Beyond Meditation Steps: Riding the Donkey You Are Already On

It is a funny thing, isn't it? We spend so much of our time looking for the donkey while we are already sitting on its back. We run around asking for directions, looking for maps, and trying to follow specific meditation steps as if they were a ladder leading to a rooftop called enlightenment. But who is it that wants to climb? And where exactly do we think we are going? If the absolute is truly the totality, it must include this moment, this breath, and even this very confusion. If the infinite didn't include you exactly as you are right now—distracted, seeking, or tired—it wouldn't be infinite. It would be a "nearly-infinite" that is missing one piece: you. We often hear about the need for a journey or a process of awakening, but liberation is never of the separate self; it is from the separate self. There is a common misunderstanding that through enough effort, the body-mind will eventually transform into something divine. We treat the separate self like a project to be fixed. We think that if we just find the right practice, we will finally achieve a state of permanent peace. But the separate self is not an entity; it is a function, a way the body-mind relates to its environment. It is like a pair of glasses sitting so close to our eyes that we forget we are wearing them. We see the world colored by our thoughts and labels—this is a tree, this is a problem, this is me—and we fail to see the glass itself. When we talk about meditation, we have to be honest. Meditation can be a wonderful thing. It can make the body-mind feel more harmonious. It can clear the fog of the mind so that when a thought does arise, it is like a bright steel wire in a vast, empty space—precise and sharp. It can bring a profound sense of comfort and quiet. But let’s not lie to ourselves: meditation is not a path to the absolute. The absolute is the screen on which the movie of "meditating" or "not meditating" is projected. The screen doesn't become more "screen-like" because the movie playing on it depicts a silent forest instead of a noisy battle. Many seekers get caught in the trap of the "witness." They learn to observe their thoughts and their bodily sensations, creating a distance. They see the tree, and then they realize they can also see the body that sees the tree. This is a powerful shift, a purification of conscious presence. But even the observer is just another mask. It creates a subtle division—the one who watches and the thing being watched. In reality, the observation is one indivisible movement. You cannot have a looker without something being looked at. They are two sides of the same coin, appearing together in the aware presence that we already are. We often worry about being distracted, but distraction is never of the being; it is from the being. We get lost in the noise and forget the silence that underlies it, just as we get lost in the music and forget the silence that allows the notes to exist.