Practice Is Not a Performance
On releasing the need for results and what actually accumulates when you stop looking.
“This too shall pass”
There is an ancient Zen story about a student who went to his meditation teacher complaining. “My meditation is horrible! I feel so distracted, my legs ache, I’m falling asleep. It’s just horrible!” The teacher replied, simply, “It will pass.” A week later the same student came back, beaming. “My meditation is wonderful! I feel so alive, so peaceful. It’s just wonderful!” The teacher said again, without any change in tone, “It will pass.”
I love this story. I have needed it many times. As have my students.
We get attached to good experiences in lots of things in life, especially in meditation. And then we get confused and frustrated when we cannot recreate them. We start trying to figure out why, which is exactly the wrong thing to do. Part of a real practice is learning to work with the mystery of it. To get in the chair regardless of what the last sitting was like. Because it all evens out over time. The value is not in any single meditation. It is in the accumulation.
If you think of meditation like going to the gym - which I am doing a lot of at the moment so it’s top of mind - checking every few squats to see ‘if it’s working yet’ would be bananas. Is it tempting? Sure thing. Have I personally been irritated that after a year off I didn’t see immediate results in the first two weeks? Of course not…haha joking, it’s all I whinged to my husband about…and like going to the gym, meditation has an accumulative result that builds incrementally over time. I have been reminded of our meditation students - some see results instantly, but they have crunchy and boring times ahead. Some are a slower burn, and it’s on reflection after a year that they are astounded as to how their gritty and boring practice has actually resulted in huge impacts in their lives.
As we live in a world of immediacy and demand, and we get frustrated when a web page takes more than half a second to load, with way too many things to watch and entertain us, with uber eats and instant next day shipping - it affects our mindset. One date and it’s not working out? Ghost them. We have turned into little beasts that insist on instant results everywhere. And it comes at a cost.
There is a Japanese concept called mushotoku, acting without interest in personal gain, giving without expecting anything in return. Simply being present is all that is required. The practice itself is the reward. You cannot lose what you have gained, because there is nothing to gain or lose. This is quite confronting for most Western minds, which have been trained to fixate on results and acquisition. We want evidence. We want before and after. We are fed fat to skinny, bad skin to excelelnt skin images at a rate of knots. We demand to feel it working.
The problem is that when we approach our inner work from this place, we miss it entirely.
The meditation teacher who told me the most important thing was to keep a beginner’s mind was not being gentle or diplomatic. She was being precise. You must always stay curious, fresh and open to your practice, never stagnant or egotistical about it. You can never master meditation. The point is to master life, not the other way around.
I have been meditating for nearly thirty years, and I sit down every single day not knowing what I will get. Some days the mind is busy and I seem to spend the whole time dragging myself back from shopping lists and conversations I will never have. Some days there is a stillness so complete it feels like touching something infinite. Some are psychaedelic filled with insight and ecstasy. Others are as boring as batshit.
And the teacher is right. It all passes. What remains is something that is not dependent on any single session. It is the quality underneath everything. The broad place itself.
The practice is a practice. Not a performance.
Practice: The Mushotoku Sit
Today, before you meditate or do any inner work, set a single intention: I am not here to get anything. I am simply here. Notice any resistance that arises to this idea, the part of you that wants to feel better, or have a breakthrough, or tick the box. Acknowledge it. Then put it down. Sit for your usual time and when your mind starts evaluating how it is going, gently redirect. No scorekeeping. No assessment. Just presence. Afterwards, resist the urge to decide if it was good or bad. Just go about your day.
A consistent, guided meditation practice is one of the most powerful things you can invest in. If you are ready to go deeper, our Integrated Meditation program gives you the technique, the community, and the ongoing support to make this a real part of your life. Find out more at thebroadplace.com.au/meditation.
With love,
Jac x
And for our paying subscribers I have a few exercises for you to take this to a new level…simple, intergrative practices that will see you grasp the above more fully.
