Peaceful Zen Meditation for Beginners

This introduction to the peaceful form of seated meditation as practiced in Zen is appropriate for beginners and experienced sitters. Discover the stillness.

Transcript

This is an introduction to the seated form of Zen meditation.

So we begin with the understanding that body and mind completely inform each other.

And so I'll begin with some instruction about the physical posture of the sitting.

And this naturally will lead to more instruction about the mental process,

The experience of mind.

And I also want to say that there's no one ideal meditation posture except that posture which enables you to be fully stable,

Relaxed,

And alert.

So you might notice that there is this continuum between the relaxation,

Which if we fall too far into the side of relaxation,

Then we start to become sleepy and unable to stay upright on our cushion.

And there is the form,

The aspect of alertness.

If there's too much of this alert energy,

Then you might experience some tension,

Tension in the body or tension in the mind,

Or a kind of racing feeling in the mind.

And so what helps to balance those two is the stability,

The groundedness of posture,

The stillness.

So take a moment at this time to find a place to sit where you can dim the lights a little bit and where you can not hear the sound of people talking.

It's very important to have not complete silence,

But an absence of the sound of speech,

Because that is a certain kind of stimulation of the mind that is difficult to ignore.

So pause this if you need to take a moment and adjust your environment.

And then coming back,

So you could find a way of sitting that enables you to have your hips slightly higher than your knees.

And that might be on a chair.

If you're on a chair,

You want to sit all the way back in the chair such that you are able to maintain an upright spine and you have support for your lower back.

And put your feet flat on the floor.

If you want to try sitting on a cushion on the floor or on a meditation bench,

Sometimes it's helpful,

It feels more grounded to be closer to the floor if you're not experiencing a lot of discomfort.

So sitting on a cushion on the floor,

What you want to do is you want to sit on the front third of the cushion that is scoot forward to the very front edge of the cushion so that your pelvis leans slightly forward and the back of the cushion is supporting you to do that.

So you counterbalance this sort of leaning forward of the pelvis with bringing the shoulders back.

So in Zen,

Our form of upright sitting is to allow the weight of the body to be carried on the bones.

And in order to do that,

You need to be able to as much as possible stack up your spine.

So tucking the chin back,

Not down,

But actually back,

And that allows the head,

The crown of the head to rise upward,

To float upward and bring the ears into alignment with the shoulders and the shoulders into alignment with the hips.

Sometimes when you're trying to find this alignment,

It's helpful to do a bit of rocking.

So rock from left to right and from front to back.

This helps to release any kind of habitual leaning to one side that most of us do.

And again,

It helps you to find a centered,

Grounded,

Stable base.

So having found this base,

Then the hands,

The hands can go just palms down on the thighs.

If you're going to do that,

Don't put them as far out as your knees.

It's best to have the palms very close into the body.

So that prevents it from giving you the tendency to lean forward.

And it also again allows for some dropping of the shoulders and opening of the chest.

So you want to find an open-hearted posture for sitting.

The more traditional way of holding the hands,

If you would like to try it,

Is what we call the cosmic mudra.

So a mudra just means a symbolic hand gesture,

And the way to place the mudra is right hand goes with the fingers together.

The pinky of the right hand goes on the abdomen,

A few inches below the navel.

So not all the way down in your lap and not as high as your navel,

But somewhere in between there.

Oftentimes,

It's helpful to find a wrinkle in your clothing to help you sustain that so that you're not having to hold it up.

So having found the place for the right hand,

Then you put the left hand on top and then bring the fingers together to form an oval.

So it looks like this.

Thumb tips touching lightly together,

Gathering together the energy of the body,

The activity of mind.

And then the eyes.

So in Zen,

We don't want to close off any of the sense gates.

So the eyes are cast downward,

Looking toward the floor,

Gazing downward,

Finding a place where you can rest the eyes and allow them to become very soft and unfocused.

Not closing them completely,

Allowing a little bit of room for light to come in.

If you wear glasses,

You may want to remove them.

I typically remove my glasses when I'm meditating.

And so again,

Gently resting the eyes.

And then the mind.

So our effort in Sa Zen,

In seated meditation,

Is to be fully present.

To maintain an open awareness of all of our sense perceptions.

Seeing sees.

Hearing hears.

Hearing smells.

Tasting tastes.

And touching touches.

And thinking.

Thinking is a perceptual activity,

Just like your other senses.

Sense can be like clouds,

Yet the mind is like the sky,

Undisturbed,

Whether it's a stormy day or a bright,

Clear sky.

So,

Just abiding in the body and mind of this moment.

Understanding how dynamic it is,

How it is functioning without any intervention on your part.

And when you abide in the body and mind in this way,

You will notice the breath,

Breathing the body.

The sound of breath.

The sensation of breath in your chest,

In your belly.

Just your presence is enough.

Resting in that which is aware of body,

Aware of mind.

And when you find yourself away from the present,

Then simply return to the body.

Return to the sights and sounds of the moment.

Understanding the stillness in between the in-breath and the out-breath.

The stillness between the out-breath and in-breath.

Simply allowing what is to be present.

Understanding that it's okay to remain right here,

Right now.

So,

Just remain right here,

Right now.

And when you find yourself away from the present,

Then simply return to the body.

Reviews

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A great tool to learn how to sit. Discusses your body positioning and posture in good detail. I've meditated on my own for years, and have never had anyone explain the seated posture so clearly and the reasons for it. After the explaination is done there is a meditation. I really enjoyed this. Thank you!

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Mindfulness = Beauty

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