Non-meditators, beginners, and long-time Buddhist practitioners alike tend to believe meditation is all about stopping our thoughts. This is a serious misunderstanding, and, sadly, keeps many people from embracing the practice of meditation. It’s very important to understand the true purpose and function of meditation, because the vast majority of us find it impossible to stop our thoughts, at least through willful effort. In this episode, I talk about why we long to be thought-free. Then I discuss how meditation is not about stopping thought, but instead is a practice of diligently and repeatedly turning our attention to something beyond thought, thereby realigning our whole being. Meditation requires diligence and determination, but also patience, humility, and faith.

Two clarifications about my teaching on meditation: First, in my enthusiastic endorsement of shikantaza or, "just sitting," I may have given the impression I think a real Zen student would only sit shikantaza. I want to go on record saying it's fine to use multiple types of meditation in your practice. Second, I seem to have communicated the idea there’s no place in Zen for paying attention to, learning from, and working with your thoughts and feelings, at least not in meditation. In my tradition we tend to do this work off the meditation seat, but there’s no reason you shouldn’t devote some or all of your meditation time to it, if you find that fruitful.

I challenged myself to write instructions for the practice of zazen that would fit on letter-sized, tri-fold brochure – 8 ½ by 11 inches, two sided. I figured I’d share it here on the podcast – and if this episode is too short for you, I recommend listening to it twice, because this “pamphlet” really does, to my mind, capture the essence of shikantaza! (At least as I think of it right now).

I propose there are two paths to meditative concentration: directed effort (what the Buddha taught) and letting go (something we do in Soto Zen). One path or the other may work better for some people. In this second episode of two I describe the "letting go" path in some detail: What it involves, how it (ironically) requires great "effort," and why it works.

I believe some of our struggles in meditation could be eased if we recognized there are two paths to meditative concentration, or samadhi – directed effort, and letting go – and what works well for one person may be frustrating and fruitless for another. In this episode I briefly discuss what samadhi is, and then describe the two very different ways to achieve it. In the next episode I'll describe the “letting go” approach in more detail.