town at my 50th high school reunion. So now I’ve set my sights on 371. If I can make it to September without missing a day, I’ve not a new streak. And I will have only missed two days in the last 1,000.

I can’t control the quality of my meditation sessions but I do have control over whether or not I sit every day. Which is important to me.

Title quote from Meditation Now or Never by Steve Hagen

Meditation: 271 Days

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After 271 consecutive days of meditation practice, I missed on Saturday. I was attending my 50th high school class reunion and just spaced it off. My previous streak of 371 days (starting on December 4, 2014) ended during a bout with pneumonia (December 5, 2015). I don’t get hung up on the quality of my practice or the duration but I do try to be consistent in sitting every day, if only for 10 minutes. Which is the only reason I keep track of my sessions. As I’ve noted previously, missing once a year might not be a bad thing if it keeps me from focusing on the string instead of today’s session. So today is two in a row!

Silence

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In the future, people will be prepared to pay for the experience of silence.

I extremely fortunate in this regard. I have a lot of silence in my life. I live at the end of a gravel road, surrounded by woods. No screaming children in my life (at least none I can’t avoid). Barb doesn’t need me to entertain her so I can experience hours of silence if I choose. I don’t take this for granted. The flip side is I have less tolerance for noise than I once did. From the article below (This Is Your Brain On Silence):

“Two hours of silence per day prompted cell development in the hippocampus, the brain region related to the formation of memory, involving the senses. […] The growth of new cells in the brain doesn’t always have health benefits. But in this case, Kirste says that the cells seemed to become functioning neurons.”

“There isn’t really such a thing as silence,” says Robert Zatorre, an expert on the neurology of sound. “In the absence of sound, the brain often tends to produce internal representations of sound.

“If you want to know yourself you have to be with yourself, and discuss with yourself, be able to talk with yourself.”

I do a good bit of this kind of introspection and, occasionally, wonder if it’s good for me. The article says yes. Shhh.

Reading List: Tao, Zen & Buddhism

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  • What Is Tao? – Alan Watts [notes]
  • Tao: The Watercourse Way – Alan Watts [notes]
  • The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing – Marie Kondo [notes]
  • Freedom from the Known – Jiddu Kirshnamurti
  • This Is It: and Other Essays on Zen and Spiritual Experience – Alan Watts [notes]
  • The Spirit of Zen: A Way of Life, Work and Art in the Far East [notes]
  • The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are – Alan Watts [notes]
  • Buddhism Without Beliefs: A Contemporary Guide to Awakening – Stephen Batchelor [notes]
  • The Sound of Silence: Selected Teachings of Ajahn Sumedho
  • Be As You Are: The Teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi [notes]
  • Ten Zen Questions – Susan Blackmore [notes]
  • Wherever You Go, There You Are – Jon Kabat-Zinn [notes]
  • Opening the Hand of Thought: Foundations of Zen Buddhist Practice – Kosho Uchiyama Roshi
  • I Am That – Nisargadatta Maharaj [notes]
  • Rebel Buddha: A Guide to a Revolution of Mind – Dzogchen Ponlop
  • Awakening the Buddha Within: Tibetan Wisdom for the Western World – Lama Surya Das
  • Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind – Shunryu Suzuki
  • Living As A River: Finding Fearlessness in the Face of Change – Bodhipaksa [notes]
  • The Tao of Zen – Ray Grigg [notes]
  • Buddhism Plain and Simple – Steve Hagen [notes]
  • The Way of Zen – Alan Watts [notes]
  • Buddha’s Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love and Wisdom – Rick Hanson [notes]
  • Still the Mind: An Introduction to Meditation – Alan Watts [notes]
  • Meditation Now or Never – Steve Hagen [notes]
  • The Tao of Meditation: Way to Enlightenment – Jou Tsung Hwa

500 Days (minus 1)

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I try to avoid talking about meditation. (Those who know don’t talk. Those who talk don’t know.) I’ve been meditating for years. I started listening to guided meditations but for several years now simply sit (30-45 minutes) each day, “following the breath.” Had something of a streak (371 days) going last year when a bout with pneumonia caused me to miss a day. But that’s okay, the only day that counts is today. Today is 500 consecutive (almost) days on the cushion.

I bring this up for those who might have thought about this practice. It’s the best half hour of my day. Here are a few books (and some quotes) I’ve found helpful.

Books on Meditation

  • Living As a River: Finding Fearlessness in the Face of Change – Bodhipaksa
  • Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind – Shunryu Suzuki
  • Opening the Hand of Thought: Foundations of Zen Buddhist Practice – Kosho Uchiyama Roshi
  • Meditation Now or Never – Steve Hagen
  • Still the Mind: An Introduction to Meditation – Alan Watts

Quotes

  • Meditation is the only intentional, systematic human activity which at the bottom is about _not_ trying to improve yourself or get anywhere else, but simply to realize where you already are.
  • (We meditate to realize) “…that things are already perfect.”
  • Meditation is about deeply seeing what’s going on within your own mind.
  • At the heart of meditation is the intention to be awake. (To experience) Reality as it is,before goals, ideas, or desires sprout. … Meditation is never a means to an end.
  • Meditation is a matter of zero or 100 percent. Either you’re present or you’re not. There are no in-betweens.
  • Meditation is awareness.
  • The desire of one who is awake is simply to be awake.
  • Meditate just to meditate.
  • Most people who believe they are meditating are merely thinking with their eyes closed. Meditation is a technique for waking up.