“Meditation practice is like waves. When you’re on a high, you’re full of motivation and energy, but there are also days when you’re on a low. It fluctuates. That’s just how it is.”

The teachings of Ajahn Suchart.

1 March 2024

“Meditation practice is like waves. When you’re on a high, you’re full of motivation and energy, but there are also days when you’re on a low. It fluctuates. That’s just how it is.”

When you feel discouraged – not reaping results from your effort, you’ll think that it is a waste of time and feel unmotivated. You have to keep thinking of the Buddha and other respectable teachers when you feel disheartened. 

They taught that when there’s despair, you have to fight and put up with it. You have to stay focussed and keep on practising. If you don’t then you may be worse off the next day – having regressed. At the very least, you’ll be able to maintain your level if you keep on practising. Once you’ve stopped, it is like backtracking because you’ll be living off your merit that you had done in the past. And when you’ve used up your past merit, you’ll go down even further. 

Therefore, when you don’t’ feel like practising, you have to force yourself to practise. It is to maintain your level at the very least. This is so that you don’t have to waste your time trying to regain your old position and can just keep making progress. 

Meditation practice is like waves. When you’re on a high, you’re full of motivation (chanda) and energy (viriya), but there are also days when you’re on a low. 

It fluctuates. That’s just how it is.

There are days when it’s easy to meditate and be calm. 

And there are days when it feels like moving mountains to do so. No matter how hard you try to focus on ‘Buddho’, it is just not possible. Your mind keeps thinking about other things and constantly gets distracted.

Don’t’ get upset or discouraged. Stay calm. Tell yourself that it is okay and that today is a bit challenging. 

It’s like driving uphill – it requires a bit more work on the way up, but once you’ve reached the top, it is easy on the way down.

You may take it easy on the day that you have tried meditating and just can’t seem to stay focussed or stop your mind from thinking – if you’ve tried your best and it still doesn’t work. But you shouldn’t give up too easily. Try to push yourself first until you really can’t do it. If there’s no use and it causes you stress and suffering instead, then take a break. 

By Ajaan Suchart Abhijāto

www.phrasuchart.com

Youtube: Dhamma in English

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCi_BnRZmNgECsJGS31F495g