BUDDHA'S FIRST MEDITATION

At least theoretically all have been meditating with dedication and sincere attention to the method presented, though no reports have been received with respect to the difficulties of that meditation.

We will not therefore proceed until it is sure that you have a clear stability in the meditation.

You will remember the idea.

1.   

A pre-programmation of the concentration upon the tactile sense at the nostrils of the passing breath.

2.   

With eyes closed, enter the meditation with complete relaxation and a total mindfulness of all tactile experiences of the body… This means that one cannot have any sense of any particular tactile experience of heat, discomfort or emphasis on any one part of the body.

3.   

If there enter thoughts, sensations or discriminations of any type, you are not in the state of full “consciousness becoming” which is common to all the states of attention except the concentration stage.

4.   

You will find when the “becoming” of the sensation of touch is established that there will be an automatic concentration upon the tactile sensation at the nostrils… You will not have to direct that attention.

5.   

The attention will slip back into the “becoming.”

6.   

If it falls into the thoughts, then the “becoming” is insufficient OR you have used conscious mind to direct the concentration.

I draw your attention to Buddha's first meditation which was successful.

It is an incident which is recounted often, but the significance of which is unnoticed.

One day, when he was about fourteen, his father inaugurated the traditional first plowing of the year, in which it was the king who turned the first earth. The Prince, left by himself, sat in the seven-pointed posture, with legs crossed, beneath a Jambu (rose apple tree).

Fixing his mind in a one-pointed manner, he proceeded to meditate, sitting there, as the Lalitavistara tells us,

“until the shadow of all the trees had changed direction, but the shadow of the Jambu did not leave the body of the Bodhisattva.”

This is the legend’s way of telling us that his meditation was profound and complete, probably having left behind for the first time access meditation (which is the “becoming of Consciousnesss”) and entering into his first trance state.

Later there will be many more elements to learn about Buddha's first meditation.

Now perhaps you can see why the pre-programmation of the one-pointed concentration works and the traditional way which is taught in folly does not.

Then do it every day for two twenty-minute periods.tel