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What meditation is not
Meditation is not a stress reduction or anger management course.
It is not about experiencing something beautiful or sublime.
Neither is meditation about saving oneself from pain.
Mediation is about bringing out all the subconscious impressions (Hindus call it vasana) gathered over many, many births. And this mostly involves pain, anxiety, boredom, and all that's negative. When we sit down and do nothing, the mind doesn't stop; it keeps going even if we want it to stop. This is because the 'impressions' gathered over many lifetimes are coming to the surface - it is not going to be a pleasant experience.
But the good news is, by meditating over and over these impressions will come to the surface and vanish. So regular meditation helps, just as exercise helps since in both cases it is a gradual process. In short, mediation is all about eliminating impressions, without which liberation is impossible. But eliminating them would entail being patient and allowing them to come to the surface - and this is very tiresome, sometimes even painful.
In conclusion, meditation is done for one purpose and one purpose alone - to liberate oneself by destroying impressions gathered over many births. It is an active work, not something passive. Nor does it revolve around experiencing this or that state, developing this or that skill, and so on. These things may happen, but they are incidental.
It is not about experiencing something beautiful or sublime.
Neither is meditation about saving oneself from pain.
Mediation is about bringing out all the subconscious impressions (Hindus call it vasana) gathered over many, many births. And this mostly involves pain, anxiety, boredom, and all that's negative. When we sit down and do nothing, the mind doesn't stop; it keeps going even if we want it to stop. This is because the 'impressions' gathered over many lifetimes are coming to the surface - it is not going to be a pleasant experience.
But the good news is, by meditating over and over these impressions will come to the surface and vanish. So regular meditation helps, just as exercise helps since in both cases it is a gradual process. In short, mediation is all about eliminating impressions, without which liberation is impossible. But eliminating them would entail being patient and allowing them to come to the surface - and this is very tiresome, sometimes even painful.
In conclusion, meditation is done for one purpose and one purpose alone - to liberate oneself by destroying impressions gathered over many births. It is an active work, not something passive. Nor does it revolve around experiencing this or that state, developing this or that skill, and so on. These things may happen, but they are incidental.
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Comments
I see your post as really more about what Buddhist meditation can be, for a willing participant.
Either way, you're absolutely right.
And completely wrong.
All the best dude have a tip top new year
http://www.lamrim.com/hhdl/heartsutra.html
Non-attainment cuts through all of the subconscious impressions because we are not bound by any of them. This bridges to @music 's analysis actually because realization of non-attainment points out that we don't have to remove or alter our subconscious. The cittas and dharmas (things) are not really us and we begin to focus on our actual mind rather than the face of the karmic world which appears around it.
this to me....
Wouldn't destroying the impressions need the
incidental things, experiencing, and developing
right?
If not, what is the 'active work' part?
First, Buddhists don't own meditation. Other people than Buddhists sometimes meditate.
Second, many people meditate for stress reduction or anger management, or saving themselves from pain.
I think that with the advant of the internet, it's almost like we have the ''answers'' from the back of the text book, but we haven't spent the time and effort to be able to understand where these ''answers'' come from.
But you frequently tell us that you have LEFT the Buddhist path...
Just as you previously left the Path of Islam.
So the ox remains where it is.
The raft remains resolutely on THIS shore. Abandoned before it ever knew water.
Just as you previously left the Path of Islam.
So the ox remains where it is.
The raft remains resolutely on THIS shore. Abandoned before it ever knew water.
And passive /aggressive smileys dont cut it.
Now, I agree meditation can have health benefits, also can relieve stress, and that isn't normally why Buddhists meditate. All those Buddha wanna-bes sitting in the Zazen hall are not there to experience altered states of consciousness, lower their blood pressure, etc. However, our Zen practice goes even further and says to even claim you're digging up and eliminating past impressions (whatever those are. Defilements?) is to go wrong. Meditation is an end to itself.
It's been something I chuckled over before about Zen, that the school that advertises itself as "meditation only" is the one that tries to minimize what meditation does. Some schools of Buddhism are really into cataloging and mapping types and effects and such of various altered states brought on by meditation. That's fine. Just not for me.
When I teach a meditation class or people ask me what I'm doing, I just reply, "Meditation is paying attention." I sit down and pay attention to what my mind is doing, and then to the immediate moment itself. Nothing fancy or special.
It is for liberation, but liberation from what? Liberation from stress, anger, pain, etc, etc.
We see that it has no intrinsic existence.
My first teacher expressed this in the title of one of his books..
" The Goaless Goal "
I always figured meditation was just awareness practice.
The mind doesn't stop no, but the chattering can.
Like the wise old owl, our minds can listen more than they speak.
Samsara is not a "bad place " or a separate mode of existence. Samsara is the view which is conditioned by duality...Enlightenment is not a movement to a different realm. Its the same view unconditioned by duality.
If not for subjectivity, we could never wake up to our true nature.
I doubt that Grand-Master Maio-lo is a fluffy bunny...
Fool me once, shame on you.
Fool me twice..shame on me.
And please give direct reference and link to the passage in the Heart Sutra your original post is based on, thanks.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/buddhism/beliefs/universe_1.shtml