Meditation without Gurus

One of the most difficult challenges in meditation is to let go expectation and experience the present for what it is. Ironically, this may take some effort to master. In a Zen Buddhist monastery the traditional wisdom says that it’s not likely to happen before the middle day of a seven-day silent retreat. During the first three days, there is usually a lot of artificial effort. One tries very hard to focus the mind, and when it wanders, one feels obliged to take it kicking and screaming back. After all, during a meditation retreat, that’s the name of the game. If you are not in meditation, then there’s no excuse for just sitting around all day. 

Eventually the mind stops craving for excitement. But first it has to pass through boredom, like travelling across the desert to an oasis on the other side. At first you were not bored with meditation because you were expecting something. You were impatiently waiting for something happen. Then, when it becomes breath, numbers, stray thoughts, you began to think, “So what! What’s the big deal? You must be missing something. 
We normally keep ourselves distracted by other things. One we sit down to meditate, the distractions cease and we are unprotected. Nothing has changed. We are simply more acutely aware of our underlying state of mind. A similar thing happens to people who suffer from insomnia. Once you are lying in bed in a darkened room, if you can’t sleep, you are far more likely to be plagued by doubt or fear. 

To learn how to let go tensions and worries during meditation takes practice, but you can begin right away by realising first of all that fighting only makes it worse. The person who suffers from insomnia understands this lesson. Struggling against wakefulness only makes you more awake. In the same way, in meditation, fighting tension and anxiety only makes matters worse. 
Meditation is not about keeping score, nor is it about obsessively looking for a particular result. Meditation only means being in your life. Some days your life is organised in such a way as caring for an infant and only wanting to sleep as soon as he or she does.