Zen In The Art Of Archery Analysis

As I run meditation workshops for fraternities and on campus organizations, people often ask me what is the best way to practice meditation. When I ask them what is the matter with the way that they practice, many of them complain that they’re not good at meditation, because they can’t empty their minds and not to think for 30 minutes. It is somewhat amusing to listen to their naïve answers, because it sounds like that they want to achieve the enlightenment by single practice. Herrigel, the author of Zen in the Art of Archery, took several years to understand what it means to empty one’s mind through relentless practice. I only began to understand the joy of just sitting down and do nothing after three years of practicing sitting meditation, not to mention that I’m still struggling with applying the level of awareness that I get have during I meditate to my daily activities.
Practicing sitting meditation has not been very easy. It certainly takes a commitment to practice regularly, and every session is different. Some days, I’m able to concentrate on my breath throughout the session, but for other days, 30 minutes goes by without any concentration. For as mush as it is hard to do, practicing is at the center of the Zen. It is impossible to understand what it feels
At first, I wondered why do people strive to do anything, or even to live, if the world is truly empty and there’s not point of doing anything. However, soon I realized that this kind of nihilistic beliefs does not lead me to anywhere. As I started to study Buddhism further, I learned that understanding emptiness is not about pointlessness and purposelessness, but to acknowledge that we are all connected, and there is nothing essential to call myself. In other words, I do not exist without others, because the world is nothing but invented and projected world by