Can’t sit still, because something urgent needs to be done? Mind racing because something has to be figured out, right now? Me too.
My favorite distraction when attempting to practice zazen (Zen sitting) is worrying about all the things that need fixing. Yet I have been reminded that we adopt a still and upright posture in Zen for a reason: The body trains the mind.
So let me share with you a four-part meditation I’ve developed that helps this process along, at least for me.
As I get into my zazen posture, I my mind is often occupied with thoughts about things I think I need to have or do, my own failings, and/or all the problems of this suffering world. From personal relationships and local community issues to national political developments, global poverty, climate change, and species extinction, there is enough off-kilter to keep me distracted forever! Now it’s time for the posture to do its work.
First, I feel the heaviness of my body in contact with what holds it. This includes my butt and whatever else is in contact with the ground or chair. Yes, in my mind I can often replay scenes of loss or betrayal that make me feel shaky, distrustful, and unsupported. I may even feel like I’m in free fall, having no idea who I am or where I am going. But what is happening right now? What does my body want to teach me?
I am totally supported! I may not trust in much, but I can trust in this. The feeling of being physically held inspires a sort of faith and peace. It brings a sense of gratitude for something I have not earned and do not need to earn. I am naturally and unavoidably grounded. And this doesn’t even require that I literally be on “solid ground.” I grew up in California, where occasionally the ground itself would quake under my feet. But whether I’m on heaving earth or riding the waves of turbulence in an airplane, my body is still supported. It still is. How are you supported right now? Be with that for some time. Have faith in it, if in nothing else.
Next, “fix it” thoughts will inevitably start to arise in my head. Often even trivial, mundane projects like editing an nonurgent email demand to be treated as PRIORITY! EXPRESS! Larger concerns may take up even more space, being accompanied by strong feelings of self-blame or anger or despair: “How could I have been so selfish?” “How do we force them to stop doing such terrible things?” “It’s all so big, it’s hopeless.” And then I shift into problem-solving mode.
Why is it that I want to fix things? Going down one level, it may seem that I want to be in control, or be seen as a good person, or get revenge, or be a hero.
Yet if I can tune down my thinking just enough to see what the rest of my body is up to, I find that there is something much softer, warmer, and more tender underlying the fix-it energy. My desire for control is just an effort to wall-off, protect, and shelter my fundamentally empty, vulnerable, and certain-to-die-someday self. Its source is a tender impulse to care for this precious human being, for as long as it is around. What else is in my heart-space? Not being separate from all that is, I discover a tender impulse to care for my sangha, for all Buddhist sanghas, and for sanghas of all suffering humans, species, rocks and trees.
Trusting my body, I allow the fix-it energy in my brain-space to revert to its source. When I release my mental busy-ness it plops down and lands on my heart, breaking it open. It finds its beginnings in compassion and, some may say, love. A physical feeling of warmth and openness and heartache fills my chest. It’s not that I will give up on trying to ameliorate things (within my abilities), but that I can give my outward-directed thinking, for right now, a rest. Touching the inward source of my longings during a period of quiet sitting gently waters the roots of creativity and healing.
Feeling both grounded and touched by love, I can open up to something beyond the anthropocentrism and even earth-centrism that drive my occasional feelings of hopelessness and despair. As human Buddhists, we come to know our place in the universe through Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Yet the Dharma Wheel of the universe is much vaster than that. Perhaps all our whole-hearted efforts to prevent us from burning or blowing ourselves up will fail. The Dharma Wheel will keep turning. Maybe the surviving cockroaches will evolve their own version of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Or new life will develop elsewhere in the universe over millennia–which, after all, is just the blink of an eye on a cosmic time scale. We do all we can do; the results are not in our control.
Third, the effect of dropping the fix-it energy down into my heart-space leaves my head in a state of receptivity. No longer occupied with problem-solving, I notice my breath, the sound of a car going by, and the growing light of a winter dawn. As Robert Aiken wrote in one of his Zen Vows for Daily Life, I may “touch and receive” the “mind of rivers and stars.”
Lastly, there is the issue of keeping my butt on the cushion. I get impatient. Perhaps I sense one such light “touch.” My automatic next thought will usually be “Okay, that’s accomplished. It’s time to get up and start my day!” In my body, I experience impatience as a vertical energy located to the left of my spine. I find I can use that energy to help rather than hinder my practice if I just shift it a bit to the right, putting it into my backbone. Now it is an energy of support for my posture. And my posture trains my mind.
Faith. Tenderness. Receptivity. Patience. The body is wise about these things.
