Those who might be offended by the force of the title, thinking it rather out of place in Buddha Dharma, should pay careful attention to the words of the great masters of Chan in the Golden age.
If you don't understand then let me make it a little clearer in a more polite way.
It is a waste of time and energy to be sitting on even the most precious toilet of the world in the most exquisitely decorated setting if subconsciously you don't want to be sitting there at all; if you have forgotten how to loosen your bowels; if you have constipation that is unresolvable; if you are sitting there simply enjoying the gold-faced tiles and the accesories; if you are looking in the mirror opposite, admiring yourself; if you are waiting for someone to drop out of the heavens with a suppository; simply have nothing better to do; are sitting there reading books on how to excrete (that is, shit) or are just sitting there crying about the state of the rest of the house outside the toilet, which is intolerable for you.
The problem is that you think that you are doing it right and that it should be easy.
As far as meditation is concerned that is far from even mundane Truth.
Meditation is DIFFICULT.
There it is, plain and simple. If you believe that it should be easy then you are in for a hard time that may result in:
Mental Frustration
Emotional Disappointment
Visceral Confusion
All three disguised in a thousand and one doubts about what you are doing, wondering if the problem is that meditation is great farce; that you are just not capable of doing it; that it is simply not worth the effort; that someone has given you a "bum steer" (no pun here intended); or that you don't really need it.
All this because when you felt that first urge to try meditation to get out of the mess you were in you thought that it was easy, because others seemed to be happy with their meditation and even important people were doing it (at least that is what the popular magazines declared).
No! No! No!
Meditation is difficult and it is pretty near impossible to accomplish if your objective is not to find out what the hell is wrong with this world which the human creature has built, which has resulted in everyone racing around from adolescence to the last miles towards death with pension and no hope, wondering where your life has gone and what in the name of Hell you are going to do now.
It is useless to try and save anything. You cannot "be" anything really important.
You have lost the chance and anyway after your body has turned to putrified flesh and your consciouness has dissapeared never to return, whatever name you have foolishly established for yourself will gradually fade with time until you are just a another John Doe or with less luck simply arrive in your imaginary heaven with a tag declaring "unknown DOA", that is as a human being "Dead on Arrival", which really means "Destined to arrive Dead after Birth."
The only thing worth being while living in this human poisoned world is a true and natural human creature that manages to keep and maintain that state to the end... No punishment... No reward. The benefit and glory is just being an ordinary man or woman.
It is your heritage; your natural state and the only way to recuperate that natural state is by learning the way, meditating, and practicing all that you have learned with these two supports in everyday life.
The first thing then to decide is if you really want to proceed with the teachings and meditations even though they are DIFFICULT with the CORRECT ATTITUDE accompanied with the gradual development of Calm, Patience, Determination, Perseverance and a great deal of honest free Introspection.
Decide in the beginning if this is really what you want, if the difficulty and the energy you will have to impart seems worth the effort, and if you are prepared to make all the sacrifices necessary.
If you are, then forget about your unresolvable constipation, which is really mental; cast away that visceral or emotional enjoyment; see that the person in the mirror is really as ugly as sin; if you need a suppository you are the one who must find it and use it; see that you are gradually getting older just sitting there in folly; tear out the pages of the books, put a little hole in the corner and hang them up with string so that at least they can be useful to someone else, see that you are responsible, with all other human abominations, for the mess outside the toilet and finally that the mental disgust and feeling of things being intolerable is an idea generated by your foolish mind.
Then, accepting the difficulty and understanding the way, SHIT, or else GET OFF THE POT, joining the rest of the world running around in circles after pleasure, wealth or fame that brings what they believe is a worthwhile Happiness.
ONCE YOU ARE OUT OF THE TOILET WITH A CORRECT ATTITUDE,
WHAT THEN ?
The answer is, don't jump into Meditation of any kind until you understand what meditation really does; what its limits are and what it entails.
We can arbitrarily divide meditation into different types which produce quite different results. If you are clear what must be done to achieve those results which will actually appear at the end, if you have persisted, in a way quite different than your initial expectations, then you can proceed.
Among the meditations, excluding the mundane and trite Relaxations which are nothing more than band-aids to cover your superficial wounds, there is:
Reflection
Concentration
Absorption
Contemplation
Penetration
Each having its apparent method and consequences, each preparing the ground, if necessary and desirable, for other experiences if you so wish or feel impulsed to follow. There is also form of meditation which we can call Visualization, which is a special technique that is effective if there is great difficulty in leaving one's Identity, which is a great impediment that clings to your normal lifestyle.
It may be a good idea for many to come to grips with the reality and illusion of their existence by first of all trying their own style of Meditation by Undirected Introspection, trying to allow natural meditation to simply evolve. At least you will understand the difficulty and be better prepared for teachings on meditation.
This is, however, akin to being one's own psychologist and for many it has great comfort which is seductive. If you try to combine being your own psychologist with being your own master of philosophy, then you are really in a mess.
Alternatively there are Professional Psychologists who can relieve you of your hard-earned bread and keep you on apparently transcendental strings; addictive psychoanalytical penetrations into your past, that are really no more than a collection of old postcards of places you have visited; psychiatrists who will cure the illnesses which they have invented or a million and one fraudulent meditation guides who are either self-deceived by their own thirst for glory or into self-survival in a world of difficult commerce.
It appears to be your choice at the moment.
But beware... don't move from one toilet to another.
THE EFFECTIVE BUT INCREASINGLY DIFFICULT MEDITATIONS
I have declared that these meditations in this list are increasingly difficult. That is the truth if you plunge into them without basic understanding and preparation and try to jump into deep water when you can't even swim.
Actually, with a gradual and sensitive approach without haste, expectations or a mind that is too mentally serious, being natural, they are really quite simple to understand. The difficulty arises from the impediments which you bring to each meditation.
VISUALIZATION:
Visualization is a method of generating visual images within consciousness. It is not, as many claim, a mental technique that uses the imagination to attract success and prosperity, cause events to happen, attracting wealth, possessions, work, and love.
Therefore one cannot expect the mere visualization of any image within meditation practice to perform some magic transcendental transformation unless you understand its use and practice with diligence.
As the great problem within all meditation is the presence of Identity, what one does in visualization is generate a well-developed vision of a perfect "other you," which may be stylized or transformed into an attractive figure; for example Tara, Vajrasattva or even a Bodhisattva of Compassion.
Allowing this "other you," evolved by practice with a complete identification, it is possible to attain meditations and consequences which can transform one's everyday behaviour and even reach into higher meditations.
I have rather oversimplified the method, but must add that there are great dangers involved in possible Identity clinging to the beautiful images and the practices themselves, which may include mantras, mandalas and chanting. This is wholly counterproductive.
REFLECTION:
As its name suggests, reflection consists in pondering or mulling over a meditational subject, turning it in one's mind, examining and analyzing it from several angles like we would examine a walnut to see which is the best way to open it and get at the kernel.
Insofar as it is entirely cognitive, reflection remains squarely within the domain of consciousness and under the control of the meditator.
However, because it involves a relaxed but exhaustive review of the topic's essential qualities, it is often used as a prelude to more advanced meditations, such as absorption and contemplation, which can use its findings as a stepping stone to higher reaches of the meditative experience.
CONCENTRATION:
This meditation is a "one-pointedness" that is directed at various meditation topics.
Its purpose is to show clearly through the development of concentration within the "becoming of consciousness," which is a calm state beyond normal mundane consciousness, the vacuity of all sensations, discriminations, perceptions, cognition, and elements of consciousness itself.
There are eight levels which actually are one, which flow from one to another quite naturally and produce during the meditations a natural state of unattached joy.
These levels are known as Jhanas and the precise meditation topics depend upon the temperament of the meditator and must be carefully selected with aid.
Reflection and Concentration may be better understood by examining Buddha's meditation beneath the rose apple tree.
see: THE PERFECTION OF THE END OF KNOWLEDGE
ABSORPTION:
This form of meditation is that developed by Gotama Buddha and is known as Vipassana. It has advanced stages which are Supra-mundane and lead to Awakening. It is a process which allows the practitioner to experience the rising and falling away of all mental phenomena and know with certainty that all phenomena are generated by the mind.
The consequence is a "cleaning within memory," in which the symptoms of Identity presence are reduced or eliminated. It includes in its use the processes of perception, memory, cognition and consciousness and the practitioner induces in the meditation a state which we can call the "becoming of consciousness."
CONTEMPLATION:
This is a Chan practice. It is a more advanced form of meditation which uses the last conceptualization of particular elements such as vacuity, impermanence, unity, clear comprehension and the Life Force in order to develop, below the level of consciousness, the raw language experiences that can change behavior and generate cognitive experiences that can be then used as constant day-by-day positive attributes which we call "the Presence."
PENETRATION:
This is the most advanced Chan Practice. It actually uses more advanced approaches to remedy the basic unconscious errors of communication between the two hemispheres. It is this penetration, by means of access to natural function, natural essence and the undifferentiated natural forms, that opens the door to Awakening.
Remember that these descriptions have been simplified so that you may have a basic idea of the range of meditations which are possible for the human creature and MUST be accompanied with adequate teachings and applications in daily life.