I'm not very good at zazen

[Guest]

I sat zazen in my backyard this morning, on an old tree stump in my garden. As I sat there, this thought came to mind---I"m not very good at zazen. I try my best, but my mind often wants to bolt, like a racehorse. I've been sitting for about 4 years now, but if someone came to me and wanted some advice, I'd have very little to say, more than likely stumbling over my words and not making any sense. Yet, I sit, every single day. It's become such a big part of the foundation of my life.

So I'm ok with the fact that my mind wants me to think I'm not be very good at it. In fact, maybe that's why I do it so faithfully in the first place.

Gassho,
Joyo
sat today

[Kyonin]

Hi Joyo,

I get to that same conclusion sometimes. Am I doing this right? What if I destroy zen forever? Will I ever get something out of this?

Then I realize I need to sit zazen

Gassho,

Kyonin
#SatToday

[Mp]

Hello Joyo,

I too have had those feelings, I think most folks have at some point in their practice. I feel the key to zazen is to just do zazen ... to let go of the right zazen vs wrong zazen and in time, zazen naturally grows and reveals itself. It sounds to me you are already doing that. =)

Gassho
Shingen

s@today

[Jakugan]

Yup me too, although nowadays I feel like my sittings are beyond good and bad. I guess it's good for nothing. And everything too.



Gassho,

Jakugan

Sat today

[Rich]

Great, I'm not the only one.

[Jakuden]

I s*ck at Zazen but I do it every day also. If I ever get good at it then I'll really know I'm doing something wrong.
Gassho
Jakuden
SatToday


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[MikeTango]

Yes me too,
Every time is the same…I usually try to focus on each short expiration trying to be aware what happens in my mind in the space between expiration and expiration (As I learnt in kendo, I try to take just one long inspiration for as much as expirations I can). The first cycles of breathing the mind gradually starts to be calm, but in a certain point (which I obviously don’t identify until seconds of minutes after) thoughts start to take this place and the space between expirations and even the same inspirations and expirations lost their borders and finally they are completely invaded by my thoughts. When I finally notice that I am completely gone, I come back and start again with my expirations. And obviously sometimes I get frustrated because, like you, I have a lot of years in this cycle and no apparent (or at least not so apparent) improvements have happened. Then, I just remind me that it is not gradual…it is not like learn French or playing tennis, said teacher Joko Beck. Life has to do its part in our transformation and we have to do the ours. And our part is …zazen.
Gassho
Miguel
Sat today

[Greggorious]

One of the reasons I chose to sign up to this site is that I can get instructions on Zazen, do it in my own time and for however long I want. There is a soto zen group that is near me that I go to from time to time, but I just can't sit from an hour at a time, let alone do a sesshin. My anxiety issues are so bad that if I sit for longer than 20 minutes I start crying out in pain. 10 mins a day for me usually. Maybe if my anxiety disorder gets better then I'll do more. I've just started 12 step recovery too so hopefully that should help.
I suck at zazen, but I also suck at Anapanasati and vipassana, but at least with zazen I don't have to worry about obtaining anything.

[Jundo]

I posted this in our readings on the Book of Serenity, but it seems to work here too. All this fits together ...

Perhaps we may say that life is constant change, moving on and getting lost, for without such the world would be frozen, lifeless and stagnant. Yet, through this Practice we realize such which is beyond all change, always at home, cannot be lost. All at once. Nonetheless, although we can never be "lost" (in a Buddha Eye) even when "lost", we do our best in each choice of word, thought and act not to wander off into life's poison ivy of greed, anger and divisive thoughts in ignorance.

Dogen also said, “There is the principle of the Way that we must make one mistake after another” (Eihei Koroku, Dogen’s Extensive Record, p. 132). Get up and sometimes fall. Yet through this Practice we realize too that no "mistake" was ever possible, all the ups and downs each shine in their way, and there was no place to fall. All at once. Nonetheless, we do our best not to make mistakes in life, stumble and fall.

This is how I express "Practice-Enlightenment", and why we never put the raft down, even though there was no raft or river from the outset.

Perhaps we can say that so often we get lost in thoughts and in judgments about our Zazen (not to mention about life in general). Human beings and our brain think thoughts, for otherwise we would be lifeless, insentient, in a coma or dead. Yet through this Practice we realize such which is Clear beyond and right at the heart of all thought, Good beyond all small human judgments of good and bad. All at once. (This Good Clarity sometimes manifests when the mind is free of all thoughts and judgments, sometimes manifests like a light shining through and illuminating even as all thoughts and judgments ... is present always, even when hidden in our mental fog and storms of thoughts and judgments like the moon which always shines even when shining through or totally covered by clouds). Nonetheless, when sitting we constantly return again and again to opening the hand of thought, not getting tangled in trains of thought, and dropping judgments ... 10,000 times and 10,000 times again ... so that the Illumination at the Heart of thought or no thought, judgment and no judgment is easily seen.

Something like that.

Practice-Enlightenment.

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Joyo]

Hello Joyo,

I feel the key to zazen is to just do zazen ... to let go of the right zazen vs wrong zazen and in time, zazen naturally grows and reveals itself. =)

Gassho
Shingen

s@today

Thank you everyone, and thank you for this Shingen. Much appreciated.

Gassho,
Joyo
sat today

[Washin]

I, too, belong here. 3 years of sitting with "no progress"
Sometimes I recall the words of someone I read in an article a couple of years ago which go like
"You can train yourself to sit for hours with the straight back and correct posture until you get bruises on your
bottom, but if you do the whole thing wrong you're just wasting time on your cushion.." This sure is somewhat
discouraging. Then I remember many sayings I heard about good zazen vs wrong zazen as well as all valuable
posts of Jundo here..

Also, I've recently come across this passage in the chapter of Boykin's book which I really like:

If practicing meditation is worth doing, it's worth doing badly.
If practicing compassion is worth doing, it's worth doing badly.
You need not choose between practicing Zen "well" and not practicing Zen at all.
Be a mediocre Zen practitioner, or a lousy Zen practitioner.
Practice Zen awkwardly, sporadically, idiosyncratically.
Do zazen in a noisy place with bright lights.
Keep your eyes closed. Fidget. Slouch.

So I just keep sitting..

Gassho
Washin
sat today

[Toun]

I, too, belong here. 3 years of sitting with "no progress"
Sometimes I recall the words of someone I read in an article a couple of years ago which go like
"You can train yourself to sit for hours with the straight back and correct posture until you get bruises on your
bottom, but if you do the whole thing wrong you're just wasting time on your cushion.." This sure is somewhat
discouraging. Then I remember many sayings I heard about good zazen vs wrong zazen as well as all valuable
posts of Jundo here..

Also, I've recently come across this passage in the chapter of Boykin's book which I really like:

If practicing meditation is worth doing, it's worth doing badly.
If practicing compassion is worth doing, it's worth doing badly.
You need not choose between practicing Zen "well" and not practicing Zen at all.
Be a mediocre Zen practitioner, or a lousy Zen practitioner.
Practice Zen awkwardly, sporadically, idiosyncratically.
Do zazen in a noisy place with bright lights.
Keep your eyes closed. Fidget. Slouch.



So I just keep sitting..

Gassho
Washin
sat today

Thank you Washin.

Gassho
Mike

Sat today

[Joyo]

Washin, Jundo, thank you

Washin, 4 years with no progress for me.

Gassho,
Joyo
sat today

[Nindo]

Hi Joyo,

just be that stump. It's been wanting to bolt like a race horse for ages.


Nindo
sattoday

[threethirty]

My sitting has yet to become daily, my brain will often find a place to run to, and when it doesn't I am confronted with things that require a lot of decompression and processing. All in all I have found it to be terrifically horrible. I figure bodhisattvas are not born they are built... back to the task at hand

sattoday