Nirvana Is Here and Now
A koan practice for working with resistance to what is, and for finding the unknown The post Nirvana Is Here and Now appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.
ValVades
When I was younger, I thought that meditation would lead to something amazing or spectacular, or at least to a peaceful, happy, and quiet experience. Something nicer than what was. Later, I realized I was subtly resisting what is.
If you look at the three delusions—the reasons we are stuck in samsara, not in nirvana—one of the three poisons is hatred. What hatred, or aversion, means here is you are subtly resisting what is. You are wishing things to be different.
That subtle resistance is the very cause of samsara.
It’s not that nirvana is somewhere else. Nirvana is right here. And yet you are subtly resisting what is.
If you are still looking for enlightenment—otherworldly, fantastic, something different from what is—then you are still perpetuating the three poisons.
It’s not that nirvana is not here; it is just that your restless mind is causing you not to see what is already here, which is unconditional and unborn.
Meditation
“If all things return to one, where does the one return?”
I would like to invite you to quietly contemplate this koan.
Take three deep breaths.
One, two, three.
One, two, three.
One, two, three.
You can close your eyes, or if you wish them to remain open, you can do that too. Then you are going to quietly ask:
If all things return to one, where does the one return?
In other words, if everything is one, what is the one? Or, where is the one?
If all things return to one, where does the one return? If all things return to one, where does the one return?
Take three deep breaths.
One, two, three.
One, two, three.
One, two, three.
If you don’t know the answer, that’s very good.
But if you try to come up with some answers, whatever they are, see that they are just a fragment, not the totality, of whatever that is.
Where you want to arrive is this experience of the unknown.
It is available right here, right now.
As long as we are struggling and trying to imagine that it has to be somewhere better, this cannot be “it,” then our spiritual journey will continue.
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