Let's Sit! — meditate

We all want to drop into that "zone" state. This is where time flies and we are intently focused on the activity at hand. Learning meditation is like learning to ride a bicycle. While sitting on the cushion, we want to coast peacefully, without distraction. It's not too different from bicycling. Imagine you are on the interstate and there is no one else on the road. There's a long stretch of highway for miles and the temperature is perfect. The ground is level so you don't need to pedal so much to keep your pace. These are the conditions that lead...

Thoughts and the mind! Ah! How do you meditate on your worries, doubts, fears or goals?? And how do you reconcile the quest for no mind?? What do you think about when you are trying to quiet it down? These are all relevant questions. One of the goals in meditation is to quiet the mind chatter - slow down the monkey mind. How do we do this? To quiet the mind we say, give the monkey a banana. This means to use breathing do calm the mind - the breath is the banana. If the mind is very active, you...