by Sheng-yen Lu
GaiGai!
Someone told me:
“In meditation, during the mindless stage, a feeling of strange quiet emptiness occurs. Then due to fear of extinguishment, I quickly exit meditation.”
Someone else said:
“During meditation, when reaching the state of cloudless blue sky, due to the fear of the vastness of space, I was unable to enter and decided to exit meditation.”
Another person said:
“During meditation, I felt darkness all around, like a huge black hole, and I was falling deeper and deeper into this bottomless hole. Due to fear, I felt the need to quickly exit meditation.”
I told them:
“Meditation is mindless sitting. If there are feelings of quiet emptiness, vastness of space, or falling into a black hole, then it is only the beginning or the initial level of meditation. In real meditation, you have blank feelings, no time, no space, nothing.”
I then went on to say:
“What is there to fear if meditation takes place in a quiet room? You feel afraid because you haven’t entered meditation!”
Before meditation I would recite:
“Reborn to the Pure Land. Transcend birth and suffering. Namo Amituofo.”
If one is already dead, then there will be no worries.
Then there will be no desires.
Instantaneously! Instantaneously! A state of no knowing and no feelings.
When I enter into meditation, it is infinitely peaceful. A state of mindlessness, with no trace of breeze, and no trace of light. There truly is nothing.
This is meditation!
I am thinking:
Before, when I wanted to come out of deep meditation, I would ust come out of it. It could be done immediately.
Now when I come out of meditation, this will happen:
From my deep meditative state, a small dot appears that gradually turns into a remarkable celestial being. With one look at her face, I find it to be the face of the White-Robed Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva. She is you and you are her, there is no difference. As a result, I come out of meditation.
It occurs to me that you, my lover’s image, has been deeply hidden in my eighth consciousness, “alaya.”
Xing Duan’s poem:
There is no birth or death,
Can there be coming and going?
Glacier burns,
Iron tree blooms.
I think:
For you the glacier is burning. For you the iron tree is blooming.
Write a poem for you:
This human world
Is a sentimental garden
Your eyes
Are celestial beings
Under the dragon-flower tree, is the Maitreya dharma mat
GaiGai
You are the amazing choice of Maitreya Bodhisattva
Let’s realize Buddhahood
Let’s realize Buddhahood
“Maitreya’s Tusita Heaven” is not far
