From "Meditation Now or Never" by Steve Hagen
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No Time, Place, or Size |
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when zen teachers talk about shikantaza—“just sitting,” with- out focusing on any object or process—they sometimes use the term single-pointed concentration. When we first hear this term, we might think they’re speaking of something small, like a speck of dust. It seems to refer to filing our concentration down to a tiny point. But single-pointed concentration is actually quite different in that it includes the Whole World. Single-pointed concentration is like each pixel in a holo- gram. It has all the information of the Whole. Indeed, if you were to fully experience this single dust-mote moment, you would know the Whole. The thing we need to realize about just this, the focus of our single-pointed concentration, is that it’s not a “little” point. It’s not a “big” point either. It’s a sizeless point. |
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M E D I TAT I O N N O W O R N E V E R |
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It’s called a point because it’s just One. But it’s truly One, with a capital “O.” It’s not one as opposed to many, or one as opposed to two or three. It’s One without any other. Single-pointed concentra- tion doesn’t have any size. It doesn’t have any dimension. It doesn’t have any duration. It doesn’t have any location. It doesn’t have any object. It’s just this. It’s objectless Awareness. With objectless Awareness, there’s sound, but no object of sound.There may be the sound of a plane or of birds chirping—but it’s not a plane, it’s not birds. It’s just sound, with nothing extra form- ing out of sound. |
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When the great Zen master Yun Men was asked, “What is single-pointed concentration?” he said,“Food in the bowl.Water in the bucket.” We’re easily confused by such direct talk.“That’s it? Just food in a bowl and water in a bucket?”“What’s that supposed to mean?” “This is nonsense!”“I don’t get it.”“This is too deep for me.” Catch yourself. Stop thinking about what Yun Men said and just take it in. “Food in the bowl, water in the bucket.” Nothing more. Stop making anything out of it. Stop talking to yourself. Crawl into what is being pointed out. Put down the book for a moment and have a direct look at this. |
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You’re walking along a lakeshore on a warm spring morning, and a duck crosses your path.You think to yourself,“duck.” |
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No Time, Place, or Size |
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See if, instead, you can experience without labeling.The fact is, the moment you think “duck,” your awareness is diminished.The direct experience is lost—bound into concepts. If instead you wordlessly experience this moment, you will dis- cover that you can always reconstruct the moment later, if you need to. But while it’s happening, don’t talk to yourself about it. Don’t throw labels on it. Stay with what’s happening. Don’t try to hold on to it. Just be there, fully present with what’s going on. You might start to realize true seeing. This is single-pointed concentration. |
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In meditation, words and concepts will spontaneously appear. Let them go. Don’t hold on to them or build upon them. Don’t think about them or use them to calculate some expectation. Just stay here. Start cultivating a wordless Awareness of just this. |
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187 |
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K nowin g Before You T hink |
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shikantaza is meditation in its simplest form. There are only three elements: body, mind, and breath. No gimmicks. Nothing to hold on to. Not even the breath. Breath is still present, of course, but we’re not fixed on it. Earlier in this book I talked about tranquility (shamatha in Sanskrit) and awareness (vipashyana in Sanskrit). In shikantaza, these¯ two are not separate.The mind settles, but not on a particular point. In shikantaza, Awareness is objectless and subjectless—there’s no “you” who does shikantaza. It’s as if concentration has been filed down to a single point—yet, at the same time, has expanded out- ward and is taking in everything: sights, sounds, feelings, sensations, thoughts, movements. And this Awareness is sizeless and timeless. In shikantaza we discover that there is no clear distinc- tion between self and other. Are you breathing? Or are you being breathed? You need not answer. There is no essential difference. |
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K n o w i n g B e fo re Yo u T h i n k |
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Awareness is general and without location. It’s been this way all along, but only now is it clear and obvious. |
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Shikantaza is a Japanese word made up of four parts.The first two—shi and kan—are Tranquility and Awareness. Ta refers to hit- ting the exact spot—dead on target, not one atom off—which, in this case, means that these “two,” shi and kan, are not even merged, but rather there is no distinction to be made between them. And finally, za means to sit. Shikantaza is often translated as “just sitting.” But this label is misleading since shikan can involve any activity. We can know
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