Meditation Without Practice

Commonly we refer to meditation as a practice. I think this is a bad idea.

Practice is something you do now so that you will be able to perform better in the future when it counts. I practice piano so that I will be great during my recital. I practice football so that I will play well during the game.

When we think of meditation as a practice we consciously or unconsciously start relating to it as something that is preparatory. Meditation – at least the way I see it – is not preparatory.

I define meditation as the immediate recognition of liberated awareness followed by a prolonged period of abidance in that awareness.

First of all meditation is the immediate recognition of liberated awareness.

Immediate  means without mediation, without anything coming in between.

That means no following the breath, no repeating a mantra, no visualization of sacred symbols – nothing but the immediate – which means right now, yes this now – recognition that your awareness is already free.

Of course, following the breath, repeating a mantra, or visualizing sacred symbols can lead us to a direct recognition of liberated awareness, but I would say that the meditation doesn’t start until then.

So how do we have an immediate recognition of liberated awareness?

Well, if it is truly an immediate recognition then you must be having it already right now.

Yes, right now. The awareness that you have, the one that is reading these words is already free. That means that the person you are right now, as you read these words, is also already free.

There is already nothing wrong, no where to go, and nothing you need to do to make anything different than it is.

The trick is just leaving it at that. Don’t think about, don’t try to understand it. Just accept the truth of freedom and see what happens.

I'm on fire to share this mystery of awakening because it changes everything without changing anything.

Don’t try to understand it. Just accept it. You are free. Free is what you are. There is no way that you could ever be limited, constrained, or stopped.

You expand infinitely in all directions. You exist at all times in all places – forever always everywhere.

Part of you will say, “But it doesn’t feel that way.” and that doesn’t matter.

Being free doesn’t depend on feeling free.

Free is what you are no matter how you feel. That is what makes it so unimaginably immediate!

Don’t try to understand it. Just accept it and see what happens.

Over the past few months the way that I teach meditation has changed dramatically. I realize that I was giving too much instruction and those instructions were making people assume that there was something to understand.

If we want to be free, there is nothing we need to understand because free is what we already are.

I get so excited about the miracle of freedom that I could write about it forever – but it will be better for you if I don’t.