Meditation like ourselves is full of many contradictions and paradoxes.
Broadly we could say that we practice it for one sole reason,
Expressed in two different ways,
Either to escape from the cycle of unsatisfactoriness and suffering in our lives,
Known as dukkha in Buddhism,
Or,
Expressed in another way,
To be truly happy,
For lack of a better word.
Yet in a way,
Meditation as a practice involves us removing the very external conditions that bring us temporary,
Though unreliable,
Happiness,
Or escape from dukkha.
What we find when we meditate is that we are immediately exposed and confronted by dukkha,
For we have put aside the distractions that keep us from seeing it fully and truly.
But what guides us to abandon such worldly escapisms at all is the intuition that there exists a form of unconditional happiness,
Reliable happiness,
Absolute happiness,
Unbounded and unending.
Herein lies the practice and challenge of meditation.
This is both why it is hard and why it is so necessary,
For the reality hits us immediately as soon as we sit down in silence.
A taste of what is inevitably to come.
A realization that if we do not choose to let go of all the things that bring us temporary relief now,
They will inevitably be stripped from us,
Suddenly and unceremoniously.
We practice for what is to come.
Here we choose to put these conditions aside and search for the alternative,
The unconditioned peace deep within,
The pure,
Unsullied,
Ultimate freshwater source of absolute happiness that flows into the wells from which we eventually draw our murky liquid,
That of relative happiness.
Yet what we drink is not the same pure water we ultimately seek.
Salted from its journey through the earth,
The liquid we drink is unable to ever truly or fully quench our thirst,
But instead with every drop it makes us a little more thirsty.
To find this pure source,
However,
We must be willing to fully taste the taint itself,
Taste and recognize its impurity,
So that we may use this knowledge and experience to sniff out the true source and upon finding it,
Appreciate its richness and quality.
For now we think the purpose is to perpetually crave and obtain,
But for those who have seen the truth,
It is to sip and let go of this craving altogether.
