Zazen (Meditation) : The Heart of the Matter

I thought about doing a couple articles before I hit on the subject of meditation, but then I thought… if zazen is really the meat and potatoes of Zen Buddhism, why wait?

This article is about zazen or meditation practice. -DV

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I always seem to get a lot of questions on the topic of zazen, and like most questions in Zen or Buddhism the answers never seem to be quite clear. (I have a theory for answers never being quite clear in Buddhism, but short of giving you a clear answer, I will give you a hint… the path is a little different for everyone.)

All the books say zazen is so simple. It seems like it should be simple. So why all the confusion?

Let me relate a story I read from Pema Chodron‘s book “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times“. I’m going to recite it from memory, and let me warn you her version is much better:

There was this teacher, he was a good one and widely respected, but one day he found himself perplexed. You see, he was teaching a small group of students how to meditate and so he said… “well it is very simple,” and then went on to describe a simple way to meditate. The students then tried, and came back to the teacher and started asking all kinds of questions, “When this happens… what do I do…? How do I do this…? How do I do that…?” Well the teacher scratched his head and thought on the subject. The next set of students he gave a detailed list of how to meditate and the questions stopped.

What is the moral to the story? Well, I think it is basically that how to meditate can be very easy, but there is no right way. The truth is, in general, that people like a little structure around what they do to make it easier for them to do zazen. There are certainly recommended ways to do zazen, and formal structure certainly makes it more harmonious when you are performing group meditation.

So what is the recommended way of doing zazen?

I think we are getting a little ahead of ourselves here. I will answer that question in the next article I write on meditation. But I think the first question really should be:

Why do we practice zazen?

Why is it that you want to practice zazen for? Does someone practice zazen to become a Zen Master (wouldn’t it be cool to be called that?) How about to be “enlightened?” Bring peace and love to the universe? How about bringing peace and love to yourself? How about stop worrying? Stop getting angry? Stop being pushed around?

The answer to all these things is … yes.

The reasons for practicing zazen can be endless, everyone has a reason, but all the reasons are basically the same thing.

The reason we practice zazen is to end suffering.

Wow… to end suffering. That is an amazing thing.

As you look more closely at the practice of zazen, as well as Zen, or Buddhism or the teaching of the Buddha, you will find that it really is all about trying to reduce suffering.

I’m pretty sure about this one… -DV

Articles that may interest you:

Here is an article about recommended ways of performing medtiation

More articles on how to reduce suffering