Thursday, May 29, 2025

Thursday, May 29, 2025

“In the beginning nothing comes, in the middle nothing stays, in the ending nothing goes,” wrote the Tibet’s eminent twelfth-century poet, yogi and sage, Milarepa. What does it mean, we wonder.

Matthieu Ricard, the American yogi who lives in Tibet unpacks this puzzle in this way:
At the start of meditation practice, little or nothing seems to change in us. After continued practice, we notice some changes in the way of our being, but they come and go. Finally as practice stabilizes, the changes are constant and enduring, with no fluctuation. Instead of being temporary states they become altered traits of the practitioner.

The beginners impact begins from under 100 total hours of practice. Long term meditators range from 1,000-10,000 hours. Yogis tested at Richie’s lab averaged three times more than long term meditators with just one acception, Mingyur’s 62,000.

Novice meditation practitioners find some benefits of stress recovery, less mind-wanderings, better focus and working memory with fifteen minutes of daily practice. This happens within first few months. The amygdala shows lessened reactivity after thirty or so hours of practice and the molecular marker of cellular aging also emerges.  

Loving-kindness and compassion meditation shows stronger benefits from the get-go. As few as fourteen hours of total practice in a month leads to increased empathy and positive feelings. Such as responding to other person’s suffering, and a greater likelihood of actually helping others. Attention and focus strengthen. Preoccupation with self reduces. For occasional practitioners, these effects are not lasting but for long-term meditators these turn into permanent traits.

For yogis who have accumulated more than 12,000 hours of practice truly remarkable effects emerge. They have converted meditative states into traits. For most of us when we sit to meditate, concentration takes mental effort but for these yogis it is effortless. Once their attention locks with their breath or any other focus of attention their mind goes quiet while their attention stays perfectly focused. There’s coupling between heart and brain. An inner basic goodness permeates their mind and daily activities. This is the Buddha nature.

We all have divine nature but we simply fail  to recognize it. It is not so much of skill development but rather the quality of recognition that we all are basically good. The crux of the practice then is recognizing our intrinsic qualities of compassion and wisdom. In loving-kindness meditation we recognize and strengthen this as a core quality that is already present in us.