Friends with the Breath
October 01, 2003
When we come out to a place like this, sit down, close our eyes, we find that the physical luggage we’ve brought along with us is nothing compared to the baggage we’re carrying around in our minds. And one of the first tasks in meditation is to let go of that baggage, for otherwise it keeps interfering, keeps getting in the way. We want to be with our breath, but thoughts of the past—this person, that person, our work, our relationships, issues out in the world—just keep coming and getting in the way. So we need some techniques for keeping them at bay. It’s one of the reasons we have these chants at the beginning of the meditation. Think of them as thinking tools. We often think of meditation as a process of not-thinking, but you have to think your way to not-thinking—in other words, learn to use your thinking processes in a skillful way—before you can let them go. The various contemplations we have in the chants are there to help us with that process.