Mind Full to Mindful

by Om Swami

  ‘Of course, I do. She gives me strength.’

  ‘Then why don’t you go and spend time with her instead of looking at her photograph here?’

  ‘Listen,’ the man said, ‘when I continue to drink, after a while comes a time when she starts looking really beautiful. I know then it’s time to go home.’

  One way to live your life to the fullest is by becoming bigger than your problems. No, even for a moment, I am not suggesting that your husband or wife is a problem. That was just a joke (not your partner, the preceding para I meant). The thing is that problems will always be there. If you are smaller than the challenges ahead of you, life becomes very hard. As a great philosopher (I think it was Uncle Ben in Spiderman), who once said, ‘With great power comes great responsibility.’ The reverse is also true, I suppose. The more you have to deal with, the more energy you discover in you.

  Somewhere we have to show our greatness; somehow we have to awaken the Buddha in us. If we are not going to rise above the problems and petty challenges in our lives, our outlook and attitude will continue to shrink and match the pettiness of such challenges.

  And like flowers, all of us, with each passing moment, are withering away as we age and move towards death. Our energy levels and our ability to do many things diminishes. Now, all we have to do is deeply inhale the fragrance of life and to spread it.

  So be fragrant, be soft and tender like a flower. Every night it closes; it knows how to protect itself. Each morning it opens. It doesn’t say, ‘The sun is out, but I am not opening up. I feel lazy.’ It just opens. It remains like this while honey bees and butterflies come and take away its pollen. The winds blow and take so much of its scent, but it remains just as fragrant. And though on its stem are thorns, the rose does not lose its own tenderness.

  There will always be thorns in your life. There are going to be excuses and people will take things from you they will not return. Especially books: people never return books, when they borrow them. For the life of me I can’t figure out why – it’s a mystery that even Buddha could not solve, I believe. Some people in the form of thorns will always be there, all over you.

  At times, nature will force you to close and sometimes it will force you to bloom. Be open to the possibilities and in all that, just remember the Zen message: you are a flower, born in flowers and you will die in flowers. We may as well live surrounded by them and continue to emit a fragrance, indiscriminately. A flower never says, ‘I don’t like you, honey bee. You’ve got that sharp sting. I’m not giving you any of my pollen or fragrance.’On the other hand, it doesn’t run after other creatures, saying, ‘Take my fragrance, take my fragrance.’ If you are fragrant enough, you will automatically attract all creatures that need that fragrance. Show no desperation in love or in life if you value yourself.

  Similarly, if you try to fall in love with people or have them fall in love with you – make a relationship work when the other person does not want your love – don’t bother. Just be loving and kind, and you will attract the right people in your life. If you stay true to your dharma, you will automatically attract the right things; the right situations in life. And none of that is possible in a mindless life or in a rash lifestyle. You can do any or all of this only if you are mindful, gentle and tender – when you are very Zen-like, when you are a flower. One good way to start is to learn to sit quietly and maintain your centre awareness, or practice Zazen, in other words.

  Your First Step in Zen (Zazen)

  A seeker approached a master who was famous for various yogic practices and methods. ‘What can I do to be enlightened?’ he asked.

  ‘Little more than what you can do to make the sun rise,’ the master replied.

  ‘What is the use of all your practices then?’

  ‘To make sure you are not sleeping when the sun rises.’

  All meditation practices are a means to an end. Mastering a certain practice does not mean that one has awakened. History is replete with awakened beings in the form of philosophers, scientists, prophets and teachers who never sat down and meditated. Having said that, in our extremely fast-paced and ever-distracting world, meditation continues to be a long lasting and practical solution to get a better handle on your thoughts and emotions.

  When children start preschool, all they are taught in the beginning is to sit properly and behave in a manner that is socially acceptable in the world. There are no rigorous studies in a preschool, only individual and group games that kids can enjoy. The scenario is not too different in Zen. That is not to say that Zen is preschool; on the contrary, it is more like a complete school teaching you (by not teaching) to be at ease with yourself, others and your duty.

  The art of sitting meditation where you sit down in a comfortable posture and maintain a sense of quietude is called Zazen. Zazen was created from the Sanskrit word dhyana which means meditation, to be in a state of flow. Dhyana or Zazen should not be confused with dharana, which is concentration. This is where Zazen is different from most other systems of meditation (you can refer to my book, A Million Thoughts, if you like that comprises all the major schools of thought in meditation), for in Zazen you don’t try to build your concentration but simply maintain your centre of awareness.

  Further, in Zazen you never close your eyes. Meditative living ought to be a part of your world, that you see with your eyes. In most forms of meditation, you close your eyes, because you want to reduce the sensory input from outside sources. But in Zen, the idea is that the meditative state must be an extension of normal life. Therefore, if I am shutting out the external world to go into meditation, this is of little use to me for it is while operating in the real world that I need the calmness and strength gained from my meditation.

  In Zen, you sit cross-legged: half or fully cross-legged. That’s the first element. Your back is straight, not stiff, and your neck slightly bent. Your gaze is normal and straight. You keep your eyes open; at the most your eyelids may be halfclosed. In fact, in most of Buddha’s paintings or sculptures, his eyes are half open and half closed – as if you don’t know if he is about to close his eyes or he has just opened them. That is the mystical gaze of a Zen meditator. Your teeth are slightly parted, barely touching each other. Your tongue is touching your palate and your lips are gently joined. Hold a soft smile.

  The idea is that your body should be so comfortable that you forget about it like a musician who has become one with their instrument. Your body should be resting in its natural state because Zen or meditation should be your most natural state. A comfortable but good posture allows you not to be distracted and to simply maintain your centre of awareness. Your elbows should be in their natural posture, each forming an ‘L’. If you meditate with your arms outstretched, they will begin hurting within the first thirty to forty-five minutes.

  In my normal meditation (I alternate between mahamudra or patanjali), I just cross my hands over my lap and rest them loosely so that my finger tips are almost touching the floor. This is how I sat in the Himalayas for hours on end. If you have a slightly shorter arms, you could rest them in your lap. But in Zen it changes. It has to if you are to follow the posture of Zen. Your hands one on top of the other, palms facing upwards and the tips of the thumbs together forming a small circle. Rest your hands in your lap and you are at your most comfortable.

  The idea of this posture is to close all circuits so the flow of energy is not being discharged. We always discharge it with our limbs. You can feel that with static electricity. Perhaps I would not feel the same charge if I were to touch something with my tongue or back. I haven’t tried this, but you can try it and let me know if that’s the case (I’m simply kidding).

  So if I am sitting correctly, my energy flow is controlled. All the energy is channeling, regulating, flowing inside my body. With cars, there is a system where the air circulates only inside the car and no outside air is flowing in. You don’t smell diesel fumes from outside because the air inside the car keeps circulating and keeps getting purifie
d. The Zazen posture is something similar. The vent is open when the tips of the thumbs are separated and closed when they are joined.

  I cannot emphasize enough how critical good posture is to meditation. For those who cannot sit on the floor, who cannot sit on a meditation cushion, who can’t cross their legs – that is perfectly fine. You can still do plenty in Zen sitting on a chair. However, you should keep your back straight. You can support your back, but keeping it straight is essential because that’s where the pranic energy, the subtlest form of energies, needs to flow. If your back is stooped, you are more likely to doze off than meditate. You will lose awareness. Your concentration and mindfulness will diminish if you bend your back and relax. You can also do that kind of meditation because Zen allows for that. But Zazen is not just sitting in any posture. It is when you sit in a proper posture.

  In some forms of meditation, we may visualize an external object, but in Zazen we don’t do that. We are simply here in the present moment, without thinking at all because even visualization is a form of thinking. Generally, to bring your centre of awareness to the present moment or wherever you want to direct it, there is a simple mechanism in Zen. Merely count your breath. For instance, I am breathing in one, breathing out one. Like this, you can count to ten or more.

  Even when not practising Zazen, just sit in a normal posture and listen to your breathing. It’s a very effective way of being in the present moment. You may only do five or seven minutes of Zazen, but it is important that you do quality meditation.

  In the beginning stages of meditation, you will lose mindfulness within moments. For example, in the first thirty seconds, more than half the meditators at my Zen retreats forget to smile. Within the next thirty seconds, many end up closing their eyes. Some end up looking very serious, some can be seen frowning as if they are trying very hard. This defeats the very idea of Zen. There is enough seriousness in the world and I am not training you to sit like a corpse. Smile and be gentle – be natural.

  Just listen to your breathing and you will automatically be in the present moment, because your first and fundamental connection with life is breath. If you are breathing, you are alive. If you are not breathing, you are dead.

  I read somewhere:

  ‘Breathe in…

  Breathe out…

  Forget that and enlightenment will be the least of your worries.’

  Humor aside, it’s when you forget how to breathe that you lose control of yourself. When you are angry or aggressive, you breathing is shallow; you breathe hard. When you are calm, you breathe deep and slow. If you regulate your breathing, your mind will become regulated, and as you regulate your mind, your breathing will reflect it.

  Yogic scriptures state that the breath of a true yogi, one who is mindful at all times, cannot be felt from more than a distance of two fingers from his or her face. Note how any time you are angry, feeling aggressive or very passionate, your breath can be felt more than an arm’s length away. Some people, medically fit, even normally breathe as if a bull is charging towards them. You can hear them breathe from miles away. But when you are calm, you can’t even hear your own breathing: it’s so gentle and calm.

  If you practise it regularly, just breathing deeply will bring you back to normalcy when you are feeling restless or indisposed.

  Breathe deeply and gently whenever you can, and don’t hold your breath for too long. Unless you have perfected your posture, holding your breath for a long time is not a good idea. But you can hold it for a few seconds. And make sure you are not holding your breath till you go red in the face – don’t hold your breath till you exhale with a sigh of relief.

  Just as you should never eat to your full satisfaction, only hold your breath so that when you begin your exhalation, it’s done very gently. We must never let go of gentleness. Under all circumstances – it does not matter how dire the situation – be gentle, be kind. Breathe gently; breathe kindly; eat gently; drink kindly. Sleep gently, and wake up kindly. Bathe gently. Talk kindly.

  Do everything gently, and you’ll be amazed by the kind of positive impact it has on you. Just be gentle. It’s not hard. You can say what needs to be said without being harsh or shouting or being too excited. It’s possible to communicate effectively in a gentle way.

  This is the art of Zazen. Maintain your centre of awareness, and let your eyes half close. Enjoy these moments – they are precious. Keep smiling gently Maintain your natural state of mind. Keep your head upright and back straight. Just listen to the beautiful silence and you will begin to draw energy from the silence, the most potent form of energy.

  Just sit peacefully. Don’t think about anything. Any thought that comes to your mind – just let it come and go... These are your moments – be here, now … Don’t think of anything: don’t visualize anything; don’t imagine anything; don’t envision anything. Don’t react to any thought. Don’t think of any other moment – just be present in the present moment... If you are here now, you will smile automatically because the present moment has no stress...

  With each inhalation, imagine that you are inhaling positivity, loving kindness, compassion, happiness, joy and bliss. With each exhalation, you are releasing negativity, baggage, depressing feelings and suppressed emotions. Keep your head and back straight. Feel the inhalation, continue the count. In the few seconds that you hold your breath, all these positive emotions are spreading throughout your body. And you are exhaling negative feelings; emptying yourself of everything that holds you back – everything that makes you angry.

  It takes a certain calm to practice Zazen and practicing it makes you calmer. At times, you may not be in the right frame of mind to just sit quietly and smile. Your emotions may be running wild. A regular practise of wall gazing is extremely effective in channelizing your consciousness so you are in better control of your thoughts and feelings. While Zazen is a pleasant activity and it builds on your inner serenity, wall gazing may feel like a chore but the rewards come through unfailingly to the dedicated practitioner.

  Wall Gazing

  A disciple asked his master, ‘Why do we pray after finishing our meditation?’

  ‘My son,’ the master replied, ‘we do it to thank God that it’s finally over.’

  Meditation need not be like that. It shouldn’t be: Dear God, when will these fifteen minutes end? My body is hurting there or my mind is hurting here.

  At times, meditators get restless, as if a bad poet is reading and they’re checking how many pages he has to turn before he finishes. Don’t meditate if you feel like this on some days. Don’t make everything a ritual. Don’t say, ‘I have to meditate every day.’ Commit to the practice, I would say, but feel free to alternate between various kinds. It goes without saying that missing your practice should not be the routine. The joy of procrastination (and subsequent guilt) is only when you do it rarely, on special occasions.

  Maybe some days, you don’t feel like sitting down to meditate. When you feel that way, you could follow the Zen way, and just be mindful of the life that is flowing. The moment you make everything a ‘have to’, you’ll feel stressed about it. You’ll say to yourself, ‘Oh, today I didn’t get time. I feel bad – I could not keep up with my schedule or routine,’ or so on. Just enjoy life, enjoy living and live every moment as much as you possibly can. I reiterate, missing your practice shouldn’t become the norm. It’s just that sometimes if you do miss it, there’s no point in feeling guilty.

  At times when you don’t feel calm enough to do Zazen, you may want to do wall gazing. As I mentioned earlier, it’s not interesting or calming but the results of this concentrative meditation (in wall gazing, as the name suggests, you maintain your concentration on a wall, unlike Zazen where you simply sit with a sense of awareness) are phenomenal.

  I will tell you something that I experienced when I was in the Himalayas. I used to do a different kind of wall-gazing meditation. My hut was mostly dark, so it wasn’t possible to gaze at a wall there. So I would take a pebble and I
would gaze at it instead. After a while, I don’t know whether it was weeks or months, something quite remarkable happened. Whenever I would pick up a stone and looked at it, within the first few minutes, I would see the stone disintegrating in my hands.

  Of course, physically, it was very much there. But it was as if it were magnifying and I could see the stone was made from tiny particles like sand. And after a while, that magnified further and I would seethe spaces between the particles. That space would continue to magnify and eventually, there would be nothing at all. After I returned from the Himalayas, even now, when I settle my gaze on anything for more than a few seconds, a pattern starts to emerge in that object.

  Wall gazing gives you the ability to recognize patterns everywhere around you. What’s that got to do with anything, you may reason successfully and you could be right. Here’s what happens when a pattern starts to emerge: it stills your mind completely. I can only speak from my own experience, but ultimately you’ve to discover your own truth which may be different from anything you may have ever heard, read or experienced.

  I have found wall gazing far more effective than doing tarataka, where you usually meditate toa candle. You just sit in front of a wall and gaze at it.

  Or you could keep a small stone or a pebble with yourself. Gaze at it for a few minutes just before or after your lunch while at work, for example. You can also use that stone as a reminder. Whenever you are angry or down, put your hand in your pocket, press that stone a little and remind yourself, ‘I am supposed to be mindful’. Because the opposite of mindfulness is not the absence of mind, it is forgetfulness. If I tell you, ‘Meditate for ten minutes, ‘and ten seconds later your mind has gone in a different direction, what has happened is that your mind has forgotten. It is thinking about other things. Had you remembered, you would still be meditating. So that stone could be a reminder to be mindful and grateful. That will remind you: ‘I am supposed to be in meditation, I am supposed to be mindful – not reckless in my responses.’Unlike the flower which you may have to change everyday, you can keep a small stone in your pocket.