The Key To Building A Life Long Meditation Practice

Once, my teacher narrated an interesting story about Krishna and Balarama. 

One day Krishna and Balarama were walking through a forest to reach their destination. However, by sunset, they were still in the forest so Krishna suggested that they rest for the night inside the forest and resume their journey by sunlight. 

Balarama agreed and took the first watch while Krishna slept. As he stayed alert and kept watch, Balarama noticed a strange figure in front of them. It was a monster with fangs and a terrifying visage. Balarama saw the monster and stepped back from it. The monster grew a little bigger. This scared Balarama and he took another step back and the monster grew bigger. With each step Balarama took backwards, the monster kept growing in size and moved closer to him. Balarama fainted in fright. 

When he opened his eyes, he saw Krishna seated next to him with a smile on his face. Balarama exclaimed, “What was it, Krishna? The huge monster that was here, where is it now?” 

Krishna took out a tiny creature from his pocket, placed it on his palm and asked Balarama, “Are you talking about this creature?”

Balarama gasped, “Yes, but this monster was so huge and it kept growing in size. I thought we both were goners. How did you manage to shrink the monster?”

Krishna laughed, “I woke up when you fainted and saw this huge monster towering in front of your prone figure.

When we run away from ourselves, suppress and repress our feelings, unwilling to face our felt experiences, these feelings don’t go away but grow in size. Each step we take away from ourselves, our fears, anger and uncomfortable emotions just grow in size. But like Krishna, if we take a step towards ourselves, the monster is no longer that scary. The closer we move to ourselves, the more compassion we can generate for ourselves, what triggers us and all beings in this world. 

In this edition of the newsletter, we will take a look at Chapter 3 of the audiobook, “Coming Closer to Ourselves: Making Everything the Path of Awakening” by Ani Pema Chodron. In Chapter 3, Pema introduces the concept of the Three Prajnas, The Four Noble Truths and The Path of Meditation. 

In this edition of the newsletter, we will explore the Three Prajnas and how they support our path to awakening. In the next edition, we will delve into the first and foundational teaching of Buddha - The Four Noble Truths and The Eight Fold Noble Path. 

Three Prajnas or Three Types of Wisdom/Knowledge

The Three Prajnas are concepts from the Mahayana tradition. They are useful to keep in mind and implement to strengthen our meditation practice. Pema starts the chapter by introducing the Three Prajnas. These are 3 ways or methods that we can use to make our life into a path of awakening. This is especially pertinent as we integrate and bring the teachings into everyday life. 

Learning/Listening/Reading 

This particular prajna is coming in contact with the teachings not just once, but over and over again through the course of our lives. This level of wisdom is about learning and understanding the teachings intellectually - not just once, but repeatedly. When we think of how to support our meditation practice or go deeper into our practice, it is important to spend some time reading/listening/learning about the concepts and teachings pertaining to the path. 

Pema notes that teaching is also on this path. She says that once you start teaching, you have to get honest about applying it in your own life. Sharing our experiences with others also helps us to keep on the path. This is pertinent to those of us who are facilitators/teachers in the space of mindfulness. I’ve seen this for myself too, that when I teach mindfulness, I understand the teachings a little bit more deeply than I did before. 

Contemplating/Reflecting

In the Kalama Sutta, the Buddha advises the Kalamas to not blindly accept teachings, traditions or hearsay. Instead, he encourages them to investigate and examine teachings based on their own experience. 

The essence of the sutta is about using critical thinking, personal experience and ethical reasoning to discern the truth rather than blindly following teachings or beliefs. Hence contemplating and reflecting on the teachings and understanding for ourselves - what do they really mean? To try to apply the teachings in our everyday life, come up with questions and wonder what is their relevance. To actively apply the teachings and reflect on our experiences in this context is an important source of wisdom. 

Meditating/Acting 

Pema focuses on meditating as a key way of understanding the wisdom of action. The wisdom of action broadly encompasses applying the teachings in our everyday lives and attaining wisdom through our direct experience in the world. Meditation is a great microcosm of how we manifest our real selves in this world. Everything that happens outside, reflects on the inside when we sit in meditation. 

When we have a regular sitting practice for ourselves, where we sit with ourselves and work towards getting closer to ourselves - body, mind and heart, we can cultivate unconditional friendship with ourselves and the present moment. When we meditate, we sit with the energy of the moment, in the middle of whatever is going on. Pema says that when we make time to meditate, we create more time for ourselves, as we start to slow down and cut through the chatter. 

Fuelling our practice 

This is one of my favourite concepts in this audiobook, as it gave me a lot of relief from one of the dilemmas that I have been having for the past 8 years! When I had a fledgling and fragile meditation practice, I noticed that I had to spend lots of time reading and listening to books on meditation. I wanted to understand the concepts, and one reading or book wasn’t enough! I also had to remind myself why I needed to practice and what I had to practice as well. I needed lots and lots of motivation, inspiration and encouragement to even do a 3-minute sitting. I would spend an hour or two reading/listening to do a 3-minute sitting. 

When this realisation dawned on me, I was embarrassed that the time I spent learning wasn’t translating into practice - either long or deep practice. Gratefully by some miracle, I stuck on to it thinking, maybe the fire in me takes a lot of fuel to even burn for a tiny bit. I also began to notice that whenever I stopped reading/learning my practice would go for a complete toss. It would take me weeks and in some cases months to get back to a 3 minute sitting. 

So whenever I noticed I had stopped meditating for too long, instead of trying to force myself to sit, I would instead pick up a book on this topic and start reading. Eventually, it helped me to get into steadier and lengthier practice sessions. That is one of my primary motivations to read/listen to the teachings, to reflect and write about them, because it serves as important fuel to keep my meditation practice going. 

I need lots and lots of encouragement and support to sustain my sitting practice. Even after sitting for 6 years, it hasn’t become an “automatic” habit, and there are many benefits to NOT having an automatic habit :-) Because this means, I have the opportunity to make time to delve into the teachings so that they constantly fuel my meditation habit. I have made time for myself, by leaving my career of 18 years, in a role that I enjoyed to make sure I can have the space, energy and time to read, contemplate and meditate. 

Pema says that we need to find out what works for ourselves and make that time to sit. I have noticed for myself that my preference for sitting keeps changing. Being flexible has been important in making sure that my practice sticks. Although I have a Zafu and a Zabuton over which I sit to do my formal practice (45 mins) as part of my morning routine, I do maintain flexibility in where, how, what and how long I practice. 

The idea is to do it for life, not just to get streaks on a meditation timer (which I also pursued at some point and realised I was “cheating” to get my streaks! Gosh, the perils of gamification! This also means that I have had to become aware of and be curious about my expectations and attitudes towards my sitting practice. Cultivating Maitri has been an essential precursor to ensure that I have been able to sit every day!

What’s next?

We will examine the Four Noble Truths and the Path of Meditation in the next edition of the newsletter. 

Write back to me! 

It would be great to hear from you, and I’d love to know what parts of this article resonated with you, and tell me about your meditation practice. It would be a good source of fuel for my writing practice :-) 

P.S. Thank you for subscribing and sticking with me.

As a parting thought, I will finish this edition with a story

Self Interest

A farmer whose corn always took the first prize at the state fair had a habit of sharing his best corn seed with all the farmers in the neighbourhood.

When asked why, he said, "It is a matter of self-interest. The wind picks up the pollen and carries it from field to field. So if my neighbors grow inferior corn, the cross-pollination brings down the quality of my own corn. That is why I am concerned that they plant only the very best."

Attribution: All images in this post are generated using Open AI!