The Myth of Bare Attention The Buddha never used the word for “bare attention” in his meditation instructions. That’s because he realized that attention never occurs in a bare, pure or unconditioned form. It’s always colored by views and perceptions—the labels you tend to give to events—and by intentions: your choice of what to attend to and your purpose in being attentive. If you don’t understand the conditioned nature of even simple acts of attention, you might assume that a moment of … [Read more...]
How Does Meditation Train Attention?
"Attention, attention, attention!" —Zen Master Ikku's answers when asked for the source of the highest wisdom It helps to conceptualize meditation as an attentive art, so let’s start with meditation’s two basic categories. The first kind employs an effortful, sustained attention. This variety of concentrative meditation is the easiest to understand. It’s what we begin with and what we return to frequently during meditation. Concentration implies that we narrow our focus voluntarily. We … [Read more...]
Simply Rest in Knowing
I would like to begin tonight by telling a story from the Zen tradition. One day, about 600 years ago, a so-called “man of the people” made his way up a steep path to the top of the mountain. A “man of the people” means an ordinary person, someone like you or me. When he'd reached the top of the mountain, he approached the wise old man who lived there, bowed, and said, “Please, sir, will you write down for me the first principles of wisdom?” The wise old man picked up a brush and wrote down one … [Read more...]