“Just keep meditating.”

“Just keep meditating.”

Question from Australia: “You advised that one should not move the body while meditation.

I followed this instruction but my body gradually slanted very seriously although I didn’t fall down & I didn’t feel any pain. 

Usually, when my body starts to slant to the left or right, I will slowly adjust my posture. Should I let my body continue to slant or should I adjust my body once I notice it starts to slant?”

Than Ajahn:  “You should ignore the body. Leave it alone. If you leave it alone, I think it won’t bother you. It won’t disturb your meditation. If you keep going back to your body, move your body back and forth, then you are not meditating, you are managing your body. And you will not succeed in your meditation.

The reason why your body moves is because your mindfulness is not strong enough. If you have strong mindfulness, like when you sit and are talking to other people, your body doesn’t move to the left or to the right. However, when you meditate, you let your mindfulness slip away, so your body starts to lean to the left or to the right.

When you meditate, you should ignore the body. Just keep meditating. Don’t care what the position of your body is. Until you find it impossible to continue on, then you restart again. But this is not good. It’s not good to restart. It’s good to keep going until you can no longer do it. If you cannot succeed, that means you may have to develop more mindfulness first.”

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Question from Singapore: “After sitting for a period of time, I felt numbness in my lower leg area. Should I persist and try to bear with the numbness or should I try to get up slowly and do walking meditation?”

Than Ajahn:  “If you want to advance, if you want to make your mind calmer, you’ll have to continue on practicing by ignoring the numbness of the body and keep focusing on your meditation object such as your breath or your mantra. If you can persist, your mind will go deeper and become calmer, and the numbness or the pain in your body will not bother your mind. Your mind becomes upekkhā. That’s where you want to get to. So, you shouldn’t get up if you want to move forward. 

If you get up or change your position, then you’ll be starting over again. You’ll never move forward. When you get to this point, you’ll get stuck. You give up and you go and restart your practice again.”

“Dhamma in English, Q&A session, May 16, 2018.”

By Ajahn Suchart Abhijāto
www.phrasuchart.com

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