In the Buddhist tradition, a sutra refers to the meeting of the teacher’s mind and the student’s mind. This is the second in a series of sutra sessions held in Los Angeles. In these sessions Ken converses informally with students about life and practice.

Different forms of meditation

Ken: We’re going to be recording this. This is because I put up podcasts of most of the interactions that I have with people. If you want to ask a question which you’re uncomfortable with, just indicate. And Elena, who’s handling the sound back there will just hit pause. But basically, your questions are an act of generosity. Even in a group such as this, where about 20 people here, this morning. If you have a question, there’s probably two or three other people with the same question, but they don’t have the nerve to ask it. So that when you ask that question and you engage that process, you can think of it as an act of generosity, and the internet amplifies that. I’ve received numerous emails from people who say that hearing somebody ask a question, “I had that same question.” And seeing how it plays out, they found immensely helpful in their practice. So please don’t feel nervous about this.

So here we are at Insight LA on July 19th I believe. Who would like to start? And as I said at the beginning, you all came here out of some kind of interest to learn something. What do you actually want to learn?

Student: Recently I’ve been experimenting with different forms of meditation. Following the breath is what I’ve always done, since I began meditating. But recently have been involved with sitting with a teacher who talks about reflective meditation, actually kind of following the thoughts, and then reflecting on those afterwards. Following sounds, I sit at the beach and follow the waves. I guess what I’m wondering is, and it seems actually to be helpful to do different forms, but is it? I guess I’ve answered my own question.

Ken: Well, yes, but I think we can go a step further. How familiar are you with Alice in Wonderland?

Student: I haven’t read it recently, but as a child.

Ken: Compulsory reading for all serious practitioners. So Alice, I think, wanders away from the … I can’t remember what, actually. And she comes across a Cheshire cat sitting in a tree. And the cat is sitting with a grin. How many of you have seen a cat grin? And she says, “Please, sir, which way should I go?”

He says, “That all depends. Where do you want to go?”

“Well, it doesn’t really matter,” she says.

“Then it doesn’t really matter which way you go, does it?”

“As long as I get somewhere,” she says.

“Well, if you go far enough, you’ll be somewhere.” So where do you want to go?

Student: I guess where I want to go with my practice is being able to sit with the pain and the emotions of life, and not be so driven by them, to be able to sit and and reflect on them. But ultimately, I guess for myself, because I deal with people dying, I want to be able to sit with my own death. I guess that’s why I practice. That’s what drives me to it.

Ken: May I go a little further?

Student: Yeah.

Ken: Why do you want to be able to sit with your own death?

Student: Because I watch people resist it so much. And I think that it doesn’t have to be. And yet I can also be compassionate and understand it.

Ken: Yes. Well, this is quite wonderful. You have a very clear intention in your practice. That makes things a lot simpler. Not necessarily easier, but a lot simpler. Ann, could I borrow the book, please?

Student: This is a most wonderful book.

Ken: That was unnecessary, but thank you. This is at the end of this book that I write:

If anything rattled you—in the book— don’t throw up, let it work in you until the you that you are now is fatally poisoned. The importance of a conventional life is greatly exaggerated, and a good death can work wonders.

An Arrow to the Heart, Ken Mcleod, p. 153

So, as I understand, you want to know how to die?

Student: I want to not resist it.

Ken: This is very deep. And I’ve long been under the feeling, or the opinion, that one of the most valuable things we can learn in our lives is how to die. There are many different forms of meditation. Meditation, it should be remembered, is a tool, not an end. It’s a way of cultivating, bringing attention to, what we experience.

I don’t know whether you ever read any of Carlos Castaneda. You may recall a distinction that Don Juan makes between dreaming and stalking. Resting with the breath, cultivation of attention that way, that’s stalking. Opening to experience, and just opening, and opening, being with whatever arises, is dreaming. In the beginning our attention is usually so unstable, particularly in Buddhism, we put the emphasis on stalking. One of the unfortunate byproducts of that is that many people think that meditation means just that, or practice means just that.

But sometimes it is good to reflect. I would not do them at the same time or in the same period. There are two different kinds of meditation. One of the things that I often recommend to people, if I’m having them do something like death and impermanence meditation, or loving kindness, or any of the four immeasurables and so forth, is that they rest in the experience of breathing, or whatever, one day, and then they do this reflective practice the other day. They actually alternate, and that they find quite helpful. Or, you could do one at the beginning of the day and one at the end of the day, if you’re meditating twice a day.

What is very important is to keep your intention in mind. So for you, you welcome every difficulty and every challenge in your life, because it’s practice for you. That’s a difficult way to live, something I’ve not found very easy at all. But that goes to the heart of your intention. Any difficulty that comes, “Oh, well, I’m going to have to experience this when I die anyway, so I might as well get started now.” [Laughter] Does this help?

Student: Very much.

Ken: Thank you. Yes.

Tasks and instructions in meditation

Student: My mind likes to have a task in meditation, and I’ve kind of tried to simplify these tasks. And I’m now kind of down to, like these one word things that I say to myself, like: allow, open, be, whatever. And then I try to let that go. So I kind of arrive at let go, but that still feels like a task. I really would like to learn to drop it all together, and I don’t know how to do that.

Ken: Does your mind like to have a task or do you like to have a task?

Student: I don’t quite know how to distinguish between myself and my mind.

Ken: This is the problem we have in Buddhism. We get a little schizophrenic after a while. Is that me or my mind? How carefully have you studied Calvin and Hobbes?

Student: Not at all.

Ken: Oh, well, you have to. [Laughter]

Student: Yeah, I think that would be difficult to study. My mind likes to study, so I’d rather not.

Ken: After this, you need to go to Barnes and Nobles or Borders and pick up a volume of Calvin and Hobbes. And you read it. I think this will help you a great deal. And I’m not being facetious. You may enjoy it, too, and that’s allowed. Okay. You’re used to doing things, I guess. What happens when you don’t do anything? Or, what happens for you when there isn’t anything to do? The responses can range from “I go crazy,” or, “I panic,” but somewhere in that region.

Student: I think I have an idea about that. And that idea would be that that would be really boring.

Ken: Oh, “I get bored.” Okay. Why do you practice?

Student: Because it’s really exhausting to constantly do and figure out.

Ken: You have a little bit of a dilemma, don’t you? Here you practice because you want to stop doing. But if you don’t do anything, you’re bored. Or, you’re afraid you’re going to be bored. What are you going to do about that? But you see the dilemma? Good. Thich Nhat Hanh once said. “If you want to be peaceful. You have to enjoy peace.” Do you enjoy peace?

Student: I do.

Ken: You do? What’s the difference between peace and not doing anything for you?

Student: I think not doing anything can be peace, just like doing something can be peace.

Ken: Okay. When you practice, you’re always giving yourself instruction, it sounds like. You know, “Sitting. Oh that’s good. Just keep going. No, no. A little distraction over here. Ah, just relax right there. You’re on course now. Ah, watch out, getting a little attached to that.” Something like this? What are all those instructions?

Student: It’s a holding on to something.

Ken: Perhaps. I’m of the opinion that all of those instructions are thoughts. What do you think?

Student: Yeah.

Ken: Okay, so what if you just say to each one, “Oh, thought,” and come back and just rest. And just let whoever is ever giving you all of these instructions give you all of these instructions, but don’t worry about them. What would that be like?

Student: I don’t know, I find it really difficult to meet my thoughts.

Ken: Let’s try it right now. Okay? I’m going to play your mind. You play you. So you’re just going to sit. You can be as relaxed as you want. I’m going to give you all of these instructions, and you just rest. Don’t worry about any of them. See what that’s like, okay? Sit straight. See, you’re already following the instructions. [Laughter] Can we try that again, please? What’s going on? It’s really important to follow those instructions, isn’t it? You want to try this?

Student: Try what?

Ken: The exercise that I just suggested. We got to the first instruction. Let’s see if we can get a little further. You’re not going to worry about these instructions. You’re just going to sit there quietly as you wish. Boy, you really don’t trust this, do you? Okay. Don’t follow any thoughts, focus on your breath, not too tight, not too loose. Do it just right. It’s not bad. Keep going. No, no, no, you’re getting a little excited. Calm down. No, a little more energy, you’re falling asleep, come on. Just let go, that’s cool, keep going. Mmm. How is this for you?

Student: It sounds really ridiculous.

Ken: And, how many other people’s meditation practice is something like this? What if you just let all of that stuff go, because they’re all just thoughts? What happens then?

Student: It just feels like it’s freeing up a lot of … I don’t know what it’s freeing up, but. Yeah.

Ken: Could you rest there?

Student: Sitting opposite from you? Yeah, totally.

Ken: Okay. You want me to hang out a little? But you’ve tasted the experience.

Student: Yeah.

Ken: Okay. Start there. You’re looking a little disoriented. Are you okay?

Student: No, no, this is this is really good. I think what it is within myself, it’s like, meeting my thoughts. There’s this sense that meeting my thoughts is different from meeting any other experience. Like when it’s sounds, or bodily sensations, there’s absolutely no sense that I produce those. But with my thoughts, it’s like I get trapped in this, the sense that I guess they are mine.

Thoughts and ownership

Ken: Okay. I have a question for you. What’s the most vicious animal in the world by weight?

Student: Vicious? I have no idea.

Ken: I think it’s an amoeba. Pound for pound I think an amoeba is the most vicious animal in the world. It’s this tiny little thing, it just eats. So, what are you thinking about right now? Amoeba? So, is that your thought, or my thought?

Student: You really triggered the thought.

Ken: Absolutely. But whose thought is it?

Student: I don’t know.

Ken: There you go. You think you own all your thoughts. Maybe you don’t. Just an idea. Now she’s looking very suspicious.

Student: Yeah, it’s a very dangerous idea. [Laughter]

Ken: Yeah. Sorry about that. [Laughter] Well, it’s too late now.

Student: Yeah, I think I’m really bummed.

Ken: This useful to you? It gets worse. But maybe we won’t go there today, another time. Anybody else? Now everybody’s scared.

Student: Are thoughts the same as words?

Ken: May I ask, what is the question behind the question?

Student: As I am meditating, I find that I followed a thought, and I recognize it, and come back to resting. Then, as I’m resting, I find words going through my head like: nostrils, chest, stomach, breath. I’m not actually thinking. I’m not thinking other things. But I do find myself with these words as I’m trying to rest, attempting to rest in experience, words going through my head that are like little signals.

Ken: Okay, so I’d like you to imagine an apple in my hand. Okay? What color is it?

Student: Red with yellow spots.

Ken: Okay. I’d like you now to imagine the word apple in this hand. What’s the difference?

Student: Well, there’s a visual difference. I can see one as an object, and the other I see as as like a word, black type on white.

Ken: Mm-hmm. Are they thoughts?

Student: Yes. So thoughts are the same as words, is what you’re saying.

Ken: Was this a word?

Student: No.

Ken: Was it a thought?

Student: Yes. I mean, I don’t know if it’s a thought. It’s an image. Whether it’s a thought, that’s what I don’t know. Seeing an apple is not really a thought. It’s mental furniture. [Laughter]

Ken: And thoughts are?

Student: I think of thoughts as strings of things, like that take you somewhere. Whereas a word is different.

Ken: You may have various categories, and they may not, you know, dividing things up. Well, we can do one more experiment. I should have chosen another object. What’s your favorite song?

Student: I Want To Hold Your Hand.

Ken: Great, Okay. Can you hear it, the tune?

Student: Yes. If I stop and think of it, I can.

Ken: Yeah. Is that a thought? Just the music.

Student: Yes.

Ken: So now we have sound, sight, word. What’s the difference? All of these things are arisings in the mind. They arise in these different ways.

Student: Different forms.

Ken: But what’s the difference among them in terms of things that just arise in the mind?

Student: I think qualitatively, thoughts are things that take me away from meditating, and these words are things that I’m trying to use to meditate.

Ken: Oh, this I missed. Tell me about that, please.

Student: These are, when I’m trying to rest In my experience, I find that I’m coaching myself, thinking, okay, “Concentrate on your breath, but where is the breath located?”

Ken: Okay. You’re like this woman over here. Yeah, we all do this. And what I was suggesting to her, I make the same suggestion to you. Just regard them thoughts. When you breathe, how much coaching do you give yourself?

Student: When I’m not paying attention?

Ken: Yes.

Student: None.

Ken: When you’re paying attention, how much coaching do you give yourself about breathing? Okay, push out the lungs. No, no, no. Got to move the diaphragm down first. Open the back of the throat. That’s important. I mean, do you do this?

Student: No.

Ken: No,okay. What is there, in your mind, as it is right now, your mind, that isn’t at rest?

Student: Right now or when I’m trying to meditate?

Ken: Just right now. What is there in your mind, or even about your mind, that isn’t naturally at rest?

Student: Scrambling to think of a response.

Ken: Where does that scrambling take place?

Student: In my mind.

Ken: Where is it?

Student: I don’t know. It’s just there.

Ken: Yeah, but there’s a kind of space there, isn’t there? Is that space at rest?

Student: A space of rest?

Ken: Is that space at rest?

Student: The spaces at rest? Yes.

Ken: What coaching does the space need?

Student: The space doesn’t require any coaching. The space just is there.

Ken: Why don’t you practice that way?

Student: Because then I’ll think, “space.”

Ken: Then you’re not practicing that way. Just rest right now. There’s your body and there’s the breathing. And then there’s the natural quiet of the mind that’s always there, no matter what’s going on. What more do you need to do?

Student: Thank you.

Ken: Okay. Does that help? We have time for a few more. Elena?

Music and frustration in meditation

Elena: You were talking about tunes, so it came up.

Ken: Talking about?

Elena: Tunes. Songs.

Ken: Oh, tunes. Yes.

Elena: Tunes. So among all the things that I think about when I meditate, there’s always a song. It’s like a CD that is skipping, always, always, every day. It’s like, a little piece of a song or something. And it’s very annoying. So I try to fight it, at first it doesn’t work, so usually I always go through the same pattern. And then after a while I’m like, okay, well, “You want to stay, stay.” And so I let it go. It takes a long time for this thing to quiet down. So what arises is frustration, which is something I experience a lot when I practice. So I guess my question is, how to deal with frustration? The thing that you usually tell me is, “Go back to your body, physical sensations,” which I do. And I feel some amount of tension and I stay with it. Still, it doesn’t … After that, I get frustrated because of the tension in my body. So it’s kind of—

Ken: It doesn’t change the way you want it to change, does it?

Elena: I’m sorry?

Ken: It doesn’t change the way you want it to change or as quickly as you’d like it to change, right?

Elena: Yes.

Ken: Yeah, music’s great. In the three-year retreat, when we were angry with somebody, before a meditation session, we’d just walked by their door and hum their favorite tune. [Laughter] You live together with people for three years, you find out a few things.

We also have the same problem up at Mount Baldy. Not as much as we used to. But it used to be on Saturdays, the lodge across the way would light up with the worst rock bands you’ve ever heard. We’d be sitting up in the zendo with this absolutely, outrageously, bad rock music playing during our meditation sessions.

I was in South America once, and the meditation hall was next to a plaza, and we had a mariachi band playing for most of the workshop in the plaza. Yeah, it’s life. So, music, all these tunes, well, there are several things. Fighting it doesn’t work very well, does it? No. So you sit and you let the tune play.

Elena: Yes.

Ken: And you breathe, and you just rest in the experience. When you don’t offer any resistance, I have to repeat that, when you don’t offer any resistance, then often things play out quite quickly. But the key is no resistance whatsoever.

Elena: So how do you do that?

Ken: Well, you have to give up wanting anything, because most of the time when we’re practicing meditation, we want the mind to be quiet. And we have, I wanna hold your hand. Guess what’s going to be playing in everybody’s mind for the next … ? Okay, and just keeps going on and on. And if it’s not that, then it’s Norwegian Wood. And we have these strains, music, etc., but if you notice that along with all of those strains of music, there’s a resistance. And, it’s not the music that’s the problem, it’s the resistance.

So you just sit back and enjoy the music. And you can rest with the breath while you enjoy the music. Now you’re resting, which is what you wanted to do in the first place. Most of us have the idea, it’s not good enough just to rest, I have to rest in a certain way. You follow? It has to be the right way of resting. So you rest, and the mind becomes quiet. The music may or may not continue, it’s very difficult to say, but you’re resting. I think that’s a better way to work with it. But there’s another way, that’s to listen to each note of the music. Because music depends on hearing the contrast between the notes. That’s what makes it music. If you just hear each note, there is no music. Each note.

Elena: Yeah, but music in my head is not necessarily what music is outside of my head. Music inside my head is a lot of things. It’s not necessarily notes. It could be just a stream of, I don’t know, of memories, and thoughts, and lots of other things. What do you mean by each note?

Ken: I think the first method is better for you.

Elena: Okay. I’m a little particular on that.

Ken: Yeah. No, the first method is better for you.

Elena: Okay.

Ken: Clearly. As I said at the very beginning of our meeting today. We rest in our experience of breathing. Your experience of breathing happens to include snippets of songs, and melodies, and chords, probably some experimental ones flying around in the background, maybe a little percussion, some ideas for lyrics, all of that stuff, the artist’s curse, that’s standard. That’s your experience. Rest in your experience, whatever it is. That doesn’t mean you follow things. That’s different. But whatever arises, you let it come and go on its own. And so, if there’s a song that is playing, it’s there. And while it’s playing, you rest with the breath. You may find, some time later, that the song stopped playing, but you can’t remember when it stopped. That sound workable?

Elena: Yeah. I mean, that’s just one small example. Then, there are many other big things like, you know, blaming yourself, and all kinds of different—

Ken: So, that’s a different tune, and that’s all it is.

Resting rather than observing

Student: Is there a difference between rest and observe? The reason I ask the question, I’ve been taught to observe, watch my breath. For instance, in my mind, the way I think, I watch it, I observe it, and I don’t deal with it or experience it. I just watch it. When you say “rest,” which is the first time I’ve heard that expression in this context, that to me says immediately that I’m going to experience it. I’m going to involve myself in it in some way. So I guess my question is, what is the difference between the two, so that I can get some understanding of what either means? Maybe it’s the same. Am I making any sense?

Ken: You’re making a great deal of sense, and I think it’s a very important question. A great deal of meditation instruction is given in terms of “watch the breath. Put your attention on this object,” etc. Some of this may be a translation problem, I’m not sure. In my own practice I found that the distancing that occurs with that instruction is very problematic, for all kinds of reasons. Other people, they don’t have any problem with it but for me, it was a problem.

When I started to just rest in my experience of breathing, as opposed to trying to watch the breath, there was a lot less struggle. I could actually start resting and as I rested, the quality of attention developed in a way that it didn’t in the other approach. So yes, there’s a difference, I think. I found that this notion of resting in our experience is very helpful, because it’s something I can easily take into my life. Whatever is happening, I can just be in that, if you follow. And for me also, it gets rid of the tension that I found was created when I tried to—just as we were discussing in several of the questions already—when I was trying to observe the breath, I kept having to push this other stuff away. And that made a lot of struggle. When I rested in the experience, I didn’t have to push any of that stuff away, because that was all part of the experience, which is basically what I’ve been trying to say today. But as I rested more and more deeply, I don’t know whether any of that stuff goes away, but it ceases to distract, and that makes a difference. Does this help? Yes. Okay, so a question up here. I think we’ll have to make this the last one.

Shamatha and vipashyana

Student: According to what I’ve learned, it sounds like, for her question, isn’t it that the one-pointed meditation of watching the breath is shamatha and the all inclusive resting is vipashyana, which are two different levels of meditation. The first is the calm abiding, the shamatha is given as an instruction to calm the mind so that the resting and the vipashyana can begin to happen.

Ken: That’s very interesting. I think there’s a difference in the way the same terminology is used in Theravadan and Mahayana, from your question. What you’re describing, would in my own training, be described as two different aspects of shamatha. Yes. The first aspect is what is usually translated as mindfulness, which I don’t like as a word anymore. I know this is how it’s defined in the Theravadan and the Mahayana tradition. It’s defined as the mind joining with the object of attention, not focused on but joining with. And that to me comes about through resting, so the resting quality is very much there.

As that resting quality develops, another aspect of attention starts and we call that awareness, which is defined as roughly, knowing what is going on. It’s the difference between meditating in a closet and meditating in an open field. That’s a subjective feeling. And when that quality arises, then there’s much less struggle, because you know what’s going on, and there’s a deeper level of resting. And you’re still resting in the experience of the object, but you also know everything that’s going on. Those two together form shamatha.

What is called insight in Mahayana, in my own training, is another quality yet, which basically grows out of the awareness that I just mentioned, that expansion, but takes it a step further. Because it’s possible to rest, but then you learn to look in the resting. And we do this in various ways. I’m doing this with some of the questions today. But you’re looking basically at, what is this experience? Not trying to answer the question, but to look at it, or, more precisely, into it. So there’s a resting and a looking. Now in the beginning, when people start to look, their attention destabilizes very, very quickly, which is why that resting quality is very important. As practice matures, then it becomes possible to rest in the looking, and look in the resting. And now there’s quite a different quality to practice. Does this fit with your experience?

Student: It does.

Ken: Okay, we need to close here. Thank you for your attention. Whatever good you feel has come out of this for you, that’s highly questionable right there, but we won’t dwell on that. Whatever good may have come out of our time together, just feel that. We’re just going to sit for a minute or two, with the sentiment that you dedicate or give this good that you’ve experienced, and dedicate it to the good of the world.