Day 14

Today was the last day of two weeks of meditation, and honestly I'm kind of sad. I've found the meditating to be rather relaxing and soothing, and wish I had the discipline to continue meditating. However, knowing me, because there is no real obligation to meditate anymore, I might only ever meditate once or twice a week. But anyways, as I've said, today is day 14, and as such, this will probably be the last entry I write.

Hopefully you've learned something from my two week long undertaking, because I for sure know that I have. Besides all of the technical things like sitting technique, the various health benefits of zazen, etc, I feel like I've learned a little bit more about myself. Zazen meditation is all about becoming one with yourself, clearing your mind and viewing the world as it is. In short, zazen is the path to enlightenment, and although this takes many many years to do, I felt that over the two week period, I myself became enlightened, if only a little bit. Before this two week period, I had said that my goal was to become more aware of myself and the world around me, but awareness isn't the thing that I really got out of meditating for two weeks. It was the enjoyment of meditating that I really gained. If the most important thing that I learned was awareness, then there would be no more reason to really mediate, but because what I learned was how to enjoy the meditation, there is still a reason to meditate, which is what is really important.

Yes, my goal was to become more aware, and yes over two weeks, I did gain a little awareness, but no, that's not the most important thing I gained by meditating. What was the most important thing was the experience of meditating everyday, and how it affected my life. Because of that experience, I'll probably continue meditating in the future.

Day 13

Zazen is all about clearing your mind, but not so that you're not thinking of anything. So what you're doing is thinking about not thinking. This may sound poetic, but as you might've guess, it seems almost impossible. Zazen in reality has multiple practices, each serving as stepping stones until you can think about not thinking. The first practice, called breath counting is just what the name suggests. On every inhale or exhale, or both, you count, from 1 to 10. When you get to 10, you just start over from 1, dropping any thoughts that may have entered your mind. This is a very effective practice for beginners since it gives their mind something to focus on instead of letting it wander. This is the practice I use, as my ability to concentrate isn't yet strong enough to move on the the second practice.

The second practice is called koan practice. In this practice, you use a koan, defined by the dictionary as "a paradoxical anecdote or riddle, used in Zen Buddhism to demonstrate the inadequacy of logical reasoning and to provoke enlightenment". The purpose of this practice is to concentrate on your koan. Although it may sound simple, it's a lot harder because a koan is intangible, while breathing can be tangible. An example of a koan is, "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" In reality this practice is similar to that of the first practice, except it requires greater concentration.

The third practice is called shinkantaza. It is this practice where one doesn't focus on anything. You use the strength of your concentration to remain aware of events that occur in the present. However, you dont think about any of it, you are just aware of it. You just sit like a mountain, immovable with your awareness. That is the true art of zazen, and my goal. However, I know this kind of meditation can take years to master. Because of that, as long as my awareness gets better, I'll feel that I was able to accomplish something by meditating

Day 12

Today's post will be about the health benefits from doing meditation. Several studies have been conducted on the health benefits of "mindfulness" activity (Google for more information, even I don't completely understand the definition), and meditation falls under this category. One particular neuroscientist, Dr. James Austin, reported in his book, Zen and the Brain (Austin, 1999). that meditation can actually rewire the circuitry of the brain. Another test conducted by Yale, Harvard, Massachusetts General Hospital, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, shows that meditation helps to increase gray matter (again, Google it, but basically its a major component of the central nervous system), slows down the deterioration of the brain due to aging, and is associated with increased cortical thickness, esp. in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, right insula, and middle prefrontal cortex. These areas of the brain are associated with communication, empathy, self-observation, emotional balance, and empathy.



Other than that, these past few days of meditaton have been good for me. I'm slowly improving my awareness, and overall I feel like my meditating has improved over the past week and a half. The only thing I'm having trouble with is clearing my mind of distracting thoughts, and my breathing. I'm good at controlling my breathing, but I lose track of it when I'm counting. This is probably the reason why I feel like I'm good at focusing on my breathing, but also one of the reasons why my awareness has been lacking. After about ~8 counts, I sometimes lose track of which breath I'm on, because my mind just goes blank or a thought pops up. I then have to mentally berate myself to concentrate.

Day 11

Yesterday I accidentally fell asleep a couple of times, so today I tried to make up for that inadmissible misstep. Now I don't know whether it was because of the mindset I had going into meditation today, or if it was just because I'm getting better at it, but I found it a lot easier to multitask between concentrating on my breathing, and being aware of myself and my surroundings. I didn't go through a spiritual transformation or anything, my mind just felt a lot less excited. Before, I found that if I thought of something besides my breathing, then my mind would get all excited and ADD. I try to refocus to the meditation, but in the background my mind is just going through all of this garbage. Because of this, I usually have to just not think about anything else besides the breathing. But today, I noticed that if I thought of something, I could just let it go, and forget about it. This means that if I hear a distant car, I just hear a distant car and move on. Normally when we view things, we see something, then fixate on it. True awareness is being able to get past that fixation, letting it go and noticing things that usually aren't noticed. So being able to somewhat stop my mind from wandering and controlling it allowed me to be much more aware. I wasn't thinking about being aware, I just concentrated on my breathing, and noticed that my senses would pick up details about the space I was meditating in, and I could let these details just be details instead of distracting thoughts. Instead of analyzing and judging things, I was able, at least for today, just view them as what they were. Hopefully this means I'm one step closer to obtaining true awareness.

Day 10

Today during zazen, I accidentally fell asleep. Well, I didn't really fall asleep, more like I was drowsing. I was sitting with my eyes closed, and before I knew it, my body's weight had shifted off-center, so that I was slowly leaning backwards. But due to the sensation of falling backwards (think of the movie Inception, or sometimes when you fall of your bed, you awake just in time to catch yourself), I regained consciousness and returned my body to the correct position. Now this happening once isn't that big of a deal, in my opinion, but the thing is is that it kept on happening. Every time I woke up, a couple of minutes later I would drift back into slumber mode, and then re-awake to the feeling of falling backwards. Reflecting about it now, I've realized that there wasn't one time after the first 6-8 minutes that I was really trying to meditate. If I wasn't already asleep, I was trying to prevent myself from falling asleep. If I tried to count my breathing, I would feel my eyelids getting heavy, and I would try to keep them open, to no avail.

To try and combat this sleepiness, I tried to do some research, but found not a lot of answers. The only advice I found was that if you do find yourself falling asleep, then you might need to get up and splash cold water in your face, work up you muscles, etc. In reality, if you are really that tired, then the best advice I can give you is sleep more.

Day 9

Today's post will go over a little on why you should meditate. A quote from Kyogen Carlson pretty much sums up what I would say:

Meditation is the practice of finding the still point of balance within your own being in the midst of all kinds of conditions. Its purpose is not to escape, not to duck responsibility or involvement in daily life, but to know with certainty exactly where the center of your own being is. When we remember who we are in silence, we bring tremendous strength and insight to daily life. The perspective gained through meditation in an ordinary daily life is a key to a truly successful life. But it is also a powerful means of progressing on the spiritual path. It brings us inner peace of mind, and helps us discover how to live in harmony with everything around us; at home, at work, and even in the difficult social and political world in which we find ourselves.

~ Kyogen Carlson, the Abbot of Dharma Rain Zen Center

Here's also a Youtube video about the Dalai Lama talking about the stages of meditation, and some of the basics on the Buddhist philosophy.




Other than that, today's meditation went good. I meditate for 47 minutes (minutes matter to me when they feel like an hour). I won't go in depth because It'll just be a general repeat of what I've said in other blog posts.

Day 8

For week 2, my goal is to do zazen while being aware of myself and the space I'm meditating in. It's also to try and become more aware in my everyday life. So I think in order to reach this goal by the end of the week, I decided that I would meditate for more than 30 minutes.

Ater coming back from a Mother's Day brunch, I started meditating. For the first 20-25 minutes I was doing everything correct. Proper posture, slow and deep breathing, staying completely still, etc. I was also trying to allow myself to succumb to my senses, instead of blocking them out. This was so that I could allow myself to become aware of what was going on around me, instead of being completely absorbed by my breathing. At around the 25+ minute mark, I began to really feel numbness in my legs, but instead of ignoring it, I tried to be aware of it. I really don't know how else to describe it. All of a sudden, I felt pain in the muscles that weren't numb, and I tried to not think about it. However, every time I tried to let go of the thought that my legs were sore, the pain would just make me think about it again. I was so concerned about the pain that I wasn't being aware of what was going on around me. I had just realized this when the meditation of was over and the pain subsided from my legs. Even though I was aware of myself, and the pain that my legs were going through, I wasn't aware of my surroundings. But I think what's even more important to note is that I was allowing myself to get attached to the pain. I wasn't aware of anything else besides the pain in my legs. In order for yourself to have sense of true awareness, you can't allow yourself to fixate on anything. You have to realize that something is there, then just move on. If I'm able to take in and process my surroundings within a matter of seconds, by the end of the week, I'll feel like I accomplished my goal.

Day 6 and Day 7

Day 6

I forgot to write a blog entry yesterday. Having to keep up with these blog posts is becoming rather difficult. After meditating, I usually go take a shower and eat my dinner. Only after that do I start on my homework. Except I always forget that writing a blog entry everyday is also a part of my homework. Last night, the fact that I had to write a post completely escaped me.

Getting back on topic, day 6 (yesterday) it rained, a lot. Lately the weather has been rather random, so I have to try and wiggle in my meditation between times when it isn't raining. But yesterday it rained non-stop after I got home, so I decided to try and meditate inside. I had meditated inside before, but that was when nobody was home yet. Today, my neighbor was mowing his lawn and my mom was cooking in the kitchen. I was also facing out into the living room where I could see everyone doing their everyday thing. The excessive noise combined with the visual disturbances, meant that I was constantly distracted and couldn't 'concentrate' on meditating. This coaxed me to go do some research on where one should meditate. I had just assumed that all you had to do was find a quite and calm place. But I've learned that besides being harmonious and tranquil, the space you meditate in should be comfortable, uncluttered, and spiritually nurturing, although it isn't necessary. Also, if you're going to meditate indoors, make sure to reduce as much ambient noise as possible, and meditate either while facing a wall, or with your eyes half-closed . I think the best advice I learned after researching today was that tip about closing your eyes. The natural human tendency is to focus on something if it comes into their immediate vision. Therefore, if you close your eyes, you can't get distracted by something moving into your vision. Just remember to not completely close your eyes, or you might end up falling asleep.




Day 7

Today is the end of week, and it has become much more easier to meditate. I'm able to keep my back straight without having to think about it and I'm concentrating on my breathing for the entire time, with my mind getting distracted maybe once or twice. I can feel that I've improved my ability to do zazen, and I'm quite proud about that. Despite this improvement, I still feel like my goal to become more aware of myself and the world around me hasn't been sufficiently reached. While I am concentrated on my breathing while doing zazen, I'm still relatively aware of whats around me. I can hear the water filter of the aquarium running and the the soft drone of the air conditioner, but I try not to let myself get distracted by them. However, even though I'm aware of these things, I want to try take it even further. A couple of days ago, while I was meditating, I wasn't being mindful of the environment around me, and because of that, I hadn't realized that the curry my dad left on the stove was burning. In fact, I didn't even know he put something on the stove. If it wasn't for my sister, who knows what would've happened. All of this makes me feel like I need to put more effort into my goal. Throughout this whole week I've gotten caught up with the idea of doing zazen, and making sure I'm doing it correct. The only thing I haven't been paying attention to was my goal. So I feel like I need to continue doing zazen for the next week to really see if meditation can enable me to become more aware of myself and the the world around me.

Day 5

My aikido sensei always tells me that what we do during zazen can and should be applied in our daily lives. When doing zazen, keeping your back straight and maintaining deep breathing all helps to clear your mind and unify mind and body. But these basics can also be utilized outside of meditation. For example, when most people walk, the're not really thinking about walking. They're usually thinking about where they came from and regretting decisions they've already made. If you walk while thinking about the place you just left, you become unaware of the world around you and it's easier for you to get injured. You can't focusing on what's ahead of you if you're attached to thoughts like, a math question you should've done right, or that presentation that could've gone better. If you instead only focus on where you are going and on the actually act of walking, you become aware of the world around you, and you can avoid injury much more easier. Letting go of events that happened in the past, that you can't change anyways, allows you to concentrate on what's ahead and needs to be done. Not focusing on walking is the same as not focusing while driving. If you get distracted while driving, the likelihood of a crash is increased. The same idea can be applied to walking.

So while trying to stay on topic with this post, my goal for today's zazen session was to sit up straight the entire time and focus on my breathing, making sure I let go of any distracting thoughts. Overall, I felt like I sufficiently met my goal. Whenever I thought of something along the lines of, "I wonder what's for dinner?" or, "What should I write for my next post?" I just let it go and refocused on how I was breathing, feeling the air pass through my nostrils down my throat. In addition to doing zazen, I've gradually began to integrate the principles of Aikido training and meditation into my daily life. Tomorrow in my classes I will do my best to sit up straight, pay attention, and not slouch or put my head on my table.

Day 4

Today marks the half way point in my week of exploration through meditation. And despite having only meditated for half a week, I can tell you that I've become slightly more calm and aware of myself. Now, it might be that I haven't had a lot of homework this week, but I still feel less stressed and I seem to not worry as much about things that need to get done. I'm not letting myself worry about the minute details in my life. Nor am I After every zazen session, I feel calm and relaxed and when I start to do my homework for the night, I'm not thinking about what the faster way to do it would be, or what I'm going to do after my homework. All I'm focusing on is the work that is in front of me, and not letting anything else distract me. As I sit here writing this entry, my dad is going back and forth between the Discovery channel and the National Geographic channel, while my mom is also watching one of her Korean dramas. However, I'm not letting myself get distracted by it. Also, even though I sitting here writing this blog entry, I'm still aware of the fact that both of the TVs in my house are one. I'm concentrating on writing this entry, but I'm still aware of the fact that my sister just opened the refrigerator to probably get some dessert.

I mentioned in my first post that my goal is to try and become more aware of myself and the world around me through meditation. Now, I want to say that this awareness and calmness came from meditating, but I don't know for sure. However, what I do know is that if I want to meet my goal, I'll have to take my meditation more seriously.

Day 3

Yesterday, I mentioned that one of the first steps to good meditation, is to find a comfortable sitting style/position. So today I'll take the time to write about the different sitting positions in zazen.

There are 4 primary ways of sitting zazen, lotus, burmese, seiza, and chair. The classic sitting position is called full lotus. This position requires a certain degree of flexibility in the hips and legs. In this position, you cross your legs, just like how you would sit cross legged, except you put each foot on the opposite thigh. This makes this particular position very stable and solid. If you aren't flexible enough to sit in the standard full lotus position, you can instead sit in the half-lotus position. In this position, only one foot in up on the thigh. This is still a very stable position to sit in. Despite being a stable sitting position, you may feel awkward sitting like that. If that is the case, then I'd recommend finding a different sitting position.

E


The second, position is called the Burmese position. The burmese position is probably the easiest and simplest position to sit in. In this position, the legs are flat on the ground, not crossed over each other, but bent so that the foot of one leg is tucked between the thigh and calf of the leg that is in front. This is a good position to try out if you're not very flexible. For both this and the lotus positions, it is recommended that you sit on a zafu, though you can instead sit on a folded blanket if that is more comfortable. The primary purpose of the zafu is to help make meditating comfortable and help to encourage maintaining a straight posture.



The third seiza position, named so because you sit in seiza, a traditional Japanese sitting position where you sit in an upright kneeling position. The seiza position can be done several ways, but the only difference between the different ways is the object which you use to aid you in your meditation. You can sit seiza with a zafu placed between your buttocks and legs, without a zafu, using your feet as a naturally cushion, and even using a rectangular stool, tucking you feet under the seat.



The fourth zazen position is called the chair position. Yea, that's right, the chair position. It's name says it all. Basically you do zazen while sitting in a chair. If you want, you can use a zafu the help cushion your buttocks, or if your chair is curved, a zafu can help ensure you maintain a straight posture.



So knowing that I would be writing a blog post about the different zazen position, I decided to try meditate in a different position today. I had decided to sit in the seiza position, where you put a zafu between your buttocks and feet. Now let me tell, I'm never doing that again. Sitting in seiza was excruciating. Not only did my feet fall asleep sooner than when I sit in full lotus, but before my feet even fell asleep, the pain from hyperextending my feet was killing me. I was extremely distracted and my concentration wasn't on the meditation, but on suppressing my pain. But honestly, if you find sitting in seiza more comfortable than sitting in let's say lotus, then by all means sit in seiza. I can't emphasize this enough, the first step to successfully being able to meditate is to pick a position that is comfortable and fits your preference.

Day 2

Unfortunately there was a storm last night (so I couldn't meditate either) and my house lost power. No power, no internet, no posting, so I'll post two entries today. Today's first post will be about how to properly do Zen meditation. Zen is a school of Buddhism that focuses on enlightenment and self-realization. Zen meditation, or zazen, is the core practice used to reach these goals. Zazen is a type a meditation that focuses on uniting the mind and body, and in order to attain self unity, one must properly sit.

Some tips for beginners:
• Sit in a place where distractions are at a minimum. You want to find a place to sit that is relatively peaceful and tranquil.
• Sitting on a soft pillow (also called a zafu), causes your behind to become raised, and allows your knees to touch the ground. This becomes a very stable base for zazen.
• Find a sitting technique that is comfortable to you. I'll write a post about sitting postures later.
• Imagine that your spine is a metal rod stuck in the ground. By maintaining a straight posture, the diaphragm is allowed to move freely, allowing deep breathing (inhale short, exhale long) through the nose.
• Although your breathing should not be forced, pay attention to it. Breath from your hara, or center
• Let go of all distracting thoughts. An easy way to do this is just focus on your breathing. Count your breaths and focus on each breath as they pass the inside of your nostrils.
• And last but not least, just find a good 15-30 minutes to just sit. After meditating, you will feel refreshed and any anxiety or stress that you accumulated will be forgotten.

Zazen is a Japanese word. The "Za" means to sit, and "zen" means to meditate or concentrate. But zazen means more than just sitting and meditating. Zazen is about being able to settle your mind to a state of clarity, so you can see everything in this world as it is. Zazen should be a very calming practice.

Day 1

As soon as a finished that last post, I quickly went to the hill behind my house. It's very quiet and serene and away from all the noise of daily living. I quickly got into sitting position and just sat, meditating. I would like to briefly pause and talk about my previous encounters with zen meditation. As I mentioned before, I take an Aikido class, every Saturday from 8:30 to 11:30. But for 30 minutes of each class, we did zazen, or zen meditation. When I was a little kid I used to hate having to do zazen, mainly because it hurt and legs and it was really boring. But as I got older, I began to appreciate zazen more and more, and began looking forward to it. During the 30 minutes of zazen I'm able to just sit, relax, and calm myself down. For those 30 minutes, I try not to think of anything, because if I do, my mind begins to wander and I end up thinking about homework and school and I just end up getting stressed. If I just sit and focus on my breathing and posture, I feel at peace with myself (this is the main reason why I've decided to try meditate more often).

So during this first session of self-regulated meditation my goal was to just sit properly and maintain good breathing and good posture (will try go over what is "good" tomorrow or day after). I must say that I was able to maintain relatively good posture, but I lost focus on my breathing, and my mind wandered to my homework. Hopefully I'll be able to keep my mind under control and train it to not wander and stay focused.

Welcome to my blog

Hello, and welcome to my blog. This blog will be about my experience living with meditation. For the next week, I will meditate for 20 min – 30 min everyday. After each meditation session, I will document how the meditating has affected my daily life. In addition to meditation, I will try to integrate the principles of meditation into my daily life. Besides just blogging about my meditation sessions, I will also write posts that talk about meditation. I'll write about how to meditate, its principles, the Buddhism philosophy behind, and much more.

I've decided to do this because I want to try become more aware of who I am, and of the world around me. I want to see if meditation does in fact have a positive affect on my life, and if it does, in what way. I've meditated before in the Aikido class I attend every week, and I'm always eager to spend 30 minutes of class to meditate. But I want to see if I can try take this further and meditate on a daily basis. Because I do actually enjoy meditating sometimes, the other goal of this endeavor is to show whoever decides to read this blog what meditation can do for them. I hope that I'll be able to maybe inspire and encourage someone to try meditate themselves. Hopefully you'll be able take something out of my week of living with meditation.