The perfect teaching of the Buddha is not accomplished through mere study.

Dharma without meditation is like dying of thirst while being helplessly carried away by a great river.

Flower Arrayed Tree Sutra

i. What does this mean to me?

I have a confession to make. When I first started studying the Dharma, the teachings were a joy to listen to. In my mid-forties, it felt like I’d waited all my life to hear the Dharma. Then came the teachings on meditation, then the practice of meditation. I didn’t like meditation even one little bit.

The very idea of sitting on a chair or cushion, closing my eyes and then essentially doing nothing for around twenty five minutes didn’t sit well with me. But nevertheless, I dutifully practiced at home. That lasted for about two or three weeks, and then suddenly, one day I was sitting there thinking I’d rather be literally anywhere else, when something shifted.

I wish I could explain it better than that. There was no fanfare, no glare of white light, just a very subtle settling as though I were a square peg that had finally found a resting place in a square space. I saw how meditation wasn’t just part of the Dharma, it was inextricably bound to the Dharma. After all, there are eighty-four thousand gates to the Dharma. Meditation is just one of them.

These days, nigh on fifteen years later, I see that Dharma teachings are inextricably bound to one’s practice. You can’t study the Dharma and not meditate, because that would be like, “…dying of thirst while being helplessly carried away by a great river”. Why? Because meditation is nothing more than stopping and taking time to settle the agitation of the mind.

The more often we do that, on or off the cushion, the better we’ll come to know the mind, and the less the mind will be able to run us down any path of thought it chases. Once we step through this gate to the Dharma, we are well on the way to drinking from the constant river that carries us and give it a direction of our choice.

ii. How would I explain this to someone else?

My teacher had a snow globe with maybe a Buddha inside. At the beginning of each meditation, he would give it a good shake then put it down and say, ‘this is what we’re doing, settling the mind.’ Now that I’ve studied the Dharma, taken a few years hiatus, and come back, I understand why “The perfect teaching of the Buddha is not accomplished through mere study.”

Reading the Dharma and hearing it is very good. But the meditation component is so important that it’s not just a component, it is interwoven into the Dharma. I would venture to say that meditation settles the mind so that we can better absorb the Dharma and make it our own. Meditation is a balm to the agitated mind. The more we do it, the clearer we see our way to helping those caught up in the illusions of samsara.

iii. How do I bring this into my life?
Meditation is easier than going to sleep. When we want to go to sleep, we are trying desperately to unplug from the world. We all know how hard that can be. Meditation is just the opposite – we work on connecting to who we truly are – our Buddha Nature. Doing this means cultivating concentration, or to say it another way, we work to minimize distractions.

When you meditate, even after just a few weeks, there’s this calm space that arises in the mind. Actually, it’s always there, we’re usually too distracted to notice it. Remember that in Buddhism, we’re not meditating to become great meditators, or get an Olympic medal. We meditate to make our minds more fit for us to be of benefit to others. I bring this into my life by having a formal ‘sit on the cushion’ meditation four or five times a week. I cultivate that calm space in the mind.

In particular, when I’m at work, which can be off the scale stressful, I make myself stop whatever I’m doing. Even though my mind is shouting, ‘YOU DON’T HAVE TIME FOR THIS!’, I still stop and close my eyes and breathe a few slow breaths. In those few moments I remember there is a calm space in the mind. I focus on knowing and understanding that I can operate from a place of peace, not agitation.

When I open my eyes I feel ready to be calm. I do this about five or six times a day. The agitation in my mind is like a fever. I work to eliminate or at least ameliorate the causes and conditions for even more agitation to arise. Every time I do this, I feel like I’m putting that snow globe to rest, instead of shaking it up even more.

Reading the Dharma and studying is of great benefit. Of even greater benefit is living the Dharma through meditation. More meditation means a less agitated mind. A less agitated mind means we can be of more and more benefit to others.

Don’t we all want to put the snow globe down and let the particles settle out of that beautiful clear water? The clear water of our mind?