The Meaning of Meditation

Zen literally translates as, “meditation,” so meditation is the heart of zen practice. Meditation in the dharma room, meditation when you're driving, meditation when you're sitting at the dinner table with your families, all of it. Meditation means asking the question, "What am I?", staying with don't know, and observing from a place of not knowing. What is happening right now?

But if you stay in your stuck conditioned mind blaming everybody else for what's going on, it will never change. Because everything is just a repetition of what happened before. It may have a little bit of a new face because it's a new moment, but generally speaking, it's just a repetition of what's happened before. It's been said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. But what Buddhism teaches, that unless we change our karma, unless we can see who we are and act differently in this very moment, life will just keep repeating itself over and over again.

By Zen Master Bon Soeng