No easy path

No failure…

Ultimately, all suffering is a message that we have something to learn; that there is some skill that we have not yet mastered, that there is some idea we have that is false, that there is pattern of behavior we have that is not delivering the results that we expect of it.

In one psychological discipline, they say that in communication there is no failure but only feedback. I believe that this is true in meditation. If what we experience in meditation is not to our liking, then it is not a sign that we are not cut out to be meditators, or that we need to give up, or that we need to find a new meditation practice, but that we have something more to learn. Not only that, but we are often being given an indication of what it is that we must learn.

This feedback can be very precise. Meditating can be a bit like scrutinizing our lives with a microscope and seeing what we most need to work on. When we repeatedly experience tiredness in meditation, this can teach us about the need to look after ourselves and to guard our own sources of nourishment. When our minds are making lists and anxiously planning, we can see that we need to become more organized in our daily lives. When we find that we are spending our meditation mulling things over, this can teach us of the need to set aside more time to reflect. Inner arguments show us that there are important conflicts that we have yet to resolve, whether by forgiving and letting go of grievances, or by working things through with another person.

The concept of failure in meditation is profoundly disempowering. It leads to giving up. In meditation there is no failure, only feedback. Remember that your difficulties will turn out to be your teachers, your obstacles will turn out to be stepping stones, and that the sometimes hard and rocky path of meditation will turn out to be the way to greater fulfillment and deeper contentment. Learning is not always easy, but it is always beneficial in the long term. Let go of the idea of failure, and embrace the notion that everything you experience in meditation is feedback, and the path will be immeasurably more enjoyable and enriching.

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Comments

Comment from David
Time: May 9, 2008, 1:42 am

Hello,

I know you said not to worry about failure, since everything can be learned from, but whenever I meditate thoughts come into my mind that I cannot get rid of, particulary failure. When I try to get rid of them, or I tell myself that there is no failure, only feedback, and that I should get my head down and just meditate, the problem worsens!

Do you have any advice for a “noobie” about the problem of thoughts that cannot be removed?

Comment from Bodhipaksa
Time: May 9, 2008, 7:14 am

Hi David,

I sympathize with the problem of intrusive and unwanted thinking. I can suggest a few approaches.

One is that you make these thoughts themselves into the object of your meditation for as long as they persist. This approach involves recognizing that the thoughts are not “things” that are permanently lodged in your mind (”cannot be removed” as you put it) but are impermanent processes that arise, seem to exist for a while, and then pass away. Now you may be saying, “But they keep coming back, so they are permanent,” but what’s happening in fact is that similar thoughts are being recreated over and over again. If you watch any one thought you’ll see that it wasn’t there, then it is (apparently), and then it’s not. Each thought is impermanent.

Over time, if you keep doing this, you’ll start to recognize that these thoughts are simply passing through. And if they’re just passing through you’ll start to recognize that they’re not fundamentally part of you. You are not your thoughts; your thoughts are not you.

It’s also not the most helpful approach to think in terms of “getting rid” of unwanted thoughts. When we try to get rid of thoughts we’re engaged in an impossible, and therefore fruitless, task. The thoughts will get rid of themselves — all you have to do is keep coming back to the breath (or wishing yourself well).

Another thing I’d strongly suggest is that when these thoughts arise you notice the pain that follows on their heels. Actually, I’m sure you do notice the pain, but what I suggest is that you notice specifically where in the body this pain is located — what size and shape is the pain, what texture does it have — and cultivate lovingkindness for that pain: direct the thoughts, “May you be well,;may you be happy; may you be free from suffering” towards your pain, as if your pain was a suffering friend.

May you, and all beings, be well!

Comment from David
Time: May 9, 2008, 2:54 pm

I tried again this evening, I still had some trouble, but I took your advice to heart and felt some difference. Not a large one, but it is still my first day :p

Thanks, and I wish you and all things well.

Comment from Bodhipaksa
Time: May 9, 2008, 3:24 pm

Hi again, David.

“Some difference” is good, especially after one session. Those small changes mount up over time and eventually our approach to life is substantially different to what it once was. “Mony a puckle maks a muckle” as we say in Scotland.

All the best,
Bodhipaksa