I've been doing Zen meditation for 20 years. AMA
Meditation is a thing that you do with your attention. When you pay attention or concentrate or get distracted, that's you doing a thing with your attention. And that's obviously important stuff in your life and the world. Meditation takes it further.
We basically have 2 kinds of meditation.
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Concentration meditation, which is plain ol concentration taken to a higher level.
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Zen meditation (aka shikantaza), which is another thing to do with your attention, kindof a left turn from concentration and is a bit esoteric.
So there you go.
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40 replies
So can you meditate at will? I usually don't say I meditate as try to meditate because that is what I am doing. Sometimes I feel I get to a state which is illusive and maybe what I am looking to get to when I try to meditate but im not sure if that is meditation either.
Yeah, I can meditate at will. I slide in. Starts shallow, gets deeper. The longer I go the deeper it gets. Then when I'm done I slide out again over hours and days. Ideally I'd do it 24-7 but there you go.
It's like my hand is chronically in a tight fist. When I meditate it relaxes and opens up and gets relaxed and floppy.
That's shikantaza anyway. The other kind of meditation, the concentration, it sorta makes me tighter. But I don't do that meditation these days.
How would you say this has affected your life?
Positively
So, do you have a more-experienced meditator that you meet with regularly, or do you meditate on your own?
I meditate on my own
Is there a principled reason why you do not consult with other meditators, or did it just work out that way?
No principal involved. The way I see it, I have this thing before me and addressing it seems to be a personal one-man job. So ya, I never felt drawn to consulting like that. But when I find somebody else who meditates I do like to talk to them. Sometimes intensely.
That makes sense. There's been an enormous amount of meditation work done over the centuries, in the Euro-American world we tend to be unaware of it. I kinda feel like I should encourage you to seek out meditation centers and temples. But if what you're doing works for you, then awesome.
no question, just one single clap
But if there is no hand to clap, did anyone hear it?
Have you ever had any dissociation events? Like, feeling that you are a passenger in your own body, after meditation?
Ya, I've felt like that. Not in a way that was associated with or caused by meditation, as far as I can tell, tho.
Have you ever done group/collective transcendental meditation? From my limited lack of knowledge, I understand it is used to push positive social waves into the surrounding community. Big David Lynch fan.
Also, have you seen that collection of David Lynch's short works? It's got its moments. Featuring Harry Dean Stanton being musically deep. I have only seen it on torrent.
https://thepiratebay.zone/search/david%20lynch/1/99/0
Yes! My current favourite is a clip of him making quinoa. Opens the tap..."Now add some fresh, fresh water".
I am also a big David Lynch fan :)
I have not done TM in any serious way. I basically fumbled around and experimented until it made sense to me. Forging my own path and such.
I did go to a TM thing once a long time ago. They were nice people.
As for pushing positive social waves into the surrounding community, yes, I have some small experience with that. It's a thing I study and experiment with some.
Thanks, all the best to you.
How do you not fall asleep?
I don't know. It never became an issue.
I guess some people are lucky, I kind of start dreaming and then fall asleep but I guess I haven't practiced enough. Chanting does help.
What’s the longest you’ve ever gone in a completely thoughtless state?
I guess 15 minutes. Maybe 60. Time kinda gets away from me sometimes.
There's always idea-stuff flowing by. Like, I dunno, snow falling. It's whether I react to it that makes it into thinking, basically. When I don't interact with it by reacting to it by moving my attention and such it isn't really thinking anymore. It's like snow.
There is no good definition of a thought.
But as a person who struggles to crack 60 seconds, respect.
Thanks. Keep in mind that that's the rare best-case scenario. My daily best is more like 5 minutes.
Getting my life to where that best-case scenario happens more often is a big deal for me. I work on that.
I feel like I've had undiagnosed ADHD my whole life. I've done some meditation in the past and I felt it helped a bit but it's been years.
Any advice that you'd give me? Anything you'd like to mention about the benefits?
Ok I wrote a thing. It's short and polished. It's basically what I did. Check it out then ask me any questions.
http://fleen.org/fluffy_cloud
As for benefits.
You will start with the concentration meditation because it's dead easy and just takes a little time and effort. It will make you sharp. Maybe a little too sharp. You'll like it. You'll feel powerful. You'll also become a little bit of a crazy asshole. I guess a monastery provides the environment for taking care of people in this state, but lacking that, try to lead a life with lots of free alone time and little stress.
After you get a handle on that you'll do the second meditation. The "shikantaza". But that comes later. It's much kinder but you need to get a handle on the first one first.
BUT that's just me. Maybe there's a better way. There was a teacher named Joko Beck who skipped the concentration meditation and taught only the shik. I dunno. Above all you need to become your own expert. Experiment and explore. There is no substitute.
This is one question:
Your attention, what you do with time ends up defining who you are and what you're good at.
...how do you feel about your use of the words "thing" and "kind of" in your post?
The brain benefits from allocated rest time, as it helps reduce and cope with stress, and aids in processing, creativity, and imagination. Concentration as a practice can help endurance and executive function, but if one has enough of these qualities, then isn't the time spent in meditation putting you at risk of poorly allocating your time?
What if there are other areas you could improve in, by consciously allocating that time somewhere else?
If meditation can cure certain symptoms of a stressful life (such as a short temper, poor self-control, or feeling stuck, or broken) - then when those symptoms aren't present and in need of addressing with meditation... Then isn't meditation beyond that kind of a waste of time?
Is there an infinitely useful aspect to meditation, or at some point are you just improving to improve at it? Doing it for a kind of self-servicing or mastabatory nature?
The world is a big place, and there's lots of things to do out there in it if you have already built up those capacities.
I like them. It softens my thrust.
It's a mystery to explore. Depths and treasures to discover and explore. That's my experience. So to that kind of growth and discovery, lots of meditation isn't a waste of time.
Yes, see reply to the previous. So ya, concentration meditation shows me something more. Penetrates the veil of shallow perception to see a realer reality. And Shikantaza does it even moreso. More comprehensively. And (not to overstate it) it makes the unconscious conscious, the invisible visible, enlargens my world and makes me more sensitive. And it's a nice high, dissolves anxiety and brings confidence, optimism and empowering-energy, which is nice.
Yeah, we covered the benefits. I'm talking about the benefits outside your head. You know, life gets lived beyond just you (time consumes).
Swimming in the same lake everyday for 500 years just to get away from the shoreline starts to look like trying to drown yourself in yourself.
Sure Plato-crates (Socratoes) said "Know theyself"... But "Dude, Where's my car?" said, "and then?".
... it's the "and then?" that I'm asking, and I don't think it can fairly be answered with "and then more meditation"... That's a kind of circular reasoning to the point of my question.
I get the benefits to self, the internal world ect... I already stated things like "improves creativity and imagination" before you said "it's an internal discovery process"... Like, yeah, we agree, we've covered the benefits in the question.
But I'm still here with the same question, so I'm not sure you actually heard me. I'm still on the same question as before (having tried to show you what we already agred on to help you hear me, and get the question).
You're a closed system, or rather your use and consumption of time is a closed system.The worlds use and consumption of time is not, as it contains more patterns and structures than your system alone.
So yeah, answering "know thyself" with "know thyself some more"... Er... no. The benefits of advocating the antithesis must also have its benefits. Perhaps not relying on the metaphorical "things" and "kind of" so much is one of those benefits (for example), perhaps having a life beyond you is another (beyond the you that sits alone with its self). Skills beyond meditation. The stuff of stuff, rather than the mind of mind (or mindless mind of my mind).
That's the allocation of time beyond you that I was talking asking after. The what, of time.The what else, what other, or what other than this, of time.
I don't know, maybe I'm just asking - after awhile isn't there better ways of knowing yourself that could also produce external real world outcomes? For all we know meditation when taken to the extreme could be a form of mental illness or onanism.
Going to a grey room of mist and darkness to find "the beyond"... Doesn't it eventually become a kind of joke? Given the wider structure of infinity you live in, and only live in temporarily.
I understand 20 minutes a day might be reasonable at first, but once the benefits are attained are you just watching TV in a new way?
Aren't you just swiping without swiping, doom scrolling under the cover of science and the media extolling the benefits of your particular kind of escapism.
Obviously you're probably not going to think so or even admit to the possibility because you can just rehtorically throw another "meditation to meditate so I can meditate some more on meditation"... Or "knowing thyself to know thyself to know thyself some more"... But as KarlMarx said; the point is to do.
I don't think I really need an answer if you don't see the question I'm asking. I think you're probably in your own head a bit. Sure, everyone is, but those who say they can see the invisible but still can't understand a question - are probably MORE in their own heads, than others.
Perception is tricky like that, some people can quickly listen to another (outside of themselves), others are more like an ingrown toenail or a distant echo. Fine, but I'm not sure that's what we're here for. I'm not sure you're still "we" if you can't get what I'm asking.
There's such a thing as meditation making people self-important.
Have you tried it?
Yes.
EDIT: Also, it's okay if you don't want to talk about my question, or attempt an answer yourself.
The concentration, the other thing, both?
Both.
well all right.
So what are you asking me exactly? Succinctly.
You are not listening, you are looking for something, and thus not comprehending.
You are applying goals, values and ambitions OP hasn't expressed. And in the absence of them, you are gripping tighter to them.
OP has generously answered your questions, it is up to you to take them in.
No they haven't.... And what's this bullshit about me gripping tighter? I didn't even respond to their last message. I just expanded on the question when they expressed that they weren't getting it.
You say they answered, then why did they ask me to put it more succinctly if they answered? Then we parted way. There was no answering, nor was I gripping (I literally said they didn't have to answer, so they didn't).
You have your own distorted take of what happened, and that's squarely on you bud, no one else... And frankly I'm NOT interested in interacting with someone so capable of distorting the facts.