3 Tips to Begin Your Meditation Practice

“Everything you ever wanted is right here in this present moment of awareness.” —Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

A long time ago there was an old man living in a run-down shack in the forest. He had next to nothing, barely enough to survive, but little did he know there was a treasure buried under his home.

Every single day, he would leave his fortune behind and venture out into the world looking for some way to make a living. He tried hunting and foraging for food. He worked odd jobs. And when he couldn’t find anything, he begged from his neighbors. Many nights, he simply went hungry.

One day a mysterious woman showed up at his door and proclaimed that he was wealthy beyond belief. “There is a treasure of gold and diamonds buried right where you are standing. You are rich! Don’t you see? You just have to dig up the treasure, and it will all be yours!”

The old man was so used to seeing himself as poor and impoverished, he simply could not believe the good news. Being wealthy was so far from his reality that he dismissed the mysterious woman’s comment without thinking twice. Maybe she was playing a joke on him. Maybe she had the wrong person. He didn’t even take the time to check for the treasure. A few years later, he passed away in poverty, completely oblivious to the wealth he possessed.

Each of us is the old man living in the forest. We all have a treasure buried deep within, a source of contentment and inner peace that we carry with us every moment of every day. Yet just like the old man, we remain blind to this inner richness. We have no idea it’s there and thus there is no way to enjoy the wealth we possess.

A nagging sense of inner scarcity drives us to look for happiness and fulfillment in a million different places. We search and search, hoping to find something that will allow us to feel at home in the world, yearning to finally let go of the struggle and relax.

But that day never seems to arrive. So we keep looking.

Buddhist Wisdom for the Age of Anxiety

“We are all homesick. Although our true home is within, we do not recognize this, and we seek happiness outside ourselves.” —Saljey Rinpoche

It is no accident that so many of us feel like we are in a race that never ends. In this age of anxiety, we are barraged with information from the time we wake up in the morning to the moment we drift off to sleep. Our devices have become extensions of our being, so much so that we rarely turn them off. As a result, we ourselves never switch off.

The pull to be doing something or consuming the next piece of information never lets up, and before we know it, doing becomes a compulsion. We might be stressed out and overwhelmed or simply unable to stop for a moment and catch our breath, but we simply don’t know how to let go. The closest we get to a moment of true rest is to lose ourselves in distraction.

Buddhism offers us a different way to live.

The core perspective of Buddhism is that we all have a source of inner peace and contentment deep within us. The problem is that we do not recognize what we have. Just like the woman who showed up to remind the old man that he was wealthy beyond his wildest dreams, we need someone to point this out and show us the way, and then we need to unearth the treasure and discover it for ourselves.

Although Buddhism is one of the world’s major religions, it is not focused on belief systems and higher powers. Buddhism is a path, a practical training to tap the potential of the human mind. It is a road map to self-exploration and self-discovery that helps us to be the very best versions of ourselves.

Belief is not the point in Buddhism. Experience is the gateway to transformation.

Tips to Explore Meditation

As a fellow explorer, there are things that I would recommend bringing with you on your journey. The first is curiosity. It was the Buddha’s initial curiosity that paved the way for the entire Buddhist path. By opening us up to new ideas and perspectives, curiosity serves as the key to growth and self-discovery.

A second item that is helpful is patience—the patience to trust the process and remain open to change. When I first started meditating, I was completely overwhelmed with stress and anxiety. But even though I was craving a new way to live, letting go of my old, dysfunctional beliefs was not easy. I had deep-rooted convictions, like the view that my worth as a human being was based on what I do and accomplish. These unconscious beliefs kept me rushing toward a finish line I could never reach. You would think that it would be easy to let go once I became aware of this mental habit, but part of me didn’t want to move past what was familiar. Letting go sounds good in theory, but when it actually happens, it can feel like we’re losing part of ourselves. This is why it often takes patience to see the journey through. The path is rarely predictable.

The last item I encourage you to carry with you is self-compassion. Being human isn’t easy, and the world is not doing us any favors these days when it comes to happiness and wellbeing. The spiritual path is transformative and rewarding, but it takes a tremendous amount of courage to even begin this journey. Our fortitude needs to be balanced with self-compassion; it takes both to step into the unknown. But the alternative is to just stay stuck.

The central idea of Buddhism is that awakening is possible for all of us. What the Buddha discovered for himself then taught to others is what we know as Buddhism. It is a living tradition of experience. The tradition is really nowhere other than within us and in all people who are living and practicing it.

Adapted from A Meditator’s Guide to Buddhism: The Path of Awareness, Compassion, and Wisdom by Cortland Dahl © 2024 by Cortland Dahl. Reprinted in arrangement with Shambhala Publications, Inc. Boulder, CO. shambhala.com.