Unsatisfying meditation might be OK

A few weeks ago I read a book called "Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha," (MCTB) by The Arhat Daniel Ingram. It's subtitled: "An unusually hardcore dharma book." It's available at Amazon or by direct download here.

The book impressed me. I've always been drawn to Buddhist practice. I had a big "awakening" after reading Sam Harris' book _Waking Up_ and wanted to get into a regular meditation practice, but could not.

MCTB renewed my desire to practice. So I tried again. I took a few sporadic and inconsistent steps. And then I stopped. What I was doing was unsatisfying.

So I started writing a blog post (not this one, the other one) to clarify my thinking, hoping that would help me start my practice.

But writing a blog post about MCTB was also unsatisfying. That's the way writing goes for me. I like writing, but I'm rarely satisfied with what I write. I write and rewrite. I've written about that before. Ad nauseam. Eventually, I give up on the piece. Or I publish it even though I'm not satisfied with it.

So I worked on that post for many days. I was not entirely unhappy with the first part of the post, but the further I went, the less I liked what I was writing.

Finally, I got completely blogged down and quit. ("Blogged down." Get it? There ought to be a word for when you make a typo and it turns out to be a good pun.)

So I was unsatisfied with meditating. I was unsatisfied with not meditating. I was unsatisfied with the blog post that I was using to help me become more satisfied.

So I tried something else. I started to write an email to explain myself to my coach. This was not a meditation coach, but a coach for something else. (else-a.) The email was less about the book and more about my experience.

And at a certain point I thought: instead of writing more about it, why not just give meditation another try. So I pulled out an app that I use, the one that gives me 3 x 5-minute timed sessions. Three quiet gongs as the start. A gong at the end of each interval. Two gongs at the very end. I was going to just follow the breath. When I do this my mind wanders after a bit; the five-minute gongs remind me to restart; when it's over I feel--generally not much different.

This time, I started the session and started crying. I alternated between crying and not crying. But there was nothing peaceful or refreshing about it. It was horrible.

I remembered that this crying-while-meditating thing had happened to me once before. In fact, it was the last time that I "tried to get serious about meditating/" Tears. Sobbing. Followed, after not too long, by giving up.

So then I came back to the email and suddenly...

Of course, it's going to be unsatisfying.

The very first of the Core Teachings of the Buddha is that all of existence is impermanent, unsatisfying and non-self. We know things will change, but we perceive them as permanent and we try to make them last; we pursue satisfaction, and we see everything in relationship to self. But no, says Ingram and the Buddha. Everything is impermanent. Everything is unsatisfactory. Everything is absent of self. Everything. Everywhere. All the time. And maybe the more you perceive what actually is (as you are supposed to do in meditation) the more you will see it.

So if everything is unsatisfying, how could I find my meditation other than unsatisfying?  It says in the book that EVERYTHING is unsatisfying. Not "everything except for meditating." Everything.

So why was I surprised? The more clearly I was trying to perceive existence (which is unsatisfying) the more unsatisfying it SHOULD be. At least until I got over the idea that I needed and wanted it to be satisfying.

So now I realized that I had misunderstood that core teaching entirely. I expect meditating to be satisfying in some way. And the more I was intent on making it satisfying, the worse it was!.

And of course, my blog post was unsatisfying. How could it not be?

And of course, the email I wrote was unsatisfying. But I sent it anyway.

And then, I changed it and turned it into this blog post.

I found it helpful. But still unsatisfying.

Next up: another 15 minutes of unsatisfying meditation.

Writing mindfully

Repeatedly I say (to anyone who is within range and shows the smallest amount of interest) "I love to write."

Anyone who survives that might then hear me continue to my frustration: "And I don't write. And I don't know why. And I am frustrated."

And if they stick around they'll be subjected to a much longer rant on the unhappiness borne out of my strong desire to write and endless frustration because something, I know not what, gets in the way of writing.

Grr!!!

Occasionally I'll come up with a fix: a solution to the problem of writing. Sometimes nothing comes of the solution. Sometimes it leads to a burst of writing. Eventually the burst ends and frustration sets in.

This might be one of those short-lived fixes. Or it might be different. We'll have to see.

The change comes from a mindfulness practice I'm working on: first becoming aware of myself, and then looking for the "self" of which I am aware.  When I look for the self I find that it disappears. According to generations of teachers of Buddhist-style meditation, that is because the self is an illusion. You'll find that out, they say, if you meditate long enough.

But looking for the self, rather than just meditating is a shortcut that I learned after reading Sam Harris' book "Waking Up." The the difference between a reality and an illusion, Harris says, is this: look at something carefully. If you see more detail, it's probably real. If it vanishes or if it turns into something else, it's probably an illusion.

So me: I look inward for the self, and I find there's nothing there. I'm looking outward instead. No self. Only the present moment. Not even "me" in the present moment.

Just the present moment.

Self appears to be an illusion.

Today I did not simply look for "the self that was aware of itself," but for "the self that wants to write and is frustrated."

And I discovered that there was nothing there.

Nothing wants to write.

Nothing is frustrated that it isn't writing.

There was nothing but the then-present moment.

How can that be any good? If my goal is to write, and the "me" that has that goal disappears taking both its frustration at not writing and its desire to write with it, what then? How can I get myself to write if there's no me that wants to write and no me to be frustrated when it doesn't?

Really!

How can I write when experience has taught me that one of the few ways I can get myself to write is by increasing the frustration that I feel when I don't write? I need to increase my frustration until it is greater than whatever pain I might anticipate that I'd feel if I did write. Then I'll write.

How can I write if I'm not feeling negative feelings that are greater than the negative feelings that stand in the path of writing?

I mean, really!

The answer is: I don't know, but here I am. I've looked for "the part of me that I wants to write." I found nothing. And I'm writing.

Now, in this moment, there's no me that who wants to write.

There's no me that is upset about not writing.

There's nothing but the present moment--and the writing that is in that moment.

I am gone, and all that's left is the writing.