What to Notice Before You Sit to Meditate

I wrote an early version of this piece years ago, back when I still thought meditation was something you got right or wrong, like a technique to master. If you’ve read Meditation for Beginners and started practicing, you may have run into the same wall I did: doing everything “correctly” and still feeling like nothing happened. I used to think that meant something was wrong with the technique. Now I think the technique was never the problem.
The biggest thing we’re doing wrong in meditation is trying to make it happen.

Meditation Isn’t Something You Do

This is where I used to get it backwards. I’d tell people meditation is “about doing nothing,” which sounds right but sends you chasing another task: now you’re trying to do nothing, and trying is still doing. You’re still making effort, just aimed at a smaller target.

What I’d say now: stop interfering. Be present. See what’s here. That’s not a task you complete, it’s what’s left once you stop adding things to the moment. You don’t need to become an audience to your own life, or stand outside it watching from a distance. You just stop pushing on what’s already happening.

Watching vs. Focusing

This distinction has held up the whole way through, and it’s worth keeping simple. Focusing takes effort, you’re working to bring your attention to one point and hold it there. Watching doesn’t. You’re not making anything happen. You’re just noticing what’s already happening.

In Vipassana, this shows up as watching the breath. Not controlling it, not focusing on it, just noticing it. You don’t need a theory about who the “real watcher” is, or a goal of self-realization sitting at the end of it. You can stay much closer to the ground: this is breathing, and you’re noticing it.

What to Do With Your Thoughts

I used to say, don’t fight your thoughts. That’s still true, but it left a gap. Not fighting them still leaves room to follow them, analyze them, or quietly try to talk them out of showing up. None of that is fighting, exactly, but none of it is watching either.

Don’t fight thoughts.

Don’t follow them either.

Don’t try to stop them.

Don’t analyze them.

Just notice them.

That’s the whole instruction. Anything more is another task disguised as guidance.

You Don’t Have to Search for Anything

This part I still believe completely: you don’t need to search for anything, anywhere, to be self-aware. You’re already here. What I’d change is what I used to say came next, that meditation was a “holistic awakening,” that there was some invisible “YOU” waiting to be found inside the body.

I don’t think I need to tell you what you’ll discover anymore. Perhaps meditation begins when we stop trying to find something and simply become aware of what is already here.

What to Do With Your Emotions

This is the section I’d change the most. I used to say: throw your emotions and pain out before you sit, dance them out, cry them out, hit a pillow if you have to, unburden yourself first so you can be present. I still think movement before sitting has its place, it’s part of why Learning to Sit with the Present exists as its own piece now. But I no longer think discharge is what emotion needs once you’re actually sitting.

What I understand now looks more like this:

Restlessness appears.
Then: why am I feeling restless?
Observe. Wait.
Let the emotion appear.
Watch it. Be with it.
Don’t judge it. Don’t try to fix it.
Give it time. Let it pass.

You don’t necessarily have to get rid of what you’re feeling before you meditate. You can begin with what’s already here.

Not Happiness, Just Peace

I used to write that meditation is all about happiness, celebration, and laughter. I don’t think that’s true anymore, or at least it isn’t the point. I’m not promising happiness.
I’m pointing at peace, and peace doesn’t mean feeling happy all the time. You can be sad and still be at peace with what you’re experiencing.

So I’d put it more simply now: meditation doesn’t have to be serious. But it doesn’t have to be happy either. You can simply be there.

You Don’t Have to Do This Alone

This part hasn’t changed. Find someone who meditates and talk to them about what comes up for you. You don’t need a retreat or a camp, just someone who can sit with your experience without rushing to fix it. If that’s something you’re looking for right now, feel free to reach out, or start with a guided session if you’d rather have company while you find your footing.