90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

[A Work in Progress]

I have not been as solid as I would like with my meditation/mindfulness practice, over the past month or so... yet I consider it a vital cornerstone of my own program for lifelong freedom from alcohol. Yesterday I found a wonderful challenge for those who want to be consistent in practicing meditation, in Tricycle Magazine (an excellent Buddhist magazine). The challenge is to embark on 90 days of daily practice, along with others who are doing the same thing. The way it is set up is along the lines of Zen tradition, but it isn't necessary to have any prior experience in Zen in order to do this challenge.

The website that explains it all is HERE.

The practices that are involved in the challenge are:

• Sit in formal meditation for 20 minutes each day.
• Listen to one dharma talk each week on tricycle.com.
• Study Dogen?s Genjokoan, the text selected for the period.Commit to the sixteen bodhisattva precepts.Practice with others at tricycle.com or at a local meditation center.Begin when you like. Tricycle?s staff will begin February 23.

The basic instructions for Zen meditation are as follows:

First, find a comfortable, upright posture, one on which you will be able to sit still for 20 minutes without a lot of discomfort. The goal will be not to fidget, move around, or scratch itchy places; instead, we observe the impulse to move, without acting on it. This trains our minds in non-reactivity (and is vitally important when we are learning to resist the craving to drink that sometimes arises).

Next, pay attention to the physical sensations of breathing. Do not try to regulate the breathing in any way. Your body knows how to breathe, and there is no need to force the breath to happen slowly or quickly, deep or shallow. Just notice whatever is there to be noticed, at the nostrils, in the throat, the chest, the belly.

When thoughts, impulses, memories, or physical sensations arise: just carefully and compassionately notice them, then return your attention to the breath. You may notice that you are feeling very judgmental about your own mind, expecting thoughts to disappear, or expecting to have enjoyable relaxing feelings while meditating.... that's OK. Just notice whatever arises, then shift your attention back to the sensations of breathing.

You can use counting the breaths to help train your attention to stick with the sensations of breathing. Count "one" on the out-breath, then "two" on the next outbreath, until you get to "ten." Then begin again. If (when!) you lose count, calmly return to "one." Do this until the 20 minutes is up.

You can use a kitchen timer to time your practice, but it is good to put it under a pillow so it is not quite so loud. It is NOT necessary to find a time or place when your house is completely silent. If there is noise around you, just notice that your attention has been drawn to the noise, then return to your breathing.

Here is how the magazine article describes the practice of sitting meditation:

Do this?counting your breath, maintaining your posture, sitting still?for the 20-minute period of zazen. Notice that urges to move?to scratch your nose, to tug on your ear?are usually ways to move away from the energies in your body. Instead of moving, stay with them, observe them, and bring your focus back to the breathing. Learn to notice how these urges fall away, only to be replaced by others, demonstrating the second noble truth: the cause of suffering is craving. All the disparate ideas, thoughts, impulses?everything comes and goes, and yet you sit. And little by little, the chatter drops away and your body, breath, and mind are one. Zazen is so simple. We focus on our posture and on counting our breath, and this develops samadhi, a unified mind. But the practice is not about reaching ?ten.? It is about training the body and mind. Let the body settle, let the breath settle, let the mind settle. Don?t worry about whether your practice is working, don?t judge your performance, don?t tell yourself stories or find other ways to avoid this very moment. These are just ways of separating from our deepest intention and our zazen. When you do zazen, just do zazen. That?s enough.

Anyone want to join me? I will post here daily about the experience, so long as it is of interest to others who want to participate!

[DeeBee]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

I would love to join you Wip. As you know I am an absolute novice at this and haven't been practicing nearly as much as I'd like to or should be.

When do we start?

[KateH1]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

Great Information, WIP! I love meditation....but, I believe this will keep me on track! Thank you for these links and this valuable insight!

Count me in!

[sunshine_gg]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

Hmmm... I am a total meditation virgin. But I would love to try it!

[A Work in Progress]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

Great, Deebs, Kate, Sunny! Why don't we give ourselves a day to read the stuff on the website, and call tomorrow Day One? Anyone who joins up later, of course, can begin new Day One's at any time... we can all write about our experiences, ask questions, share info, here!

[peacenik]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

i'd love to join you all!

[DeeBee]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

I have signed up on the website but do I need to subsribe to get access to Dogen’s Genjokoan?

[A Work in Progress]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

DeeBee;539928 wrote: I have signed up on the website but do I need to subsribe to get access to Dogen?s Genjokoan?

I will check that out and get back to all of us... if we can't get those webcasts or podcasts easily, or for free, I know where we can get some excellent free ones (the "audio dharma" site).

That's great, Peacenik! This will be good!

[A Work in Progress]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

hmm, here is what I could find on the website as the text for the Genjokoan; it isn't very long, at all. I will also check on how to access or download the talks on the website...

[A Work in Progress]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

OK, here is the full text:

As all things are Buddha-dharma, there are delusion, realization, practice, birth and death, buddhas and sentient beings. As myriad things are without an abiding self, there is no delusion, no realization, no buddha, no sentient being, no birth and death. The Buddha Way, in essence, is leaping clear of abundance and lack; thus there are birth and death, delusion and realization, sentient beings and buddhas. Yet in attachment blossoms fall, and in aversion weeds spread.

To carry the self forward and illuminate myriad things is delusion. That myriad things come forth and illuminate the self is awakening.

Those who have great realization of delusion are buddhas; those who are greatly deluded about realization are sentient beings. Further, there are those who continue realizing beyond realization, who are in delusion throughout delusion. When buddhas are truly buddhas, they do not necessarily notice that they are buddhas. However, they are actualized buddhas, who go on actualizing Buddha.

When you see forms or hear sounds, fully engaging body and mind, you intuit dharma intimately. Unlike things and their reflections in the mirror, and unlike the moon and its reflection in the water, when one side is illumined, the other side is dark.

To study the Buddha Way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. When actualized by myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop away. No trace of enlightenment remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly.

When you first seek dharma, you imagine you are far away from its environs. At the moment when dharma is correctly transmitted, you are immediately your original self. When you ride in a boat and watch the shore, you might assume that the shore is moving. But when you keep your eyes closely on the boat, you can see that the boat moves. Similarly, if you examine myriad things with a confused body and mind you might suppose that your mind and nature are permanent. When you practice intimately and return to where you are, it will be clear that nothing at all has unchanging self.

Firewood becomes ash, and it does not become firewood again. Yet do not suppose that the ash is after and the firewood before. You should understand that firewood abides in the phenomenal expression of firewood, which fully includes before and after and is independent of before and after. Ash abides in the phenomenal expression of ash, which fully includes before and after. Just as firewood does not become firewood agaiμ after it is ash, you do not return to birth after death.

This being so, it is an established way in Buddhadharma to deny that birth turns into death. Accordingly, birth is understood as no-birth. It is an unshakable teaching in the Buddha?s discourse that death does not turn into birth. Accordingly, death is understood as no-death.

Birth is an expression complete this moment. Death is an expression complete at this moment. They are like winter and spring. You do not call winter the beginning of spring, nor summer the end of spring.

Enlightenment is like the moon reflected on the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken. Although its light is wide and great, the moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch wide. The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in dewdrops on the grass, or even in one drop of water.

Enlightenment does not divide you, just as the moon does not break the water. You cannot hinder enlightenment, just as a drop of water does not hinder the moon in the sky. The depth of the drop is the height of the moon. Each reflection, however long or short its duration, manifests the vastness of the dewdrop, and realizes the limitlessness of the moonlight in the sky.

When dharma does not fill your whole body and mind, you may assume it is already sufficient. When dharma fills your body and mind, you understand that something is missing. For example, when you sail out in a boat to the middle of an ocean where no land is in sight, and view the four directions, the ocean looks circular, and does not look any other way. But the ocean is neither round nor square; its features are infinite in variety. It is like a palace. It is like a jewel. It only looks circular as far as you can see at that time. All things are like this.

Though there are many features in the dusty world and the world beyond conditions, you see and understand only what your eye of practice can reach. In order to learn the nature of the myriad things, you must know that although they may look round or square, the other features of oceans and mountains are infinite in variety; whole worlds are there. It is so not only around you, but also directly beneath your feet, or in a drop of water.

A fish swims in the ocean, and no matter how far it swims there is no end to the water. A bird flies in the sky, and no matter how far it flies there is no end to the air. However, the fish and the bird have never left their elements. When their activity is large their field is large. When their need is small their field is small. Thus, each of them totally covers its full range, and each of them totally experiences its realm. If the bird leaves the air it will die at once. If the fish leaves the water it will die at once.

Know that water is life and air is life. The bird is life and the fish is life. Life must be the bird and life must be the fish. You can go further. There is practice-enlightenment which encompasses limited and unlimited life.

Now if a bird or a fish tries to reach the end of its element before moving in it, this bird or this fish will not find its way or its place. When you find your place where you are, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point. When you find your way at this moment, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point; for the place, the way, is neither large nor small, neither yours nor others. The place, the way, has not carried over from the past, and it is not merely arising now. Accordingly, in the practice-enlightenment of the buddha way, to attain one thing is to penetrate one thing; to meet one practice is to sustain one practice.

Here is the place; here the way unfolds. The boundary of realization is not distinct, for realization comes forth simultaneously with the mastery of Buddha-dharma. Do not suppose that what you attain becomes your knowledge and is grasped by your intellect. Although actualized immediately, the inconceivable may not be apparent. Its appearance is beyond your knowledge.

Mayu, Zen Master Baoche, was fanning himself. A monk approached and said, ?Master, the nature of wind is permanent and there is no place it does not reach. Why then do you fan yourself??

?Although you understand that the nature of the wind is permanent,? Mayu replied, ?you do not understand the meaning of its reaching everywhere.?

?What is the meaning of its reaching everywhere?? asked the monk again. Mayu just kept fanning himself. The monk bowed deeply.

The actualization of the Buddha-dharma, the vital path of its correct transmission, is like this. If you say that you do not need to fan yourself because the nature of wind is permanent and you can have wind without fanning, you will understand neither permanence nor the nature of wind. The nature of wind is permanent. Because of that, the wind of the Buddha?s house brings forth the gold of the earth and makes fragrant the cream of the long river.

Written in mid-autumn, the first year of the Tempuku Era [1233], and given to my lay student Koshu Yo of Kyushu Island. Revised in the fourth year of the Kencho Era [1252].

From Enlightenment Unfolds, ?1999 by San Francisco Zen Center, edited by Kazuaki Tanahashi. Reprinted with permission of Shambhala Publications, Inc., shambhala.com.

[A Work in Progress]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

Day One!

OK, meditation buddies! I sat my 20 minutes this morning, which is a bit longer than I had been regularly sitting meditation over the last year or so. When I sit for even slightly longer periods of time, my restlessness is always greater, and it gives me a great opportunity to practice resisting impulses! The impulse to take a peek at my clock, to move around, to get lost in thought, to just get up off my cushion and do something else... all of those regularly show up for me. My task is to observe what is happening, in my head and in my body, and then to shift my attention back to the sensations of my breathing, in and out. Every time I resist the urge to give in to an impulse, I get stronger... better able to resist cravings for alcohol, as well.

Tips for today, from me, are along the lines of resources outside of the Tricycle article linked above.

First: the best beginner's book about meditation that I have ever found is Mindfulness In Plain English. You can find it used on Amazon for $8 or $9.

Second, for those who prefer to listen to meditation instructions and guided meditation, a fantastic resources is Audio Dharma. They have an entire course on meditation there, which you can download and listen to, for free. Also, a lot of wonderful talks by some of the greatest meditation teachers now working, from around the world.

Third, here is a website with many of these resources, plus a very nice list (I compiled it myself) of the very best YouTube videos about meditation and mindfulness.

So: let's get started! Post here to tell us how your meditation sessions are going; ask questions; share information, encouragement, problems, and stories!

[A Work in Progress]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

Bumping this for Raggs, and:

Anybody want to join in?

[joesgal]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

Count me in as well too please, joesgal

[rubywillow]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

Just saw this site, WIP, and I'm going to read up on it all tonight. If I can do it physically with all the crap that's wrong with my bones, body right now, I want to do it too. I've always had an interest in learning the correct way to meditate and focus. Thanks for the thread!

[A Work in Progress]

90-Day Meditation Practice Challenge!

Great! So far we have:

Cowgal
Sweaty Betty
Kriger
RubyWillow
Joesgal
One2Many
DeeBee
Peacenik
Sunshine
KateH
and WIP

So: here's the simplest possible approach. First, especially if you are new to this, click on the links in my posts, above, and do a little reading. Then: Sit every day, and come back here and tell us about it. Try not to make too much of a big deal out of it, just sit still for 20 minutes, paying special attention to the sensations of your breathing, and observe whatever happens (in the way of your thoughts, your emotions, your physical sensations, any impulses, noises that bother you, and thoughts about the noises, etc.). Come here and write a little about it.

Don't worry if you get the idea that you are "doing it wrong." Everyone thinks that, at first. The keys for meditation practice (and for everything worthwhile in life!) are persistence, patience, and compassion.