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Ru Meditation Part 3: Quiet Sitting on a Chair
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Hi, My name is Bin Song. I am a Ru scholar, and a college professor in the disciplines of philosophy, religion, and theology. This audio is written and recorded by me to guide your practice of Ru meditation using the posture of quiet-sitting on a chair.
As I explained in How to Breathe during the Ru Meditation, the focus upon a specific posture is less important than the focus upon breathing for the practice of Ru Meditation. However, this does not mean that one should not practice varying postures of Ru meditation. Instead, I would like to emphasize that compared to breathing, it is equally important that practitioners can command all the static and moving forms of “postures” so as to extend the state of energy equilibrium, or the state of centrality in a Ruist term, to both static and moving states of our body.
Let me use one metaphor to explain it. The state of centrality achieved during the breathing practice is like the inner body of a lake, while the static or moving postures of body during the practice of Ru meditation are like the surface of the lake, which is sometimes still but sometimes agitated depending upon the weather and the environment. The goal of Ru meditation can be described as such: if our life is like the life of a lake, then, no matter what surface state the lake is experiencing, our inner body is always tranquil, quiet and full of vital energies. For achieving this goal, it is much more important to encompass both static and moving postures of meditation, rather than merely focusing upon any specific one of them.
Let me explain the significance of varying postures of Ru meditation in another perspective. The practice of concrete postures of Ru meditation is to model in a micro scale what happens more frequently in a broader macro scale of life. As I will explain in this series of audios, I intend to introduce 7 postures of Ru meditation: sleeping, cross-legged quiet-sitting, quiet-sitting on a chair, standing, walking, eight brocade exercise, and the yang-styled 24-move Taiji martial arts. As you heard, some of these postures are more static, and some of them are more dynamic. However, human life is obviously more complicated, more social, and more far-reaching than the performance of these concrete meditative postures.
From the perspective of Ru philosophy, being able to deal with real life issues, conducting oneself properly in varying human relationships, and constantly embodying the major principles of Ru metaphysics and ethics, such as harmony and humaneness, in one’s daily life, are of course far more important than commanding good meditative postures and ideal breathing. Nevertheless, the benefits we get from the practice of Ru meditation is that it can help human individuals to realize those metaphysical and ethical principles in a micro scale, and then, gradually, to enable us to be an exemplary person, the Ruist junzi, in those broader stages of human life.
As mentioned by one of the canonical texts of Ruism, the Great Learning ??, before one can govern a state, or align one’s family, everyone must be dedicated to cultivating their persons. So, before we are more sufficiently involved in varying stages of human life, we should be dedicated to the practice of Ru meditation. And the gist of Ru meditation is, firstly, to achieve the state of energy equilibrium, or the state of centrality, during one’s breathing practice, and secondly, to extend this state to the practice of both static and moving postures of Ru meditation. As mentioned, we will introduce 7 postures in our audios for you to practice this gist.
Among all these 7 postures, let’s talk of one of the most Ruist at first, which is quiet-sitting on a chair.
So far as my research shows, the invention of this posture by Ruists took place in the same time when the so-called “neo-Confucianism” arises to react to the increasingly flourished Buddhism in ancient China. And the timeline is around the 10th or 11th century.
As I mentioned in the brief introduction of Ru meditation, Ru practitioners are scholars and scholar-officials. Apart from the dedicated works of learning, education, and scholarship, they had so many things to care and manage in their households, schools, the governments and other workplaces. This means, even if they were fond of meditation, their occupied life schedule required them to immediately get out of meditation, and deal with tangible issues in their life. In this way, the normally Buddhist style of meditation, which requires a crossed-legged posture, a secured and quiet space, and sometimes an extended time period of practice, would be thought of by these Ruist scholar-officials as too isolated and socially disengaged. Therefore, rather than crossing one’s legs and letting every thought come and go in one’s mind in an isolated space, why not quietly sit on one’s chair, to clear one’s mind, re-gather oneself, to nurture an attitude of reverence towards things at hand, and thus, stay centered in one’s everyday life? This is the central motif for Ru practitioners to invent and practice this posture of quiet-sitting on a chair in this period of time.
Before I describe to you the major points of the posture, let me elaborate its characteristic and significance a bit more. “Chair” is a very normal piece of furniture, and you can basically find it in any place where your life is seriously engaged. It is in your study room, in your office, around family dinner table, in your classroom, or in any other private or public meeting room. Therefore, if you know how to meditate on a chair, at least for a few minutes or even some seconds, you will know how to remain centered, focused, and re-energized in your daily life.
Let’s imagine that you are right now in a very important conference with your colleagues and boss in a business meeting room. The boss is going on and on, sometimes on the topic, and sometimes not. Although you know the meeting is important, you feel quite exhausted by it. Then, you can start to meditate on your chair. You just need to sit nicely according to the method I will describe in the following, put your vision broadly on objects in front of you, and then, focus on your breath. Once you have a deep, slow breath, you start to let those bossy words appear on the screen of your inner-mind; you understand them, follow them, but your attention is actually put on the entire universe, the heaven, the earth and the human beings, which include but is not limited to those words. In this way, you can nurture a specific kind of attitude of reverence, dedication and seriousness towards your own work and your own worth, while being able to reenergize yourself during this work time in an uninterrupted way. You get it? Right? So the benefit to meditate on a chair is huge.
Let’s use another example to explain. Almost every adult has an experience of being interviewed for a job. Before you meet those interviewers, as a candidate, you are normally required to sit for a while in a room or a space separated from the interview room. I will tell you, this will be a perfect space and time to do a quick quiet-sitting meditation on a chair. Close your eyes, focus on your breath, feel all the energy flowing around you who are right now sitting nicely in the middle of heaven and earth. You need to remind yourself that you are special, you are unique, and while attending to the needs of those interviewers are important, you also need to be awesomely authentic to be and do yourself. And then, you take a deep breath; start to visualize everything you have prepared or anticipated for the interview. Per my experience, this practice of quiet-sitting meditation on a chair will contribute very positively to your interview.
Sounds good? Yes, remember the three features of Ru wisdom: simple, consistent, and adaptable to change. You already get two instances why it is so in the case of quiet-sitting on a chair.
Now, a final example before talking of its method. You know, almost no couples do not fight. We are human beings, we have our own views, and arguing with each other between a couple in our household is not only inevitable, but indicates that we invest our life upon each other, we care each other, and care our family. However, if inappropriate emotions are intertwined with inappropriate words during the process, squabbles will develop into fights, and fights will develop into wars. So, how can you nicely exchange ideas with your spouse without getting mired into these annoying and exhausting family in-fights? I will tell you, when your spouse forcefully expresses their views, you can quietly sit on your chair using the method of Ru meditation. At this moment, you pay attention to your breath, calm it down, and you listen to your spouse carefully and peacefully. During the process, you intend to nurture an inner feeling of love, mutual-bond and respect even though you also need to manifest your genuine self and exchange ideas with your spouse. Since the quiet-sitting meditation happens rightly during the middle, it will greatly calm down yourself, and thus, prevent the interaction between a couple from deteriorating into an undesirable family in-fight.
Good, enough examples for the significance of this posture. Let me get to the method part. The method of quiet-sitting on a chair is actually quite simple. It comprises the following several major points:
(1) Make sure your hip a bit higher than your knee. This may mean you need to put a cushion under your hip, or, you need to sit towards the edge of a chair. A chair with a hard surface will be better than a softer one, since sitting softly would make people sleepy. A too high chair which cannot have you put your feet, or a too low chair where you need to squat a bit to sit, is not ideal for beginning practitioners either. However, most chairs are not made as such, so you will find it fine to meditate using this posture almost everywhere.
(2) While sitting on a chair, the position of your backbone is really the key. Starting from our neck, our backbone caves in, caves out, and finally, caves in again towards our tailbone. So, make sure you neither pop up your chest to make the backbone super straight, nor slouch yourself to block your tract of breathing. Make sure you can feel the natural stacking-up of varying parts of your backbone skeleton: cave in, cave out, and finally, cave in again. In a word, the key to sit rightly in this posture is that you need to use minimal efforts to position yourself so as to make varying parts of your body naturally and harmoniously fit together. In a Ruist term, you need to find the pattern-principle ? of your body so as to sit there nicely and joyfully.
(3) After you position your backbone well, then, your head naturally lines up with it. No nodding, no looking upwards; neither shall your head lean towards either of the sides. Still, let’s follow the same principle, use your minimal effort to make varying parts of your skeleton fit together.
(4) For your eyes, you can either close them or leave a slice of vision broad and open, just as what I explained in the previous audio on Ru breathing.
(5) The distance between your feet is about the same as your shoulder. Maker sure it neither too wider nor too narrower. Your toes are forward, but do not make them rigidly forward, like right in the angle of 90 degree. No, you do not need to do that. You just need to give yourself a little bit discipline, line up with the effortless position of your body, and then, sit there nicely and quietly.
Basically, the look of your upper body in this posture will be exactly the same when you do crossed-legged quiet-sitting. However, since this is sitting on a chair, your lower body has its unique position.
After you sit in this way, you just need to focus on your breath using the method of Ru breathing which I explained before.
Good, that’s all about quiet-sitting on a Chair. If you have any questions or comments to discuss with me, I would look forward to seeing them below the audios. You can also send me an email you can find in the contact part of my website, or find me in the facebook group “Friends from Afar: a Confucianism group.” Have a nice one, and You take care!
CREDITS:
Opening Music: Ta-da! By Siddartha Corsus is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/...?)
Closing: Music: Endless forms most beautiful by Sidartha Corsus is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/...?)
Source: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Siddhartha
Artist: https://siddharthamusic.bandcamp.com/
LINKS:
www.binsonglive.wpcomstaging.com
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- Features
- Hosting
- Blog
Hi, My name is Bin Song. I am a Ru scholar, and a college professor in the disciplines of philosophy, religion, and theology. This audio is written and recorded by me to guide your practice of Ru meditation using the posture of quiet-sitting on a chair.
As I explained in How to Breathe during the Ru Meditation, the focus upon a specific posture is less important than the focus upon breathing for the practice of Ru Meditation. However, this does not mean that one should not practice varying postures of Ru meditation. Instead, I would like to emphasize that compared to breathing, it is equally important that practitioners can command all the static and moving forms of “postures” so as to extend the state of energy equilibrium, or the state of centrality in a Ruist term, to both static and moving states of our body.
Let me use one metaphor to explain it. The state of centrality achieved during the breathing practice is like the inner body of a lake, while the static or moving postures of body during the practice of Ru meditation are like the surface of the lake, which is sometimes still but sometimes agitated depending upon the weather and the environment. The goal of Ru meditation can be described as such: if our life is like the life of a lake, then, no matter what surface state the lake is experiencing, our inner body is always tranquil, quiet and full of vital energies. For achieving this goal, it is much more important to encompass both static and moving postures of meditation, rather than merely focusing upon any specific one of them.
Let me explain the significance of varying postures of Ru meditation in another perspective. The practice of concrete postures of Ru meditation is to model in a micro scale what happens more frequently in a broader macro scale of life. As I will explain in this series of audios, I intend to introduce 7 postures of Ru meditation: sleeping, cross-legged quiet-sitting, quiet-sitting on a chair, standing, walking, eight brocade exercise, and the yang-styled 24-move Taiji martial arts. As you heard, some of these postures are more static, and some of them are more dynamic. However, human life is obviously more complicated, more social, and more far-reaching than the performance of these concrete meditative postures.
From the perspective of Ru philosophy, being able to deal with real life issues, conducting oneself properly in varying human relationships, and constantly embodying the major principles of Ru metaphysics and ethics, such as harmony and humaneness, in one’s daily life, are of course far more important than commanding good meditative postures and ideal breathing. Nevertheless, the benefits we get from the practice of Ru meditation is that it can help human individuals to realize those metaphysical and ethical principles in a micro scale, and then, gradually, to enable us to be an exemplary person, the Ruist junzi, in those broader stages of human life.
As mentioned by one of the canonical texts of Ruism, the Great Learning ??, before one can govern a state, or align one’s family, everyone must be dedicated to cultivating their persons. So, before we are more sufficiently involved in varying stages of human life, we should be dedicated to the practice of Ru meditation. And the gist of Ru meditation is, firstly, to achieve the state of energy equilibrium, or the state of centrality, during one’s breathing practice, and secondly, to extend this state to the practice of both static and moving postures of Ru meditation. As mentioned, we will introduce 7 postures in our audios for you to practice this gist.
Among all these 7 postures, let’s talk of one of the most Ruist at first, which is quiet-sitting on a chair.
So far as my research shows, the invention of this posture by Ruists took place in the same time when the so-called “neo-Confucianism” arises to react to the increasingly flourished Buddhism in ancient China. And the timeline is around the 10th or 11th century.
As I mentioned in the brief introduction of Ru meditation, Ru practitioners are scholars and scholar-officials. Apart from the dedicated works of learning, education, and scholarship, they had so many things to care and manage in their households, schools, the governments and other workplaces. This means, even if they were fond of meditation, their occupied life schedule required them to immediately get out of meditation, and deal with tangible issues in their life. In this way, the normally Buddhist style of meditation, which requires a crossed-legged posture, a secured and quiet space, and sometimes an extended time period of practice, would be thought of by these Ruist scholar-officials as too isolated and socially disengaged. Therefore, rather than crossing one’s legs and letting every thought come and go in one’s mind in an isolated space, why not quietly sit on one’s chair, to clear one’s mind, re-gather oneself, to nurture an attitude of reverence towards things at hand, and thus, stay centered in one’s everyday life? This is the central motif for Ru practitioners to invent and practice this posture of quiet-sitting on a chair in this period of time.
Before I describe to you the major points of the posture, let me elaborate its characteristic and significance a bit more. “Chair” is a very normal piece of furniture, and you can basically find it in any place where your life is seriously engaged. It is in your study room, in your office, around family dinner table, in your classroom, or in any other private or public meeting room. Therefore, if you know how to meditate on a chair, at least for a few minutes or even some seconds, you will know how to remain centered, focused, and re-energized in your daily life.
Let’s imagine that you are right now in a very important conference with your colleagues and boss in a business meeting room. The boss is going on and on, sometimes on the topic, and sometimes not. Although you know the meeting is important, you feel quite exhausted by it. Then, you can start to meditate on your chair. You just need to sit nicely according to the method I will describe in the following, put your vision broadly on objects in front of you, and then, focus on your breath. Once you have a deep, slow breath, you start to let those bossy words appear on the screen of your inner-mind; you understand them, follow them, but your attention is actually put on the entire universe, the heaven, the earth and the human beings, which include but is not limited to those words. In this way, you can nurture a specific kind of attitude of reverence, dedication and seriousness towards your own work and your own worth, while being able to reenergize yourself during this work time in an uninterrupted way. You get it? Right? So the benefit to meditate on a chair is huge.
Let’s use another example to explain. Almost every adult has an experience of being interviewed for a job. Before you meet those interviewers, as a candidate, you are normally required to sit for a while in a room or a space separated from the interview room. I will tell you, this will be a perfect space and time to do a quick quiet-sitting meditation on a chair. Close your eyes, focus on your breath, feel all the energy flowing around you who are right now sitting nicely in the middle of heaven and earth. You need to remind yourself that you are special, you are unique, and while attending to the needs of those interviewers are important, you also need to be awesomely authentic to be and do yourself. And then, you take a deep breath; start to visualize everything you have prepared or anticipated for the interview. Per my experience, this practice of quiet-sitting meditation on a chair will contribute very positively to your interview.
Sounds good? Yes, remember the three features of Ru wisdom: simple, consistent, and adaptable to change. You already get two instances why it is so in the case of quiet-sitting on a chair.
Now, a final example before talking of its method. You know, almost no couples do not fight. We are human beings, we have our own views, and arguing with each other between a couple in our household is not only inevitable, but indicates that we invest our life upon each other, we care each other, and care our family. However, if inappropriate emotions are intertwined with inappropriate words during the process, squabbles will develop into fights, and fights will develop into wars. So, how can you nicely exchange ideas with your spouse without getting mired into these annoying and exhausting family in-fights? I will tell you, when your spouse forcefully expresses their views, you can quietly sit on your chair using the method of Ru meditation. At this moment, you pay attention to your breath, calm it down, and you listen to your spouse carefully and peacefully. During the process, you intend to nurture an inner feeling of love, mutual-bond and respect even though you also need to manifest your genuine self and exchange ideas with your spouse. Since the quiet-sitting meditation happens rightly during the middle, it will greatly calm down yourself, and thus, prevent the interaction between a couple from deteriorating into an undesirable family in-fight.
Good, enough examples for the significance of this posture. Let me get to the method part. The method of quiet-sitting on a chair is actually quite simple. It comprises the following several major points:
(1) Make sure your hip a bit higher than your knee. This may mean you need to put a cushion under your hip, or, you need to sit towards the edge of a chair. A chair with a hard surface will be better than a softer one, since sitting softly would make people sleepy. A too high chair which cannot have you put your feet, or a too low chair where you need to squat a bit to sit, is not ideal for beginning practitioners either. However, most chairs are not made as such, so you will find it fine to meditate using this posture almost everywhere.
(2) While sitting on a chair, the position of your backbone is really the key. Starting from our neck, our backbone caves in, caves out, and finally, caves in again towards our tailbone. So, make sure you neither pop up your chest to make the backbone super straight, nor slouch yourself to block your tract of breathing. Make sure you can feel the natural stacking-up of varying parts of your backbone skeleton: cave in, cave out, and finally, cave in again. In a word, the key to sit rightly in this posture is that you need to use minimal efforts to position yourself so as to make varying parts of your body naturally and harmoniously fit together. In a Ruist term, you need to find the pattern-principle ? of your body so as to sit there nicely and joyfully.
(3) After you position your backbone well, then, your head naturally lines up with it. No nodding, no looking upwards; neither shall your head lean towards either of the sides. Still, let’s follow the same principle, use your minimal effort to make varying parts of your skeleton fit together.
(4) For your eyes, you can either close them or leave a slice of vision broad and open, just as what I explained in the previous audio on Ru breathing.
(5) The distance between your feet is about the same as your shoulder. Maker sure it neither too wider nor too narrower. Your toes are forward, but do not make them rigidly forward, like right in the angle of 90 degree. No, you do not need to do that. You just need to give yourself a little bit discipline, line up with the effortless position of your body, and then, sit there nicely and quietly.
Basically, the look of your upper body in this posture will be exactly the same when you do crossed-legged quiet-sitting. However, since this is sitting on a chair, your lower body has its unique position.
After you sit in this way, you just need to focus on your breath using the method of Ru breathing which I explained before.
Good, that’s all about quiet-sitting on a Chair. If you have any questions or comments to discuss with me, I would look forward to seeing them below the audios. You can also send me an email you can find in the contact part of my website, or find me in the facebook group “Friends from Afar: a Confucianism group.” Have a nice one, and You take care!
CREDITS:
Opening Music: Ta-da! By Siddartha Corsus is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/...?)
Closing: Music: Endless forms most beautiful by Sidartha Corsus is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/...?)
Source: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Siddhartha
Artist: https://siddharthamusic.bandcamp.com/
LINKS:
www.binsonglive.wpcomstaging.com