Excerpts from "Bringing Home the Dharma"

Distractions are the natural movement of the mind, which is often like muddy or turbulent water. Each time an enticing image or an interesting memory floats by, it is our habit to react, to get entangled, or to get lost. When painful images or feelings arise, it is our habit to contract, to avoid them, or unknowingly distract ourselves. We can feel the power of these habits of desire and distraction, of fear and reaction. In many of us these forces are so great that after a few unfamiliar moments of calm, our mind rebels. We repeatedly encounter restlessness, busyness, plans, unfelt feelings, and these all interrupt our focus again and again. The heart of meditation practice is working with these distractions, steadying our canoe so to speak, letting the waves wobble us and pass by, coming back again and again to this moment in a quiet and collected way.

The steady power of our concentration shows each part of our life to be in change and flux, like a river, even as we feel it.

But where have we actually gone? It is only that a mood or thought or doubt has swept through our mind. As soon as we recognize this, we can let go and settle back again in the next moment. We can always begin again.


Always remember that in training a puppy we want to end up with the puppy as our friend. In the same way, we must practice seeing our mind and body as “friend”. Even its wanderings can be included in our meditation with a friendly interest and curiosity. Right away we can notice how it moves. The mind produces waves. Our breath is a wave, and the sensations of our body are a wave. We don’t have to fight the waves. We can simply acknowledge, “Surf’s up.” “Here’s a wave of memories from when I was three years old.”
“Here’s a wave of planning the future.” Then its time to reconnect with the wave of the breath….
Our task is to train the puppy to become our life long friend.