Taming the Bull — The Buddhist Meditation Tips

In many Buddhist teachings the bull is the most common metaphor to the mind, as lots of time and effort are required to tame a bull. It is a very thoughtful and appropriate metaphor, as one who wants to tame and control his/her own mind needs to invest lots of time and effort to get its control.

“The practice” is the simplest definition one can be given to the meditation and it’s the key to tame the mind. If we need to excel in a sport, we need to practice. And if we want to get good grades in subjects we need to study continuously. Consistency and perseverance are the promising strengths to achieve success in the physical world. Similarly, in meditation also we need to practice continuously. However, ‘the mind’ is intangible and unseen which makes it more challenging to control as per our wish.

There are many teachings on meditation and I prefer Lord Buddha’s preaching’s as it includes many comprehensive details of meditation. In his teachings there are four main characteristics of the human mind. By understanding these characteristics, we can ascertain the required effort to gain concentration. These four characteristics are as follows;

· Mind can travel long distances instantly

Think about the Great wall in China, Amazon rain forest, Taj Mahal, and Donald Trump. You might have never gone to those places or haven’t seen any of them on your own. But still your mind has the ability to travel to the other side of the world and instantly create imaginations of its own. This is the first amazing characteristic of the mind.

· Mind goes alone

Individual people and their minds work separately. No matter the relationship between the people, one’s mind cannot be connected to someone else. Hence, every person in the world owns a different mindset which is never equal. This is the second fact of the mind.

· Mind has no physical body

If the mind has a physical body it will be easy to control it. However, the mind doesn’t own a physical body and it’s intangible and unseen. This nature of mind is the third characteristic.

· Mind lives inside the body

Though the mind is intangible, it lives inside our bodies. In the Buddhist teachings it says that the mind is associated with the heart. When you promise to give your heart to someone, beware, your mind is also live there!

Due to these strange characteristics one will find it extremely difficult to control the mind. It’s clear that physical and tangible solutions are incapable of controlling the mind. But the mindfulness and continuous practice will help to tame and control the mind.

When I feel stressed and frustrated my home remedy is the meditation. There are many techniques and methods to follow the meditations. But everyone needs to find the most promising and rewarding methods for themselves. I have been meditating for a few years and the below three stages have been most effective to obtain mindfulness, which eventually reduces stress and frustration.

1. The position and its Awareness

Silence is a blessing for meditation. At the same time, you should find a comfortable sitting position with minimum aches. The first step of practicing meditation is to think about this sitting position. Close your eyes and detach your body from disturbances. Try to keep the balance of the body and maintain the stillness. Starting from the head, think about your whole-body step by step. Your eyes, mouth, neck, chest, hands, hips, thighs, legs, and toes. You can see them in your mind. If you keep the concentration and practice this, you should be able to see your face clearly from your mind. It’s like a mirror. You see yourself, within you. At this moment your mind and body both have come to the stillness. You won’t be able to do this overnight, but through continuous practice this will be possible. My usual meditation time per day is around 30 minutes and I can see myself within five to ten minutes after many years of practice.

2. Spreading the Metta or loving-kindness

Once your body and mind are stable, it’s time to move into the next step. Without having the stillness it’s not recommended to move to the next step, as it will be difficult to spread the loving-kindness without inner peace. Friendliness is the simplest meaning of Metta or loving-kindness. You need to be friends with yourself first. Then as the next steps you can practice to spread the friendliness or loving-kindness to your spouse, family, parents, relations, and friends, etc. You always need to start with yourself as if you don’t love yourself, it is impossible to love anyone else.

Now you are in a stable position and your mind is still. These what you need to think;

May I be safe

May I be happy

May I be healthy

May my mind be at ease

It’s only four sentences and you need to repeat this continuously. Not just you say these lines, you need to wish them in your mind. Have faith in yourself, have kindness, and spread the love towards yourself. The more you wish these from the bottom of your heart, the mind will be relaxed. There’s no anger, stress, or sorrow. Just kindness, love, and happiness. Once you are good at spreading loving-kindness towards yourself, it’s time to spread the love towards family and friends.

3. Notice the inner commentary

Spreading Metta or loving-kindness is not as easy as you read the lines. As I mentioned earlier controlling the mind is like a taming a bull. During the journey of meditation, the most challenging distraction is the inner commentary. This is where your mind starts to talk and tells you lots of things you never wanted. Sometimes it seems like a help, but it’s not. The inner commentary is where your own mind tells you about the body aches, lunch you are going to have, your pending office work, missed commitments, your meditation effort. It starts from somewhere and ended up in nowhere. If you support these inner talks, you will go along with those commentaries and lose the purpose of the whole effort. Most of the time these inner talks are very interesting and entertaining where you will almost forget the meditation. Those imaginations have the ability to deceive you and you will lose the control of your mind.

The challenge is that you need to identify whenever the inner commentary starts. You need to control the inner talks and bring the mind back to the stillness. Sometimes all that you can do is this first and third steps, where you bring the stillness and then controlling the inner talks. These inner talks won’t allow you to practice loving-kindness or Metta as it will distract you and bring you down through different paths of imaginations. In order to have a good meditation you must aware of your inner talks.

Mind is a bull and it runs around the body, home, country, and even around the entire world. Mind has four unusual characteristics which make it difficult to tame. However, if you have a commitment for 20 to 30 minutes every day, there is a good chance to tame your own bull. Practice is the key to meditation and the first step is to have the stillness in the body. Secondly need to spread the loving-kindness starting from yourself. Be friendly with yourself and then only you can be friends with anyone else. Thirdly and most importantly you need to end the inner commentary. Be mindful of them and always try to bring the mind stillness as soon as possible. If you can follow these three simple steps daily, you will find the happiness than anything else as the mind gets freedom through mindfulness!