Appendix: Instructions

There are a lot of bad reasons not to meditate. Here are my top
three:
1. Its bullshit. I get it. As you may remember, I used to feel this
way, too. But theres a reason why businesspeople, lawyers, and
marines have embraced meditation. Theres no magic or
mysticism required its just exercise. If you do the right amount
of reps, certain things will happen, reliably and predictably. One
of those things, according to the research, is that your brain will
change in positive ways. You will get better at not being carried
away by your passing emotional squalls; you will learn maybe
10% of the time, maybe more to respond, not react. We now
know that happiness, resilience, and compassion are skills,
susceptible to training. You dont have to resign yourself to your
current level of well-being, or wait for your life circumstances to
change; you can take the reins yourself. You brush your teeth,
you take the meds your doctor prescribes, you eat healthfully
and if you dont, you probably feel guilty about it. Given
everything modern science is telling us, I think its now safe to
put meditation in this category.
2. Its too hard for me. I call this the fallacy of uniqueness
argument. People often tell me, I know I should meditate, but
you dont understand: my mind just moves too fast. I cant
possibly do this. News flash: Welcome to the human condition.
Everybodys mind is out of control. Even experienced meditators
struggle with distraction. Moreover, the idea that meditation
requires you to clear your mind is a myth. (More on this
misapprehension below.)
3. I dont have the time. Everybody has five minutes. My advice is
to start with five minutes a day and to tell yourself youll never
do more. If you increase your time gradually and organically,
great. If not, totally fine.
Basic Mindfulness Meditation
1. Sit comfortably. You dont have to twist yourself into a crosslegged position unless you want to, of course. You can just sit in
a chair. (You can also stand up or lie down, although the latter
can sometimes result in an unintentional nap.) Whatever your
position, you should keep your spine straight, but dont strain.
2. Feel your breath. Pick a spot: nose, belly, or chest. Really try to
feel the in-breath and then the out-breath.
3. This one is the key: Every time you get lost in thought which
you will, thousands of times gently return to the breath. I
cannot stress strongly enough that forgiving yourself and starting
over is the whole game. As my friend and meditation teacher
Sharon Salzberg has written, Beginning again and again is the
actual practice, not a problem to overcome so that one day we
can come to the real meditation.

Pro tips
To stay focused on the breath, try making a soft mental note, like
in and out. (Dont get too mesmerized by the note itself, just
use it to direct your attention to the actual sensory experience of
the breath.)
Noting, as its called, can also be useful when something strong
such as itches, pain, worries, or hunger comes along and
drags your attention away from the breath. The act of applying a
label planning, throbbing, fantasizing can objectify
whatevers going on, making it much less concrete and
monolithic. (Dont get too caught up in thumbing through your
internal thesaurus for the right word. Make a note and move on.)
Another trick for staying focused is to count your breaths. Start at
one, and every time you get lost, start over. When you reach ten
if you ever reach ten start back at one.
Try to meditate every day. Regularity is more important than
duration.
Set a timer so that you dont have to check your watch. There are
apps for this. (I use something called the Insight Timer.)
Find friends who are also interested in meditation. Its not a must,
but sitting with a group or merely having people with whom
you can discuss your practice can have an HOV lane effect.
Find a teacher you trust. Meditation can be a lonely and subtle
business. It really helps to have some personal guidance. If you
live in a remote area, there are teachers who offer lessons over
Skype.
Beginning meditators are sometimes advised to sit at the same
time and in the same place every day. If, like me, your schedule
is unpredictable and involves a lot of travel, dont worry about it.
I sit whenever and wherever I can fit it in.
Every once in a while, do a little reading about meditation or
Buddhism. Even though the basic instructions are simple, hearing
them repeatedly can be useful. Its the opposite of airplane
safety announcements. Also, since the practice itself often feels
stupid ( in, out, ad nauseam), glancing at even a few
passages of a good book can be a helpful reminder of the
intellectual underpinnings of the practice, which are extremely
compelling. Here are some books I like:
On meditation
Real Happiness, Sharon Salzberg
Insight Meditation, Joseph Goldstein
On Buddhism and mindfulness in general
Going to Pieces Without Falling Apart, Dr. Mark Epstein
Buddhism Without Beliefs, Stephen Batchelor
FAQS

Remind me, whats the point of this?

Meditation is the best tool I know for neutralizing the voice in the
head. As discussed, the ego is often a hatchery of judgments,
desires, assumptions, and diabolical plans. The act of simply feeling
the breath breaks the habits of a lifetime. For those short snatches
of time when youre focused on the rise and fall of the abdomen or
the cool air entering and exiting the nostrils, the ego is muzzled. You
are not thinking, you are being mindful an innate but underused
ability we all have, which allows us to be aware without judging.
When you repeatedly go through the cycle of feeling the breath,
losing your focus, and hauling yourself back, you are building your
mindfulness muscle the way dumbbell curls build your biceps. Once
this muscle is just a little bit developed, you can start to see all the
thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations that carom through
your skull for what they really are: quantum squirts of energy
without any concrete reality of their own.
Imagine how massively useful this can be. Normally, for example,
when someone cuts you off in traffic or on line at Starbucks, you
automatically think, Im pissed. Instantaneously, you actually
become pissed. Mindfulness allows you to slow that process down.
Sometimes, of course, youre right to be pissed. The question is
whether you are going to react mindlessly to that anger or respond
thoughtfully. Mindfulness provides space between impulse and
action, so youre not a slave to whatever neurotic obsession pops
into your head.
My mind keeps wandering. Am I failure?
This question gets back to the whole clear your mind
misconception. The relationship between thinking and meditating is
a funny one. Thoughts are simultaneously the biggest obstacle to
meditation, and also an unavoidable part of it like the opposing
team in basketball, or the hurdles in track. The goal is not to erase
the obstacles, but to play as well as possible. So, again: this entire
endeavor revolves around moments of mindfulness, interrupted by
periods of distraction, then gently catching yourself and returning to
the breath. Over time, the mindfulness may grow longer and the
wandering shorter. Not incidentally, the ability to begin again and
again has significant off the cushion benefits. It creates a
resilience that can be enormously useful when confronting the ups
and downs of everyday life.
How come I dont feel relaxed?
This really sucks. First of all, when you learn any new skill Urdu,
French horn, krumping, whatever it is often awkward and difficult
at the beginning.
Second, write down this quote from Jon Kabat-Zinn and put it up on
your wall: Meditation is not about feeling a certain way. Its about
feeling the way you feel. Its amazing how many times I can hear
this message and yet forget it when I sit down to meditate. You

dont need to achieve some special state; you just need to be as

aware as possible of whatevers happening right now. This is what
the Buddhists mean by letting go better translated as letting
be.
Meditation became much easier for me when I stopped holding
myself responsible for what was happening in my head. To this day,
as soon as I start meditating, the first thoughts are usually: How the
hell am I going to make it until the timer goes off? Why am I even
doing this? But I havent summoned those complaints. They just
come out of the void. So rather than lapse into what Sharon
Salzberg calls a judgment jag, I just note the thoughts as
complaining or rushing or doubt. Yet again, there are massive
off-the-cushion consequences to cultivating this attitude. Just
because your wife or your kids are driving you nuts does not mean
you are a bad person.
You cant control what comes up, only how you respond. You
keep talking about this notion that you cant help what we
feel, only how you respond, but I want to feel different
things. Wont meditation do that for me?
In my experience, yes, it will. Not right away, of course and not
entirely. But as you learn to stop feeding your habitual thought and
emotional patterns through compulsive mental churning, you will
make room for new things.
If Im in physical pain, should I change position?
I know this stinks, but the advice is to sit still and investigate the
discomfort. If you look closely, youll see the pain is constantly
changing. Try to note it: stabbing, throbbing, pulling, etc. You
may find that its not the pain that is intolerable, but instead your
resistance to it. Of course, if you think youre in real danger of
injury, definitely shift position.
I keep falling asleep.
This is not a new problem. The Buddhists, perhaps unsurprisingly,
have lists of things you can do to fight fatigue. Meditate with your
eyes open. (Just enough to let a little light in. Try to fix your gaze on
a neutral spot on the wall or the ground.) Do walking meditation.
(More on this later.) Investigate the feeling of fatigue. Where do you
feel it in your body? Is your head heavy? Your forehead buzzy? Do
metta. (More on this later, too.)
This is so unbelievably boring.
Boredom: also not a new problem. The advice here is similar to how
you should handle pain and fatigue: investigate. What does
boredom feel like? How does it manifest in your body? Whatever
comes up in your mind can be co-opted and turned into the object
of meditation. Its like in judo, where you use the force of your

enemy against him. Another trick for overcoming boredom is to

increase the level of difficulty in your meditation. Try feeling the
breath more closely. Can you catch the beginning and the end of an
in- or out-breath? Can you see yourself subtly leaning forward into
the next breath instead of being exactly where you are? Can you
note the intervals between breaths? Maybe, if those periods are long
enough, you can designate a few touch points quickly bring your
attention to your butt or your hands or your knees before the next
breath resumes.
I keep trying to feel the breath as it naturally occurs, but
every time I focus on it, I involuntarily start to control it, so
it feels artificial.
Doesnt matter. As Joseph Goldstein says, This is not a breathing
exercise. You dont have to breathe a certain way. If you want, you
can even take sharper breaths so that its easier to feel them. What
matters here is the mindfulness, not the breath.
What if I feel panicky and hyperventilate every time I try to
watch my breath? This is not uncommon. Fortunately, there
are many variations of mindfulness meditation.
Body scan
1. Sit, stand, or lie down.
2. Start at one end of your body and work up or down. Bring your
attention to your feet, your calves, your knees, your butt, and so
on. When you get to your head, what can you feel? Anything?
After reaching the top, work your way back down.
3. Every time your mind wanders, gently bring it back.
Walking meditation
1. Stake out a stretch of ground roughly ten yards long. (Thats
somewhat arbitrary whatever length youve got will work.)
2. Slowly pace back and forth, noting: lift, move, place with every
stride. Try your best to feel each component of every stride.
(Dont look at your feet, just look at a neutral point in the
distance.)
3. Every time your mind wanders, gently bring it back.
4. There is a temptation to denigrate walking meditation as less
serious or rigorous than seated meditation, but this is wrong. Just
because your legs are crossed doesnt mean youre meditating
more effectively. As a noted teacher once said, Ive seen
chickens sitting on their eggs for days on end.
Compassion meditation (aka metta)
At first blush, most rational people find the below off-putting in the
extreme. Trust me or, better, trust the scientists it works.

1. This practice involves picturing a series of people and sending

them good vibes. Start with yourself. Generate as clear a mental
image as possible.
2. Repeat the following phrases: May you be happy, May you be
healthy, May you be safe, May you live with ease. Do this slowly.
Let the sentiment land. You are not forcing your well-wishes on
anyone; youre just offering them up, just as you would a cool
drink. Also, success is not measured by whether you generate
any specific emotion. As Sharon says, you dont need to feel a
surge of sentimental love accompanied by chirping birds. The
point is to try. Every time you do, you are exercising your
compassion muscle. (By the way, if you dont like the phrases
above, you can make up your own.)
3. After youve sent the phrases to yourself, move on to: a
benefactor (a teacher, mentor, relative), a close friend (can be a
pet, too), a neutral person (someone you see often but dont
really ever notice), a difficult person, and, finally, all beings.
Open awareness
1. Sit, stand, or lie down. (You can actually do open awareness while
walking, too.)
2. Instead of simply watching the breath, try to watch everything
that arises. Set up a spy cam in your mind and just see what is
there to see. To maintain your focus, try noting whatever comes
up: burning, hearing, itching, breathing, etc.
3. Every time you lose your focus, just forgive yourself and come
back. (Its pretty easy to get distracted doing this type of
meditation, so you might want to use your breath as an anchor
that you return to when you get scattered. Its like filling up the
hot-air balloon of the mind with enough concentration so that you
can fly.)