We spent the first session as Shamata, often translated as “calming.”  This, in my understanding is only partly true.  The Chinese translated Shamata as “Stopping” (while the Tibetans translated it as “calming”).  How come?  In order to calm the mind, we have to stop the habitual chatter of the mind.  But if we say “stop the mind” it tends to suggest a forcing.  So while the Chinese use Stop (Zhi 止), it does not mean to stop the mind all together, it merely means to stop the habits of the mind.  It means to recognize those habits as they arise, and then “stop” them from carrying you.  This is where you come back to awareness of the breath, or the contact of the hand and the stone, or of sounds, etc.  The mind will always produce thoughts.  It is when I am carried away by a thought that is when I want to intervene, because the thought now takes me and controls me (which can be pleasant or unpleasant, but either way, I am no longer “in control,” I have lost awareness, I got swept).

The trick with Shamata is to “stop” the habits of the mind (being swept by the habits of the mind) without force and find the right balance between paying attention and relaxing (because we can get swept by the relaxation and get quite indulgent…).

Our second sitting concentrated on Vipashyana – looking deeply (In Chinese Guan 觀, to observe – the left side is a stork , and the right side is a big eye on top of the legs: it implies to observe from some spaciousness, as in “taking in the vista” as a stork might).

We asked ourselves the following 5 questions, allowing each question to just permeate us, not seeking an “answer” but just sitting with the question, observing what it does to/within our mind.  We also observe habits/patterns that come up as we sit with the question (for example the desire to have a good answer) and how that might carry us.  When we recognize a habit has taken over as we contemplate the question, we “stop” the habit, and recommit to having the question become fresh again.  After a few minutes (I suggest not taking too long, just 2-3 minutes, as the mind will tend to wonder into its comfort zone/habit with extra time), we write down bullets – any key words, or insights we want to carry with us for later use.

In writing “bullets” we can also recognize habits, which can vary from fear of writing things down, writing long sentences (rather than bullets), searching for perfect words, etc.  Our meditation does not stop simply because we are writing, we continue in the same mind space that Shamata establishes.  (This is why it is said that although meditation is composed of two components, Shamata and Vipashyana, one has to practise Shamata, calming/stopping only because Vipashyana, deep looking, can only be true looking when it is fully rooted in Shamata and flows out of Shamata.

Our questions for contemplation were:

(1) What is Practice (or what does “Practice” mean to me)

(2) What do I want Practice to do for me?  (or why do I practice?)

(3)  What is my suffering (meaning the theme of suffering in my life)?

(4) How does the Practice relate (transform, affect) my suffering?

(5) When will the Practice intersect my suffering?  Can I make that Now?

As you sit with these questions, see if you can sit with them in this order in spite of having seen the rest of the questions, so you allow each question to occupy its space without being colored by “knowing what the next question will be.”  See if you can recognize (and let go) of ideas (a very strong habit in most of us), so that the heart can find its space and start to “speak.”

After doing this exercise a sixth question came up in the group –

Is Life Practice?  This can be looked in a number of ways, for example:

How do I make Practice intersect Life?

Is Practice different than Life?

Do I (personally) live to practice, or do I practice so as to facilitate my life?

After you do the exercise using bullets, perhaps a few times, then, if you like you can expand your answers into a longer form.  The advantage of bullets is that they offer a chance to not engage in discourse (an “essay” inevitably does, and even sentences do, while a key-word or a bullet, tends to just capture the flash on insight (Vipashyana)