seventh world of chan buddhism - Zen Buddhist Order of Hsu Yun

The longer you can `dwell' on the object, the better. Spontaneously, you will come
out of the meditation.
Gauge the depth of your meditation by the depth of the euphoria you feel after it ends
and you come out of it. The more elated you feel, the deeper you have gone.
Euphoria is, in fact, an indication of successful meditation. True religious experience
is always joyful and exciting. Sometimes, however, a meditation takes a wrong turn and the
meditator afterward relates that he had entered a dreadful void, a Stygian abyss or vast area of
terrible desolation. He remains for hours or days as gloomy as his vision. This kind of
experience evidences a psychological problem and should prompt a visit to an analyst or a
good Chan master.
Some commentators would have us believe that this Stygian void is the ultimate of
meditative states. They theorize that the meditator has actually seen through the gross
material state of things to some fundamental sub-atomic reality. This, they think, is what
Nirvana is... seeing the world not as being composed of people, mountains, trees, oceans,
sky, and such, but as photons, protons, quarks, and so on. This is elitist nonsense.
Don't be surprised if you lose your ability to meditate upon an object the second or
third time you successfully use it. The mind sometimes habituates to an object; and when
the object loses its ability to fascinate, it becomes worthless as an object of meditation. If one
method repeatedly fails, move on to another method.
TICKING MEDITATIONS
Get two clocks or timers that tick and place one on each side of you, a few feet away.
Then take your meditation `seat' and, after performing the bow, the examination of
conscience and enough deep breaths to get into alpha, listen carefully to the clocks. There
will be moments when their ticking is synchronized and moments when their ticking is not.
Study the pattern, trying to determine which one is slower. Without resorting to numbers or
names, try to get the feel of the converging and diverging rhythms. Throughout this period of
observation continue to perform deep breathing using the rhythm of the clocks to measure the
4:16:8 or 8:32:16 breathing ratio. Try to make the breath slower and finer. Instead of
counting with English numbers, use the Indian or Japanese words described in an earlier
chapter or use nonsensical terms such as mee, mah, moo, mum, to keep the cadence. It is
also possible to use your own heartbeat to keep the rhythm.
Whenever you come out of the meditation, it is finished. Don't try to force yourself to
get back into it. The entire experience may last anywhere from several minutes to a half-hour
or more. Again, success is measured by the degree of elation which follows it.
Another meditation exercise using the same two ticking instruments, one on either
side of you, is as follows:
CHAPTER 19 RIGHT MEDITATION
S EVENTH W ORLD O F C HAN B UDDHISM
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